Chapter 56
THE THIRD MAN
Aubrey
“I’m soaking wet!” Ledger shouts, but there’s laughter in his voice, booming through my little apartment.
“Well, yeah. Dogs shake,” I say.
“That’s clear,” he says, then peels off his shirt.
Mmm. Nice. I shamelessly stare at his sturdy chest while keeping my hands on the wiggly, wet body in the tub. “And I don’t mind that dogs shake,” I say.
“I’d strip, too, if I wasn’t busy helping this little dude be presentable,” Dev says. He’s kneeling on the floor of my tiny bathroom, scrunched in front of the world’s smallest tub, giving this puppy a bath.
I snap my focus back to the critter.
As I spray the nozzle over the wily guy, who’s maybe fifteen pounds, Dev scrubs some more of my cruelty-free tropical paradise shampoo into the pup’s short-haired coat. The dog was more black and gray when we found him. Now he’s gleaming.
But he’s no fan of getting clean. The little guy whines, then rears up on his back paws, hell-bent on scrambling out of the tub. His black-and-white legs reach the edge, then he hoists himself up and onto Dev’s chest.
The goalie wraps his arms around the sopping wet, soaped-up mutt of all mutts, and hugs the busy boy. “It’s all right. I’ve got you.”
Deep, but soft. Commanding, but caring.
There goes my heart. It thunders as the burly, bearded man embraces the homeless dog and then gently sets him back in the tub. “Let’s just get you rinsed off,” he says to the new guy, and I’m almost too fluttery to focus on the task.
But I manage, spraying the dog till he’s spick and span and both Dev and I are as waterlogged as Ledger. My sweater is dripping. Dev’s burgundy Henley is sticking to his pecs and abs.
When I turn off the water, Ledger snort-laughs at the two of us. “Join the club,” he says, then holds out his arms with a towel draped across them. Dev hands him the dog and Ledger wraps the dry, fluffy towel around the canine. “There you go, buddy,” Ledger coos.
My heart flip-flops again.
Ledger stands and carries the pup out of the cramped bathroom, drying his head, then his belly, then carefully blotting each paw.
I follow him, plucking at my wet sweater.
There’s not much room in my home, and every square inch is filled with wet dog, big men, and me.
After rubbing the towel down the dog’s bony spine one last time, Ledger puts our new companion on the floor. The pup shakes again, leaving a huge circle of water droplets on the tiles.
“How does he have any more water on him?” Ledger sounds amused and a little bit in love.
I get it.
“He was a dirty boy,” Dev says, crouching down and offering the dog a palm for sniffing.
Nervously at first, then boldly, the boy scampers over to Dev, then downward dogs him, shaking his butt, gone from scared to friendly in a few hours.
On the way home with the dog, we’d stopped at a grocery store and grabbed some kibble, a collar, and some dog toys.
It’s one a.m., too late to call Little Friends, but I’ll do that in the morning, see if he’s someone’s dog who got out.
For now, the pup runs around my kitchen, then barks at the bowl where we fed him earlier.
It’s empty now. “Maybe he’s hoping he can conjure more food into it,” Ledger says.
“He needs a dog butler,” Dev jokes, then looks my way. “He needs a—”
“Fitzgibbons,” we say in unison.
Dev scratches him under the furry chin and nods to Ledger. “Give this boy some more kibble, will ya?”
Ledger grabs the bag, shakes some nuggets into the ceramic dish with the paw-prints pattern, and then returns the bag to the counter while our sleepover guest chows down.
I head to my bedroom to strip off my soaked clothes and tug on some sleep shorts and a cami.
I haven’t technically invited the guys over, and though it seems a fait accompli, I’ve been learning that words are actions.
They matter. When I return to the living room, my guys are yawning, so I hook my thumb in the direction of my bedroom.
“There’s only one bed here, but I think it can fit all of us. ”
Ledger grins. “I bet it can.”
A few minutes later, I’m under the covers with Ledger. Dev’s in the bathroom, brushing his teeth. “Well, looks like you two finagled a sleepover pretty quickly,” I say.
Ledger scoffs. “Don’t put it past us to pull out all the stops to get one. But no, we didn’t plan a dog rescue to get into your bed,” he says, then slides closer to me.
But a dog rescue is doing things to my heart. “How’s your knee? I’ve been wondering. Been thinking about you.”
A smile tilts his lips briefly, then he inhales deeply to answer, “It’s okay.”
“Does it hurt when you skate?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes it hurts when I don’t skate. Mostly it doesn’t.”
“Is that good?” I ask, trying to read between the lines and determine if he’s really okay.
“I’m good. Don’t worry about me.”
But I do worry. I stare at him with the same intensity he gives to me. “Are you being Stern Brunch Daddy?”
“Maybe. But you love that.” He swipes a finger down my cheek.
“Ledger,” I implore.
“Trust me. I feel good, especially right now.”
My heart cartwheels. “I don’t want you to get hurt though.”
