Page 35 of Play Dirty

No one laughed now, though. No one said anything. Eventually he turned and hurried back to his team, which had suddenly found a reason to start boarding the bus again.

Ares didn’t follow him. He didn’t even turn, to watch them leave.

He just stood there for a second, breathing steadily. Like nothing he’d just done had required any effort at all.

Honestly, it made me a little… well…

He spotted the keys, and bent to pick them up. Then he walked over, and stopped just close enough to hand them to me.

“You alright?”

I nodded as I took them. My fingers brushed his.

They were warm. Too warm.

“Thanks,” I muttered.

It came out quieter than I meant it to. The cold had seized me again, infiltrating my coat and sending all new shivers through my body.

Ares watched me shudder for a moment. Snow had started falling now; tiny flakes, but many of them. I watched as they swirled lazily down around him.

Then he exhaled a quiet breath, shaking his head slightly.

“You might be an asshole, Spreadsheet,” he said.

His words were flat and familiar, with something else, just beneath. He shifted his weight, turning away.

“But you’re our asshole.”

And then he was gone, just like that. Moving powerfully in the direction of the rink, like nothing had happened.

The chugging of the bus’s engine faded into the distance, leaving me alone with the cold and wind. I still had my keys in my hand as I stood there, processing.

Not the hit. Not the guy.

Him. Ares.

I’d known he didn’t like me. That fact hadn’t changed at all.

But that— the thing that just happened?

That wasn’t nothing.

I finally bent to pull my car door open, wincing as it creaked. I slid inside, slammed the door, and tried shutting out the cold. Or at least, as much of it as I could.

But sitting there, my fingers gripping the steering wheel, I took a few seconds before starting the car.

No, Ares still hated me. That much was clear.

But apparently, he didn’t hate me enough to let someone else touch me.

And somehow… that meant something.

~ 14 ~

HAVEN

I didn’t just wake up shivering, I was shaking all over.