Jordy said something to the guy on his right, who was just as big as Jordy if not bigger, laughed, and then smoothly glided in their direction. He stopped opposite Kaira and tapped the glass with one gloved hand. Kaira grinned and put her hand on the same spot. For a moment, they made faces at each other and stared adoringly.
God, Rowan was going to die from the cuteness.
Then the guy from before arrived at Jordy’s side and bent over to pull a face for Kaira, who cried, “Uncle Sully!”
A few other fans were scattered about, and some of the adults murmured, their attention caught by Kaira’s outburst. Some of the kids who were lined up around the boards trying to get a closer view drifted nearer, clearly wanting to join the fun.
But Jordy and Sully had jobs to do, so after pulling a few more silly faces, they both waved goodbye and skated off to do…
Something that looked like it should involve a partner. Rowan’s ears burned as he watched Jordy stretch low to the ice, his thighs spread wide, and tilt his hips. Rowan was pretty familiar with that position.
He didn’t know how he felt about Jordy doingthatin front of strangers.
Fortunately, it only lasted a few minutes before the stretching gave way to something less pornographic.
“Rowan,” Kaira called, and he gave in to the temptation to join her at the glass. She rested her head against him and kept her eyes on the ice. After a few minutes, she asked to be picked up, so Rowan settled her on a hip and they watched together, Kaira chattering about what was happening on the ice—who she saw and what they were doing.
He was so busy watching her face as she explained about goalies that he didn’t see Jordy’s approach until Kaira cried out and the glass was suddenly sprayed with snow. Rowan jumped and Kaira shrieked with laughter. On the other side of the glass, Jordy laughed. Apparently hard stops could shave up ice and throw it high enough to spray a grown man in the face—at least if one didn’t have the protection of the plexiglass. Rowan narrowed his eyes at Jordy and pouted. “Not funny,” he said, enunciating slowly so Jordy could read his lips.
Jordy kept grinning. “Very funny,” he said back. Then he blew Kaira a kiss and skated backward several meters.
Kaira blew a kiss back and waved. “Bye, Daddy!”
There went any hope of staying incognito. Not that they were trying, Rowan reflected as he thought about Kaira’s jersey. Jordy waved once more, turned, and slipped off the ice.
“So, poppet, what next?”
What nextwas three hours of—well. Nottorture. Kaira’s not-so-secret identity was definitely out, though, which meant people were looking at Rowan and wondering where they knew his face from, and Rowan was remembering that approximately a hundred lifetimes ago he’d been Jordy’s fake date at a fancy party and the internet had found out about it.
Maybe he’d escape without anyone putting two and two together. After all, how many people cared about hockey games that didn’t even count for anything?
He did his best to put it out of his mind and concentrate on the game and on keeping Kaira from falling off her chair, which she kept trying to stand on to get a better view. Rowan couldn’t help but think that while their seats were perfect for warmups, he might have liked the relative safety of box seats for the game itself.
And in the box seats, no one would wonder who Rowan was to Jordy or what he was doing here with Jordy’s kid.
No one except Rowan, anyway.
Meanwhile, Rowan was experiencing the lure of hockey for the first time.
If anyone had asked, he would have said he was a pacifist. The closest he’d ever come to committing physical violence was accidentally clotheslining someone in ultimate Frisbee. Heshouldbe appalled at the entire concept of checking.
Unfortunately, watching Jordy crush people into the boards and take the little rubber thingy away woke the caveman that slept in every human person’s brain, dosed him with Ecstasy, and set him loose on Rowan’s imagination with an industrial-size bottle of lube.
Thank God he and Jordy were already sleeping together or he might’ve had a stroke.
The players left the ice after an hour or so, and Rowan might’ve thought the game was over, except the Jumbotron indicated that they had only finished the first of three periods, and now there was an intermission. Anyone who’d spent more than five minutes with kids knew what that meant.
“Bathroom break?” He could certainly navigate his way to a restroom, but… then what? Gods, would he be forced to wait outside the ladies’ room for her? He could handle that in a mall, but there were, what, ten thousand people here? How did Jordy do this?
Of course, if Jordy took her to the arena, he could probably find her a private bathroom so he never had to let her out of his sight.
Rowan was debating his next move when Jessica appeared as if by magic. “Let me show you the VIP restrooms,” she said. “And then we’ll get you some dinner.”
Thank you, Jordy, Rowan thought. Maybe next time they did this, he’d think to ask about the logistics first.
But then his thought train screeched to a halt. Because what did he mean,next time? Jordy was already looking for a new nanny. Rowan had seen the printed-out résumés, annotated in Jordy’s haphazard professional athlete handwriting, on the end of the kitchen counter yesterday. Not a moment too soon either—with the regular season starting in just over a week, Jordy would be gone half the time. And Rowan had to work too, at his real job that he actually liked that had benefits and a pension and everything.
Even if he did miss getting to spend almost every day with Kaira. And he’d miss it more in the future, when Jordy hired a real nanny.
