Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Lila
I know it was stupid to be floating on air, but that’s how I felt. For like…days.
Kardok had held my hand at the ballet, and if I closed my eyes, I was back there in the darkness, his warm hand cradling mine as we breathed in tandem and watched the beauty unfold before us.
At one point in the second act, I’d begun to cry.
They were silent tears, me being overwhelmed by the dancer’s emotions and grace…but Kardok was there. He carefully put his arm around my shoulders, pulling me against him, as he cradled my hand in his other. I’d been warm and safe and comforted.
My heart still hadn’t recovered.
I told myself it was just a case of a partner offering friendship. He was a hockey player attending a ballet, for goodness’ sake! Of course that was only because he wanted this exhibition to be a success, not because he had any strong feelings for me.
Right?
But a traitorous part of me whispered dreams that I should probably ignore.
It was bad enough that I had the hots for my pairs partner, bad enough that my stupid libido couldn’t control itself around him…I didn’t need to get my heart involved.
Unfortunately, despite my years of discipline, this was one area where I seemed to be fighting a losing battle.
I spent the next week working on the plans for the charity gala—I’d shifted a few other projects aside—and in communication with Maddie.
A major online sports site had done a positive write-up about the exhibition which, in my opinion, still didn’t forgive them for the way they’d torn Kardok apart for setting up the Crushers’ power play in that last game, but it had really boosted our ticket sales.
Yeah, my hours were full of logistics and being charming and saying all the right things to make this event a success…and then, each afternoon, I stepped onto the ice and turned to total goo.
Oh, it’s not like my years of training had let me down; Joshua was clear I still had enough skill to pull this off. But being held by Kardok as we glided across the ice?
It was like a dream come true, and I felt as if I was floating through life.
But the problem with floating, of course, was that eventually you had to land.
In our case, landing looked like Joshua clapping his hands together on Thursday and announcing that it was time to work on the approach for the overhead lift.
“Lila, you’re not committing! We’re going to do it again and again until you’re comfortable.”
Oh, drat.
I’d known this was coming. I’d been dreading this coming, in the specific way you dread something you know is your own fault and can’t blame on anyone else.
The overhead lift itself was not the problem.
We’d done it dozens of times by now—in my living room, at the complex, on the ice with Joshua watching.
Kardok could catch me out of the air with an ease that made me catch my breath each time, long after I’d stopped being surprised by the steadiness of his hands.
The approach was another matter.
“From the blue line,” Joshua called, skating backward toward the boards. “Full speed, Lila. Kardok, center ice, wherever feels natural.”
Kardok skated to his position and turned to face me, planting himself with that stillness he had—all that coiled power, waiting. His expression was neutral. Patient.
It had been patient the first time.
And the sixth.
He’d been patient every single time I’d screwed this up.
I took a breath, pushed off, built speed across the ice toward him and then—
In the moment I should already be in the air, I pulled back again.
Just before the jump, I slowed, so that the lift was…well, it was weaker than it should have been. Kardok was an orc, so it would never be weak…but he had to compensate with his strength rather than my momentum.
It worked, but it was wrong. And we both knew it.
Kardok set me down and said nothing, which was somehow worse.
“I know,” I said.
“You keep doing the same thing,” he said, not unkindly but very directly. “You slow down. Every time.”
“I know.” I pushed my hair back from my face. “I’m working on it.”
“You’re not trusting the catch.” He crossed his arms. “You’re trying to control the landing before you’ve even left the ice.
I could feel the irritation gnawing at my insides as I pushed myself backward. “I’m used to being in control.”
To my surprise, he left his spot, then came to me slowly. “What did you do with your other partners?”
I winced and watched his eyes widen slightly. “You tried to control them?”
“No! I’m just…”
Embarrassed now, I turned away from him, trying to make it back to the blue line. “Let’s try it again.”
When I reached my starting spot, I turned back to see that Kardok had returned to his spot in the center, waiting. Patiently.
I tamped down that rogue thought from earlier, the one I’d hidden.
My other partners were figure skaters. Experienced.
I took a deep breath and launched into motion, throwing myself across the ice. I tried to think of myself as a projectile, loosed from a sling or something, heading straight for Kardok.
But at the last moment, I hesitated—and then his hands were around my waist, lifting, lifting…holding.
