Chapter Five #3
“Not exactly. Okay, yes. But that’s only part of it.
” He swirled the ice in his glass as though it would help him order his thoughts.
“I never wanted those things before. Or maybe I did but I wouldn’t admit it to myself.
And now I feel… cheated? But I’m also not sure how to tell if…
.” He glanced toward Aubrey again. An attractive flush had spread across his face, but he wasn’t looking at Kaden anymore; he was staring at his own hands.
Nate took a long drink.
“Let me get this straight.” Nate shot Bonesy a look. “Shut up. It’s a figure of speech. You want to know if that guy wants to fuck you as much as you want to fuck him. Do you talk to him in person like you do on the air?”
Nate snorted, using his thumb to draw a sad face in the condensation on the glass. “No. I kind of avoid him.” He inhaled deeply and made himself hold it for a few seconds before letting it out slowly. “We got off on the wrong foot.”
“Never would’ve guessed,” Bones said, dry. “But here’s a thought—if you want to know if he’s DTF, try it. Your show is a master class of sexual tension.”
Nate winced, wondering how to explain that was part of the problem. Once he and Aubrey slept together, that tension would disappear, right? “The thing is, I sort of have instructions, uh, not to make friends.”
Bones blinked at him over the top of his glass. “What?”
“My boss, okay, ratings were… suffering with John, and with Aubrey they’re not, and she said, and I quote, ‘Don’t. Change. Anything.’” He smeared the sad face. “What if I screw it up and the show gets canceled?”
Carefully, Bones put his glass down. Then he said, in a clear, slow voice, as though Nate were being particularly obtuse, “Nate. I know your ego is as out of control as any other professional hockey player’s.
But if the show gets canceled, it’s not going to be because you and Mr. Bedroom Eyes gave in to your hormones and got your poles waxed. ”
Nate didn’t have time to respond to this allegation before Bones continued, “You’re making excuses because moving on from divorce is hard and you’re chickenshit.”
Nate’s shoulders seemed to recognize the truth of it ahead of his brain, because he felt them slump even before he admitted to himself that Bones had a point.
He sighed, spun his glass around on the table, and finally raised his eyes again, looking down the table almost automatically, as though Aubrey really were magnetic—only to find Aubrey looking back at him.
A second later Aubrey looked away, returning his focus to Kaden, but it seemed to Nate as though his heart wasn’t really in it.
None of this gave him the slightest idea what to do next. “I hate you,” Nate mumbled. “Why couldn’t you just tell me to forget about it and move on?”
“Hey, you get what you pay for. You want your head shrunk, get a therapist.”
Nate was screwing up his face in a grimace, reaching for something cutting to say, when a wadded-up napkin flew through the air, hit Bonesy in the face, and fell into his glass.
The rookies in the center of the table erupted in cheers, and Nate ended up smothering a laugh with one hand lest he inadvertently encourage them.
“Just for that you’re picking up our tab,” Bones threatened, shaking his head. “And get me another drink.”
Nate had obviously not expected Aubrey to accept the invitation to drinks with him and his former teammates.
Even Aubrey was a little surprised at himself.
He’d fucked a couple hockey players, but aside from a few carefully curated outings with Jackson, he didn’t spend time with them en masse—too much aggressive heteronormativity.
But something about the possibility of seeing Nate in his natural habitat called to him irresistibly. So here he was.
Having, it must be said, a surprisingly pleasant time.
“I don’t know, man, call me a weirdo if you want, but there’s something about folding your socks and putting them in a drawer to look all nice that’s soothing, okay?”
“No, I actually agree,” Aubrey said, wondering how the hell he’d gotten into a conversation about Marie Kondo with an NHL defenseman. “It must’ve taken me an hour to get folding a T-shirt right, though.”
“Trial and error,” Kaden said, reaching for his mojito. “Hey, you got a picture of your closet?”
They swapped pictures for a few minutes. When Aubrey swiped past a photo of his last trip to the Caymans, Kaden slapped his hand down over Aubrey’s.
