HOTSHOT

LANE HAYES

Copyright © 2024 by Lane Hayes

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

This book is a work of fiction. Places, names, characters and events are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, or persons, living or deceased, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

Cover Design by Sleepy Fox Studio

Cover content is for illustrative purposes only. Any person depicted on the cover is a model.

Editing by Flat Earth - Hope Vincent

Proof Editing - Lyrical Lines, Mildred Jordan

The rookie superstar, the desperate cowboy, and a naughty proposition…

Denny

The press calls me this year’s hotshot, the rookie who scores at will and conjures plays out of thin air. Truth is…I’m a PR nightmare. Seriously. Ask my agent.

My anxiety is off the charts. I can’t talk to the media without breaking into a cold sweat, but once I get through the season, I can regroup at home. Life is simpler in Vermont.

Well, not anymore. There’s a new cowboy in town. Literally, a cowboy. At least, Hank looks like one—he owns a horse, wears a hat, and did I mention he’s hot?

And get this…he has a proposition for me.

Hank

Proposition is a strong word. I prefer to call this a mutually beneficial arrangement. See, I could use Denny’s help with a family business venture, and though I was planning to offer cash, the jock has a sexier idea.

Not gonna lie, I’m interested.

This could be a fun distraction while I’m stuck in Elmwood. Nice enough place, however, the locals are wary of an outsider taking over the neighboring mill. Long story short…they don’t trust me. But they love their hometown hockey hero.

I get it.

I’ve never met anyone like Denny—skittish in street clothes and a feral beast with cunning instincts on the ice. He’s fascinating, sexy, smart, and⁠—

Whoa! I’m not falling for the hotshot rookie. No way, no how, no chance…

Too late.

Hotshot is an MM bisexual, age-gap, small town romance featuring a hotshot rookie, a sexy cowboy, and a proposition that changes everything.

To my sweetheart, my big love story, my cowboy…

1

DENNY

“You miss one hundred percent of the shots you don’t take.”—Wayne Gretzky

“This defense isn’t prepared for Denver’s rookie,” the sportscaster commented. “Denny Mellon is quick and agile and—he stole the puck again! It’s a breakaway for Mellon! He’s blasting toward the goal. Oblinsk is ready, but this guy is lightning. Mellon fakes a pass, takes a high shot to the upper left corner, and…scores! NHL’s new hotshot is on fire!”

The Bleacher Report

The hotshot is at it again. Denny Mellon, Denver’s power forward, is earning his ice time and putting his team on the map.

ESPN

There are some talented rookies out there having great seasons, but Denny Mellon is arguably the best. He’s an impact player with speed, skill, and poise, and Denver’s hotshot is a mad scoring machine reminiscent of hockey’s greatest players.

Sports Illustrated

Denny Mellon is the undisputed golden boy in Denver, scoring and assisting at will every time he takes the ice, Mellon dazzles fans, who chant, “Hotshot!” from the rafters.

“Yo, Hotshot! Welcome home!”

I waved at the shadowy figure outside the bar and sighed.

Were you supposed to get a say in a nickname? If so, I wanted a redo.

There had to be something better out there than Hotshot. It was too silly, too flighty, too showy. I was none of those things. How about Speed Demon, or Speedy, or just…Demon? I was open to all ideas and propositions.

Oh, wait. That didn’t sound right. Propositions came with connotations. Nothing good ever came from an opening line like, “I have a proposition for you.”

Interesting, funny, ridiculous, smarmy, terrifying…sure. But not good.

Of course, I had zero to no experience in such matters. Elmwood wasn’t Vegas…or Denver. We didn’t do propositions here. We dared each other to do things we’d planned on doing anyway, like climbing the roof of St. Finbarr’s and chugging beers under the stars or maybe going skinny-dipping in Lake Norman at midnight.

But that was in high school, when impromptu parties and dubious decision-making had practically been badges of honor. I was old enough to know better now, and I did.

I rubbed my hands together and glanced up at the black awning over the bar attached to the Black Horse Inn, a small motel at the fringe of forest in southern Vermont. The bar advertised itself as a charming gem from a simpler time. If you were into sticky tabletops, watered-down beer, a perpetual playlist of hokey songs from the sixties and seventies, and ambient lighting so dim it was hard to see two feet in front of your face, then…yes, this was the right spot.

To me, it looked and felt like home.

And damn, it was good to be back…if only for a short time. The mellow hum of everyday life in Elmwood was a welcome respite from the reality of grueling practices, high-stakes games, and constant travel. I liked my team, and I’d met nice people in Denver. I just couldn’t relax there.

Sure, I was killing it in the NHL, but a rookie had a lot to prove. I had to be a-fucking-mazing every night. I had to put in a thousand percent effort, smile through rough hits, and shake off idiotic jabs meant to fuck with my concentration on the ice. None of that was particularly challenging for me. The hardest part was not knowing who I could trust.

That wasn’t the case here. The second I walked into the bar, I knew I’d be greeted with a sea of friendly faces, high fives, fist bumps, and hugs. However, I was still me, and I didn’t do well with crowds or people in general. Even at home.

Awkward? Yep, that description fit.

I sucked in a fortifying breath, wiped my sweaty palms on my leather jacket, and tapped my thumbs against my upper thigh to calm my nerves before I pushed open the door, mentally preparing myself for a huge helping of unfiltered, in-your-face attention, and—well, you’ll see.

“Denny!”

A whoop of applause and cheers echoed from the rafters of the old bar. Next thing I knew, the whole place was chanting the nickname a sports reporter had given me after my premier game in the NHL a few months ago.

“Hotshot! Hotshot! Hotshot!”

Ugh.

I pushed forward with my chin tucked to hide my certain blush, slapping high fives like a pro on my way to the bar.

