Chapter 45
The player exit tunnel was chaos in the best possible way.
Families crowded near the barriers—kids in oversized jerseys, partners holding coats and bags, staff trying to keep people organized. The energy was electric. Everyone buzzing from the win, from Andrew’s return, from the noise still echoing in their ears.
I stood between Diane and Angelica, feeling completely out of place.
These were wives. Girlfriends. Long-term partners who knew how this worked, who’d done this a hundred times before.
And then there was me. The guy who’d been Andrew’s assistant a few months ago. The guy whose face was probably all over social media right now thanks to Angelica’s selfie.
Diane’s hand squeezed my shoulder.
“Relax, kid,” she murmured.
“Relax?” I huffed a laugh. “That’s not my area of expertise.”
She smiled. “I know my son. And I know that look he gave you. You belong here.”
Before I could respond, the door opened.
Players started filing out. Searcy first, grinning at a woman holding a toddler. Voss next, kissing someone who might have been his wife. Chappell, Morrison, a few others I didn’t recognize.
And then Andrew.
His hair was still damp from the shower. Black jacket, jeans, bag slung over his shoulder. He looked tired but good. So stupidly good.
He walked out into the hallway, and for a second—just a second—I thought he might not see me. There were so many people. Reporters, staff, a cluster of teammates near the exit. His eyes scanned the crowd, and I felt that old familiar tightness start to creep up my chest.
Then he found me.
Andrew’s entire expression changed. Everything else—the noise, the people, the cameras—just fell away.
He didn’t walk. Andrew cut straight through the crowd like it wasn’t even there, someone calling his name behind him, but he didn’t stop. Didn’t slow down. He dropped his bag in the middle of the hallway and closed the distance between us in three strides.
He didn’t say anything. Andrew just stepped into my space, pressed his forehead against mine, hand finding my waist and pulling me in.
I could smell his soap. Feel the warmth of him. The solid weight of his presence.
“Hey,” he said, quiet. Just for me.
“Hey.”
His thumb brushed against my hip. Just once. Small and private and completely ours even though we were surrounded by people and at least one camera was definitely pointed our way.
“Good game,” I managed.
“Yeah.” His breath was warm against my face. “You were there.”
“I was there.”
“Made it better.”
My chest was so tight I could barely breathe, but it wasn’t panic. It was something else entirely.
“Okay, lovebirds.” Diane’s voice cut through the moment. “As much as I’m enjoying this, I’m taking Angelica home before she posts another selfie.”
Andrew pulled back slightly. Looked at his mother. “Thanks for coming.”
“Wouldn’t miss it.” She kissed his cheek. “You kicked ass. I’m proud of you.”
Something soft crossed Andrew’s face. “Thanks, Mom.”
Diane turned to me and pulled me into a hug. “Take care of him.”
“I will.”
“And let him take care of you too.” She squeezed once, then released me.
Angelica was next. She hugged me and whispered, “Don’t do anything I would do.”
“That’s not how the saying goes,” I said.
“I said what I said.” She pulled back, grinning. Then she looked at Andrew. “If you hurt my brother, I’ll murder you.”
Andrew nodded solemnly. “Noted.”
“Good.” She grabbed Diane’s arm. “Come on, Ms. Knox. Let’s leave them alone.”
“It’s Diane, sweetie.”
They disappeared into the crowd. And then it was just me and Andrew, surrounded by people but somehow completely alone.
“Did you see that third period?” Andrew was still riding the high, eyes bright, almost wild with it. “That pass to Morrison—I threaded it through the seam between two defenders. Tell me you saw that.”
“I saw it.”
“And the breakaway in the second? I thought Searcy was going to have a stroke when I went glove side.”
“You were incredible.”
Andrew grinned, breathless and beautiful and so stupidly happy. “I was, wasn’t I?”
“Yeah.” I looked at him, at his blue eyes still bright from the win, at the small scar above his eyebrow, at the way he was looking at me like I was the only thing that mattered even in a hallway full of people. “Andrew, I’m in love with you.”
He froze.
Not just still, frozen. As if every ounce of that post-game adrenaline, all that kinetic energy that had been vibrating through Andrew since he’d stepped off the ice, just stopped.
His blue eyes went wide, and for half a second he just stared at me, like he couldn’t process what I’d said, like his brain had short-circuited somewhere between hearing the words and understanding them.
Then: “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
He exhaled, slow and shaky, like I’d just knocked the air out of him. “Good. Because I’m in love with you too.”
My heart stopped.
“I’ve been in love with you for a while.” His hand tightened on my waist. “I just didn’t know how to say it without fucking it up.”
I laughed. “You’re not fucking it up.”
“Good.” He kissed me. Right there, in front of everyone. Not long, not desperate, just solid. Real. A promise.
