Page 105 of Two for Roughing

“What?”

Did Damir not know this? Had he somehow missed Kilian’s utter lack of experience?

“Yeah? I mean, obviously I didn’t know shit when I showed up at your hotel room last year, and afterward, it was all hookups in club bathrooms or whatever.” To avoid totally humiliating himself, Kilian elected not to admit that, during those encounters, he’d always been so desperate to get fucked that he hadn’t pushed to include other acts. “You have to have noticed how bad I am at giving blow jobs.”

Damir rubbed at the back of his neck. “I, um…I…did not. But then why… I mean, you don’t want me.”

Kilian had to laugh. “I think it’s been more than obvious that I really, really do, dude.”

“Don’t call me dude.”

Kilian paused, taken aback. He’d heard Damir sound grumpy, even annoyed, but never hurt. “Damir, why do you think I don’t want you?”

“You said we had to stop once we were teammates.”

“Well, yeah, I thought you’d want some boundaries?” It was the smart, adult thing to do, and he’d figured Damir would be pleased he didn’t have to make all the hard decisions. “Anyway, I immediately fucked up with the phone sex, and over break, we…you know.”

“But your teammates—your captain—were doing the same thing in San Francisco, so clearly, you don’t want to be with me.”

Kilian blinked. “Uh, well, Jax and Tom are living together. It’s different.”

Damir raised his thick, dark eyebrows. “Are we not living together?”

“Point.” Kilian bit his lip. “But we’ve been pretty casual. To be honest, I already liked you a lot before I came here, and all the cooking for me and everything we did over the break didn’t help me get over it. You don’t want me falling for you or anything.” He forced a nervous laugh.

A frown line drew tight between Damir’s eyebrows. “I don’t want you— Of course I want you to fall for me!”

Kilian’s mouth dropped open.

“You think I spent hours making chebureki from scratch for Ketchup when he moved in? You think I went and groveled to the best figure skater in Chicago because Fuller needs to work on his edges?”

“Okay, but he so does,” Kilian interjected.

“Not the point,” Damir bit out. “I do things for you because I like you, and I want you to stick around. And I know I shouldn’t tell you to stop drinking or have less fun, but I just…worry.”

“Oh.” Kilian licked his lips. “Wait, okay, to be crystal clear, you want to do things for me in a boyfriend way and not in a ‘this annoying rookie can’t handle life by himself’ way?”

“You can handle life fine.” Damir pursed his lips, just a little prissy, just the way Kilian loved him. “I don’t want you to have to do it by yourself.”

Kilian launched himself at Damir, forgetting he wasn’t that much shorter and lighter. Damir hit the brick wall with an “Oof,” which Kilian immediately muffled with his mouth on Damir’s.

Some indeterminate amount of time later, when Kilian’s neck burned red and raw from Damir’s unshaved upper lip, and Damir’s shirt was rucked up where Kilian’s hands traced all over the soft skin of his lower belly, Damir pulled away.

“I really am sorry about how I treated you our first time,” he said.

“Did you miss the part where you made me come untouched?” Kilian asked. “I wasn’t lying when I said it was perfect for me.”

Damir shook his head, a rueful smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “I should have been more careful with you. Later as well. And I’m sorry about tonight.”

“I promise I don’t want to do anything harder than, like, a weed gummy.” Kilian pecked him on the cheek. “And I’m not looking to get wasted at team functions. Been there, done that, regretted it for weeks.”

Damir still looked troubled. Kilian wrapped his arms tighter around Damir’s middle and made a questioning noise.

“I don’t want to make you miss out on anything,” Damir admitted. “You’re younger than me—”

“Six years. There’s hockey players married to women with twice the age difference.”

“Not a model I strive to emulate.”