Page 72 of Offside

“This is my regular face.”

“It is absolutely not your regular face. Your regular face is very composed. This face has opinions.”

He released me, stepping back, his expression returning to neutral. The line near his eye gave him away entirely. “I’ve been on skates since I was four years old,” he said. “I’ve watched a lot of people learn. You are not doing terrible, and I didn’t expect you to learn in a day anyway. But I was making sure you aren’t hurt.”

“Nothing but a pride injury here.” I grinned playfully. It really didn’t hurt when I fell, I wasn’t going more than a fraction of a mile per hour anyway.

He held out his hand again. “Come on. Try again.”

I took his hand. “If I fall again⁠—”

“I’ll catch you.”

“You say that like it’s a small thing.”

He held my gaze. “It’s not a small thing,” he said, simply, and started moving us forward again, holding both my hands while he started to skate backward again.

I kissed him. Just leaned forward the two inches it took and kissed him, and he kissed me back without hesitation, one hand coming up to my jaw, steady and warm. When my legs wobbled, he held me tighter, pulling me closer with ease since he had the home ice advantage so to speak. We stayed like that for a moment in the middle of the empty ice with the dim amber lights around us and the whole rink to ourselves.

When I pulled back I was smiling, and so was he.

“I’m probably not ever going to be good at this,” I said.

“You don’t have to be good at it.”

“Then why are we here?”

He pulled me closer into an embrace, resting his chin on the top of my head. “Because it’s mine,” he said simply, “and I wanted to share it with you.”

I pulled back and watched his expression. He smiled simply, like what he’d just said wasn’t a sentence that lands in the center of a person and stays.

I took his hand and we kept skating.

He drove me home at nine-thirty. The city had cooled down to almost pleasant and I had my window cracked and my new skates in a bag at my feet. I was thinking about what he’d said on the ice.

It’s mine. I wanted to share it with you.

Not I thought you’d enjoy it or I figured it would be fun.

I was quiet for most of the drive and he let me be, which was one of the things about him I was trying not to accumulate too many feelings about.

When he pulled up in front of my house I didn’t immediately get out.

“Do you want to come in?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Good.” I picked up my bag. “Because your present is still on.”

The expression crossing his face was suddenly dark and lustful and entirely worth keeping that information to myself until this moment.

I’d left one lamp on in the bedroom, low, and the room was warm and dim when I turned around to face him. He’d followed me in and closed the door and I had led him down the hall after taking his fingers in mine. Now he was standing a few feet away with his hands at his sides, watching me with the quiet focus usually reserved for someone who knew what they wanted was right in front of them, and they were just waiting to be allowed to have it.

I pointed to the edge of my bed. “Sit.”

“Show me,” he said. His voice was low, husky. He ran a hand through his hair then did it again a second later.

I tugged my sweater over my head. Unbuttoned my jeans, stepped out of them, and kicked them aside.