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Beckett picked up after a couple of rings.
“I didn’t wake you, did I?” I asked.
“Nah,” he said sleepily. “I’ve been up for a few hours.”
“Where are you? At the hospital?” I asked.
Beckett cleared his throat. “No. Uncle Nate’s apartment, actually.”
“How is he? Did you see him?” I pressed on with the questions before I could control myself.
Beckett inhaled through his nose. “Not the best, to be honest. Mentally, I mean. He’s very bitter. But can you blame him? His career is as good as done.”
I couldn’t recall his exact age, but Nate was Beckett’s father’s younger brother. He might have been thirty-seven or -eight. I doubted he’d blown out forty candles. And even so, he was pushing it with how long he could keep playing professionally. Most hockey players in the NHL retired in their thirties, although it wasn’t unheard of that players played a game or a few after turning forty. I also knew that Nate had been flirting with the idea of retiring for some time, especially because the press had suspected it was his time and the questions about his retirement plans had been steadily increasing in the past two years. I had watched it happen in real-time with Beckett. “And his injury? Aside from hockey, will he be alright?”
“He will. As good as you can hope, I guess,” Beckett replied in an exhausted voice. I hated that he was stuck in this position. If there was only something I could do to help…
“And you?” I asked.
Beckett was silent for a moment. His voice sounded better, more refreshed when he replied, “I’ve got Caden with me.” That meant everything was fine. Caden would know how to handle Beckett’s moods in these stressful times and how to keep him focused on the positives. The two had had a bumpy ride early on, but their relationship had blossomed into something as strong as steel. “How are things there? Where are you, even?”
I snorted. “I’m holed up with Asher at the lake house.”
“Just the two of you?” Beckett asked, mock concerned. “Hide the knives, buddy.”
“Ah, I think I’ll be fine,” I said. “I don’t want to keep you, Beck. I just wanted to check in and see if you needed anything.”
He thanked me although I did nothing at all to help him. A few idle words later, I decided he was better off taking a nap before the hospital visit and then returned inside.
I washed the bowl and the fork, then unloaded the clean dishes from the dishwasher. While lost in my thoughts, I didn’t hear his footsteps. Turning around, I froze. Asher stood still in the kitchen, watching me. His lips were slightly parted, his eyes big, and his hair messy from sleeping. He was easily the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, but I pursed my lips before grunting a good morning. My throat was dry all of a sudden. It helped me none that Asher had decided to come down in his briefs and nothing else whatsoever.
“Sorry I scared you,” he muttered. “I thought you were still sleeping.”
I decided not to point out it was already half past seven. “Coffee?”
“Mm.” He lingered a moment longer. His torso was all etched with definition. His abs led down with a pronounced V line that hid inside his small underwear. I didn’t look any lower, although I knew his legs were practically hairless and his thighs strong. I knew his calves were just as defined as the rest of him but also as lithe. He combined his slenderness and his definition like Adonis. Asher rolled his round shoulders, his chest stretching, and turned away. “I’ll get dressed.”
Don’t, I thought. “Sure,” I murmured instead.
I didn’t breathe. I didn’t even blink. The back panel of his black briefs was pulled slightly toward the middle and the seams of the leg openings were lifted over his smooth, round ass. It wasn’t anything wild, but that inch of flesh I rarely saw was enough to make my brain spin and my heart pound out of my chest.
The small of his back was dented between the long extended muscles and the thick curve of his ass. The one-inch waistband with the brand name’s silver lettering hung low on his hips, giving me a lot to daydream about. But it was the strength and broadness of his upper back that truly took my breath away. He had gone from a small and slender twink to a serious athlete in the years since I’d met him. It was hard to erase the old image of him and accept that he had transformed so much.
Perhaps it wasn’t only his body that I still saw that way. Perhaps I truly ignored the fact that he had matured. My advice and so-called lectures wouldn’t be welcome if I spoke to him like he was an irresponsible child.
Asher disappeared around the corner and I heard his thumping footsteps up the stairs and then down again. He returned with a pair of shorts hanging low from his waist and a T-shirt that he was just pulling over his head. It gave me one last look at his tight abdomen before he let the T-shirt drop. His arms were my next fascination now that the rest of him was covered. His bulging biceps couldn’t match mine, but they didn’t need to. His beauty wasn’t in brute force and raw strength.
I poured two mugs full of freshly brewed coffee and pushed one to him. “A peace offering,” I said softly, although that was a hard thing to pull off in my voice. It was naturally rough.
“Truce it is,” Asher said with a nod.
We lifted our mugs simultaneously and brought them to our lips. My gaze darted from the rim of my mug to Asher and I found him looking at me. The brilliant mossy green of his eyes held my gaze for a heartbeat and then another.
I swallowed my sip and looked down as I set my mug on the island’s counter. “I think we should start over.”
Asher thought about it for a time. “If that means you’re redoing last night’s pasta, I vote in favor.”
“If that’s what you want to do, I’m sure I can whip it up again.” If he was teasing me, it flew over my head. I decided that reading too much into it was most of our problems. “But I was thinking something more along the lines of trying from the beginning. All the way back.”
