Page 120 of Ethan

And so far, he couldn’t say they werewrong, necessarily, but it turned out that having Hank in the seat next to him, the reassuring warmth in the bed at night, lulling him into a quick, easy sleep, made it all much more tolerable.

Nothing had changed, not really. But Hank’s proximity filled him with a continued and prolonged joy that he didn’t even know how to dim.

Probably the whole team knew now, because despite the effort, he didn’t think he’d beenthatsubtle.

Like right now, Ethan throwing himself into Hank’s arms after Hank had shot in a gorgeous puck from the blue line, slipping it right under Oettinger’s pad, tying it up two–two with only a few minutes left in the second period.

“Sick goal, babe,” Ethan yelled at him.

Hank flushed but he didn’t push him away.

And really, it wasn’tthatobvious, anyway, because Max and Charlie routinely hung all over each other even more than this, and to top it off, they’d been doing it foryears.

When Ethan returned to the bench after his shift, Danny leaned over.

“Yeah, youlovedthat,” Danny teased.

“Shut up,” Ethan retorted. “It was just good for him to tie the game.”

“Yeah, Danny, don’t you know that’s what we’re here for,” Charlie inserted. “Towin.”

“Oh, is it?” Danny asked innocently. “I must’ve gotten hockey confused with another sport. The one where you’re supposed to lose.”

Charlie rolled his eyes.

But his annoyance was nothing compared to when, late in the third, one of the Stars’ guys wouldn’t stop fucking with Ethan during his shift, and Jonas—whowasn’tthat much bigger, really; his brothers had annoyingly been right about that—made his retaliation a little too obvious, slamming Duchene into the boards with a little too much force.

The ref blew his whistle, called the penalty, and Charlie shot daggers as Ethan returned to the bench and the penalty kill team skated out.

Charlie was, not surprisingly, not on penalty kill.

He’d never been a very defensive forward, and his years in the NHL had only solidified that even more. But Max was, as well as Jonesy, Niko, and for the first time this game, Hank.

Hank had been added because the PK had been anemic lately, even with Max’s best efforts to improve it. Si, their coach, and Bauer, who ran special teams, had suggested that maybe some fresh blood would help.

What would really help, in Ethan’s too-honest opinion, was to take Niko off PK. He was going through one of his moments, often weeks long, where he couldn’t seem to do anything right.

Ethan thought that Charlie was just about to lose his shit on the guy, and sure enough, Niko totally missed the puck when Hank passed it, trying to clear it out of the Stars’ offensive zone, and Robertson stole it, passing it to Johnston, who predictably nailed it into the back of the net.

“Shit,” Charlie muttered, loud enough that Ethan could hear him, several guys down on the bench.

The game ended that way—three to two—and Ethan didn’t need Hank to tell him that he blamed himself for the play, even though it hadn’t been his fault. He was quiet and pensive, eyes downturned as they got dressed and headed towards the bus.

They were headed to the airport, and they’d be in Utah in an hour or so. At least, they had a day off tomorrow before their game against the Mammoth.

“Hey,” Ethan said to Hank as they took their seats on the plane, half an hour or so later. He’d waited—it had kinda killed him to wait—but the bus was closer and tighter than the plane, and he had a feeling that when Hankdidtalk, he wasn’t going to want to say anything any of their teammates could overhear.

Besides, Hank was an introspective guy; maybe he’d needed that time to work through the play in his head and figure out that it hadn’t been his fault. The pass itself had been solid; it was Niko who missed it.

Niko was grinning and laughing with Dom now, like they hadn’t just lost.

Like they hadn’t been right up there with one of the better teams in the league and let it slip away from them at the end of the game.

Hank glanced over at Ethan, his gaze snagging on Niko briefly. “Hey.”

“You good?”

It was so quick, if Ethan had been blinking, he’d have missed it, but he wasn’t and he didn’t miss Hank’s little frown before it smoothed out, like it had never been there at all.