He pushes up onto an elbow. “I know you don’t.” He comes in for a brief, hot kiss. “And I can’t tell you how much that means to me.” He pulls back and meets my gaze with vulnerable blue eyes. “My dad wants me to go into the broadcast booth with him when I retire.”
Oh. I hadn’t even realized that was an option. “Do you want to?”
“I haven’t told him I’m retiring.” He drags a hand across his hair. This is hard for him. I set a palm on his chest so he can feel my support.
“Maybe you’re not ready to tell him yet.”
His soft laugh stirs the air. “Yeah, I’m definitely not. I’ll need to soon though. I saw him before the season started, and he mentioned working with him. It’s my last year on the ice, and I couldn’t tell my dad.” Another pause, the kind where it’s clear he’s deep in thought. “Aubrey?”
“Yes?”
“I don’t know what I want to do when I retire.” It must be a hard thing to say, but he sounds utterly relieved to have said it.
I meet his gaze again. “That’s okay.”
“Yeah?”
I nod. “Yeah. Maybe you’ll just…take time off.”
A smile shifts his lips. “Maybe I will.”
It sounds like he’s giving himself permission at last to think differently. He drops another kiss to my forehead. “I wanted to tell you all that for a while.”
“I’m glad you did,” I say, then pause. “Are you still having nightmares?”
“Not as often. Actually, a whole lot less. I think you were right. I was just working through stuff.”
“You sound like you’re coming out on the other side.”
“I think I am.” He slides his hand down my arm, clasps his fingers around my wrist. “I didn’t realize how much I wanted to see you at my games till you started showing up. Seeing you in the stands…”
My heart stutters as he trails off, the words clearly hard for him to say. I get that. He’s a man who’s been burned before. He’s a man who’s closed himself off. But he’s also a man who’s demanded the best from himself his whole life. Whose family expected the best from him too.
And he’s a man who possibly no longer wants the life that’s been ordained for him. “I’ll be there,” I say.
“Yeah?” His voice sounds like it contains all the hope in his heart.
“Yes.”
He squeezes my wrist, his fingers encircling it.
Before my heart performs an entire uneven bars routine, I hear Dev’s footsteps, and he pointedly clears his throat. “Hello? Did you forget about Puck Fitzgibbons?”
The other shirtless man in my home bends and scoops up the dog from the floor beside the bed. I laugh and Ledger snorts, letting go of my wrist.
“You already named him?” Ledger asks Dev.
“Dude. He needs a name,” Dev says defensively, then sets the precious cargo down on the mattress, not even asking me if he’s welcome in the bed.
Because Dev knows me. Of course the dog is welcome.
The mutt seems to know it, too, bounding up the bed then whining tentatively for my attention. I stroke his soft snout till he sighs and then curls into a dog ball by my side. “He might be someone’s dog,” I point out.
“We do need to see if someone is looking for him,” Ledger adds.
Dev rolls his eyes. “Dude is skinny, hungry, and collarless.”
“But he might have gotten out a few days ago,” I say.
Dev turns on his side and pets the dog. “Puck, did you get out, or were you looking for Aubrey?”
Ledger drops his face into the crook of my neck, chuckling. “There’s no way you’re not keeping this dog.”
I sort of knew that the second we found him, but I take issue with one word. “You mean we.”
When Ledger lifts his face, he smiles softly. “Yes. We.”
I let that sink in for a little bit—the ease of the we.
The comfort of it. The way we all seem to know that a year became two months.
That a first date is only the beginning.
That this is us. “You know, the place where I used to live didn’t allow dogs,” I say, musing on the seemingly random as I pet the new bedmate.
“But this place does?” Dev asks with some concern.
“Yes. Definitely. One of the reasons I moved here. But then Aiden was allergic…”
Another pause. Another contented sigh from Ledger. Another pet of the pooch from Dev.
“Looks like it all worked out,” Ledger says.
Maybe it did. Like Trina said, sometimes time is just time. It doesn’t have to flow perfectly. It doesn’t have to line up according to rules. Life is short and real love doesn’t come around often. If you don’t grab it, it might pass you by.
Ledger falls asleep first, like he always does. I turn to Dev, who’s petting the dog. “Damn, you fall fast.” I’ve never seen someone bond so quickly with an animal. “Even faster than me.”
He meets my gaze, his green eyes flickering with heat and vulnerability. “Yes. I fell a long time ago.”
My breath catches. My skin tingles. “You did?”
He nods solemnly. “I did.”
My neck is warm. My insides are melting. “Really?”
He slides a thumb along my jaw. “Yes, really.”
“That’s why you said you’d wait for me?”
He shakes his head. “No. I fell for you before that week. During that week, I knew you were worth waiting for.”
So much for going slow. I’m not sure I can now either. I lean in to give him a quick, firm kiss. When I break it, I say, “How are you feeling about the season? I know you want it to be the best.”
“I do. But that’s not the only thing I want now,” he says.
The dog breathes evenly against my neck as I drift off after my first date with my two men. I’m pretty sure I fell in love with them while we were together on the honeymoon.
And then I fell a little more while we were apart.