Side note: The bartender here knew everyone’s name and beverage preference. There was no waiting or overthinking your poison of choice for the night. Bill took one look at the door, gave the newcomers an up-nod, and got to work. It didn’t matter how long it had been since your last visit to the Black Horse—he never forgot a name or an order.

“Denny Mellon! I saw that goal last night. Your money is no good here tonight, Hotshot,” Bill boomed. “Drinks on the house for you.”

I probably should have insisted that was unnecessary, but I’d done this dance a few times and knew Bill wouldn’t relent. There was no point in expending my finite amount of social energy on an argument I wouldn’t win. So I thanked the older man before heading toward the high table near the ancient jukebox in a dark corner of the bar where my idiot friends were screaming their lungs out.

“Hotshot! Hotshot! Hotshot!” Abe and Micah chanted, standing to greet me with high fives and fist bumps.

“Yeah, yeah. Very funny,” I grumbled without heat, flashing my first honest-to-God smile of the night.

Niall slugged my left biceps hard and slung his arm around my neck. “Good to see you, man. You’re fuckin’ kickin’ ass on the ice. How many goals do you have already this season? Twenty-nine?”

“Thirty-two,” Mary-Kate corrected, lunging for me. “Get over here! I missed you, Den.”

I hugged her, breathing in the scent of her favorite Jo Malone fragrance, something with wild bluebells…whatever that meant. Didn’t matter. MK always smelled amazing.

“Missed you too.” I kissed MK’s cheek and let her drag me to the stool next to hers.

Someone slid a beer in front of me. Someone else across the bar called out a greeting and asked me to say hi to Grams. And some wise guy belted out the first line of Queen’s “We Are the Champions” and raised their glass in a toast. So yeah, my cheeks were now on fire.

I buried my nose in my beer and took a big gulp.

If you haven’t caught on…I was one of those weird athletes who wanted to be the best player on the ice but didn’t want the spotlight off the rink. Coach Smitty, my old high school coach, called me a contrary conundrum, which was probably fair. The way he said it inferred that I was an interesting puzzle to crack or a mystery to solve.

Nothing could be further from the truth. I wasn’t mysterious in the slightest. I was just…extremely reserved—even amongst people I cared about and had known for years. Like this motley crew.

Niall, Abe, Micah, and MK were some of my closest friends from high school. We’d fought many battles together during our pivotal adolescent years when every little injustice had seemed like a call to arms. Dramatic, but hey, a gaggle of hormonal sixteen-year-olds with a chip on their collective shoulders was either a pitiful cliché or a powerful force to be reckoned with.

We’d been a little of both. As founding members of the first men’s and women’s teams to take the ice at Elmwood High, we’d all had something to prove. And we’d done it.

Actually, we’d been terrible.

However, we’d gelled at the right time and won the Four Forest Championship titles our senior year—a gigantic feat, and we fully credited Coach Smitty for making it happen. We’d formed unbreakable bonds and had promised each other we wouldn’t lose touch after we graduated, no matter what.

That was four and a half years ago now, and so far so good.

Sure, we’d all gone our separate ways and our lives no longer revolved around high school bullshit, practices, and games, but we’d stayed connected. Niall and Micah worked at the mill in Wood Hollow, Abe was an accountant at his dad’s firm, and MK ran the bookstore her uncles owned. She also coached women’s varsity hockey at the high school.

And me…well, I was an NHL rookie forward for the Colorado Condors. Life was good. Intense and sometimes terrifying, but good.

“How long are you home?” MK asked, nudging my elbow.

“One night. I have a meeting Sunday and practice Monday morning.”

Micah scoffed, brushing his longish brown hair from his eyes. “Don’t you guys know this shit about each other? I thought it was a mandatory boyfriend-girlfriend info exchange. Ally wants to know my schedule down to the minute. I swear to God, we might as well be married.”

That drew a few howls and wolf whistles and thankfully, a topic change. MK and I exchanged a look while our buddies teased Micah about the possibility of impending wedding bells.

I linked my pinky finger around hers and squeezed, sipping my beer as I studied her profile.

Mary-Kate Moore was petite but tough with long brown hair, pretty blue eyes, and a killer smile. She was also a fast skater and one of the most accurate shooters I’d ever met.

She’d been so good in high school that Coach Smitty used to ask her to join our practices a couple of times a week. He’d paired us up for drills because no one on either of our teams could match our speed. Maybe there hadn’t been a real competition at stake, but we’d chased each other like whirling dervishes on the ice, taking no prisoners.

MK was and always had been a badass—the uber-feminine version who wore bright-pink lipstick, tight jeans, and V-neck sweaters that accentuated her tits. Like tonight.

“You look good,” I commented in a low tone.

Mary-Kate grinned, whispering, “So do you. How’ve you been?”

I shrugged nonchalantly. “Not bad, I guess.”

“Not bad? You’re on fire. The Condors must be falling all over themselves to make sure their new star forward is a happy camper.” She cocked her chin and fixed me with a shrewd once-over. “Are you happy?”

I frowned at her sudden intensity and cast a wary glance across the table at our friends currently arguing over the score of the Bruins game last night. If one of them caught her concerned expression, they’d wonder what was wrong or if I’d said something to piss my girl off. And MK wasn’t my girl anymore.

“Sure. Why do you ask?”

“Twenty-four hours in Elmwood a month before playoffs…color me suspicious. If I hadn’t just run into Annie at the bakery, I’d have been worried there was something wrong and that you’d hurried home for her sake.”

I rolled my eyes. “You think I’d take a detour at the Black Horse Inn instead of checking on my poor, helpless granny?”

MK smacked my arm. “Watch the sarcasm, or I’ll tell her you called her helpless.”

Ouch. Grams was sharp as a tack, prickly as a porcupine, and definitely wouldn’t take kindly to the notion that she’d slowed down…even though she was in her late eighties.

