CHAPTER FOURTEEN NOTHING LEFT TO WIN #2
Tyler opened Brock’s shirt slowly, exposing dark chest hair, bruised ribs, scars, and the muscular body that had spent two games absorbing shots. Brock removed Tyler’s jacket, shirt, and trousers with the same care he had used in Detroit.
Their arousal became fully visible as the last clothing fell.
Neither concealed it.
“Still want you,” Tyler said.
“Still not the only truth,” Brock answered.
They entered the gym naked.
The mats held memories of every struggle: their first complete encounter, naked wrestling after the fundraiser, challenges won and abandoned. Tyler stepped into the center and offered Brock both hands.
Brock took them.
They moved together without rules.
Brock offered a palm. Tyler placed his against it. They pushed—not to defeat each other, but to feel strength answer strength. Their joined hands moved slowly between them.
“Too much?” Brock asked.
“More.”
Pressure increased.
Tyler gave ground by choice, one step and then another, until his back reached the padded wall. Brock stopped before pinning him.
“Closer,” Tyler said.
Brock closed the space.
Their arousal pressed visibly together. Months earlier, either man would have called the position victory. Now Tyler held Brock’s face while Brock supported Tyler’s waist.
“What do you want?” Brock asked.
“Your weight without a count.”
Brock gave it carefully.
Tyler breathed beneath the broad body, feeling power arrive as shelter. Then he shifted.
“My turn,” he said.
Brock followed him to the mat and lay back. Tyler settled above him, distributing weight away from injured ribs. Brock opened both arms instead of defending.
Tyler traced the tattoo from wrist to shoulder. Frozen lake. Pine trees. Milwaukee skyline. Number twenty-seven. He kissed each part slowly.
“This body is not a piece of equipment,” Tyler said.
Brock’s hand moved through his hair. “Neither is yours.”
Tyler stretched beside him, allowing Brock to examine the thighs that produced speed, the narrow waist sold in campaigns, and the bruised ribs that had needed care. Every part received attention without appraisal.
“Nothing to prove,” Brock said.
Tyler brought their foreheads together. “Nothing left to win.”
What began like wrestling became something slower. Tyler tested Brock’s balance; Brock accepted the pressure and guided him down. Brock rolled above Tyler, but did not pin his wrists. Tyler wrapped both legs around him without trying to reverse.
Every display of strength became support.
Brock lifted Tyler from the mat. Tyler let himself be carried, then lowered Brock beside him and took part of his weight.
They touched every muscular surface once used for leverage: shoulders, backs, thighs, waists.
Scars received mouths instead of points.
Bruises received careful palms instead of challenges.
“Pain?” Tyler asked when Brock’s knee tightened.
“Five.”
“Actual?”
“Five.”
“Mine too.”
They adjusted together.
The glass shower filled with steam before they entered. Water struck naked bodies already heated from the gym.
Tyler put Brock beneath the rain head and washed sweat from the dark hair across his chest. Brock traced the bruise beneath Tyler’s eye, then kissed it.
Their visible arousal remained openly welcomed between them. It required no joke, no proof, and no immediate satisfaction.
They took time.
Brock turned Tyler beneath the water and washed the back of his neck. His thumbs worked into muscles tightened by travel and two losses. Tyler let his head fall forward.
“This is where we first stopped pretending,” Brock said.
“Gym or shower?”
“Both.”
“We were terrible at stopping.”
“Still are.”
Brock’s physical response rested openly against Tyler’s back. Tyler leaned into it without making the contact a demand. They remained close while water moved down both bodies.
Tyler turned and explored the bruises covering Brock’s torso. Fourteen blocked shots had left red, purple, and blue marks across chest, ribs, thighs, and shoulders.
“You cannot spend yourself like this in Game Three,” he said.
“You cannot take sixteen shots.”
“Pass first.”
“Protect the lane first.”
“Trust first.”
Brock nodded. “Both captains.”
Tyler pressed his mouth to the darkest bruise. Brock’s breath caught. Tyler watched the response rather than using it to claim anything.
In return, Brock knelt and kissed the muscles along Tyler’s thighs, not because speed had earned admiration but because they belonged to the man he loved.
When Brock rose, Tyler drew him into a slow embrace beneath both rain heads.
The glass fogged completely. No city, arena, or contract remained visible beyond it.
Tyler followed the tattoo over Brock’s shoulder. Brock traced the faint scars along Tyler’s hips. Each man examined the body he loved as if the championship could not make it more valuable or the contract make it less.
Control changed with breath. Tyler guided Brock against the glass. Brock lifted Tyler into the water. Tyler asked to be lowered. Brock obeyed. Brock asked Tyler to stay close. Tyler did.