He stood there in center ice, the same way he’d frozen in my apartment, me balanced over his head.
I glanced down at him to see him watching me.
“I’m here, Lila,” he said quietly. “I’m always here, and you can trust me to be here. You just have to commit.”
Was that the issue? I didn’t trust Kardok because he wasn’t a figure skater? That was dumb.
“Put me down,” I whispered, not recognizing my voice.
Slowly, he did, and when my feet touched the ice, I heard Joshua yell, “That was better!” but I ignored him.
I ignored everyone but Kardok, tipping my head back to look up at him.
“I’m sorry,” I finally said. “Logically, I know you’re strong, I know you’re there. I’m just used to being in control of my body, and it’s difficult to throw myself out into nothing…”
To my surprise, he nodded as if that made perfect sense. Considering it made zero sense to me, I was impressed.
“In hockey,” he said, “when you drive toward the net, you commit. You put your body where it needs to be, and you trust your read of the play, and you trust your teammates to be where you expect them to be. It’s not control, it’s part of being on a team.”
A team. Is that what we were?
He continued. “If you’re driving toward the goal and you slow down, you lose the shot.
Or worse, someone gets hurt.” His hands hadn’t left my waist, and now I felt his fingers flex against me as he dipped his head slightly.
“Princess, you have to trust me. You’re my partner, and I’ll always be there for you.
As long as you want to show up, want to fully commit… I’ll be here.”
There it was.
I thought about all the times I’d watched him from the stands, from the television, from the upper tier of the practice rink with my unread notebook clutched to my chest. The way he threw himself into every play without hesitation.
The way his teammates trusted him to protect their left flank—because he always did.
Because he’d never not been there.
He’d been doing this the whole time. Committing. Showing up. Trusting the process and trusting his people, giving up control. The PR machine and the media had him tagged as some kind of out-of-control beast, but giving up control wasn’t the same as losing control.
Kardok didn’t have to manage himself carefully, because he knew he was part of a team, and trusted the team to know what needed to be done.
Certainly, sometimes his primitive side came out in the middle of a game, but that was part of his charm, the reason the ladies loved him.
He was fallible the way anyone was fallible.
Since he was still staring down at me, I dug my fingers into his forearms, feeling the strength and courage there. “I’m sorry,” I whispered yet again.
His grin was crooked, his tusks intriguing as always. “Don’t be. It’s stupid to demand you trust me just because I say you should trust me. Joshua’s going to make us do this four hundred more times, and eventually your body will learn to trust me to be here, even if your brain doesn’t.”
I matched his grin. “Oh yeah? You know what my body needs?”
It was supposed to have been a joke, but as soon as the words were out of my mouth, I realized what they sounded like. And the way his lids lowered slightly, his grin curling up on one side…oh God, his wink?
“Probably know as well as you do, Princess.”
Was it possible he knew about my orc-shaped dildo? I felt a flood of liquid heat between my legs.
And from the way his nostrils flared, I knew he’d guessed.
Abruptly, I let go of him, pushing away, dropping my gaze to his chest, swallowing down the tomato instinct.
“Hey.”
Instinctively, I glanced up, and Kardok had removed all inuendo from his expression. Instead, he nodded encouragingly. “Only three hundred and ninety-nine times to go.”
I snorted in agreement and felt my shoulders relax.
“Just think of yourself as—” He hesitated, then shrugged.
“I was going to say a puck, but I don’t think hockey-based metaphors are working here.
Think of yourself as a weapon—an axe. You throw those, they go end-over-end, yeah?
You’re the axe, I’m the target, and you don’t want to fall flat right before you get here. ”
When he tapped his chest, I blinked.
“I’m not sure that metaphor’s any better, Kardok. I’ve never thrown an axe.”
He reared back as if I’d slapped him. “What? Really? I’m not talking about a traditional coming-of-age ceremony, Princess, I mean just one of those regular axe-throwing places. There’s one downtown, right beside my apartment building.”
I felt the laugh bubbling up inside of me. “I don’t know what you think I do in my spare time, but no, I’ve never been axe-throwing.”
His expression turned thunderous, and he pointed one long green finger at me. “I went to the ballet, Lila. It’s your turn to learn from me.”