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“Ah, gee shucks, thanks.”
Davey laughs and smiles again. I make him smile. I make him laugh. Nobody else does that. But I do. He steps back to me, fully into my space, and once again those lips graze mine. I close my eyes and inhale him.
“Come to the game tonight.” Davey says. It’s just a bit shy of being a demand.
“Why?”
He has yet to leave my space. In fact, he shows no signs of doing so soon. “Because I want you to.”
That directness shoots straight into me. My cock twitches. But, even more, my heart soars.
Chapter sixteen
A rivalry with Dallas came naturally due to the Vipers being in the same division. But that rivalry turned to full-on hatred the night Wendall Stevens snapped Levi’s arm in two, altering the course of Levi’s career.
One failed surgery combined with Levi’s age ultimately made it a career-ending injury. But Levi went out in a blaze of glory on his terms, obliterating a 17-year-old record – and man was that fun to watch. Stevens? Well, Devyn predicted it. She said in ten years no one would even remember his name, if his career even lasts that long. It hasn’t. Not at the NHL level, anyway. Dallas traded him a year after that night, and he has bounced around the AHL and even ECHL ever since.
Yet the rivalry and hatred remain. Tickets for Dallas games are impossible to get and the arena is electric with excitement, as if the Stanley Cup is on the line every single time.
Levi and I stand in the owner’s box together, watching Ilya casually deflect shots during warmups.
“Hey, I didn’t know you were coming.” I hear Brady say. I don’t need to turn around to know who he had spoken to.
My lips curve into that uncontrollable smile, which lately seems to happen any time Carter is around.
He’s here.
I feel Levi’s eyes on me. He had not missed the smile, nor the reason for it. I bite my lip and wait for whatever snide remark he might have for me.
“This is a far cry from ‘keep him the fuck away from me.’”
I do my best to scowl at him.
“Obviously, you fucking failed.”
Levi laughs hard and I can only do the same.
“Nice to see your taste in men has improved,” he winks at me. My taste in men, ha. My prior choices haven’t really been men. Boys, really. Young, beautiful, petite twinks. Nothing more than hookups.
Brady, Devyn and Levi invited me over to dinner once. It was before they had come out as a throuple. I knew they had all fooled around, but Brady had been coaching in Buffalo when that happened. When he was named the Grizzlies GM and returned to Denver, the relationship became just that, a relationship.
They encouraged me to bring someone to dinner. I’m pretty sure that encouragement came from Devyn. She was still harboring some guilt at blowing our cover story. So, I found a pretty young thing and went to dinner. He blatantly hit on Levi that night. That annoyed me, but it didn’t piss me off. Because I didn’t care. I still got laid that night, but I’ve not seen that particular PYT since. He was not my taste at all. None of them have been. They’ve been the exact opposite of my taste and even Levi can see that. Carter has always been my taste though, hasn’t he?
Levi places a hand on my shoulder. “Happy looks good on you,” he adds as he steps away to greet Carter and then heads over toward the team owners.
Happy. Is that what this delightfully foreign feeling is? Happiness?
Carter greets Levi and smiles at me before he turns his attention back to his brother. He changed clothes since our date this afternoon. Was that for me? Rarely do I see him in anything other than jeans, unless we are at a funeral.
Now it’s charcoal gray trousers, pale gray turtleneck, and a black wool pea coat. And, of course, those damn glasses. My modern-day Clark Kent. My Superman. At any given moment I expect him to rip off the turtleneck to reveal the Superman uniform underneath. Which would send Devyn into a tailspin. Ours is a Marvel Universe.
His eyes catch mine for a moment. “Wow,” I mouth to him. His eyes widen in surprise. I like that I can do that. Surprise him. That makes me happy. His cheeks pink. I just made Carter Hughes blush.
Thankfully, Brady misses the exchange. Brady doesn’t usually miss much, but his mind is on the game, just as it should be. He steps away when the team owners motion for him and he joins his husband with a gentle touch to the small of Levi’s back. Such a subtle gesture, yet one filled with so much meaning. I feel slightly wistful. How nice. How nice to know someone has your back.
“Hi,” Carter says.
“Hi.”