“Hey, go back to that.” He tilted his head toward the phone, which let him look up at Aubrey from under long lashes. Aubrey wondered if Kaden knew how flirtatious that seemed.
“What? I thought we were sharing home organization pics. Me at Seven Mile Beach is a lot less interesting.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.” Kaden flashed a little half-smile, head still tilted coquettishly. “Can I see?
Yeah, that’s flirting, consciously or not.
Aubrey pulled up the gallery from the trip and handed his phone to Kaden.
Aubrey had gone with two other skaters from Team Canada, so Bianca and Marie-Laure were featured prominently in the pictures.
He was curious at what Kaden would have to say about the two beautiful, scantily clad women in the photos.
Turned out, not much.
“Wow, you get really tan!” Kaden stopped and squinted at a photo of a sun-kissed Aubrey in bright yellow swim briefs. “Looks good on you. I mean, not that you look bad without.”
Definitely consciously. That was flattering as well as unexpected.
It would be easy to respond in kind. Aubrey liked when handsome guys flirted with him, and he liked flirting back.
He also liked when he could sense how easy it would be to whisper, Want to get out of here? and get a smile and a nod in return.
It was almost as if Kaden had a blinking sign over his head that said I’ll say yes.
For a moment Aubrey considered it. Kaden was hot and willing, and not giving any sign that he was going to get hung up about hooking up with another guy.
Add to that, the only action Aubrey had been getting lately was his own right hand. Or his left, when he wanted to change it up a little. He looked down at said hands.
Kaden passed the phone back, but his smile had changed. He’d noticed Aubrey’s hesitation in flirting back, but he didn’t seem disappointed. “Maybe I’ll head out that way at the All-Star Break. You can give me tips on where to go.”
Where to hook up with other guys, Aubrey heard, and smiled. “Yeah, for sure.”
From there the conversation drifted to the show—how Aubrey had ended up subbing in at the last minute, his charged first meeting with Nate, the ups and downs of it since then. Then the server swung by to ask about the next round and the conversation lulled.
“How’s he doing, anyway?” Kaden asked, and Aubrey belatedly realized he’d been staring at Nate down the table as he and Bones talked. Had to be interesting, whatever it was, to get Nate looking like that, like he was squirming.
Aubrey would like to make him squirm like that.
Aubrey had apparently had enough alcohol tonight. Maybe he should’ve told the server he wanted to pay his tab. “I’m sorry?” he said, trying to get his head back in his conversation with Kaden.
“Nate,” Kaden said. “I remember what it was like when he and Marty first separated. He was like a zombie, man. He seems a lot better now that the paperwork’s all signed, but… you see him every day. What do you think?”
“What do I think?” Aubrey echoed as Kaden’s words reverberated in his seemingly empty skull.
“Yeah. I mean, he looks happier now than he did for a long time even before he and Marty split.”
Before he and Marty split.
Nate was divorced.
Nate was divorced?
“Thank fucking God,” Aubrey said. Then he realized he’d said it out loud and glanced sidelong at Kaden.
“I mean, it seems like it was a long time coming, but yeah. He’s come a long way in the time I’ve known him.
” Totally true. Oh shit, no wonder Nate got so pissed when Aubrey said he needed to get laid—could Aubrey have said something more insensitive?
“I’m glad.” Kaden flicked his gaze down the table, and Aubrey’s stomach tightened uncomfortably. Oh no. “Do you know if he’s seeing anyone?”
Fuck Aubrey’s entire life. “No idea,” he managed.
“We don’t really socialize outside of work.
” Nate had kept things between them professional most of the time.
But he’d slipped on enough occasions that Aubrey wondered, and he’d seen the way Nate looked at him sometimes.
Maybe he should push his luck. Sure, he’d more or less just admitted to himself that he wanted something more lasting than a roll in the sheets…
but he could put that on hold long enough to satisfy a mutual curiosity.
Right?