Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 87771 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87771 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
And the Sharks would have to go home knowing they wouldn’t be playing for the championship series. They blew their chance, and I’d been the one to seal the deal.
“Fuck yeah!” I shouted as I took off my helmet and looked around, spotting the man I’d been keeping an eye on for the entire night.
I skated to Eli. He had his helmet off. His wavy curls were stuck to his forehead with sweat. His cheeks were flushed, and his smile spread from ear to ear. Out of everyone in this building—all thousands of them—his scent was the strongest. And even after playing an entire hockey game, he still smelled amazing. Notes of pine and woodsy spice with hints of soft vanilla.
He didn’t just smell great, either.
He looked like more of a prize than anything we could have won tonight.
He was my Stanley Cup. He was my Olympic gold medal.
Elijah Sager was my everything.
I wanted him to know that.
And that’s when I said something I’d been meaning to say for a while now.
“I love you, I fucking love you,” I said, holding Eli’s face in my hands and kissing him, not even giving him a chance to respond.
He did, though. His wide, shocked puppy-dog eyes blinked through his surprise before he said it back. “I love you, Gabe.” He kissed me again, the roar of the crowd surrounding us like it formed its own protective bubble. Everything melted away. I knew I loved him the moment I allowed him into my shift room. Maybe sooner—maybe if I really looked at the threads fate had used to weave our connection, I would have seen that I had fallen in love with him from the moment I first laid eyes on him.
I’d been nervous to say it out loud, though. Even if I felt it as deeply as I felt the pull of the moon on my soul, I couldn’t bring myself to say it any sooner.
I’d been scared of hearing he didn’t feel the same. That this was moving too fast. That my declaration frightened him even more than seeing me in my were form.
But none of that happened. All he did was reaffirm my feelings with his own.
Maybe it was coincidence, or maybe it was an observant DJ who wanted to make a statement, but I looked up to see that our kiss had been on the jumbotron just as “Born This Way” by Lady Gaga started playing through the arena.
“A little on the nose, huh?” I said as I kissed him again.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Post-Game Celebrations
ELI
The pack had gathered at Emmy’s house after the game. Music blasted from the speakers outside. The smell of smoky meat and buttered corn was carried with the gentle night breeze. My muscles ached, and a couple of spots were already beginning to bruise from where I got hit, but that was nothing a couple of cans of locally brewed IPA couldn’t fix. I cracked another one open and went over to the fire pit, where Gabe sat with Chris and Soren. He had changed into a pair of black shorts and a slightly oversized T-shirt with a neon green and pink television advertising MTV Spring Break—circa 1999. His sleeves were rolled up so that his biceps were in full view.
Fuck.
I wanted to lick them.
“No,” Chris said, waving a hand in the air. “No, I don’t think pineapple on pizza should ever be allowed. It’s like putting a donut on a steak. It’s just weird.”
“What do you think?” Gabe asked me as I took the seat next to him. I inched it closer to the left so that our legs were touching. It felt so fucking good not having to hide. I didn’t think something like this would ever happen, not after I learned why Gabe had been so hesitant about following his heart. His reason appeared to be insurmountable. I had been reckoning with the idea of possibly being secret boyfriends for the foreseeable future.
Clearly, I would have never made it as a fortune teller.
Thank fucking God.
“I like it,” I said.
Chris dropped his head back and put a hand on his face. “Damn, man, I trusted you.”
“Don’t you eat like raw deer when you shift?” I noted.
Chris spread his fingers open and looked through the hole. “Yes. And that’s still better than pineapple on pizza.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” I said with a laugh. My phone buzzed in my pocket. I glanced at it and saw it was from my manager, forwarding over another interview request. This one for… “Oh shit.”
“What?” Gabe asked.
“Looks like TIME magazine is asking us for an interview for their Pride issue.”
“Really?” Gabe leaned over and read the message. His bushy black brow arched. He seemed to be interested in this one. We had both agreed that keeping out of the media as much as possible would be best, considering the, uh, circumstances. But we also agreed that it was important for us to realize that there’d be people looking toward us as symbols of positivity and hope, that kids who may have loved hockey but felt like they didn’t belong because they were queer would look to us for that green light. It’d be selfish of us to completely wall ourselves off and not use our platform for good.