Chapter 23 #3
I looked at him for a second before sliding my menu across the table. This was such a small thing, to trust someone with your food order, and yet, I was sure no one was more capable of picking the right option for me. “Potentially.”
When our waiter came back, Mikko spoke enough Italian that I had another question.
“How many languages do you know?”
“Four.”
I blinked. “Wow. Okay, show off.”
“It’s common in Finland.”
“What was it like growing up there? You’ve never told me much about it.”
Mikko leaned back in the booth, tilting his head from side to side. “Cold and dark.”
I snorted, caught off-guard by the answer even if I should have expected it.
“I love Finland,” he said, smiling now. “Despite the cold and darkness, it’s beautiful.
Helsinki in winter feels like the whole city is holding its breath under the snow.
The streets go quiet after four in the afternoon when the light disappears, but then the Christmas markets open and everything smells like glogi and gingerbread. ”
“That sounds suspiciously cozy for a country that freezes solid half the year.”
“Hockey was everywhere. Outdoor rinks near our apartment, then later the frozen bays when they were thick enough. My dad played in the Finnish league and a few seasons in Sweden, but he retired after Mom’s accident and started coaching instead.”
“You said you were five?”
“Yeah.” He scrubbed a hand over his head, forgetting he’d styled his hair.
“She was a downhill skier, prepping for the next Olympics. One minute she was on top of the world, the next… everything changed. I don’t remember much from before.
After that, it was like the house got quieter. And my dad got harder.”
“That had to be so awful.”
“It wasn’t good.” A bitter sigh escaped him. “Not only did I almost lose my mom, but my dad was never the same.”
“You mean he wasn’t a judgmental prick before that?”
It was Mikko’s turn to laugh, the sound short and surprised.
“Honestly? It’s hard to remember a time when he wasn’t an asshole.
You’d think hockey would’ve been the one thing that connected us.
Instead, it was like he wanted nothing to do with me.
He never coached my teams—only everyone else’s.
Never came to my games, but somehow never missed one of his own.
I thought it would be different when I got drafted. That he’d finally be proud.”
He shook his head, staring at the table for a second too long. I reached across for his hand, squeezing once.
“That all sounds like his problem, not yours,” I said. “You know that, right? The same way Ava walking out on Leena isn’t a reflection on your daughter, but her own weakness.”
Mikko’s eyes met mine. “He didn’t pick me for the Olympic team last year. I’m hands-down the best Finnish defenseman in the NHL, and he still didn’t put me on the roster. How the hell am I supposed to let that go?”
I squeezed his hand harder, wishing I could take the weight of it for him.
“His opinion of you means nothing. It still hurts like hell, I know, but you can’t let him win that round.
You’re doing the best you can every single day, both on and off the ice.
And your best is so far out of the realm of most people’s imaginations, you make everyone else look bad.
That’s the only scoreboard that matters. ”
He turned his hand over beneath mine, threading our fingers together like it was the most natural thing in the world. His thumb brushed once across my knuckles, slow and careful, and butterflies erupted in my belly.
“You’re really good at that,” he said quietly.
“At what?”
“Making the shitty parts feel smaller.”
I arched a brow, trying for lightness even as my pulse kicked harder. “Don’t get used to it. Usually, my motivational speeches are more insulting than uplifting.”
The corner of his mouth curved, soft and real. “Noted.”
We stayed like that—hands linked on the table, the low murmur of the restaurant fading into the background—until the air between us felt heavier in the best possible way. Like we’d crossed some invisible line neither of us had planned on acknowledging.
A few minutes later, our waiter returned with a bowl of delicate strands of fresh pasta, glistening beneath shaved parmesan and a light butter sauce. Thin ribbons of black truffle perfumed the air before the plate even touched the table.
My mouth watered, already sure I’d like whatever he picked. And then the waiter set a cheese pizza in front of Mikko.
I looked down at the pizza, then back at the swanky restaurant around us. “No way was cheese pizza on that menu.”
He tore off a slice. “I asked.”
“You can do that?”
Another shrug. “If you ask nicely, you can even have a beautiful stranger agree to marry you.”
I laughed, twirling the pasta onto my fork before taking a bite. Butter. Parmesan. Earthy truffle. Somehow it tasted both ridiculously fancy and exactly like comfort food. I pointed my fork at him. “Okay. Good job.”
He grinned, looking pleased with himself. “Good? Or would you like the pizza instead?”
I looked at it, then at him. “Which would you prefer?”
“That’s not what I asked, rakas.”
Every time he said that nickname, my heart fluttered. I was equal parts dying of curiosity to know what it meant and afraid of what I thought it meant.
“I’m not sure.”
He slid the plate toward me, waiting while I took a slice. At this point, we’d shared over a dozen pizzas, and I was sure he was sick of it. But the moment I bit into the cheesy, garlicky slice, my eyes closed.
“This is so fucking good,” I moaned.
When I opened my eyes, Mikko was watching me, that smile faded into something far more dangerous.
Heat flooded my body as the weight of that look settled between us, thick and electric.
I should have looked away. Should have made a joke, shoved the pizza back at him, rebuilt the careful distance I’d spent weeks maintaining.
Instead, I held his gaze, pulse hammering in my throat, the taste of the pizza still on my tongue while every rational thought scattered.
He didn’t move closer.
He didn’t have to.
The quiet intensity in his eyes said everything I was desperately trying not to hear: that this wasn’t just dinner, and the way he remembered every small piece of me wasn’t an accident.
The walls I’d built brick by careful brick crumbled under the force of his gaze.
I felt them give—first a hairline crack, then a full collapse—and the terrifying part was how little I wanted to stop it.
I set the slice down with fingers that weren’t quite steady. “You’re staring.”
“You’re impossible not to stare at,” he said, voice low enough that it felt like a touch. “Especially when you sound like that.”
I wanted to lean in.
Wanted to close the last few inches and find out what that dangerous look would taste like.
Wanted it so badly my hands curled into fists in my lap to keep from reaching for him.
Every part of me screamed. I was spectacularly and completely failing at ignoring whatever had been brewing between us since the day we met. But for the first time, the failure didn’t feel like defeat.
It felt like surrender.