I snickered. “Grams is fine and I’m fine. I’m just…”

“Homesick?” she supplied.

“Something like that.”

Okay, so yes, I was homesick.

Really fucking homesick.

MK smiled sweetly and rested her head against my arm. “Ya big ol’ marshmallow. I bought my plane ticket for the Seattle game next month. My dad and my uncles are going too. Uncle Vinnie may be rooting for the bad guys, but since he played for them for forever, I think we need to give him a hall pass.”

I took a swig of beer and cast my gaze around the bar, aware that Niall and Abe had rejoined the conversation while Micah was texting his girlfriend.

“Seattle’s tougher now than they used to be,” Abe chimed in. “They have that big guy…what’s his name? Grotski or Gorski or…”

“Not even close. Kawalski. I know this shit,” Niall corrected confidently.

Micah looked up from his cell. “Kawalski plays for Montreal.”

“Chicago,” MK said. “You’re thinking of the hottie with the tats and…”

I tuned them out, basking in the nostalgic sweet vibes of familiar voices and welcoming spaces. Some might say that spending half a day traveling wasn’t a great use of free time, but they’d be wrong. A quick infusion of small-town life where everything and everyone was recognizable was good for the soul.

Like now…

Our old teammate, Harry Cromer’s parents were at the bar chatting with Mrs. Sullivan, our eleventh-grade biology teacher, and her husband. The Kinneys were at the high table closer to the window and a couple a grade ahead of us in high school were canoodling in one of the booths. I couldn’t remember if they’d gotten married. I couldn’t remember their names, either. Jason and Abby or maybe Jack and Alicia? Didn’t matter. It was just…cool.

I was suddenly very happy about my impulsive detour home. I’d needed this more than I’d realized.

The conversation at our table devolved into good-natured taunting about “cute hockey players.” I chuckled softly, nodding hello to one of Grams’s neighbors as I twisted in my seat to add my two cents—just as the door swung open and a tall dude wearing a cowboy hat strode inside, trailing a blast of cold winter air behind him.

That was the second my whole life changed.

Dramatic, right? But also true.

I didn’t know that, of course. Not really. But the atmosphere in the bar suddenly felt charged. I was aware of his presence the way I was aware on the ice, surrounded and battling from the boards with a puck at the end of my stick.

This was different. It was visceral awareness mixed with the kind of attraction I’d staved off for years.

And my God, the guy was a fucking cowboy.

The whole bar went silent for a beat. In fact, his reception was the exact opposite of the frenzied welcome I’d received half an hour ago. No one was rude, per se. Elmwood prided itself on being a friendly haven. The stares and whispers were a product of bald-faced curiosity.

See, no one wore cowboy hats around here. Not like it never happened, but Elmwood was more of a beanie or baseball cap kind of town. Trust me on that one. I had a hat fetish. And a cowboy fetish.

On the right guy, or girl—cowboy hats were hot as fuck. So yeah…the stranger had my attention.

Other than the hat and his expensive-looking boots, he sort of blended in with his puffy winter jacket, green plaid flannel, and standard-issue 501s that accentuated his package to perfection.

Eyes up, asshole.

I made myself glance away, but it wasn’t easy.

Something in the way he moved, slow and sure with just the right amount of swagger, set him apart. He was tall and thick—built like a brick house…or an athlete. I assumed he had brown hair based on his end-of-day scruff, and that he was at least a few years older than me, but there was no way of knowing without getting closer. And I definitely wouldn’t be doing that.

Still, I wondered who he was. We didn’t get many tourists in the middle of March. Not like summertime when the hockey community converged on Elmwood for our internationally renowned youth camps. But New England was cold as fuck this time of year, and Elmwood was remote with a series of winding roads separating the Four Forest area from the main interstate. You had to want to visit.

Mary-Kate hummed in a low tone. “Day-um. He’s dreamy.”

Affirmative. And you know what? He looked familiar.

Weird.

I picked up my glass, welcoming the cool condensation dripping between my thumb and forefinger as I watched the newcomer belly up to the bar, seemingly unaware of the buzz he’d caused.

“Who is he?” I asked.

Micah tore his gaze from his phone and squinted. “Oh, that’s our new boss. At least, I think that’s him.”

“It’s him,” Niall confirmed. “Dude, you need glasses.”

“Fuck off. My vision is fine.”

“No, you almost hit a deer on the way over here and⁠—”

MK held a hand up and pointed toward the bar. “Stay on topic, knuckleheads. Tell us about your new boss.”

“Hank Cunningham. His family bought the mill from the Larsons.” Niall swirled the contents of his glass thoughtfully. “They were silent part owners for a while, but Mr. and Mrs. L decided to cash out when the town council approved the new construction in Wood Hollow. That’s the official story, anyway. I’ve heard they were gently pushed out the door for a sweet pile of dough to make room for a corporate takeover.”

It was tempting to roll my eyes at Niall’s wary disdain, but I understood. Commerce in the four towns of the Four Forest area belonged to small business. We didn’t have Starbucks or Shake Shacks here. No, siree. We bought our lattes at Rise and Grind and ate ridiculously delicious burgers and fries at the diner. The lack of big-name logos on Main Street was a source of pride to the locals.

“Corporate takeover? Oh, shit,” MK murmured. “Poor Wood Hollow.”

“I didn’t know the Larsons sold,” I piped in. “When did that happen?”

“Around the holidays. They kept it on the DL, knowing it wouldn’t go down well. They cashed the check, sold their house, and caught the first flight to Fort Lauderdale,” Niall reported.

“Well, since he’s your boss, say hi and let’s shake some info out of the corporate cowboy and assure him we don’t play those games in Elmwood,” MK suggested playfully.

