On Thin Ice (Austin Aces Hockey Club #6)

Prologue

PROLOGUE

ETHAN

Three Years Ago

Sitting at the end of the bar, I nursed my beer, my eyes cast down to stare at the dark, sticky counter as I absentmindedly swirled my half-empty bottle in the ring of condensation.

The owners of the Austin Aces, the NHL team I played for, had rented out O’Malley’s for staff, players, and a handful of the team’s sponsors to watch the draft together like one big happy family.

I wanted nothing more than to be at home. Alone. I’d still be watching. I just didn’t want to do it in a big ass group where I was forced to act all jovial and shit.

The broadcast was mostly drowned out by the sound of raucous chatter and laughter, but with team jerseys and logos flashing across the TV screens scattered throughout the bar, it was easy enough to keep track of what was going on.

The loud cheers and jeers from the group, paired with the sharp sound of glasses slamming down on the bar each time a new pick was announced, added to the chaos.

I half-heartedly joined in on some of the conversations taking place around me and attempted to smile and cheer along with my teammates, but the only moment that broke through my funk was the roar that erupted when it was announced the Aces had used our first-round selection on Thackeray College winger Stryker Bell.

Fuck .

I should have seen this coming.

Hell, I did see it coming.

But I guess I was still holding out hope that, for once, life wouldn’t fuck me sideways.

Alas, no such luck.

When my phone immediately buzzed in my pocket, I pulled it out and rolled my eyes at a message from my brother praising the 19-year-old phenom everyone was predicting would take the NHL by storm.

Ryan

Bro, Stryker Bell is IT.

Loved watching him dominate at Thackeray.

Can’t wait to see him in an Aces sweater alongside you!

Ethan

Objectively, I could see why Ryan was happy. Stryker was an exceptional player—maybe a bit too flashy and unpredictable for my liking, but undoubtedly skilled.

And, of course, my family thought it was amazing that he played for the college we’d all graduated from.

But despite my brother’s excitement, I just wasn’t feeling it.

Was I a tiny bit put out that he’d recently broken my long-standing Thackeray record for most goals scored in a single season, and as a freshman, no less?

Maybe. Probably.

Yeah, okay. I was.

Deep down, I knew it shouldn’t have mattered—that record wasn’t going to stand forever; someone was always going to break it—but something about the team I’d played for my entire NHL career drafting him rubbed me the wrong way.

The kid had already stolen my collegiate record; was he going to steal my job from me now, too?

“Hey, E. You see who we just grabbed?” I turned at the sound of Samson “Murdock” Murray’s cheerful voice as he clapped me on the shoulder, grinning widely.

“Fresh meat on third line next season!” Chet Doyle called out from a few tables away.

I plastered on what I hoped looked like an unbothered smile. I couldn’t let anyone—least of all that asshole—see how much that thought ate away at me.

Last season, I’d spent longer than expected recovering from shoulder surgery, which had done two things: dropped me down a line and driven home the excruciating point that I was one bad injury away from calling time on my career.

“Yeah, yeah. Very funny.” I raised my nearly empty beer in salute. “To the next generation of Aces.”

“Fuck. You seen this kid’s TikTok?” Lars Soderberg mused from the stool to my right as he scrolled past dozens upon dozens of slickly produced videos featuring the Bell’s handsome face.

“Yeah, it’s something else,” I told him, swallowing down another mouthful of beer.

That was the thing about these young, up-and-coming guys. They weren’t just great athletes; they were brands as much as they were players, something I’d never fully wrapped my head around—or wanted to.

Somehow, between tearing up the ice at Thackeray and earning his degree, Bell had found the time to cultivate a massive online following. Every post he made sent his fans into a frenzy. Whether he was proudly discussing his sexuality or sharing one of his many body positivity mantras, they ate up everything he put out.

Sometimes, I wondered if they were drawn more to his persona than his hockey skills.

And really, who could blame them? The kid had the kind of looks that made people sit up and take notice—bright blue eyes, blond hair that somehow always looked artfully tousled, and an all-American jawline that was practically begging for its own fan club.

