11. Liv
“Want me to teach you how to skate, Livy?” Brad still lingered too close, and the fringes of the panic attack remaining in my system threatened to return full force.
“NO!” Oh, hell, my voice was as loud as my idiot coworker’s. “No. I just need a second.”
The white expanse yawned open beneath me, a chasm stretching out dozens of yards in all directions as I turned myself with my hands to press back against the wall. Both men watched me, and Ash gathered my things, setting them beside me.
Another moment of silence, and I flinched away when Brad drew closer. I shouldn’t have been surprised when Ash, whose eyes tracked a puck flying between a dozen grown men with sticks, caught the tiny movement.
A frown turned Ash’s soft looking lips downward and pinched his black brows together. “Hey, Brad, I’ve got this. I’m sure you’ve got better places to be.” He sounded vaguely threatening.
With a look like he was grateful and confused about it, Brad took off, more easily convinced by Ash than he would’ve by me. Normally, it might’ve irked me how easily Ash got rid of him, but I was grateful he took the hint and left.
“What happened?” It looked like Ash wasn’t sure if he should leave or stay. His stare darted between me and the direction Brad had disappeared.
“Panic attack,” I wheezed, squeezing my eyes shut against the glare of the ice.
“Do you need?—”
“No.” I cut him off. “I’m okay now.” And I was, with Brad gone.
Little by little, soothing, chilly air entered my lungs until my breathing returned to normal, and our surroundings filtered back into my senses like a pixelated image filling a screen.
Fairy lights and the setting sun bathed us in golden light.
Every one of Ash’s lashes caught its own beam of light somehow, the pattern fracturing across his face as he watched me.
Close, we were so close; I could count the fractal pattern in his irises if I wanted.
Too close, maybe. The brush of his chest against mine sent my breath skittering away again, and I gasped in oxygen.
Somewhere a bonfire cracked and roared. The scent of wood smoke permeated the air, mingling with the chocolate and cider in a heady autumnal perfume.
It was a perfect, cinematic moment, captured like a mental polaroid.
Like some sort of out-of-body experience, our little tableau unfolding in real time and slow motion together.
Ash’s eyes kept flicking down, and something flickered in his eyes, like he wanted to me ask, but I didn’t know the question.
I still didn’t know what game we were playing.
Until his words snapped me back to reality, his gravity pulling me back in.
“Why do you let him do that if you hate it so much?”
Huh? Whiplash, much? Where did that even come from? “What?”
“Brad kept touching you, and you didn’t stop it. And the nicknames, which you said you hated.” One hand fisted at his side, the other shoved deep into his jacket pocket.
“With Brad, I find it easier to ignore those things. I’d hate to damage his fragile male ego, especially since we have to work together.”
Ash’s thick, dark brows drew into a deep crease. “It’s not okay, Barnes.” The roughness in his voice made my knees even wobblier.
“It’s not, but it’s my burden to bear.”
“So, can I call you Babycakes? Since you don’t seem to mind as much as you said.” His chuckle was lighter, more like what I expected from him.
“If you call me that again, I will slit your throat with this idiotic deathtrap.” I tried to lift a foot but nearly lost my balance again.
“Nah. You’d have to catch me first.” And he skated backward a few feet, drawing a serpentine pattern in the ice with his skates, leaving me to cling to the wall.
“How do you do that?” I hissed.
“Do what?” He skated in a lazy infinity symbol, barely moving his body but still gliding around the ice somehow. “This?” He spun on one skate, graceful despite his size.
“But you play hockey. You’re not a figure skater; how do you know jumps and shit?”
Still skating backward, Ash came back to my spot on the wall. “My interests are broad and varied, Babycakes.”
“Don’t you fucking start. Olivia is bad enough.”
“Don’t lie. You like it when I call you Olivia.”
I really did, but I was not about to tell him, although he didn’t give me the chance as he continued, facing me again.
We were almost chest to chest, our skates nearly touching.
Only a breath separated us, and mine hitched at his closeness, all the heat radiating off him.
“You’re the only person I let call me that.
” The space between heartbeats drew out as he glanced at me, his eyes darting to my mouth for a split second before flicking back up.
My eyes mirrored his, flitting down to his perfect mouth. Would he kiss gently? Or would he be aggressive?