“No, thanks. We’re supposed to have fun tonight. Thinking about or talking about work is the opposite of a good time. Besides, I haven’t personally met him,” Niall said. “Have you, Micah?”

Micah shook his head, fingers still flying over his cell. “Not yet. I heard he bought the old Hamilton house and the land next to it, though.”

MK frowned. “In Elmwood? Why wouldn’t he buy something in Wood Hollow?”

“They’re fancy folks, MK. Wood Hollow doesn’t do fancy. Plus, the Hamiltons had a barn, so maybe he has animals?” Niall shrugged. “Fuck if I know. I’m sure he’s not staying for long. He’s from way out of state, like California or⁠—”

“No, no. The Cunninghams are from Colorado. They own the Rocky Mountain Mill in Denver,” Micah reported.

Whoa. That was a coincidence.

“Maybe you know him, Den.” Niall tipped his chin my way.

MK snorted. “Colorado is huge. Just because Denny lives there now doesn’t mean⁠—”

“Denny knows Cunningham?” Micah set his phone down. “No way. How?”

I ignored MK’s exasperation and the ensuing squabble as I tried to work through the puzzle pieces clicking together in my brain.

The Cunninghams, the billboards on I-70, the Rocky Mountain Mill…

I saw advertisements for the RM Mill all over town in Denver. Huh…it seemed improbable that they’d expanded this far east, but that had to be why the guy looked familiar. The hottie in the hat might just be the billboard cowboy who graced the giant sign near the off-ramp to my condo.

Picture this: a supersized cowboy perched on a horse in front of a log cabin, his shirt hugging his biceps like a glove, snug jeans with holes in the right places, snow-peaked mountains in the background advertising sustainable logging products. I mean, c’mon…how could I not notice? It was borderline obscene, and I was all for it.

Actually, the ads were perfectly tame, but they had sex appeal. I noticed. And I’d kept right on noticing something new every time I made the turn onto my off-ramp—the tilt of his hat, the slight cleft in his chin, the stretch of denim across his thighs.

I tried to tell myself the ads only caught my attention because they were ridiculous—too big and kind of corny. Real cowboys weren’t that hot, were they? He was like…a model, for fuck’s sake. A modern-day Marlboro man minus nicotine and carcinogen hazards. As far as advertising went, it was a hit.

Folks talked about that billboard everywhere in the city. I overheard the baristas at my local coffee shop fawning over it, and Trinsky joked that he wanted to be the billboard cowboy for Halloween. Everyone had laughed and teased him that he wasn’t handsome enough, and objectively speaking, Trinsky was a good-looking dude. Just not as hot as the cowboy who was currently sitting on a barstool in my town, chatting with my favorite bartender and my old biology teacher.

Real life was definitely stranger than fiction.

Of course, it was too dark in the bar to be sure the new guy and the billboard model were one and the same. There might be some other reason he seemed familiar, and if I were a normal person, I’d march up to him right now and ask him point blank. Even if I was dead wrong, a selfie with this guy would be worth its weight in gold. My teammates would think I was some kind of hero. As the new, quiet, awkward rookie on the team, it was social currency I desperately needed.

But introducing myself to a stranger was—no way. I’d need alcohol for that.

Well, I was in the right place for it, I mused as the decibel level returned to normal and conversation at my table resumed to the usual friendly banter and basic catch-up involving hockey, more hockey, and a little town gossip.

Abe was dating a girl from Fallbrook, Micah talked about doing a marathon in spite of the fact that he hated running, and Niall had signed on to do some coaching for the junior varsity team.

“Coach Smitty wants to spend more time with his family and I want to spend less time at the mill, so…it works out,” Niall said.

“Did you hear that Coach Smitty and Mr. Milligan have another kiddo on the way?” MK reported. “How cute is that?”

“Three kids under five years old? Sounds terrifying,” Micah huffed.

I nodded absently, intermittently participating in the conversation while clandestinely checking out the cowboy straddling a stool ten feet away.

Oh, and I drank.

A lot.

Our pitcher was never empty, and shots showed up with alarming regularity. I usually passed my alcohol on to my friends who all had better tolerance than I did, but I was hopelessly distracted tonight.

It wasn’t just the cowboy. I had shit on my mind.

My fledgling career and living up to that stupid nickname, being in Colorado and the memories it stirred, the weirdness of the new status of my relationship with MK, the homesickness…in short, I was anxious about every fucking thing lately. Were my skates tight enough? What time was my flight? Did I check Grams’s smoke alarms?

I’d been told I had obsessive-compulsive tendencies and that was probably true. I had a hard time relaxing and if a little buzz shook a layer of anxiety off tonight, I was all for it.

I drank at least three more beers and powered through a few complimentary tequila shots over the next hour and damn, that shit worked!

Seriously. In my tequila-and-beer haze, life was grand and I loved everything and everyone. My new team rocked, Denver was freaking amazing, and being besties with my ex was awesome sauce. And that cowboy over there…damn, I’d do him in a heartbeat.

Or he could do me.

As long as he kept the hat on. Even better if we could do it in front of the foggy mirror on the wall leading to the restrooms. That was the kind of pornolicious hotness I’d need to see. Our jeans around our ankles, his fingers digging into my hips, my hand on my cock and⁠—

Oh, shit. I was drunk.

“D’ya guys ’member that time we went bowling in Pinecrest and Niall threw a strike in the lane next to ours?” I snickered. “It was so funny. I love bowling. We should go bowling. Want to go now? Let’s go bowling.”

Micah pushed the pitcher out of my reach and glanced at MK. “Are you taking the lightweight home?”

“Yep, I got him.” MK furrowed her brow and whispered, “You okay?”

I beamed, swaying slightly on my stool. “I’m great.”

“Hmm. I have to coach tomorrow morning, so…if you’re ready, I’ll drive you.”

I nodded. “Okay, I can say hi now.”