He was the kind of guy who could flash a grin and have people eating out of the palm of his hand. And judging by the thirst traps he frequently posted, he knew it, too.

More than once, I’d scrolled to one of his gym selfies, only to get caught up in the comments section where guys and girls alike lost their damn minds. That kind of confidence was something I could barely wrap my head around, let alone understand.

It was hard not to feel a twinge of something—envy, maybe—at how comfortable Stryker was in his own skin.

I’d never allowed myself that luxury, not back at Thackeray and certainly not in the NHL.

“Ugh,” I muttered, tossing back another drink of my beer. “Dante’s already on my ass about posting more than once a month. I told her the Aces didn’t pay me enough to dance on TikTok.”

“Maybe you should put up a couple of shirtless pics, E,” Murdock teased, bumping against my shoulder with a playful smirk. “Do it for the ‘gram, or whatever the kids are saying these days.”

Chet, never one to miss an opportunity to be a dick, came up alongside me. He rested his elbow in a pile of beer spooge and grimaced, yanking it back with a disgusted look on his face. “I’ll pay you a hundred bucks to keep your shirt on . No one wants to see that.”

As far as taunts went from this guy, it was fairly benign, but still. Anything out of Chet’s mouth was one word too many.

“Fuck off, all of you,” I muttered, though I made sure to sound more amused than pissed.

Thankfully, they decided I was too boring and moved on to fuck with someone else.

I let my smile slip from my face.

My phone buzzed again with another text from Ryan. This time, it was a photo of Stryker celebrating a game-winning goal, his fist raised in the air as his teammates mobbed him on the ice. His lips were tilted to the side in what looked like a self-satisfied smirk.

Yeah, the kid knew exactly how good he was.

“Yo, E! Stop brooding and get your ass over here!” one of the guys called from across the room, causing me to slam my phone face down into a shallow puddle of beer like I’d just been caught watching porn.

Which, honestly? It would have been less humiliating than the fact that I’d spent an entire minute staring down at Stryker’s sweaty, matted blond hair, wondering what it would feel like gripped between my fingers.

For a thousand different reasons, including our considerable age difference, I had zero business lusting after Stryker Bell.

You’re not that much older than him, the voice inside my head tried to convince me as I grabbed a handful of napkins to wipe my phone down, hoping I hadn’t done any lasting damage. When it was dry, I shoved it into my front pocket with a shake of my head.

Yeah, I was done here—time to bail.

Waving over my shoulder, I made my way toward the front door, rolling my eyes at the drunken calls of “Is it past your bedtime already?” and “You’re no fun!” that echoed in my ears as I stepped outside, the hot Austin night enveloping me.

* * *

I reached into my fridge and grabbed another beer, knowing I would probably regret it in the morning, before strolling aimlessly into my living room.

My gaze fell to the framed photographs displayed on the shelves that flanked the fireplace—pictures of my teams hoisting trophies, grinning over beers with my brother, and lounging on beaches during the off-season. Anyone looking at them now would think I had it all.

It was a life that looked damn good in photos.

But photos only told part of the story.

In reality, my life was a relentless cycle of workouts, games, endless travel, and the unyielding pressure of the public spotlight.

And beneath it all—buried so deep I barely let myself acknowledge it—was everything I denied myself.

The things I could never act on.

The secrets I kept locked away.

Austin was liberal, sure, but it was still Texas. And a gay man playing pro hockey here?

I couldn’t risk it, especially not after that rugby player was forced out of the closet a couple of years ago when a hookup threatened him about going to the press. So here I was, thirty years old, and I’d only ever fucked one guy—someone who had maybe even more to lose as I did. But we hadn’t crossed paths in over a year, which meant it was just me, my right hand, and a growing sense of pathetic self-loathing.

And if that wasn’t the saddest fucking thing I’d ever heard, I didn’t know what was.

My gaze snagged on another photo—one taken back at Thackeray after some big win, though I couldn’t even remember which one. My right arm was slung around a blonde whose name I should have remembered but didn’t. Kelcey? Kaitlyn? The names of all my past “girlfriends” tended to blend together at this point. She was gazing up at me with stars in her eyes. I was looking at the camera with a smile that didn’t quite reach mine.

