Chapter Fourteen #3
Tessa hesitated.
“How did you get that scar?”
Matvei’s hand dropped.
“Skate.”
Her stomach tightened. “A skate?”
“When I am fifteen.”
“During a game?”
“Practice.”
He tilted his head slightly, exposing the line more clearly.
“Player falls. Skate comes up.”
Tessa stared at it.
“How many stitches?”
“Many.”
“That isn’t a number.”
“Thirty-two.”
Her eyes widened.
Matvei smiled at her reaction.
“It was close to your neck.”
“Yes.”
“Were you wearing a guard?”
“No.”
“Of course not.”
“I am goalie.”
“That does not make your neck invincible.”
“Now I wear.”
“Because you nearly had your throat cut.”
“Because mother makes.”
Tessa imagined his mother receiving that call, already nervous watching him play and then seeing her fifteen-year-old son with a skate wound along his jaw.
“She must have been terrified.”
“Yes.”
“Were you?”
“No.”
“You were fifteen.”
“I was angry. Practice stops.”
Tessa laughed softly. “That sounds like you.”
“It is good scar.”
“You like it?”
“Girls like.”
She looked at him.
Matvei’s expression remained serious for less than a second before amusement appeared.
“That line probably works better when you don’t explain the injury.”
“It works now.”
“Does it?”
His gaze held hers.
Tessa’s pulse shifted.
Before she could reconsider, she lifted one hand.
Matvei went still as her fingers reached his jaw.
She touched the beginning of the scar beneath his ear.
His skin was warm.
Tessa traced the line lightly, following it toward his chin. The scar was smoother than the skin around it, slightly raised near the center. Stubble caught against the pad of her finger.
Matvei did not look away.
Neither did she.
The noise of the bar softened until Tessa could hear only the music and the faint movement of his breath.
Her hand should have dropped as soon as she confirmed what the scar felt like.
Instead, her fingertips remained against his jaw.
Matvei turned his face slightly into the touch.
The movement was small.
Unmistakable.
Tessa’s thumb rested near the corner of his mouth.
She became aware of how close they sat, their knees pressed together beneath the table and his face within reach. His eyes lowered briefly toward her lips.
The same way hers had looked at his outside.
Tessa withdrew her hand.
The absence felt immediate.
Matvei’s gaze followed it back to the table.
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Then Tessa looked at the empty glasses between them.
“We should talk about this.”
Matvei’s expression became guarded.
“This?”
She gestured vaguely between them. “Whatever this is.”
“Drink.”
“You know that’s not what I mean.”
“Yes.”
The lightness left his face, though he did not retreat from her physically. Their knees remained together.
Tessa folded both hands around the base of her glass.
“I cover you.”
“I know.”
“I write about you.”
“I know.”
“You keep saying that as though knowing it fixes anything.”
“No.”
The immediate agreement startled her.
“You don’t think it’s a problem?”
“I think problem.”
“Then why are we here?”
Matvei looked around the bar.
“You wait for me.”
The answer was not accusatory.
That made it more difficult.
“I know.”
“You come.”
“I know.”
“You touch me.”
Heat rose across Tessa’s face.
“Yes.”
Matvei rested both forearms on the table.
“I do not bring you here alone.”
“I’m not blaming you.”
“You sound like.”
“I’m trying to understand what we’re doing.”
He considered this.
“Talking.”
“That is technically true.”
“You want different?”
Tessa looked at him.
The question was too direct to evade.
“Yes,” she said quietly. “That’s the problem.”
Something changed in his eyes.
Not surprise. Recognition.
Matvei’s hand moved beneath the table again. This time, his fingers rested against the outside of her knee.
Deliberate.
Tessa’s breath tightened.
He did not move higher. His hand remained there, warm through the fabric, thumb near the seam of her trousers.
“I want too,” he said.
The admission made everything inside her feel suddenly unsteady.
She looked toward the bar, though no one was watching them.
“It isn’t only awkward,” she said. “It could affect my job.”
“How?”
“You’re a player I cover every day.”
“Yes.”
“If people think I’m involved with you, they’ll question everything I write. Every story where I was fair to you. Every time I defended a decision. Every quote you gave me that you didn’t give someone else.”
“I do not give because of this.”
“They won’t know that.”
“Then tell.”
“That won’t matter.”
Matvei’s thumb moved once against her knee.
Tessa looked down at his hand, then back at him.
“You don’t understand what it would look like.”
“Explain.”
She drew in a breath.
“They’d think I had special access because you liked me. Or that I wrote something positive because we were sleeping together. Or that the Montreal story was harsh because we had some personal fight. Everything would become about this instead of the work.”
Matvei’s expression hardened at the reference to the Montreal story.
Not with anger toward her. At the idea of strangers reshaping it.