The shower led to the bedroom.
They crossed the loft without towels, unashamed beneath the open windows. Snow fell over the city. Their bodies reflected faintly in the glass, two naked men walking side by side instead of colliding.
On the bed, intimacy became the longest conversation of the night.
Tyler lay on his back while Brock knelt beside him. No position carried authority. Brock asked before moving closer. Tyler answered with words instead of challenge.
“Touch my chest,” Tyler said.
Brock placed one broad hand over his sternum.
“Harder?”
“No. Stay.”
The hand remained. Tyler felt his heartbeat strike against Brock’s palm while arousal tightened visibly along his body.
“Your turn,” Tyler said.
Brock guided Tyler’s hand to the scar near his knee. “This.”
Tyler traced it, then the swelling around the joint, then the strong thigh supporting years of collisions.
“What do you feel?” Brock asked.
“Pain. Strength. Time.” Tyler kissed the scar. “You.”
Brock lay beside him.
They explored one another without the hurried inventory of competition.
Tyler felt the natural hair across Brock’s chest, the smooth scar through one eyebrow, the callus where a stick rested against his palm.
Brock followed Tyler’s body from the blond hair at his nape to the arch of one foot, pausing at every place cameras had praised and every place they had never seen.
“Beautiful,” Brock said.
Tyler’s first instinct was to deflect. He stopped himself. “Thank you.”
“Strong,” Tyler answered.
Brock almost made a joke about the record. He stopped too. “Thank you.”
The simple acceptance felt more naked than exposed skin.
Their desire intensified while they remained slow. Tyler watched Brock’s body respond to attention. Brock watched pleasure move across Tyler’s face. Neither hid involuntary reactions or translated them into score.
When Brock’s strength took the lead, Tyler welcomed it. When Tyler shifted the pace, Brock followed. Natural control passed back and forth until the distinction ceased to matter.
The bed held no captain, winner, celebrity, or aging defenseman. It held two men practicing how to belong without ownership.
There were no commands. Tyler said what he wanted. Brock answered. Brock asked. Tyler chose. Physical reactions remained visible and unguarded, pleasure allowed to move across faces without performance.
They alternated strength and softness until neither could identify which man controlled the pace.
“Hot tub,” Tyler said eventually.
Brock looked toward the roof. “Snow.”
“Northwoods rules.”
They wrapped one blanket around both bodies and climbed the steel staircase.
Snow struck bare shoulders when they stepped outside. The rooftop hot tub steamed beneath a white cover. Brock removed it. Tyler entered first and pulled him down.
Warm water closed around them.
Milwaukee spread below: bridge lights, warehouse roofs, the arena glowing near the lake. Snow collected in Brock’s dark hair and melted across Tyler’s face.
They sat facing each other with legs intertwined.
The water amplified every small movement. Tyler’s foot slid along Brock’s calf. Brock’s thumb traced the inside of Tyler’s knee. Their arousal remained visible beneath the surface whenever city light shifted across it.
“Do you miss the ledger?” Brock asked.
Tyler looked toward the chimney releasing the final smoke from below. “I miss the version of us that needed it.”
“Why?”
“We were terrified and called it competition. We kept finding ways back to each other before we understood why.”
Brock considered that. “I miss recording your penalties.”
“You took more.”
“Bad officiating.”
“Retaliatory personality.”
They smiled.
“We can remember without repeating,” Tyler said.
“New ledger?”
“Not for winning.”
“What for?”
“Things we choose. Goals, workouts, chores, mornings like this.”
Brock’s hands moved higher on Tyler’s thighs. “Private rewards?”
“Increasingly inventive ones.”
“That sounds suspiciously like scoring.”
“Household administration.”
“Very professional.”
“Extremely.”
The possibility belonged to a future beyond the championship. Neither wrote it down.
“This could be our last week here,” Brock said.
“It could.”
“New York offer expires after the series.”
“I know.”
“Milwaukee still cannot match it.”
“I know.”
Brock’s hands rested openly on Tyler’s thighs. “I’m not telling you to go.”
“Progress.”
“I’m asking what you want.”
“Tonight?”
“After.”
Tyler looked toward the arena. “A home with you. Hockey if my body allows. A city that values us, even if it is not this one. Rinks for children. Enough space for your shoulders and my jackets.”
“Forty-nine.”
“Fifty now.”
Brock smiled. “Anything else?”
“A bed where I never need a guest room to make you speak.”
“Agreed.”
“And you?”
Brock watched snow fall between them. “I want to finish playing without treating retirement like death. I want to coach when I choose. I want to wake up beside you and still believe you are allowed to leave.”
Tyler went still.
“Explain.”