CHAPTER SEVEN FULL CONTACT, HANDS OFF #2
They paired before anyone could object.
Tyler lay on his back while Brock raised one leg and pressed it toward his chest. The position was routine, performed by trainers every week. Brock’s hand around Tyler’s ankle and the weight above him made it anything but routine.
“More,” Tyler said.
Brock increased the stretch.
“Not what you meant,” he murmured.
“You don’t know what I mean.”
“Your body is explaining.”
Tyler looked down. The front of his shorts had tightened visibly.
The strength coach passed. “Good range, Hayes.”
“Excellent partner,” Tyler said.
Brock nearly dropped his leg.
Day three included a home game.
Milwaukee won four to one. Tyler scored, Brock earned two assists, and both banked the rewards because the no-contact agreement overruled the ledger until Friday.
The first assist came from the power line. Brock planted himself at the crease while Tyler circled behind him. The familiar route placed them together for one fraction, protected by equipment and justified by tactics. Tyler used the screen, took Brock’s return pass, and scored high.
Brock reached him beside the glass. Instead of the usual lift, he struck helmets and kept both gloves on Tyler’s shoulders.
“Goal,” Brock said.
“Assist.”
“Two more days.”
“Afraid you won’t last?”
Brock pulled Tyler closer as teammates arrived. “Afraid the league won’t.”
The second assist came on an empty-net goal. Brock could have shot from his own end. Instead, he passed to Tyler, who carried the puck over the line and fed the rookie winger for his first professional score.
The rookie jumped into Tyler’s arms. Brock joined the celebration and wrapped both men in a crushing hold.
Necessary team contact.
Tyler’s back pressed into Brock’s chest. Brock’s glove spread across his abdomen. In the noise of the arena, Brock said, “I gave away a goal.”
“Leadership.”
“Cost me a command.”
“You earned a request.”
“I’m saving it.”
“I know.”
In the handshake line, a reporter caught the captains together for a live interview. Tyler stood close enough that their sleeves touched but their bodies did not.
“What explains the chemistry between you two?” she asked.
“Boundaries,” Tyler answered.
Brock coughed.
“Communication,” he said.
“Healthy distance,” Tyler added.
The reporter looked between men standing less than an inch apart. “Whatever it is, it’s working.”
They maintained professional smiles until the camera light went dark.
“Healthy distance?” Brock asked.
Tyler stepped away. “Demonstrated.”
Their total increased.
So did the problem.
After Tyler’s goal, Brock caught him in the celebration. Tyler jumped against his chest. Brock’s hands closed beneath Tyler’s thighs for one dangerous second before teammates surrounded them.
“Game contact,” Brock said against his helmet.
“Celebration contact.”
“Necessary.”
Tyler locked his legs tighter. “Extremely.”
Brock nearly lost the challenge there.
He set Tyler down and skated away before the referee dropped the puck.
At home, they ate separately. Tyler reviewed film in the living room while Brock used the sauna. When Brock emerged wearing only a towel, Tyler moved to the roof despite the snow.
Five minutes later, Brock came outside fully dressed and placed a coat over the railing beside him without touching.
“You’ll freeze,” Brock said.
“Strategist.”
“Idiot.”
Tyler put on the coat. It was Brock’s, heavy and warm, smelling of cedar and cold air.
“Does clothing count as touching?” Tyler asked.
“Not unless I’m still in it.”
The image silenced both of them.
Day four became openly hostile.
Tyler showered with the bathroom door unlocked and sang badly. Brock cooked dinner without a shirt again. Tyler stretched in front of the television. Brock cleaned the gym while wearing low-slung sweats. They exchanged no unnecessary words because every conversation turned into provocation.
At practice, Keller noticed.
“Captains,” he said after Brock checked Tyler into the glass during a passing drill. “Whatever this is, either finish it or hide it better.”
“Competitive intensity,” Tyler said.
“You were skating in the same direction.”
“Very competitive direction.”
Keller assigned them twenty post-practice laps.
They raced every one.
On the final turn, Tyler gained the inside edge. Brock placed a glove at Tyler’s hip to hold him wide. Tyler pressed back into the contact and felt Brock’s body answer.
They crossed the line together.
“Tie,” Tyler said, bent over his stick.
“Story of my life.”
“You could end it.”
Brock skated close. “So could you.”
They stood face to face on empty ice while arena staff collected pucks around them.
Neither touched.
That night, Tyler discovered physical deprivation could produce phantom sensations.
He stood at the bathroom sink and felt Brock’s hands at his waist even though the older man was across the loft. He climbed into bed and imagined the weight that usually curved around his back. When the furnace started, warm air moved over his neck like breath.
Sleep refused to come.