When he pulled back, I was smiling.
“Let’s go home,” he said.
By the time we got back to Andrew’s apartment, my phone was exploding.
Angelica’s selfie was everywhere. Every social media channel, every sports blogs, fan accounts.
“Andrew Knox’s Mystery Man Identified?”
“Everything We Know About the Wardens Star’s Companion”
“Knox’s Return: The Goal, The Win, and The Smile That Broke the Internet”
That last one had a photo. Andrew on the ice, looking up at the stands. At me. Smiling.
“They got the smile,” I said.
Andrew looked over my shoulder at the screen. “Fuck.”
“You okay with this?”
“Are you?” he asked, and there was something careful in his voice. Protective.
I thought about it. For the briefest moment, my mind flashed to Ben, to the NDA, to the years of hiding and being small and apologizing for existing.
“Yeah,” I said. “I’m okay with it.”
“Good.” He took my phone and set it on the counter with a kind of finality. “Then stop reading and come here.”
I went to him.
Andrew pulled me in and kissed me slow and deep, hands sliding under my jacket, pushing it off my shoulders. His touch was sure, confident—the same way he moved on the ice, like he knew exactly what he wanted and wasn’t apologizing for it.
“Bedroom,” he said against my mouth.
“Demanding.”
“You like it.”
I did. God help me, I did.
We made it to the bedroom barely, Andrew pulling my shirt over my head while I worked on his jeans, both of us laughing because we kept getting tangled up.
He got the belt undone, got my jeans open, and pushed me back onto the bed. I landed with a bounce and looked up at him, at the way he was staring at me like he couldn’t quite believe I was real, like he’d won something more important than any game.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing.” He crawled over me, all controlled power and focused intensity. “Just looking at you.”
“Why?”
“Because I can. Because you’re mine. And everyone fucking knows it now.”
He kissed me again, slower this time, less urgent. His hands mapped my skin like he was memorizing it, like he had all the time in the world and planned to use every second of it.
I pulled him closer, let my hands slide up his back, feeling muscle and warmth and the solid reality of him. Of Andrew Knox, who’d burst into my life like a wrecking ball and somehow made space for me to be whole.
“I love you,” I said.
He pulled back just enough to look at me, and something in his expression cracked open. “Yeah? Say that again.”
“I love you.”
“Fuck.” He kissed my jaw, my neck, his breath warm against my skin. “I love you too. And I’m not letting you go. Not for anything.”
“Possessive.”
“Fuck yeah, I am.” No apology. No hesitation. Just Andrew, claiming me the way he claimed everything else—completely.
But his hands were gentle when they touched me. Careful. Like I was something precious.
I laughed, and he didn’t.
“I mean it, Matthew.” His voice was serious now, that rare moment when the bravado dropped away and I could see straight through to the center of him. “You’re mine. And I’m yours. And I don’t care who knows it. I don’t care who sees. Let them all fucking see.”
My throat was tight. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yeah.” I reached up, cupped his face, made him look at me. “I’m not going anywhere either. You’re stuck with me.”
Something fierce and bright flashed in his blue eyes. “Good.”
He kissed me again, harder this time, and I let him. Let him take what he needed while giving everything I had.
We took our time. No rush. No desperation. Just us, together, learning each other in the low light of his bedroom.
His hands on my skin. My hands in his hair. The sound of our breathing. The slide of skin on skin. The way he said my name like a prayer, like a promise, like something sacred.
It felt different from before. Not frantic. Not urgent. Just right.
This. This was what it was supposed to feel like.
When it was over, we stayed tangled together, sweaty and breathing hard. Andrew’s arm was around me, pulling me against his chest like he was still afraid I might disappear. My head was tucked under his chin, and I could feel his heartbeat starting to slow, steady and strong.
“We’re in love,” he said quietly, enunciating each word like he was testing out the sounds.
“Yeah. We are.”
“Fucking ridiculous.”
I smiled against his skin. “You love it.”
“I love you.” He said it simply, like it was the easiest thing in the world. And maybe for him, it was. Andrew had always been honest about what he wanted, even when it got him in trouble. Especially when it got him in trouble.
I turned my head and kissed his chest, right over his heart. “I love you too.”
We stayed like that for a long time, just breathing together, existing in the same space. Eventually, Andrew shifted and kissed the top of my head, his lips lingering there.
“You’re home,” he murmured against my hair.
Home.
Not his penthouse. Not Boston. Not any physical place.
Just here. With him. With this impossible, explosive, brilliant man who’d somehow seen past all my broken pieces and decided I was worth keeping.
And I’d done the same for him.
Because that’s what this was. Not Andrew saving me or me fixing him. Just two people choosing each other, again and again, in all the messy, imperfect, beautiful ways that mattered.
“Yeah,” I whispered. “I am.”