Page 83 of Ice Dance

“Just a tiny bit.”

I heard his sigh. “I’m going back to sleep.”

“Wait, don’t . . . I wanted to say . . .”

“Yes?”

There was so much, all of it stuffed in my heart. I wanted to tell him I couldn’t have skated like I had today without him. I wanted to say that he wasn’t anything like what people had told me he’d be, that he should open up more, and then the press wouldn’t fill the vacuum his silence made with stupid gossip about him. I wanted to tell him I wished he was here, with me.

“Are you still there?” he asked.

I wanted to tell him his voice was delicious.

“So uh, I’m here, but you’re not, and I wanted to tell you it sucks that you’re not.” That wasn’t what I wanted to say at all, and I wasn’t sure the words had come out in the right order, but they were out there.

“Do you need help getting home?”

I snickered. “It’s sweet how you take care of me.”

“I’m protecting my investment.”

I wasn’t sure I believed him. I hadn’t missed how he’d been looking out for me in small ways. Making sure I ate, reminding me what was next on our schedules, checking in when he didn’t have to. Maybe that was all business, but I’d also had his hands and mouth on the most intimate parts of me, and that wasn’t about the dancing.

“You should go home,” he said. “We have a flight to catch tonight.”

Right, going back to the UK to start the next phase of our training. I downed the last of my drink and stumbled against the wall. “I wish you were here.” I mumbled it, and wasn’t sure the words had come out right.

“Good night, Navarro.”

“Yeah, okay⁠—”

He’d ended the call.

I stumbled into a taxi after that, and instead of giving the driver my home address, I gave him Hasegawa’s hotel. Fifteen minutes later, I staggered out of the hotel elevator. I hadn’t really thought it through, especially what would happen if he didn’t answer. But I wasn’t really thinking about much, just that I’d spent the last few hours missing him.

He answered the door looking sleep bedraggled and messy, and exactly how I liked him.

“Hi.” I flapped a hand.

He sighed, like he had on the phone. “You’d better come in.”

His lips had flattened into their disapproving line. It used to happen a lot, but not so much lately. I stumbled in, missing a step that had to be something to do with a wrinkle in this very fine five-star hotel carpet and nothing to do with the number of drinks I’d consumed. When I came into the bed area, passing a little couch, he handed over a bottle of water.

“Drink.”

I twisted off the top and took a few glugs.

His bed was all messed up. He’d obviously been sleeping. Alone. Which I really wanted to fix. But his scowl wasn’t the friendly kind, and my great idea to show up and romance the fuck out of him had lost its momentum.

I dropped onto the two-seater couch, ignored my complaining hip, and flopped my head back. “We fucking nailed it today.”

“Yes, we did.” He came around into my sightline and leaned against the table. With my head flopped back, I got a look at him from my upside-down angle. Was he smiling or frowning?

“I suggest you stay here for the rest of the night,” he said. “I can’t let you go home alone like this. I’m surprised your friends let you leave without supervision.”

“My friends do not like you all that much.”

“I’m not surprised.”