“You calling me strong?” I grin, skating backward.
“Calling you annoying,” he fires back.
I click my tongue. “Same thing.”
Logan skates past and smacks my stick with his. “Keep flirting, maybe he’ll take you to dinner.”
I smirk. “Dinners aren’t his thing. More like silence and glares.”
Laughter echoes down the ice, Coach’s whistle slicing through it a second later.
“Enough with the jokes!” Coach yells. “Back to the drill. Austin, stop chirping and lead the line.”
I raise a hand and shoot him a wink. “You got it, Coach.”
“Don’t wink at me, Rhodes.”
I shoot him another one because I like to bust his balls, but even with the laughter and fun I’m having being back on the ice, my thoughts keep drifting.
Because here’s the thing. If I tell her now, she’ll think I was using her. That I took her secrets and confessions and used them to get close to her. To get in her pants or whatever else she might concoct in that brain of hers.
And yeah, I want her. I want her bad. But not because I read her private thoughts. I want her because she’s Maisie. Because she’s stubborn and brilliant and rolls her eyes at my jokes but secretly likes them. Because she makes me feel like something more than the guy who screws up his grades and gets suspended.
And I want her to believe that.
Coach blows the whistle again, and we’re off. Sprint drills, shooting drills, 3-on-2 plays. I’m sweating and breathing hard but it feels good to move, to focus, to be back on the ice with the guys.
Practice wraps an hour later and I peel off my helmet, sweat soaking my hair, my jersey stuck to my chest. The guys are filing off toward the locker room when I see Maisie, lingering by the wall.
I skid to a stop, caught off guard. She doesn’t have practice today so what the hell is she doing here.
Screw it. I don’t care. I’m just happy to see her. I break out into a grin at the sight of her standing with her arms crossed, and her dark brown hair twisted into a bun.
I stash my skate guards and head her way.
“What are you doing here?” I ask her, running a hand through my soaked hair.
She shrugs. “Just wanted to watch you practice.”
A smile tugs at my lips, wide as fuck. “You were watching me, huh?” I tease.
She rolls her eyes, pushing at my chest. “Sue me for trying to support my boyfriend.”
Everything in me short-circuits.
My heart actually skips.
Boyfriend.
Never been called that before. Never been anyone’s boyfriend.
Maisie freezes. Her eyes go wide, mouth parting like she can’t believe the words just came out of her.
“Oh my god,” she breathes. “I—I don’t know why I said that. I didn’t mean—obviously we’re not?—”
“Yes we are.”
Her brows shoot up. “What?”
