Page 54 of Cross Ice

We stood there for a moment. Just looked at each other.

Then Nico stepped inside, kicked the door shut behind him, and kissed me.

The kiss was desperate and hungry. His stubble scraped against mine, catching and dragging with every shift of our mouths. He tasted like mint toothpaste, and when I pulled him closer, he made a sound low in his throat that went straight through me.

“Missed you,” he murmured against my mouth.

“Missed you too.”

We kissed until I was breathless, until his hands were sliding under my shirt and I was pulling him closer by his belt loops.

When we finally broke apart to catch our breath, we were both breathing hard.

“Let me…” He stepped back and ran a hand through his hair. “Let me take off my shoes before I forget what I came here to do.”

“What else did you come here to do?”

His grin was wicked. “I’ll show you in a minute.”

He toed off his sneakers, took my hand, and pulled me toward the couch. And that’s when he saw it.

The book.

He stopped, reached down, and pulled it from the bottom of the stack. Ice Hockey for Beginners. He turned it over in his hands.

“I can explain⁠—”

“You bought a book about hockey.” His voice was quiet. Almost awed.

“I watched the Portland game Tuesday, and I didn’t understand half of what was happening. The penalties, the power plays, why everyone kept stopping…” I shook my head. “I meant to hide it before you got here.”

“Why would you hide it?”

“Because it’s embarrassing. I’m thirty-two years old reading a children’s guide to a sport.”

He looked up from the book, and his expression made my breath catch. “Evan. You bought a book about hockey because you wanted to understand my world.”

“Well, yes.”

“That’s not embarrassing.” He set it down carefully, like it was something worth being careful with. “That’s one of the best things anyone’s ever done for me.”

“It’s just a book.”

“It’s not just a book.” He crossed to me in two strides. “It’s you trying. It’s you caring enough to learn something you have zero interest in because it matters to me.”

“I might have some interest,” I admitted. “I watched three periods Wednesday without getting bored. And I cheered, apparently loud enough to concern my neighbors. I had the book by then. It helped.”

He shook his head, still smiling, like he didn’t quite know what to do with me. “Come here.” He kissed me again, slower this time, and I let myself sink into it.

Then his hands slid to my hips and pulled me flush against him, and I felt exactly how much he’d missed me.

We barely made it to the bedroom. His hands were everywhere, and mine were just as desperate, and when we finally got rid of the last of our clothes, I pulled him down onto the bed and held on while he took us both in hand. Four days. It had only been four days, and I’d missed him every single one of them.

Afterward, we lay still while we caught our breath, tangled and sweaty and in no hurry to move.

“Shower,” he said eventually, into the quiet.

“Yeah.”