Page 46 of Man Advantage

“That’s what I said.”

Cole’s jaw worked. Then he nodded, once, turned his hand over under Ford’s, and held on hard enough to hurt.

They did the dishes. Ford washed and Cole dried. Neither of them said much, and every time Ford looked over, Cole was already looking at him. Charlotte came down in her pajamas and made Cole check her spelling words. She got four out of five and went up without arguing. Ford read her the dog book. When he came out of her room, Cole was standing in the hall outside their door with his arms crossed, waiting, like he’d been there a while.

“Come here,” Ford said.

He pulled Cole inside and shut the door and laid his hands on him. Not fast. He worked Cole’s shirt up and off and stood there a minute with his palms flat on Cole’s chest, feeling it go up and down. Cole’s hands came up and undid Ford’s buttons one at a time, slow, eyes on his fingers, and pushed the shirt off his shoulders.

They stood there in the lamplight with nothing between them.

Ford ran his hands up Cole’s sides, over his ribs, up to his face. He held it. Cole’s eyes closed.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Ford said.

“You don’t know that.”

“I know you’re not going anywhere tonight.”

He steered Cole into bed, got in after him, and pulled him in, chest to back, one arm wrapped around him. Cole was tense the whole length of him. Ford pressed his mouth against the back of his neck and stayed there. After a while, he felt Cole start to let go, one piece at a time. The shoulders first. Then the hands. Then the long breath that meant he was nearly under.

The words were right there. Ford could feel them in his throat. I want to keep you. All of it. The whole thing. Tomorrow, he’d told himself Wednesday night, with a hallway between them. Now there was no wall. There was Cole’s back against his chest and a kid down the hall who’d asked her one question and gone to bed satisfied.

He opened his mouth.

Cole’s breathing had gone slow and even against his arm. Asleep. Somewhere in the last minute, with the words still on their way up, he’d gone under.

Ford lay there in the dark with his mouth against the back of Cole’s neck and the whole thing still in his throat.

Tomorrow, he told himself, just like he had on Wednesday.

SEVENTEEN

Ford went down in the second period, and Cole was twenty feet away when he did.

Nothing was happening. The Stags were up two, and Cedar Rapids had quit on the night. Cole was standing at the top of the circle watching a forward come in low off the boards with nowhere to go. The forward threw it at the net, looking for a stick or a skate. He got one. The puck came off a shin pad and squirted across the crease to their winger on the far post, who had nobody on him.

Ford pushed to get across. He made that push forty times a night. Cole had watched him make it in warm-ups an hour ago.

The push came up short.

A goalie goes down on purpose, already looking for the rebound. Ford went down like the ice had come out from under him. The winger’s shot rang off the far post and into the corner. The whistle blew. Ford was on his side with his head down.

He stayed down.

The Forum went quiet, ten thousand people all at once, and in the quiet, Cole heard his own skates as he turned.

Riggs got there first and crouched with a hand on Ford’s shoulder. Carter came in hard from the blue line. Cole stopped a stick length off and looked down at the back of Ford’s helmet. His mouth had gone dry as paper.

Ford shook the catcher off his left hand. He set the bare palm flat on the ice and pushed. His skate scraped once, looking for an edge and not finding it, and he came back down on his hip.

Cole took a stride in. His glove was off his stick and halfway to Ford’s back before he pulled it down and closed his fist around the shaft until his knuckles ached. Riggs could have a hand on Ford’s shoulder. Cole stood there with his heart slamming in his throat and did not touch him.

“Cally,” Riggs said. “Talk to me.”

“Second.” Ford’s voice came up muffled off the ice. “Give me a second.”

Theo came across from the bench in his shoes, flat-footed and quick with his kit in one hand, and got down on one knee at Ford’s head. He said something Cole couldn’t hear. Ford said something back. Theo’s hand went to the outside of Ford’s thigh and pressed. Ford’s whole body went rigid. Theo took his hand away.