“To who?”

“You know…” I motioned for her to come closer and probably would have confessed that I was crushing pretty hard on the guy at the bar, but the room started to spin just as a wave of heat engulfed my face. “Iz me or is it really warm in here?”

MK patted my arm. “Let’s go, big guy.”

I said my good-byes, grabbed my jacket, and followed MK.

This was perfect. I could walk up to the stranger at the bar and say, “Yo, stranger. You’re hot.”

Ha! No, just kidding. I would never, ever, ever… But I could practice being social in a normal way and go with, “You look familiar. Do I know you?”

Nah, that sounded like a cheesy pickup line. I could do better than that.

“Good night, Denny.” Mr. Kinney shoved his hand at me, congratulated me on my season, and basically said a lot of words that smooshed together in my brain. I smiled a lot and thanked him, scanning the bar for the cowboy and⁠—

He was gone. What the fuck?

“Denny?”

“Uh, yeah. Coming.” I took one last look as I stepped under the black awning, shivering at the blast of frigid winter air. “Geez, it’s cold out here. But it was hot in there and this feels better. Mush better.”

MK wiggled her fingers meaningfully. “Keys.”

I tossed her the keys to the ancient Bronco I’d bought my sophomore year of college with money I’d earned from coaching at the youth camp. This was my Elmwood ride. I had a brand-new, tricked out SUV in Denver courtesy of my NHL contract, but my Bronco was perfect for cruising around at home.

I slid into the passenger seat, glancing toward the bar at the sound of the creaking door, then at MK. “What’s wrong?”

She grinned. “You’re zazzled.”

I busted up laughing. “Zazzled! I like that word. What does it mean?”

“It means you’re drunk.”

“Nah, I’m just a little tipsy.”

“Just a little, huh? That’s cute. Drunk Denny is fun and chatty,” she singsonged playfully. “He tells all the secrets.”

I frowned. Shit. What did I say?

“I do?”

She chuckled. “No, you reminisce about the good ol’ days.”

“Oh, that’s ’cause I don’t have any secrets,” I lied.

Mary-Kate turned on the engine, blasting the Bronco’s heaters and fiddling with the radio as if it were her own. Made sense. She liked driving more than I did. I used to hand over my keys and let her take over when we were in high school and college. We’d explore every inch of the forest, parking on deserted country roads and hiking for miles, and just…talking.

She was my best friend in the world and that wasn’t going to change, but navigating our “ex” status was an odd one.

We’d dated so long that we’d become a habit, a catch phrase since high school…Den and MK, MK and Den. But we’d officially broken up at Thanksgiving…and no one knew. There were reasons for that, and someday they wouldn’t seem important. For now, it was easier to let people think what they wanted.

Mary-Kate and I were solid. That was all that mattered.

“I do,” she said softly. “I’m seeing someone.”

Oh.

I accidentally tightened my seat belt like a vise around my chest in my haste to face her. “Oh. Okay, that’s cool.”

MK offered a wan smile. “It’s not serious, Den. He lives in Burlington and it’s totally new, nothing to get excited about. But it feels weird to talk about dating other people with you.”

I waited for Mary-Kate to meet my gaze in the dark, then reached across the console and brushed a strand of hair from her troubled eyes. “Yeah. I get that.”

She licked her lips. “I won’t fuck this up for you. We had a deal, and I won’t let you down.”

My brain was buzzing with alcohol, but I did my best to push through the fog and give her my most sincere, no-nonsense look. “Forget about the deal and⁠—”

“No, this is your rookie year, and you’re in the spotlight. This is important. I don’t want you to worry about distractions.”

“Well, if a reporter takes a picture of my girlfriend kissing another guy, that’ll be a distraction,” I pointed out.

“Understood, but we’re friends and I like him, that’s all. You and I said we’d be honest, and this is me being honest.”

I wished I could be honest too. I wished I could tell her that I was bi and that lately, I couldn’t stop thinking about being with a guy. But what was the point? It was never going to happen.

Not now anyway.

I regarded her in the semidark. There were a handful of people whose happiness I truly cared about, and MK was one of them. I hated the idea that I’d hurt her and that she might regret me. But she seemed fondly exasperated…not sad.

“Have I told you I think you’re pretty fucking cool?” I rasped, pinching her chin.

She swatted my wrist and grinned, all traces of melancholy gone. “Have I told you I’m proud of you, Hotshot?”

I slumped in my seat and put my hands over my ears like a grouchy toddler. “Ugh. Stop.”

“Why? What’s wrong with being hot and making all the shots?” she teased, cranking the defrost settings to clear the windows.

“I’m feeling bullied, and you know what…I’m outta here.”

MK snickered, her gaze darting my way as I opened the door. “Oh, you’re serious.”

“No, I’m messin’ with you.” And I was. Except now I didn’t want to go home. Yeah, I was bombed, but the night was young and our friends were at the bar. So was the cowboy. I could still get that selfie for the team. “But…I’m gonna stay and hang out with the guys for a while. Take my ride.”

She smiled. “All right. I’ll park it at my house, so you’ll have to see me tomorrow before you leave for the airport.”

“Deal.” I leaned over to kiss her cheek. “No joyriding.”

“Do you actually think this thing goes over forty miles per hour?”

I scowled. “It goes at least fifty.”

“Sure it does,” she drawled sarcastically. “It’s a real speed demon. Love you, Den. Be good.”

“Love you, too.”

I watched the red taillights of my Bronco fade, my hands buried deep in my pockets, inhaling the frosty night and exhaling in a rush. The plume of steam mesmerized me. So I did it again, freeing one hand to trace a finger through my breath.

Damn. I was really drunk. Maybe I should have gone with MK and⁠—

“Denny Mellon?”

I pivoted on a patch of thin ice and almost toppled over.

