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Something wild and pleased took over Zee’s face.
This wasn’t the first time he’d gone dancing with Zee. Their junior team used to go to house parties all the time or sneak into clubs after wins. Ishir had kept to the periphery sometimes, but Zee loved to pull him into the thick of it, letting him sweat his inhibitions away.
This time, though, there weren’t other teammates to act as a buffer. It was just him and Zee, an island in a sea of people.
Ishir blinked up at him as music pulsed through his chest. Everything was pink and purple and blue, glittering in Zee’s dark eyes. He couldn’t help but rake his attention across Zee’s plump lips, the high, round cut of his cheekbones, the thick, raised eyebrows as Zee grinned.
Ishir knew that face so well. Had seen it smiling and angry and in despair. Had seen it flushed and bloody and wet. Ishir had thought he’d seen every iteration, but this was new—this hunter’s focus, intense in a way Ishir didn’t understand.
Ishir closed his eyes. Let the rhythm in the air take him, the alcohol buzzing in his veins. He cut away any reservations that still clung, sticky on his skin.
He startled into awareness as a hand grazed his hip. He opened his eyes, sure that it would be the Alpha they’d been looking at, but it was Zee pulling him in.
The air was thick. Hot. Zee stared at him, and Ishir had no idea how to escape the grip of that gaze. He stepped closer, caught in a strange spell. His hands came up, arms draping over Zee’s shoulders.
Just like that, they fit together. Zee was taller than him only by an inch or two, but he was broader, enveloping Ishir, walling off the rest of the world. Sweat beaded on his neck, his temple, the heat building from inside him.
He let it happen. It was too fantastical to process further. The clutch of Zee’s hands on his hips, the way the Alpha scent of him filled Ishir’s head—it was all part of a fantasy brought to life. The Cinderella enchantment would break in the morning, and everything would return to normal.
Ishir had no idea how many songs passed, one beat melting into the next. He’d completely forgotten about the guy they were supposed to be scoping out until Zee surprised him by manoeuvring him so his back was pressed to Zee’s front, exposing him to the rest of the world.
There, just a few paces away, was the Alpha Zee had chosen for him. Ishir was caught between the body of his best friend and the interested gaze of that stranger.
“Yeah?” Zee murmured in his ear, more breath than sound.
Ishir nodded and felt Zee’s smile on the skin of his neck. He didn’t know if Zee signalled him or if their intentions were just obvious, but the Alpha stepped forwards.
Suddenly, Ishir was caught between two Alphas, so overheated he couldn’t string a single thought together.
The Alpha raised an eyebrow, questioning, and Ishir grazed his fingertips across the guy’s chest, his side, an invitation.
They began to move. All three of them unearthed some hidden tempo, a three-headed beast under the same spell. Ishir’s eyes fluttered closed when the Alpha cupped his cheek and bent down, kissing him.
All he could think of as a tongue licked into his mouth was that Zee was right behind him, seeing it all, feeling Ishir go pliant and needy, neck exposed. Could he hear the moan that slipped from his throat? Did he know it was forhim?
The Alpha tried to pull him in closer, but Zee’s hands on Ishir’s hips tightened, fingers slipping under his shirt, gripping possessively. Ishir couldn’t breathe, breaking the kiss, but before he could do anything else, the warmth against his back disappeared.
“What—” Ishir croaked, confused. He turned his head to see Zee giving him a nod and then disappearing into the waves and foam of the crowd like it was nothing.
“Everything okay?” the Alpha asked.
“Yeah,” Ishir said, shaking his head. This had been the plan all along. There was no reason to feel so disoriented.
So bereft.
He let the Alpha draw him in, sinking into another kiss, but all he could think about was Zee.
CHAPTER FOUR
Ishir tried to put it out of his mind, aided by the whirlwind of hockey games and practice and hanging out with the rest of the team.
Their sheer compatibility on the ice easily masked the friction building between Ishir and Zee. It wasn’t just that the Cats were winning far more than they were losing; it was howfunplaying was. Not that being Bergy’s partner had been a chore, but it was electric with Zee. Even blind passes would connect, as if Ishir could sense exactly where Zee was—a scent in the air, a scrape of the ice.
The crowd at the Brooklyn arena was eating it up, filling the space with chants and roars. “Go, Cats, go! Go, Cats, go!”The booming mantra pulsed like a living thing as Ishir raced towards the opponent’s goal, skates cutting grooves beneath him. The Baltimore Beasts were a divisional rival, and he could taste the blood of past battles in his mouth, the combined desperation to win.
Like a self-fulfilling prophecy, the Beasts earned their name by being brutal hitters. Ishir had been crunched into the boards several times already, but adrenaline was keeping the soreness of his body at bay.
Ishir wove through the middle of the neutral zone, tapping the puck to Orion as they crossed the blue line onto the Beasts’ side. Orion scrambled to avoid getting his stick swept from under him, puck sliding against the ice shavings clumped to the boards and then wrestled out just in time, a clean pass to Corona, to Ishir.