“You write before.”
“That won’t matter either.”
“It should.”
“It should.”
He looked down.
Tessa watched him process the distinction between what was true and what other people would believe. It was the exact problem that defined his relationship with reporters.
“You can lose job?” he asked.
The bluntness made her stomach tighten.
“I don’t know.”
“That means yes.”
“It means there would be consequences.”
“For me?”
“Probably fewer.”
His hand stopped moving.
“Why?”
“Because you’re the player.”
“That is not answer.”
“It is. People might call you distracted or question your judgment. They would question my ethics and whether I deserved the beat at all.”
Matvei’s jaw tightened beneath the scar she had touched.
“That is wrong.”
“Yes.”
“Then why rule?”
“It isn’t about punishing me. Reporters can’t have relationships with people they directly cover. It creates conflicts.”
“You already have conflict.”
Tessa frowned. “What does that mean?”
“You like me.”
The words landed with enough force that she forgot to breathe.
Matvei’s expression did not shift.
“You still write.”
“That’s different from acting on it.”
“Why?”
“Because thoughts aren’t relationships.”
“You wait for me.”
Tessa looked down.
He was right.
The line had not first been crossed when she touched his scar. It had moved when she stood outside the arena knowing he would eventually come through the doors, hoping he would choose to walk.
“I shouldn’t have,” she said.
Matvei’s hand withdrew from her knee.
The loss felt like rejection even though she had created it.
“You regret?”
“No.”
They sat in silence.
Tessa had hoped acknowledging the ethics would create clarity. Instead, it made the attraction feel more real. People did not discuss consequences unless something existed strongly enough to carry them.
“What are we supposed to do?” she asked.
Matvei looked toward the windows. Snow continued falling beyond the glass, soft beneath the Christmas lights.
“I do not know.”
It might have been the first time he had admitted uncertainty without trying to disguise it as impatience.
Tessa appreciated the honesty.
She hated that it offered no help.
“We shouldn’t make any decisions tonight,” she said.
“Because drinks?”
“Because we’re in Helsinki, and it’s Christmas, and everything feels separate from real life.”
“This is real.”
“I know.”
Matvei looked at her for a long time.
The expression in his eyes made the room feel smaller.
“You say should not decide,” he said. “But you decide already.”
“What did I decide?”
“You came.”
Tessa remembered saying nearly the same thing at the hotel entrance in an imagined version of this night she had refused to acknowledge until now.
She had come.
Twice.
First across the city beside him, then into the bar.
The second time had been a choice.
Tessa glanced at the time.
“We need to go.”
Matvei’s face closed slightly.
“You have game tomorrow,” she continued. “I have Canada and Sweden first, then your game. We both need sleep.”
“You sleep on plane.”
“Not enough.”
A faint smile returned.
Tessa signaled for the check before either of them could order again.
Matvei attempted to pay for everything.
Tessa stopped him.
“You invited me,” he said.
“You invited me.”
“Yes. So I pay.”
“That logic works against you.”
“No.”
“I’m expensing my drinks.”
“You cannot.”
“Why?”
“This is work?”
His expression challenged her.
Tessa closed her mouth.
The bartender stood beside the table waiting while they argued in English over a receipt written in Finnish.
Tessa reached for her wallet.
Matvei placed one hand over it.
The gesture covered both her wrist and most of the bag.
“I pay.”
“Matvei.”
“Tessa.”
The bartender looked between them.
Tessa lowered her voice. “Paying makes it feel more like a date.”
Matvei did not look away.
“Maybe.”
Her pulse stumbled.
He handed his card to the bartender.
Tessa sat back.
There was no point arguing without drawing more attention.
When the card returned, Matvei signed the receipt and stood. He held Tessa’s coat while she put it on, a small gesture that belonged so clearly to a date that she nearly refused on principle.
Instead, she slid her arms into the sleeves.
Matvei adjusted the collar where it folded beneath her hair.
His fingers grazed the back of her neck.
Tessa went still.
He removed his hands before the touch could become anything else.
Outside, the cold returned immediately.
The snow had stopped, leaving a fresh layer across the sidewalks and street. Christmas lights stretched between the buildings, casting warm reflections against the white.
Tessa shoved both hands into the coat pockets.
Matvei zipped his jacket and looked toward her boots.
“Ice.”
“I can see.”
“You did not yesterday.”
“That was one time.”
“You almost fall today too.”
“I did not.”
“Because I catch.”
Tessa looked toward her hotel across the street.
The distance was less than a minute. Matvei’s hotel stood behind them, closer to the bar.
“You don’t need to walk me.”
“Yes.”
“You’re going the opposite direction.”
“It is street.”
“I think I can cross it without assistance.”
Matvei stared at her boots.