Holy shit.

It was him.

The cowboy.

And he knew my name.

Did I mention cowboys were my kryptonite?

Check this out: Teenage me had jacked off to a YouTube video I’d found of a cowboy stripping a T-shirt over his head while water sluiced over his cut abs. It had been a nightly ritual for weeks on end. The second that first bead of water would slide down his pecs, I was a goner, shooting so hard cum hit my chin as I panted and gasped for air.

In the aftermath, a wave of confusion would swallow me whole and I’d wonder why I wasn’t thinking of my girlfriend’s tits. It took a while for me to figure out that I might not be so straight after all. But cowboys were my first clue.

The Western mystique of a tough guy taking charge and being a fuckin’ boss was a turn-on. The reality probably involved cow patties and a lot more manual labor than I’d ever want to do, but it was a sweet fantasy.

That might have been why those billboards resonated. They taunted me…tempted me, reminded me who I really was. Sure, I liked women, but I definitely, absolutely, positively was a hundred percent attracted to dudes too.

And no one knew.

“Uh…”

Yeah, that was me. This wasn’t going to go well at all.

The stranger stopped a couple of feet away and tilted his hat. Damn, he was really fucking hot with a rockin’ bod, sky-blue eyes, high cheekbones, and a perfectly square stubbled jaw. Christ, even his slightly crooked nose added to his masculine beauty.

“Hank Cunningham. I’m new here. My family recently bought the mill in Wood Hollow and⁠—”

“I know,” I intercepted. “I, uh…I heard. My friends work for you.”

“Oh, that’s cool. Hey, I⁠—”

“I’ve seen your abs,” I blurted nervously. “They’re nice.”

He cocked his head, lips curling in amusement. “My abs?”

“No, your ads, like…advertisement. You’re the cowboy billboard. The billboard on the cowboy,” I rambled. “I mean the—the cowboy on the billboard.”

I could have sworn he frowned at first, but then something else happened. He smiled. And fuck, it was stunning. Hank’s grin started on the left corner of his sexy mouth and slowly took over his face. Shit, he had killer dimples too.

“Am I?”

For someone with acute anxiety, this minor interaction was a major challenge…even with tequila. If I hadn’t had a little social lubricant in my system, there was no way I’d have been able to form a full sentence. And I would have been better off.

“Yeah, I live in Denver and I play hockey. I drive by the billboard with the log cabin and the horse on my way to the rink. It’s a big ad, and the horse looks like it could step onto the interstate. It’s cool.”

Full sentences…good. Bonus for being sort of intelligible too.

Hank pursed his lips. “Are you sure that’s me?”

I motioned at his hat and smokin’ bod in an “I’d know this sexy package” anywhere gesture.

“Positive. He’s hot…and you’re hot.” Shit. The words were out, and there was no getting those fuckers back. “For a tall guy…with a horse.”

“You don’t like horses?”

I shook my head. “No. Wait, I mean, yes, I do like them. But from afar. I wouldn’t want to ride one.”

“Why not?” he asked, folding his arms over his substantial chest.

“I got thrown off a pony at the county fair when I was a kid and landed in turd. I think it was for a birthday party, and everyone thought it was hysterical. Which was fair. It’s less amusing if you’re the one with poop on your shirt.”

And now Hank was chuckling in earnest. I couldn’t blame him. I was a runaway train fueled by Patrón, passing every viable station at breakneck speed.

“You’re funny.”

“Said no one ever,” I quipped, raking my fingers through my messy dark hair. Time to get the fuck out of here. I waved and hiked a thumb behind me. “Well, nice to meet you. I—oh. Can I get a selfie?”

He furrowed his brow. “You want a selfie with me?”

“Yeah, I have to prove to Trinsky that I mesh you—I mean, met you.”

He stepped closer, thoroughly disarming me with his twinkling eyes and wicked good looks. “Sure.”

I fumbled with my phone and almost dropped it on the pavement. Hank swooped in to save the day, handing it over as he scooted into my space. My mouth went dry but I managed an awkward, cheesy smile, catching a whiff of his cologne as I clicked a photo.

It was probably blurry as fuck, and my eyes were probably crossed. But hey, I’d done it. I’d talked to a hot guy. On my own.

“Thanks. It was nice to meet you.” I slipped my cell into my pocket and stepped toward the door.

“Hang on. I was hoping to talk to you.”

More talking. Shit.

I froze. “Talk? To me?”

“Yeah, you. I should have introduced myself at the bar, but I didn’t want to disturb you while you were with your friends and your girlfriend.”

“She’s not my girlfriend.” Wait. No one knows that. Damn it, tequila.

“Oh.”

I shook my head as if to clear the cobwebs, moving to the shadowy part of the eaves when the bar door opened and customers spilled into the parking lot. It wasn’t exactly private, but we were partially hidden from view.

“She’s…we’re—what did you want?”

Hank lifted a brow. “Well, this probably isn’t a great time, but⁠—”

“No, this is fine.” And curiosity was killing me already. “What is it?”

“I have a proposition for you.”

And there it was.

That enigmatic invitational phrase I associated with indecent proposals and morally problematic ideas. At least that was how it went down in the movies. “I’ll give you a million dollars to fuck a perfect stranger or your boss or your best friend or your best friend’s boss.” You get the picture.

I highly doubted this guy was in the market for a naked good time with yours truly, but in my tequila-addled brain, nothing made sense.

“A proposition?” I squeaked.

“More of a deal or…an arrangement.” Hank pulled a card from his shirt pocket.

I glanced from the business card to the stranger and back, sorting through the clues he’d given me and coming up blank.

“For sex?” tequila asked.

Fuck me.

Oh. My. God.

For sex? Really, Denny? Really?

When future me was nursing my future hangover, wearing sunglasses on the plane, sipping Bloody Marys, and popping Advil to soothe my aching head, this would be the moment I’d relive over and over, cringing at my drunken self while swearing I’d never ever ever mix tequila shots and the Black Horse’s crappy beer again.

To his credit, Hank didn’t blink, flinch, or laugh this time. But he also didn’t say anything and if the shadows weren’t going to swallow me whole, I was going to have to arrange my own disappearing act.

Too late. He was talking now.

“I hadn’t considered that,” he drawled in a teasing honeyed tone that made my pulse race.

“Uh…ha. Good. I was kidding!” I spared a quick glance at the bar’s entrance. “Bad joke. Sorry. Need water. Thirsty.”

“Relax. It’s okay.” He hummed as if reassuring a spooked animal. “Why don’t we go inside and grab some water at the bar?”

“No way.” I waved my hands like twin flags. “People.”

He frowned. “Okay, can I get your number? We can talk in the morning and⁠—”

“I need water,” I repeated.

“Water. Right. Uh…I have water in my room. Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

I watched Hank traverse the stairs leading to the second level, snapping to attention at the sound of my loudmouthed buddies barreling out of the bar.

A lifeline at last. Hallelujah!

I was a drowning man, and those three goofballs had a key to the getaway car.

Except…I should have been home by now. They’d wonder why I hadn’t left with MK, and they’d probably ask if everything was cool with us. And the answer was yes, but it was complicated. In my current state, I was a babbler. I wasn’t ready for big truths and tequila reveals. I might even end up doing something super nutso like come out. They wouldn’t care, of course.

This just wasn’t the time. Not here, not now.

According to my calculations, the only way out was up.

So as quietly as possible, I traversed the stairs and met Hank in the hallway in front of room 228.

He jolted in surprise, one hand on the knob, the other hovering his key card over the lock.

I leaned my elbow on his door, darting my gaze left and right. “Okay, fine. Just…do it. Proposition me.”

Half a beat later, the door swung open, and I tumbled unceremoniously into the cowboy’s room.

2

HANK

“Damn, are you okay?”

Denny stood shakily, dusting the seat of his jeans as he cast a curious gaze around the room. “Yup.”

No, he was not okay.

I should have been thrilled that after weeks of plotting and strategizing, the rookie was here…in my hotel room. My golden opportunity to chat with the star forward one-on-one had literally fallen at my feet. But Houston, we had a problem.

The dude was drunk. There was a good chance he wouldn’t remember anything I said tomorrow, and I might not get another convenient shot at reaching him on his own for a while.

Denny had been almost impossible to reach. His agent hadn’t returned my phone calls, so I’d been forced to go into bounty-hunter mode and track him down. I thought that would be easy enough to do in Denver. RM Mill owned Condors season tickets, and arranging a post-game meeting seemed like a logical option.

My dad’s CEO, Carl, had invited employees and their kids to a home game and meet-and-greet afterward last month. It was a cool event. Except Denny hadn’t shown. Any direct inquiries about him through the Condors organization had been ignored or funneled back to his agent, which left me at square one…in Elmwood…doing a very poor imitation of the Mandalorian.

I’d stopped by the bar after another frustrating day at the mill where a shipment hadn’t arrived, no one had reported damage to a new piece of machinery that had apparently been out of commission for a week, and my new secretary had dropped three important calls in succession. I was fucking exhausted. I had a lot to relearn about the business, and it wasn’t leaving me much time to wrangle a hockey player into submission.

Poor choice of words, but you know what I mean.

Now he was here…swaying like a tree in hurricane winds. I couldn’t decide if this was an amazing stroke of good luck or a sure sign that I should never have accepted my dad’s offer.

“Here. Have some water.”

I picked up one of the complimentary bottles on the dresser across from the king-sized bed, unscrewed the cap, and pushed it into Denny’s hands. He nodded his thanks, downing half the contents in record time.

“Much better,” Denny said.

“Good. My number is on the card I gave you. If I could get your number too, that would be⁠—”

“I think we stayed in this same room on prom night. It was supposed to be MK and me, but it ended up being a huge group. I slept on that sofa.”

Okay…

“That must have been uncomfortable.” I took my hat off and set it on the desk, perching on the edge with my arms crossed to settle in for a rambling chat with a drunk. Whatever. I just needed his phone number.

“Probably, but I can sleep anywhere.” Denny cast his gaze around the standard hotel room as if it were incredibly interesting.

It was nice but basic—mahogany furniture, white duvet, and plain walls decorated with tasteful photographs of the surrounding forest. The real draw was the view of the virtual sea of evergreens from the balcony. It was pitch-dark now, and he was lost in thought anyway, perhaps reliving a long-ago wild party with his peers.

Fine by me. It gave me a chance to size him up.

Denny Mellon was maybe an inch taller than me with a wiry toned frame, wavy raven hair, and tawny hazel eyes. Even drunk, he emanated a startling intensity, as if he were constantly measuring danger. Like a spy or an assassin. I’d seen him play and knew he was as savage, quick, and cunning on the ice as the good folks of Elmwood had claimed at the bar.

At the moment, he just seemed kind of sweet and a little out of his depth. Oh…and off his rocker. Had he really thought I’d tracked him down in the parking lot to proposition him for sex?

That was just… Wow. Nope. Couldn’t touch that one.

However, this might be the only opportunity I’d get to convince him to work with me.

“I’m a hockey fan, by the way. It’s an honor to meet Colorado’s hotshot rookie.”

Denny grimaced. “Please don’t call me that. It’s embarrassing.”

“But accurate. I’ve been to a couple of games this season. You’re a rising star.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“Don’t be so modest. According to the bartender, you’re the next Great One.” I chuckled at his eye roll, slyly adding, “I hear there’s a gold mine of talent in this little town. I’d love to talk to you about it some more. Are you free tomorrow?”

He sipped his water and squinted. “You want to talk about…Elmwood?”

“Something like that,” I hedged. “Give me your num⁠—”

“Now is good. Trust me, I won’t want to do this again. By this, I mean…talk. And I have questions too.”

“Oh. Okay.” I opened my arms. “You go first.”

“Why’d you buy the mill?” he asked before continuing in a manic rush. “Are you a logger or a cowboy? Why is there a horse on your business card? Are you going for a western vibe, or is that a sales technique? If so…why? And what do you want with me? If it’s a proposition, please proposition away and make it a good one. I’ve never been propositioned, and I’m all for it. Just keep the innuendo down. I’m new to the bi thing, and I don’t know all the lingo. If you’re straight, ignore me. I drank tequila. Remember that. Very tipsy.”

Whoa.

I didn’t know where the hell to begin. Usually, I’d take it from the top, but I was stuck on “the bi thing.”

Denny Mellon was bi?

And coming on to me. Not well, but it was there.

Christ, was that why he’d followed me to my room?

I pinched the bridge of my nose and met Denny’s gaze, noting the hint of vulnerability the proud tilt of his chin didn’t quite mask.

“Uh…that’s a lot to unpack there,” I stalled. “Let’s start with the mill. I didn’t buy it from the Larsons, my father did. They say it was a great purchase and beneficial to both parties. This area is growing and frankly, the Larsons weren’t equipped to handle a large-scale ecologically sustainable production. That’s what the RM Mill does best. It’s on our website, so it must be true.”

He didn’t crack a smile. “You bought the Hamilton place.”

“My father did. He intended to live here part time, but he’s not able to now. I can see why he liked the property, though. It’s a nice bit of land. I’m just staying at the inn till the remodel is complete.”

“Why does a logger need a cowboy hat? I don’t get it, but I like cowboy hats.”

“Good to know. I’m not a logger or a cowboy. I’m just helping out my dad while he’s recuperating.” I pointed at my wavy mop. “I was having a bad hair day, so I threw it on at the last second.”

He flopped onto the bench at the foot of the bed. “You’re not a cowboy? Bummer. Do you have horses?”

I nodded. “One of my own, anyway. I’m an equine assisted therapist.”

“Oh! How do horses and therapy mix? Are you a PT? That’s almost as cool as being a cowboy. Not quite, but almost.” Denny flashed a beguiling, cocky smile that went straight to my dick.

Damn, he had to go.

“I do some physical therapy, yes…and developmental therapy. A horse’s gait mimics the normal movement of a human pelvis while walking. We can measure sensory stimulation and integrate movement in therapy sessions. That’s useful for pelvic injuries. And spending time with a horse is great for promoting physical and emotional growth for anyone who suffers from severe anxiety, cerebral palsy, autism, dementia, or depression.”

He considered me for a long moment. “Did my therapist call you? Or my coach? I went to my session last week and I thought it went okay, but it’s always quiet ’cause I’m quiet. I’m working on that, but it’s not easy and⁠—”

“No.” I raised my right hand like a stop sign. “I have nothing to do with your therapist. I didn’t know you had one. And please take this the right way, but you’re not quiet at all. I’ve barely been able to get a word in.”

Denny shot a lopsided grin my way. “That never happens. Must be⁠—”

“Tequila,” I finished. “Got it.”

“Yeah, I rarely drink, but the signs are easy to read. First I talk, then I slur, and eventually, I pash out.”

Fan-fucking-tabulous.

“We can do this another time. Can I get your number?”

“No, no.” Denny waved his arms and winked—an honest-to-God, sexy, sassy, teasing wink. “Proposition me first. Make it good, please.”

The dude was using my lines on me. Lines I would have used if he wasn’t high as a kite. And if he wasn’t a potential client.

Fuck. All right.

“We’d like to hire you as a spokesperson.”

He pointed at his chest incredulously. And yeah, I had to bite back a laugh at his comical WTF expression. “A spokespershon?”

“To put it plainly, we could use some positive publicity. We’re new in town, and when a new company takes over a century-old family-owned business, there’s bound to be a measure of mistrust. We’ve participated in a few community outreach programs and agreed to sponsor Wood Hollow’s football team, but we’re having hiring issues.”

“Uh…”

“Recruiting employees from other parts of the state is an option,” I continued, warming up to my spiel. This could be a practice run for our next meeting. “Not a great one, though. Wood Hollow is the poorest of the four towns in the Four Forest area. They need us, we need them, but there’s a lot of animosity—surly employees, graffiti. I won’t go into all that, but there’s a problem that needs fixing…fast. We need to build decades’ worth of goodwill within weeks if we’re going to meet the demands of the builder, and the best way to do that is through marketing. We want to hire a local celebrity as a spokesman of sorts, and you’d be perfect.”

“Me?”

“Yes, it wouldn’t take much of your time, and we could film at the rink or—” I stopped midsentence, narrowing my gaze. “You just turned gray. Are you going to be sick?”

“No, I’m fine. But I’m not the guy you want. Jake Milligan has been in the league longer. Ask him. Or ask Vinnie Kiminski, Riley Thoreau, Court Henderson, Smitty Paluchek. They’re all better options.”

“They’re not you. We want a rookie, and the fact that you’re originally from Colorado like us is a nice selling point.”

Denny frowned so hard his eyebrows met in the middle of his forehead. “Wait. That’s your proposition?”

“It’s actually more of an offer than a propo⁠—”

“Worst propzishun ever. Complete fail.” He jumped to his feet. “I wanted sex and a cowboy. Not a job offer. Thanks for nothin’.”

I was stunned speechless for a moment, but I sprang into action when he moved to the door.

“Hold up.” I grabbed his elbow, unthinking. “I don’t even know you. Did you really think this was about sex?”

“Yes. