28. Too Early, Pet’ka
TOO EARLY, PET’KA
ANDERS
It takes me a minute to realize I’m not waking up in my own bed.
For a few blissfully empty seconds, I’m suspended somewhere between sleeping and consciousness, buried beneath heavy blankets and warmth that doesn’t belong to me.
The mattress feels different. Firmer. Bigger.
The room smells unfamiliar, too—like the faint lingering scent of Parker’s cologne that’s somehow worked its way into every square inch of this house.
Then a strong arm tightens around my waist and everything immediately comes rushing back.
The way I completely lost my fucking mind. Parker’s monstrosity of a cock stuffing my mouth to the fucking brim. His fingers running through my hair like they belonged there.
What kind of freaked out shit was I on last night?
At some point during the night, my shirt apparently vanished.
I have no memory of when that happened, or why, or who the hell removed it.
All I know is that I’m currently spread across Parker’s bare chest like we’re having skin-to-skin contact for the first time in recorded human history, wearing nothing except a pair of tight briefs and whatever dignity I have left.
Not much, as it turns out.
The steady rhythm of his heartbeat thumps beneath my ear. Strange to admit how comforting it feels. For a second, I let myself listen to it. There’s a deep, overwhelming kind of relief that resides somewhere behind my ribs.
For months, every interaction with Parker has felt like standing on unstable ice and waiting to see which one of us would fall through first. And now I’m here in his bed, wrapped in his arms and listening to the sound of his heartbeat.
The thought almost feels absurd, like if I move too quickly, the whole thing might disappear.
“You’re awake,” Parker murmurs, his voice rough with sleep. A second later, his lips brush against the top of my head. The simple affection of it nearly makes my heart explode.
“What time is it?” I mutter, flicking my finger through his beard.
“Eight—”
“Ugh.” I immediately bury my face back into his chest. “Too early, Petchka. Let’s go back to sleep.”
“Morning skate,” he explains, brushing the tips of his fingers down my spine. The motion sends a pleasant shiver through me. “Duty calls.”
I tilt my head up and look at him through sleepy eyes. His hair is sticking up in every direction. There’s a crease from the pillow pressed into his cheek. His eyes look tired. Like, really tired the more I look at him. Dark circles linger beneath them like he barely slept at all.
The thought passes through my mind almost as quickly as it arrives. It was probably my fault for keeping him up so late. I tend to have that effect on people…
I smile. “It’s optional.”
Parker chuckles softly. “Not for me.”
“Yes for you.” I pretend to pout. “Don’t leave me, Pet’ka. You’re so warm and…” The rest of the sentence dies when his hand slides down my body and roughly grabs my ass. I let out an offended noise. Parker just grins.
Exhaling dramatically, I shake my head. “You hate me.”
“As much as I’d love to stay in bed all day and grope you,” he murmurs, slapping my ass again, “I have to go to work.”
“So you hate me and I’m ugly…”
He rolls his eyes. “You’re impossible.”
“No. I’m persuasive.”
“You’re coercive.” He points at me. “Guilt-tripping me with that cute look on your face.”
“If I was guilt-tripping you, then I’d probably say something like…” I force the saddest expression I can manage. “I only just got you back.” The words leave my mouth before I really think about them. Mostly a joke.
The grin slips from Parker’s face for just a second. Something flickers across his expression before it’s gone almost immediately. His face softens and my heart gives an embarrassing little flutter. “That was stone cold.”
I shrug. “Go to work, Petchka. By all means—”
Before I can finish, he suddenly bear-hugs me. Hard. So hard it forces a startled squeal out of me. “No,” he growls through clenched teeth. “Not happening. Now I have to stay and get my lick back.”
I laugh so hard my stomach hurts.
Eventually the laughter fades. Neither of us moves, and for a minute, we’re locked in a staring match.
Sunlight spills through the crack in the curtains, painting pale gold stripes across the room. It feels like one of those mornings when you wake up and everything just makes perfect sense all of a sudden.
Parker looks at me. The grin slowly disappears from my face because there’s something different about it.
It’s not lust or desire. There’s no unbearable tension like the kind that’s followed us around for months.
It’s just…affection. It’s plain and simple and entirely uncomplicated, like the kind of look that covers me like a warm blanket.
For a moment, he almost looks like he wants to say something.
His eyes drift across my face, moving from my hair to my mouth.
Then something unreadable passes through them.
Just a heaviness that seems to appear from nowhere before disappearing again beneath a small smile.
He could be tired still or thinking too hard about practice.
I have spent months over-analyzing this man.
Needless to say, I’m taking a fucking break.
“You don’t have to,” I tell him seriously.
Something shifts behind his eyes again, but then he leans forward and presses a gentle kiss to my forehead, almost like I’m something fragile to savor. “Stay in bed, beautiful,” he says quietly. “I’ll go make us some coffee.”
And despite every reason I should probably be suspicious of how easy this all feels, I find myself smiling as I watch him climb out of bed.
“What are your plans today?” Parker asks me an hour later.
We’re still tangled together in bed. The sheets are half-kicked off somewhere near the foot of the mattress, cold air brushing over my bare legs every time Parker shifts beneath me. His arm is wrapped tightly around my waist like he thinks I might disappear if he loosens his grip for even a second.
“Nothing,” I murmur. “Just have to work on a paper.”
“Hm.” His fingers lazily drag up the inside of my thigh before resting flat against my hip again like he wasn’t doing anything at all. “I could help.”
I glance up at him. “Yeah? Would you say you’re pretty knowledgeable about the Cold War?”
