Chapter 2
Milo
Why did I say that?
Why, why, why?
My brain is running about a million miles a minute as I try to piece together whatever the fuck I was thinking. I turn back to my box and start jumping again, only to immediately trip over myself. I stumble, falling to the floor in a bit of a heap, more embarrassed than hurt.
I feel the blush blooming across my face and down my neck.
“Fuck, Haller, you good?” Brennan rushes over to help steady me. My face is flaming hot. I blow out a bit of a stuttered breath and look around the room quickly. I find myself relieved to see that Beau seems to have missed it.
That sends me spiraling back to my little freak-out, because why on earth would I invite him to come live with me?
He’s hot.
Like, painfully hot.
Like, so hot I apparently lose all the filters between my brain and my mouth.
Because that is the only explanation I can think of as to why I offered my spare bedroom to the most attractive man I have ever seen.
He’s tall, has to be nearly six foot three, and the man is rugged.
Deliciously rugged. He’s giving all kinds of "sexy lumberjack" vibes. His hair is a dark chocolate color and curly. I can’t see it all because his tank top is incredibly fitted, but I’d bet anything he’s got hair on his chest and everything.
I can just picture running my hands down his broad chest and…
Oh shit.
I adjust uncomfortably as my cock begins to plump up.
Thank goodness Brennan has already started walking away.
Back to my mind spinning out.
It’s more than that, more than just sexual attraction. It feels like he saw me. Like he saw through the mask I wear to hide my very being.
I’ve never been seen like that.
I shove my palm down against my now aching cock as I turn back toward the box. Thankfully, the training room doesn’t have mirrors everywhere, like most gyms, so I can discreetly palm myself to try and ease the discomfort. I definitely don’t want to feel seen in this moment.
I feel so dumb for inviting a straight guy to come into my home when I clearly am developing a big, fat crush on him. It’s basically just signing myself up for heartache and constant hard-ons. Hard-ons that I won’t even be able to properly hide because he’ll be in my home.
The doors to the gym open, and I turn to look, my headphones still in my hand. Mia, one of our athletic trainers, walks into the room, and I watch as Beau eyes her.
I’ve always had a thing for straight boys, it seems.
I think back to the boarding school I attended from sixth to twelfth grade.
It was right at the peak of my sixth-grade year that I realized I might be gay, in the middle of changing into my goalie gear for the first district game of the season.
I had never really cared about girls, which I never questioned, but that day in the locker room, I turned to my closest friend to ask him a question and was met with his half-naked body.
I remember noticing how well hockey was treating his body and, to my utter horror, how much I liked it.
I didn’t know what to do with these feelings of attraction, but my parents had always taught us to hide our extreme emotions, so I tucked it away.
But I kept noticing how attracted I was to some of my friends. I kept noticing their bodies and how my body would react to them. It got to be so bad that I would change in a bathroom stall before every game, and my friends chalked it up to the goalie being weird.
I don’t even know this guy. He just walked in here looking like a rugged Henry Cavill, and I immediately folded for him.
“Haller, where’s your head at?”
I look up, and Paxton is staring at me, a little tilt to his head. He looks kind of like a puppy when he does that. Like a husky, maybe.
“Thinking about dogs,” I say, because I am. I’m not going to tell him I’m picturing him as a dog. That would be ridiculous.
I must have been staring off mindlessly for some time now.
“Oh, do you have a dog?” Beau walks over. Well, more like he saunters over. There is this swagger, and confidence, in his step that is just seeping from every pore in his body. It’s intriguing and terrifying.
His tank top is clinging to his body like a second skin, and I’m carefully trying not to notice it.
“No, I think I’m more of a cat person.” I really don’t know.
We never had pets growing up, so I’m not entirely sure what I’d like.
I just know a dog would be a chore of a roommate, especially with our hectic game schedule.
They need constant love and affection, and sometimes I just want to be left alone.
Sometimes I want to hide in my room with a book and disappear for a few hours.
I really don’t have anything against dogs; I just can’t imagine owning one, not on my own anyway.
“Ah, I can see that.” He nods as if he immediately knows me. Beau has a nice voice. It’s all deep and velvety, and it feels like being wrapped up in a warm embrace. I feel like I could melt for him. Like I could just become a puddle at his feet.
I look down at my feet then, suddenly very overwhelmed by his presence. This feels like the middle school locker rooms all over again. I’m raw and vulnerable and exposed, and I hate it.
Our parents always instilled in us that letting people see behind the mask would only end in hurt. I’ve always tried to keep that mask up. But it feels like Beau might know how to take that mask apart, piece by tiny piece.
I peek back up at him, and he’s watching me with a careful smile on his face. It’s soft. I take a deep breath before looking at him a little more closely. He has a small scar next to his left eye, a thin sliver of raised skin. I want to ask him about it.
I kind of want to know him. There’s this air of mystery and intrigue surrounding him that pulls at my curiosity.
“Do you want my number?” he asks, holding out his hand for my phone. I cock my head. Is he that bold? “You know”—he raises an eyebrow and smiles a wicked smile—“so you can text me your address?”
Oh.
Duh.
That feels so obvious now that he’s said it. Of course, if we’re going to live together, even if it’s just for a week or so, he would need my number.