The fact that this photo still held a prominent place on my shelf made me want to puke. It was nothing but a prop, just another piece of my carefully curated persona, another layer of bullshit masking the truth.

Would Bell have photos like this in his place? Some half-hearted attempt at proving something to the world?

Doubtful.

No, his shelves would be filled with pictures of his friends with bennies—as he called some of the guys who graced his socials. He probably wouldn’t hesitate to point to one and say something casual like, “Oh yeah, we hung out for a few months. He was straight until I sucked his cock. Good guy. Married to a dude now.”

My stomach twisted, and my jaw clenched as heat pooled low in my gut as my thoughts veered wildly off-course, somewhere they had no business going.

I exhaled sharply, scrubbing a hand over my face, but the damage was already done.

The thought of Stryker Bell on his knees—his mouth stretched around someone, his confident smirk flickering with something softer, something filthier—lodged itself deep, unwelcome and impossible to shake.

I definitely did not need to be picturing that.

And yet, for one reckless second, I let myself wonder what it would be like if, instead of some nameless, faceless guy, it was me standing in front of him. If he looked up at me through those thick lashes, smirking like he knew exactly what he was doing to me.

A sharp pang—equal parts longing and anger—ripped through me, and I shut the thought down fast.

Because it didn’t matter. It would never matter.

Bell got to live that life. He got to be the bold, unapologetic poster boy for queer men in sports. He could skate onto the ice with pride tape on his stick, talk about queer romance novels online, and be with whoever the fuck he wanted without second-guessing it.

Me? I’d spent my whole career making sure no one looked too closely at who and what I wanted.

When I was his age, I was too afraid.

Afraid of being judged, mocked, and shunned.

Afraid that the second I so much as hinted at the truth, my masculinity and my ability to play a brutal, aggressive sport like hockey would be called into question.

Hell, I was still afraid.

So I’d made my choice—again and again—to suppress that part of myself. To stay deep in the closet, hiding behind the macho stereotypes the world expected of me.

My gaze dropped back to the picture of me with Kaitlyn—to the guy in the photo, the one selling a version of himself that never existed.

“And what has that gotten me?” I muttered, my voice laced with disgust.

I lived alone, keeping the world at arm’s length lest anyone figure out that I was a sham.

But at this point, I was too used to pretending, too afraid to ever take that leap into authenticity that Bell seemed to have been born ready for.

Maybe that was why I was so annoyed by my team drafting the guy. He was a walking reproach to the choices I’d made. To the lies and deceptions I’d allowed myself to succumb to out of fear.

And now he was crashing into my carefully constructed world.

Not just as my new teammate, but as someone whose very existence would rub against the fragile lies I had built my whole life around.

Yeah, that’s what it was.

That, and he was fucking gorgeous—my deepest, darkest desires made flesh and bone.

I hated him for that, too.

I ran a hand through my hair and let out a weary sigh. I stripped off my clothes as I headed upstairs, dropping each item in a trail leading to my bedroom. Living alone had at least one advantage—no one to witness me falling apart every now and then like this.

Sadly, now and then was quickly becoming way too often .

I flopped face down on my bed, groaning into the mattress. I closed my eyes and let my mind wander. Let my imagination conjure up images I had no business imagining.

Turning onto my back, I stared up at the ceiling while my right hand drifted down my torso to wrap around my dick. My calloused palm slid over it as images began to surface in my mind: Stryker standing at the foot of my bed, grinning boldly down at me, his own dick flushed and standing at attention, his body smooth and cut.

Fuck it , I thought, surrendering to this need I couldn’t seem to shake.

Reaching into my bedside table, I grabbed the bottle of expensive lube I kept there, flipping the top and coating myself up. I stroked myself harder and faster, my muscles tense as I pictured the blond Adonis crawling over me, Stryker’s gaze drinking me in just before he lowered himself down and rolled his hips against me. Gasping, I tugged on my balls with my free hand, making it hurt just a little bit.

And when I came a few short moments later, his name slipping from my lips like a fucking prayer, the pleasure barely had time to settle before shame came crashing down on me.