At two in the morning, he found Brock seated on the living-room floor with his back against the sofa. The room was dark except for city light. Brock wore a T-shirt and loose shorts. A blanket covered his lap.
Tyler sat on the opposite side of the coffee table.
“Can’t sleep?” Brock asked.
“Hydrating.”
“Without water.”
“Emotional hydration.”
Brock gave a tired laugh.
For several minutes, they said nothing. The distance across the table was less than four feet. Tyler could have crossed it in one movement.
“This isn’t only sex,” he said eventually.
Brock’s expression softened. “I know.”
“I keep reaching for you.”
“I know.”
“You’re enjoying saying that.”
“No.” Brock looked at his hands. “I reach too.”
The admission settled into the quiet room.
Tyler extended one bare foot beneath the table until it stopped inches from Brock’s. Brock did the same. Their toes nearly met on the wood floor.
“Does almost touching count?” Tyler asked.
“Feels like it.”
Neither closed the final distance.
They remained there until exhaustion finally outweighed desire. Then they returned to separate rooms without saying good night, because the words had begun to sound too much like leaving.
The final day arrived with twenty hours remaining.
Tyler woke before dawn from a dream he refused to examine. His erection was so hard it bordered on painful. He went to the kitchen for water and found Brock standing at the sink in sleep shorts.
Brock had the same problem.
They looked at each other across the dark room.
“Twenty hours,” Tyler said.
“I know.”
“We could call a tie.”
“Is that surrender?”
“Negotiation.”
Brock drank from the glass. A drop of water moved down his chest.
Tyler watched it disappear into the waistband.
“Go back to bed,” Brock said.
“Command?”
“Self-preservation.”
They retreated to separate rooms.
Morning practice ended at eleven. A sponsor lunch lasted until one. Tyler had an individual commercial fitting at three. Brock attended a youth-rink planning meeting. Their separate schedules should have made the remaining hours easy.
Instead, absence turned the tension into ache.
At seven forty-five, Tyler returned to the loft expecting victory.
The rooms were empty.
Brock’s coat was gone. His skates were missing from the gear closet.
Tyler checked his phone. No message.
Fifteen minutes remained? No. The agreement ended Friday at eight, but the wall clock showed seven forty-five in the morning? Tyler stared and realized exhaustion had scrambled him. It was eight in the morning after his pre-dawn wake, not evening; twelve hours remained.
He laughed once at his own stupidity, then noticed the location shared through the team safety app.
Brock was at the practice rink.
Tyler drove there without changing.
The arena stood dark except for work lights above the ice. A maintenance crew talked somewhere in the service corridor. Tyler followed the sound of skates through the tunnel.
Brock circled alone in black practice pants, shoulder pads, and a gray base layer. No jersey. No helmet. Sweat darkened his hair.
Tyler stepped onto the bench. “Running away?”
Brock stopped near center. “Trying not to wake you.”
“You could have left a note.”
“You would have followed.”
“Correct.”
Brock skated toward him. “Twelve hours.”
“I know.”
“Go home.”
Tyler found spare skates and a stick in the equipment room. He wore black trousers and Brock’s jersey from day two. The clothing was absurd for hockey.
He stepped onto the ice anyway.
Brock circled once around him before stopping. Up close, exhaustion showed beneath his eyes.
“Why are you really here?” Tyler asked.
“Couldn’t sleep.”
“You could have used the gym.”
“Too many mirrors.”
Tyler understood. In the gym, Brock would see the empty space where Tyler usually watched. On the ice, movement could turn absence into speed.
“You thought skating would fix it.”
“Usually does.”
“Did it?”
Brock looked at the borrowed jersey hanging over Tyler’s trousers. “No.”
The answer stripped away the final humor.
Tyler rested both hands on top of his stick. “We can end the challenge without anyone losing.”
“We wrote rules.”
“We write new ones.”
“That why you drove here?”
Tyler considered lying. The empty loft, the missing skates, and the relief of seeing Brock under arena lights made dishonesty feel pointless.
“I drove here because you left,” he said.
Brock’s face changed.
“I knew where you were,” Tyler continued. “I knew you were safe. It still felt wrong.”
Brock shifted one skate closer, then stopped before contact. “Tyler.”
The first name carried more intimacy than a touch.
Tyler dropped a puck between them. “If you say something honest, I’m checking you through the glass.”
“No checking, remember?”
“Then save us both and start the drill.”
Brock’s smile returned slowly. “Coward.”
“Strategist.”
“Drill,” he said.
Brock looked at his bare head, street clothes, and borrowed jersey. “You’ll kill yourself.”
“No checking.”
“That removes your only advantage.”
Tyler dropped a puck.