“Really?” Something light, like hope, clung to the word.
“Mhmm. I guess you’re special.” Shit, I needed to stop thinking about kissing him.
He must’ve read my mind, because suddenly he dragged me off the ground and against his body, crashing his lips against mine.
Oh, God, were we spinning? He was spinning us.
Gripping him tighter was impossible through our layers, but the invisible barrier between us snapped, and I let out an involuntary sound when his tongue traced across my lower lip.
Bliss sparkled over my skin, setting me alight like a match to dried leaves.
In a blink, he set me back on the ground—er, ice—my legs wobbling like a fawn as Ash skated backward a few strides. Missing his warmth and stability, I reached for him and nearly fell over. Something inside me swooped and?—
Butterflies from a kiss are a cliché, and one I never appreciated.
Butterflies, for me anyway, were always more like alarm bells.
What I felt when Ash kissed me was the opposite of the fluttering restlessness of a butterfly, always seeking and never able to fully alight.
Something I’ve learned about butterflies is that the ones in my stomach never made me feel safe .
When Ash kissed me, it was a match in pitch black night, a tiny flame set to the kindling that was my blood. And I burned so slowly I didn’t notice until I was already ablaze. For him.
Whatever fire he lit inside me set those damned butterflies alight.
I pressed a hand to my mouth, unable to look away from Ash.
“I’m sorry.” The inky depths of his eyes were entirely visible as he stared back in shock.
“What for?” My voice crackled in the cold air.
“I should’ve asked.” His voice went lower, smoking around the edges.
“You can ask now.”
He breathed the words out. “May I?—”
“Yes,” I interrupted. “Please.” The word fell out on a breath.
With another kiss so soft my heart ached at the tenderness, Ash slid his hands into my hair, gently cradling the back of my head. It was so at odds with the way he’d been moments before, but somehow it wasn’t.
“Skate with me.” A hint of what he must have looked like as a boy peeked through the angles of the sharp-jawed man, all eager and unfettered by expectation and pressure.
“I can’t skate.” My ankles wobbled all on their own to prove my point.
“Let me show you.” When he tugged on my hands, I slid forward, gripping his forearms with a yelp.
“Don’t let me fall.”
“I won’t. Trust me.”
I did. It surprised us both.
It wasn’t easy, letting him take over, but I did my best to let go.
And it was nice, following instructions for once, not having to make decisions, left, right, left, right, gliding over the ice on knife-thin pieces of metal on my feet.
Whenever I thought about it, I panicked, so instead of thinking, I focused solely on Ash.
The setting sun created a golden-pink glow against the stark white of the rink, and it was like looking at an old photo or through literal rose-colored glasses.
Even all the facts rising in my mind about atmospheric pollution causing color distribution silently sank back into the depths of my brain as Ash moved us across the ice.
We stayed together until the sun fully set and dark crept in beyond the lights of the rink.
Either his hands cradled me by the waist, holding us steady, or he cupped his hands on my elbows, directing me.
Normally, anyone being in my space would’ve sent me into a tailspin of sensation, but Ash was different.
The reason I became calm instead of the reason I needed calming.
A million tiny details fascinated me in such close proximity to his face.
A scar across his left cheekbone, so thin I only noticed it from this proximity.
The length of his lashes as he trained his eyes on my skates when I tripped over myself.
The flex of his jaw when he met my eyes and looked away.
And so many others I wanted to catalog and analyze and?—
I blinked, remembering we were on a rink filled with people.
Being so close to Ash made me forget anyone else existed. A jolt traveled through me with the realization of what we just did in public , and I dropped his hands.
Which was a mistake.
All the graceful gliding we’d been doing around the rink was entirely Ash’s doing, and I retained nothing from his instruction. When I let go, my ankles turned in, my knees collapsed and the next thing I knew, I landed on my ass on the ice.
Instead of helping me, Ash crouched down beside me, irritatingly able to stay upright on his skates in such a weird position.
It made me hate him a tiny bit, but he looked so boyish and adorable with a huge smile on his face. “That one’s on you, Barnes. You let go.”
Grumbling, I tried to push to my feet, but the skates kept slipping. Ash rose and held out a hand.