Chapter Nine Sadie
“Gorgeous spiral,” Coach Moreau says, her accent thick in the airy quality of her voice.
Celine Moreau, Canadian bronze medalist and one half of a very famous brother-sister pairs team, is the university’s current pairs-team coach.
Only two pairs currently train as part of the Waterfell team, along with the eight singles.
Today, she’s the only coach present for first season practice; really, it’s more of a warm-up skate mixed with team bonding.
My coach is strangely absent, but I try not to think about that. Try not to let that anxiety even take root.
Instead, I find myself, unfortunately, thinking about Rhys.
His massive hands, his stupid pretty doe eyes and dimpled smile.
Everything. I’m distracted—sloppy—and I know Coach Kelley wouldn’t be pleased, that I’d get reprimanded and told to do it again until perfect.
I’d prefer that, it’s what I need, so I let Moreau’s compliments roll off my shoulders, passing my ears as background noise.
Eventually, practice ends and the entire team circles up for a quick meeting. I’ve got blinders on, and thanks to Rhys’s extravagant gift that I begged him to take back last skate, music still plays through the fancy headphones in my ears—which is the only reason I don’t hear Luc approach.
He plucks a headphone from my ear.
“This is sex music,” Luc whispers. I elbow him discreetly, pretending to listen to the encouragement from his coach.
Luc Laroux is a handsome—and unfortunately, skilled—pairs skater. If he would stop dating and dumping his partners, he might be on his Olympic tour right now. Instead he’s here, with a set of skills that the other pairs team obviously envy and a heartbreaker reputation.
Currently, he’s found himself partnerless again.
“I saw Rose on a magazine cover the other day,” I say. “Still too proud to grovel?”
His jaw clenches tight, all mirth melting from his face at the mention of his longtime partner, the now popular Olympic prospect currently plastered everywhere in the skating world alongside her new endearing partner.
The ice king himself almost looks jealous.
“Aw,” I say mockingly. “Do you miss her?”
There’s a flash in his eyes before he covers it with a wicked smirk that I know has gotten him under many women’s skirts.
“Why? Are you offering to be my new partner?”
I fake a gag. “Over my dead body.”
Luc’s snicker is hidden under the loud double clap from Moreau signaling the end of practice.
“You sure? I need to practice my lifts. Was looking for a partner.”
I roll my eyes as we slug slowly behind the rest of the team. The innuendo is one I’m unfortunately familiar with. Usually, I’m quite repetitive in my motto of not mixing business with pleasure, but in this case I already have mixed. Which makes it easier to say yes.
And yet, I’m hesitating.
And a stupid pair of brown eyes are taking over my entire brain.
So I shake my head and shove Luc’s shoulder. “I’ve got to get home.”
It’s a pancake breakfast morning, which, by Liam’s standards, assures it will be a good day.
Ms. B, our neighbor who often helps us, offered to watch the boys today. I don’t usually need her on the weekends before noon, but Coach Kelley called a last-minute practice at the community rink in a midnight email.
Which means I need to be there a few hours early to make sure my current jump combo and my spiral are as clean as possible. I’m desperate for this year to be different; starting with not disappointing Coach Kelley.
But then, I see Rhys’s car.
Emotions soar through me too quickly to home in on just one—anger, frustration, fear, worry… excitement and anticipation.
I want to see him, I realize, as much as I want to scream at him to get out of my rink and out of my head.
You can’t touch him. Stop it.
I mentally chant it as I march into the rink and down to the locker rooms, ready to be firm. To tell him we can’t skate together anymore, for my sanity.
Fuck .
Rhys is sitting on the bench, back resting against one set of lockers, bent and sweating, skates on, legs splayed out as he heaves breaths like he’s been drowning.
My bag falls off my shoulder. My anger falls away into nothing.
The sound alerts him, brown eyes shooting toward me in panic—then going half-lidded as he realizes it’s just me.
“We have to stop meeting like this,” he mutters, his plump mouth arching into what I assume is meant to be some sort of smile, even if it’s barely there from exhaustion. My stomach hurts. Finding him like this again… a week before he has to be back at practices…
My heart feels like it’s lodged in my throat.
“Rhys,” I barely get out, my hand reaching for his face. It’s only as he circles my wrist that I realize I’m shaking.
“Worried about me, Gray?”
“Terrified,” I admit. “I thought it was better.”
“S-so did I.” He groans, his head slumping into my palm, as if it’s the only thing keeping his neck upright. “Today is just a bad day.”
“I should’ve brought you pancakes,” I say, not realizing how insane that sounds on its own.
He laughs, breathless but happy. “Please explain that one.”
“Liam thinks when I make pancakes, it’ll be a good day.”
He smiles at me, doe eyes glittering, dimples deep. “I’ll try that one next time. I bet you make the best pancakes, though.”
“I’ll make you some sometime,” I whisper, sitting next to him as he wipes off his forehead and leans back. “You okay?”
Rhys nods. After sitting up, he takes a few gulps of his water. “Yeah. But just a fair warning, I will take you up on that. I love breakfast food.”
“I thought you liked savory over sweet.”
“I like anything when it comes to you,” he confesses, and my heart clenches.
His hand dips into his pocket, handing me a headphone. I realize only then that he’s got my old pair in his ears, that he’s listening to music.
“I couldn’t find mine fast enough,” he sighs.
I take the proffered earbud, letting the cord link us as he hands me his phone to select the music.