When Coach Keller finally called an end to the session, I felt like I could breathe properly for the first time since I’d spotted Cody. The players skated off the ice, but my brother remained, beckoning me towards him, and I stood, making my way down from the stands to the rink.
“So, what did you think?” He glanced up at me with a grin, his face flushed with exertion. “Do we have a chance?”
“Fuck, yeah. You were all amazing, and you deserve to win this.” I stared out across the rink. “This is so different to football. If one of our players had tried some of those moves, they’d be out for the rest of the season.”
He laughed. “You should see us when we're in action, especially when we have some shit to sort with another team. This was just a friendly practice.”
“Friendly? Even Clements?” My heart rate kicked up when I said his name, and I forced myself to take several deep, steady breaths.
“Yeah. That’s just Clements being Clements. Like I said, practice is supposed to be no contact, but accidents happen. Davis can take it. Neither of them got hurt.”
“If you say so.”
He laughed again at my sceptical tone. “I’ll introduce you to them, and the rest of the guys after I’ve showered. What do you want to do tonight? I was thinking we could grab dinner somewhere, or get takeout, and catch up properly.”
“Sounds good to me.”
After practice, Brayden did as he’d promised and introduced me to a number of his teammates, but there was no sign of Cody. I wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing. Good, probably, given the impression I had of him so far.
But when we left the training facility, I caught a glimpse of him walking towards the car park, his gym bag slung over his shoulder. He’d changed into jeans and a hoodie, and I drank in my first unobscured sight of him in daylight, without his hockey gear.
Fuck me, he was gorgeous. So tense, with his shoulders set and his jaw a hard line, but fucking beautiful at the same time. That deep brown, tousled hair, lightly tanned skin, and sharp jawline covered in thick, dark stubble. Then there were the blue eyes that appeared to be ringed in black, thanks to his thick lashes.
Like I said. Fucking beautiful.
I sucked in a breath, cataloguing every inch of him. That was when I noticed the tattoos peeking out from beneath the sleeves of his hoodie, and when he turned his head, I caught a glint of metal in his ear. My breath caught in my throat as I stared at him, frozen in place.
He didn’t even spare a glance in my direction, but I could feel the tension radiating from him, even from a distance.
“Jude? You coming?”
I turned back to Brayden, forcing my mouth into a smile. “Yeah, sorry.”
I was sorry. Brayden was why I was here, after all. But as I climbed into the SUV and followed my brother’s Mercedes away from the training facility, I couldn’t get rid of the image of Cody from my mind. It wasn’t even his looks. It was the way he’d been walking across the car park, all alone. Something in my chest had tightened at the sight of him looking so tense. So isolated.
This was going to be a problem. A big fucking problem.
And I had no idea what I was going to do about it.
6
Cody
The elevator ride felt as if it was never going to end. I slumped against the mirrored wall, my gym bag heavy on my shoulder, and watched the LED display change in slow, torturous increments as I rose higher. Thirty-five. Thirty-six. Thirty-seven.
Each floor put more distance between me and the training facility. More distance between me and the moment I’d looked up into the stands and saw John—no,Jude—staring down at me with huge green eyes, shocked recognition written all over his face. With his short, styled brown hair, tanned skin, and lean soccer player’s build, combined with those bright eyes and devastating, dimpled smile, he was the kind of guy I’d take a second look at. More than a second look, if I were truthful. But it didn’t matter how hot he was. I would have given him a wide berth if I’d known then what I knew now.
Nielson’s brother. Of all the fucking people in Calgary, I’d picked Brayden fucking Nielson’s brother to stick my dick into.
The elevator finally reached my floor, and I entered my apartment, kicking off my shoes, and dumped my bag on the floor opposite the cupboards that held the washing machine anddryer. My shoulders unfurled, losing some of their tension as I stepped inside the living area.
Floor-to-ceiling windows dominated two walls of the open-plan space. Straight ahead of me, the Calgary Tower pierced the sky, surrounded by the high-rise buildings of downtown. To my left, the Calgary Bobcats stadium was the focal point among the shorter, more nondescript buildings, its gleaming roof catching the late summer sun.
Heading straight for the fridge, I grabbed a bottle of chilled water, uncapping it and taking a swig. The building’s cleaning team had been in today, leaving my apartment spotless. The white granite countertops shone, the bleached hardwood floors were dust-free, and the pillows on my slate-grey couch were plumped invitingly.
It was perfect. Just as it had been when I’d first viewed it the day I’d landed in Calgary. I’d bought it there and then, furnishings and all. It was a good investment and exactly what I needed to maintain the illusion that I had my life under control.
It was also exactly the kind of place someone with too much money and no one to rely on ended up living in. Someone with no family and no one they could truly call a friend. Someone who’d learned early on that depending on other people was a mistake. Someone whose mother had been too high to remember they existed most of the time and who never even knew who their father was. Someone who’d learned that caring about people meant giving them the power to hurt them, and who had to learn that the only person they could rely on was themselves.
