Ramsey shot him a look. “Baby, you’re gonna hate it, and it’s okay.” He dropped his voice even more. “It was still really fucking sweet.”
“Maybe I’ll be a freaking skating genius,” Nate muttered.
That seemed unlikely, but he didn’t like how everyone—not just Ramsey, buteveryone—thought he was going to suck at this. He had good balance. Exceptional reflexes. He was a professional athlete for fuck’s sake. Maybe he wouldn’t begood, but he was at least going to hold his own.
“Sure,” Ramsey said. “And I’m gonna take the field and play wide receiver.”
“You wouldn’t be bad at it,” Nate argued loyally. Ramsey had good hands and great instincts for the field of play.
“No, I’d be fucking amazing,” Ramsey said, grinning as they headed over to a row of empty benches. “You’re an 11 right?”
“Why?”
Ramsey rolled his eyes. “I brought you skates, dummy. You don’t wanna use their cheap ass rentals.”
Oh. Yes. Skates.
Nate stared down at the pair of brand-new skates that Ramsey pulled out of his open bag. “Where did you even get these at such short notice?”
“I’m sponsored by Bauer. They love me. This face sells a lot of hockey gear, baby. Told them I needed a pair overnighted to me.”
It was surprisingly thoughtful.
“Besides,” Ramsey added with a smirk, “you’re with a hockey player now. You need skates.”
Nate almost declared this was the first and last time he was ever getting on the ice, but considering he’d actually planned thisandhe had no intention of letting Ramsey go, not anytime soon, clearly that was not going to be true.
Best to get used to it. Actually, best to getgoodat it.
“Alright,” Nate said, accepting them. “You think I should be wearing hockey skates.”
Ramsey, who’d pulled his own much more worn skates from his bag, glanced over at him. “Did you want to wear figure skates?”
“Isn’t there something else? Like something in-between?”
Ramsey burst out laughing. “Babe,no. You’ll like these. They’re good stuff. Had them sharpened at the practice rink this morning. Just enough. You should be good.” He paused. “Well. Theskatesshould be good.”
“Hey,” Nate retorted without heat.
Patting him on the leg, Ramsey turned back to his own skates, lacing them up with quick, expert motions. Nate wondered how many years he’d been doing this. He’d heard talk of some guys getting on the ice before they could walk.
Maybe a question to ask once they were on the rink and Nate needed to distract Ramsey from hownotgood he was going to be at this.
It wasn’t hard to figure out the skates. Except that Nate had just gotten the first on when Ramsey stopped him.
“No, no,” he corrected. Then sighed. He’d already gotten his skates on, unsurprisingly. “Let me.”
“What—” But before he could ask what Ramsey meant, he was standing up, as steady as if he was on his own two feet, and tucking Nate’s skate boot between his legs. Leaning down, and Nate let out a surprised yelp as Ramsey tightened the laces.
“You’re not gonna be on your edges, so you don’t need them that loose,” Ramsey said under his breath. “Tighter will be better. Trust me.”
“I do,” Nate said, realizing as he said it that of course he meant it.
Ramsey must have realized it too, because his eyes flicked up to Nate’s, big and wide and so fucking blue.
“Yeah, I do,” Nate repeated more firmly this time. “Wouldn’t be doing this otherwise.”
Thiscould mean the ice-skating. Or it could mean this whole relationship, and Nate realized that he meant both.
