Until a hand lands on my shoulder and my anxiety shoots through the roof. The shriek that escapes me as I open my eyes and yank free is high-pitched enough to shatter glass.
“Oops,” Dáithí says. “Didn’t mean to scare you.” He sounds sincere, but he’s grinning, the jerk.
“I could learn to hate you,” I threaten. Now that I’m getting my breathing back under control, my sense of humor is asserting itself.
He laughs and claps me on the shoulder. “So you say, but nobody’s done it yet. I’m universally adored.” He glances over his shoulder. “Right, Eoin?”
I follow his gaze and see Eoin detaching himself from a group a few yards away. There’s Jared, giving me a smile and a wave, and his boyfriend, who’s the freaking king of the elves. I’ve met him twice before in passing and he seems nice in a hot daddy, “I bear the weight of the world on my shoulders” kind of way.
My eyes drift past the king to a man standing a little behind him, his back to us all, a phone held to his ear, and the tingle of hormonal heat begins to thrum through me. I normally need to see a man’s face to find him attractive, but not when he’s got a back—and backside—likethat, all long and lean and shapely in the right places. And thathair… The dark mass of it has been pulled forward over his shoulder, but enough has escaped for me to see that it’s wavy and?—
Wait.
Wait.
I know that hair. I’vedreamedof that hair, of tangling my hands in it, of it falling around my face like a curtain while its owner plows me like a field. That’s Ari’s hair.
Which means…
I grab Dáithí’s forearm.
“Ow! What the fuck, Felix?”
“Is that Ari?” I hiss, still unable to take my eyes off his back. Please let me be wrong. Please let it be a stranger I can actually approach and invite back to my place for some hormone-satisfying, head-banging exercise.
Dáithí and Eoin both turn. “Of course that’s Ari. Why would you ask that? You know what Ari looks like.” Dáithí’s gaze meets mine and widens. “Oh.”
Heat races up my body and into my face, and I swallow hard. “I’ve never seen him dressed so casually before,” I mumble, asthough that’s an excuse. It’s true—even when he came to training camp, Ari always wore business casual attire. I’ve never seen him in anything more casual than slacks and a business shirt.
I’ve certainly never seen him in worn denim that hugs his ass and thighs like it was molded around them and a faded T-shirt that’s been washed one too many times and clings to his broad shoulders.
Not until now, anyway.
I clear my throat. This is bad—how am I going to get through a whole hockey game with him looking like that? How am I going to intelligently explain the game to him with himlooking like that?
How am I going to survive him turning around and giving me the frontal view?
“This is fine,” Dáithí says reassuringly. “It’s going to be fine.”
“Huh? I don’t understand,” Eoin says. “What’s going to be fine?”
I hold back a whimper, shifting my weight in an attempt to take some pressure off my crotch. I need to adjust myself, but the last thing I want is Eoin to think I’m some kind of creep. I’m trying to make more friends, not lose the few I’ve managed to make already.
Dáithí raises a brow at me and tips his head toward his boyfriend. It takes me a second to understand that he’s asking for permission to tell him about my situation. That’s sweet.
“It’s not exactly a secret. Go for it.” Anything that might win me some sympathy and allies right now.
“Shifters have two puberties,” Dáithí explains quickly. “Felix is in the middle of the second one. It’s called reproductive puberty and it makes him emotionally volatile and horny.”
Well, that’s a nice, succinct way to explain it.
Eoin’s jaw drops, and he blinks a few times. “That sounds… inconvenient. Hold on, are you saying thatAriis making him horny?” He transfers his gaze to me. “Ari?”
Could this be any more humiliating? “Right now, yes,” I admit. “But that doesn’t mean much. The day before yesterday was sunny, and I could smell someone’s sunscreen, and that reminded me of this guy I met on vacation once, and…” I shrug, like getting hard and achy over the scent memory of a stranger I fucked one time years ago is common.
Oh no. Ari’s finished his phone call and isturning around.
“Is that why you play so aggressively?” Eoin asks in the tone of someone who’s just had a revelation, but I’m no longer listening. I was right about the frontal view of those jeans being the thing that might kill me.