He reaches out, and I hand over my phone. He looks up at me with a raised brow and a small smile before scrolling to my contacts to enter his number. He sends himself a quick text and hands it back.
I look down at my phone.
Beau.
I look back up at him. Middle school me would have been jumping up and down at scoring such a hottie’s number. A real-life main character straight out of one of my romance novels.
Well, little did that version of me know that we’re still stuck firmly in the closet at the ripe age of twenty-three, with absolutely no end date in sight.
I’m pulling into my driveway when my phone starts ringing. My mom is calling.
I let out a long-suffering groan, inhaling the car’s leather interior scent before picking up.
My parents are … great. Really, they’re fine. They just worry way too much. They worry about hockey, they worry about me living alone, and ever since I came out to them in high school, they worry about me being found out. Their concern is sincere, or at least, I’m pretty sure it is.
When I sat them down and told them I was gay, my mother started crying.
Like, full-blown sobs. Sniffling and snot-nosed, with tissues everywhere.
She and my father assured me they were not at all disappointed that I was gay, just scared of the hardships I would face being in the closet.
Somehow, them telling me they weren’t disappointed completely unprompted made me feel the exact opposite.
They stressed and stressed and stressed that if I were to follow my dream of being a goalie in the PHL, I would never be able to come out.
There isn’t anyone out as anything other than straight in the hockey world.
Not a player, not a coach, not even an equipment manager.
Okay, maybe that’s a little bit dramatic.
I don’t know every team’s equipment manager situation.
And I’m not naive enough to think I’m the only gay man playing hockey professionally.
I can’t even imagine how many could possibly be on my own team.
But I don’t want to be the first. My parents and my agent keep shoving the fear down my throat.
That I’ll be the first and immediately be kicked from my spot as starting goalie.
That I could potentially be kicked from the team.
I’m so firmly in the closet that I’ve set up camp there and have fully resigned myself to spending the rest of my career here.
I hate it, though. It’s cramped and lonely in the closet. It’s kept me from getting close to my teammates. It’s kept me from meeting anyone, even as just a friend, let alone a lover.
Maybe if someone else came out. Maybe then I could be brave. Maybe then I could come out and have a relationship. Maybe then I could fall in love. But as it stands right now, I’m stuck between a rock and a hard place. And that hard place is my…
“Honey?” My mother’s voice comes through tinny over my car’s speakers. Shit. My mother.
“Yeah, Mom.” I try to relay urgency in my voice. I want this to be as quick a call as I can manage. Mostly, I just want to be inside, under my own shower. But it’s hard to think about that while I’m talking to my mom.
I’m still hesitant to shower beyond a quick rinse with the other guys.
The fear of accidentally popping a boner with twenty-plus other men naked and sudsed up is incredibly real and kind of ruling my life.
It’s not even that I would be looking at them.
I keep my eyes firmly planted on the wall.
It’s just that the stupid thing is so sensitive.
I’m sure the other guys just chalk it up to the weird goalie being weird.
It’s how I’ve explained away pretty much everything I do and don’t do.
“Honey, it’s been weeks since we last spoke,” she whines.
“We spoke two days ago,” I say.
“Now that can’t be right. Are you sure?” Her voice is condescending, and it makes me cringe.
I’m sure.
“What’s up, Mom?” I try to keep my annoyance out of my voice. I know she really means well. I know she’s trying to make me feel better. I just can’t help but resent her a little bit.
She loves me, but…
She doesn’t care that I’m gay, but…
But, but, but.
She doesn’t realize how big that “but” feels.
“What? Can’t a mother just want to catch up with her son?” I can practically hear the pout in her voice. “I worry about you, you know. I just like making sure my baby boy is okay.”
“Well, I’m fine. I promise.” I sigh before remembering the extent of my day. Do I tell her about Beau? Do I tell her about the new, potentially dangerous position I’ve put myself in? At least that’s how she’ll see it.
No, I don’t need the added stress of her anxiety piled onto my own.
“Have you gotten out your winter clothes yet?” she asks. It’s only September, so that answer is a big fat no. I tell her as much, and she launches into a speech about preparedness, one I’ve actually heard dozens of times.
I hear warbled grumbling on the line. “Your dad says hi.” She interrupts her own lecture to interject. I’m sure he does. Dad took my queerness the hardest in my family.
He gives me the same spiels that my mom does.
More buts.
Mom has tried explaining it as “he just wants a son he can relate to,” as if we aren’t both hockey players, even if he never made it pro.
I can’t imagine what it is exactly he wanted to relate to.
I’ve always been exceptionally private, so it’s not as if I’d be sharing all the gory details of hookups, even if it was with women.
I decide I’m not going to tell my mom about Beau. She would just go into a tirade about why it’s a bad idea. And I’m already perfectly aware of exactly how bad this is going to go.
I am clearly incredibly attracted to Beau, a fact that will not be made better by my mother’s lectures.
While she continues her lecture, I look down at my phone, resigning myself to at least a few minutes of her tirade.
There’s a new text waiting for me.
From Beau.
Beau: Hey Milo, are you ready for me?
Am I?
My cock perks up, and I groan.
I’m so fucked.