15. Archie
ARCHIE
I’d forgotten what life was when I wasn’t at the bottom of a dark hole without means of getting out.
I noticed it in many small ways. I slept through the night, and the shadows beneath my eyes faded. At team dinners, which I attended and didn’t have to be dragged to kicking and screaming, I stopped checking the time and counting the minutes until I could leave and drive home to an empty house.
But that house was no longer empty, and there was a person waiting for me. My wolf, who’d spent the pain-filled years grieving in a tiny space inside me, pressed upward whenever my mate came near, wanting to close the distance between them.
So for our date night, I did something I hadn’t done for anyone. I took Walter to the rink. But not for a game. We’d done that where he sat and watched and cheered for me and the team.
It was after eleven, and at this time of night, the practice rink was dark and quiet.
Players had badge access to the facility for extra training, but this wasn’t that.
I couldn’t bring a guest in after hours without clearing it first, so earlier in the day, I’d asked a favor of the operations staff and security.
Having my face on the posters finally paid off, and they agreed.
The lights over the ice were down low.
“Are we allowed in here?” my mate whispered and gripped my hand.
“No, so if you hear sirens, run.”
“What?”
I kissed the top of his head. “I have permission.”
I dug out a pair of skates from the equipment room, and my mate put them on. He got up and gripped the top of the wall. My guess was he hadn’t done much or any skating as a kid.
“I’m going to embarrass myself.”
“There’s no one watching. That’s the point.” This was our alone time and so different from when I’d been here in the past.
I skated a slow backward loop in front of him. I enjoyed showing off a little because I was only human, or I was in human form in this moment.
You’re not. My beast huffed.
Kidding, I told him.
“Come on. I’ve got you.”
Walter rolled his eyes. “That’s what you tell everyone you bring here right before they go splat.”
“You’re the first and the only person I’d do this for.”
“Well, don’t make me cry.” He sniffed. “Because I’ll fall for sure if I can’t see through my tears.”
He took my hands and let me pull him onto the ice, and for thirty minutes, I got to watch my mate be terrible at something and laugh about it.
He clung to me, and his ankles rolled. He called me unflattering names and cursed when I let go for two seconds to prove he could balance.
He couldn’t, and I caught him before he went down.
I helped, my beast said proudly.
Walter grabbed two fistfuls of my sweater, and we ended up nose to nose, grinning at one another.
“Okay, I may be crap at this, but it’s a good date. I give you ten points.”
I kissed him in the middle of the empty rink, and there was not one thing I’d have changed about this evening or my life in general.
We took a break on the bench by the boards, and Walter snuggled against me. The ice was cold enough that I felt it, even with the increased heat from my beast. But this cold wasn’t the empty heart-wrenching kind that was pointed and sharp and needled me until I begged it to stop.
We sat in silence because since we’d been together, I’d learned there was a comfortable kind of quiet that you didn’t have to fill.
But underneath the comfort, there was something going on with Walter.
He was shuffling his butt, fiddling with his hair, and kicking his heels.
He reminded me of when I was a kid and had to go shopping with my dads.
“Are you bored?”
He looked at me. “No, why would you say that? I’m loving our date, even though you now have enough evidence to blackmail me about my shitty skating skills.”
“Okay.” We didn’t know one another well enough for me to nudge him and say he was fibbing, so I let it go. Maybe he was working on a big story at work, though he usually shared what happened at the office.
“It’s been a long week. I’m just tired.”
His behavior wasn’t what I’d expect from someone who was exhausted. We could have stayed home instead of coming here. Perhaps he was still coming to terms with the shifter world and his mate having the ability to get furry.
“And you’re leaving soon.” He took my hand. “You’ll be gone for two weeks and play six games and be so far away.”
He’d brought up something I hadn’t wanted to think about. Now that we’d found one another, being apart even for a few hours was hard. And leaving him now when Garrick was still out there and the issue of us mating was unresolved, worried me.
What if I bumped into a pack member and they scented Walter on me? Alpha would search for Walter, and he wouldn’t be hard to find. He was on the company’s website and he had social media. And I was more prominent. If he checked out the gala photos, he’d find my mate in some of them.
“I hate that I have to leave.” I’d told my captain—he’d sussed out that I had someone in my life—and he just said “Welcome to the club,” because most of the team had families, and many had kids. “My captain wasn’t sympathetic when I whined about leaving you.”
That got a laugh out of my mate.
“I’m going to miss you. That’s all. It hit me as we’re sitting here. Fourteen days is a long time when I only just got you.”
I could sense his sincerity as he clung to me and his eyes were blurry because it matched mine, but I couldn’t shake the feeling there was something else going on. I didn’t want to push and come across as an overbearing so-and-so who needed to know who, what, why, and when about his life.
His hand was in mine and he was leaning against me. That was enough, and if he was holding something back, he’d tell me if I needed to know.
“I’ll call you every day.” I was going to be insufferable. “You’ll get sick of my face.”
“That’s never going to happen.” He grinned. “And I’m hoping for texts and emojis and more. Once a day isn’t enough. I’m greedy for you.” He kissed me. “Teach me one more thing before you go far away, and hopefully neither of us breaks anything on the ice.”
He’d spoken of his fear of how “violent” hockey was, and I’d reassured him I’d be fine. I wasn’t as prone to injury as my human teammates were. My wolf puffed out his chest at the compliment.
We went back on the ice, and I taught him to glide. He had to get a little speed and bring both skates under him and ride it. He had to let the ice carry him. Walter wanted to move his feet, but I told him to stop working and to trust what he was doing.
“That’s terrible life advice.”
“Not on the ice.” I skated backward in front of him. “I’m going to let go.”
“Don’t you dare.”
I gave him a gentle pull, and he glided on the ice on his own. Then he held out his arms, and I caught him.
“See. You got it.” I held him close.
“Maybe I should consider a change of career.”