His mouth twitches. “Does it count if I was alive back then?” he snorts.
A grin spreads across my face. “I’d believe it.”
This conversation shouldn’t feel different.
We’ve had versions of it a thousand times before.
Passing each other in the kitchen. Sitting on opposite ends of the couch.
Me bothering him while he cooks dinner for me.
But now I’m stretched across his chest with his heartbeat thudding steadily beneath my cheek, and every tiny thing suddenly feels unbearably intimate.
“How the hell am I supposed to leave tomorrow?” Parker mutters quietly, taking a sip of his coffee.
Something tightens in my chest from the way he says it into my hair like he forgot to keep the thought to himself. I tilt my head up and brush my fingers through the sleep-mussed hair at the back of his head. “Retire. Become my full-time sugar daddy.”
“My contract is up at the end of the season,” he says casually, as if he’s just floating the idea past by me.
I still for a second. “Wait.” I prop myself up on his chest. “You’re actually thinking about retiring?”
“Yeah.” Parker exhales through his nose and stares up at the ceiling for a moment before looking back at me. “Been thinking about it for a while.”
The excitement hits me so fast it’s embarrassing. “Seriously?” I ask.
His hand slides up my back slowly. Thoughtlessly. “I’m so tired, Anders.”
I study his face for a second. The lines around his eyes. The exhaustion that never fully leaves him anymore. “You’d hate being retired,” I tease softly. “You can’t sit still for more than a minute.”
More than anything, retirement means Parker finally talking about a future that exists somewhere beyond hockey arenas and road trips and temporary things.
His thumb brushes the corner of my mouth. “I want to travel,” he says suddenly.
“What?”
“When the season’s over.” His gaze flickers between my eyes like he’s testing the idea out in real time. “Europe. Somewhere warm first. Then somewhere cold. I know how much you like your penguins.”
One time he walked in on me and Luca in the middle of watching a five-hour documentary about stupid fucking penguins after I had seen one at the zoo. I was probably seven or eight.
At the time, I didn’t think anything of it. But one day, the memory suddenly hit me. The memory before the good one.
Apparently, Luca—who needed to do something important for work—called Parker and asked him to take over because I didn’t want to be alone. I had a nightmare the night before and clung to my older brother like a sticky leaf for the rest of the night.
Of course it was Parker.
I blink at him. “You mean…” I smile before I can stop it. “Me too?”
Parker gives me a look. “Obviously you too.” Heat crawls into my face. “We could do Madrid,” he continues quietly. “Or Reykjavik. Fortaleza. You’d like Tokyo, I think. They have good food.”
I laugh softly. “You’re, like, serious? You would take me somewhere?”
“If you want.” There’s something almost tentative about the way he says it. Like he’s waiting for me to tell him he’s insane for imagining a future out loud.
Instead, I crawl fully into his lap. “Of course I do.”
“Yeah?” That catches him off guard enough to make him grin. “That easy? Not gonna fight me on it?” His warm hands close around my waist. The look on his face shifts softer the longer he stares at me. Dangerously soft.
“This is real,” I whisper before I can stop myself. The words hang there between us.
Parker’s expression changes immediately. I don’t know how to explain it. Something in him loosens. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “It really is.”
I run my fingers through his hair again, slower this time. I can’t stop touching him. Every part of me still feels shocked he’s letting me. “You’re so beautiful, Pet’ka,” I murmur. “I swear, every time I look at you, it’s, like this visceral reaction I get.”
He cups my cheek. “Come here,” he whispers, puckering his lips.
My lips meet his. Parker tilts his head slightly and deepens the kiss, exhaling like it’s a relief to be kissing me again. It’s slow and steady, the kind of kiss you sink into without thinking. His mouth tastes like coffee and toothpaste, which somehow feels freakishly domestic.
“You’re beautiful,” he murmurs back softly, his mouth lingering against mine all warm and unhurried.
“You’re so fucking perfect, Anders.” He pulls back a little, his mouth curling into a small grin.
I have to stop myself from immediately leaning back in and kissing him again—for the sole purpose of kissing him because I can.
“You’re different than I thought you’d be,” I admit.
“Yeah?” One eyebrow lifts. “Is that a good or bad thing?”
“Good.” I pout a little. “Just…different.”
“Different,” he repeats. His nose brushes mine. “You thought you had me all figured out?”
“I thought you’d be meaner.”
That actually makes him laugh. “Baby,” he murmurs, “I am mean.”
“Mhm. Sureee.”
“I can literally bench press you.”
“Yeah, but that doesn’t make you scary,” I snort. “And it would be sad if you couldn’t.”
“It should.” He pecks my lips.
“It doesn’t.” I give him a peck back.
His gaze darkens slightly at that. “You really have no survival instincts,” he mutters. The shift in his voice sends heat curling low in my stomach.
“Why?” I whisper.
“Because you keep looking at me like that.” His hand slides down my spine slowly before settling at the base of it.
I swallow hard. Parker studies my face for another second before his expression turns subtly amused. “What?” he asks.
“Nothing.”
“No lying.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re just…” I shake my head once. “Way more gone over me than you pretended to be.”
His expression turns unreadable for half a second. Then he grabs my ass hard enough to make me yelp. “Don’t get cocky,” he mutters. “I’d say I’m gone over you a very normal amount.”
“Promise?”
Something softens in his eyes. “Well, I’d never lie to you—”
“M’kay.” I throw my arms around his neck and launch myself at him, kissing him with enough urgency to steal his breath away.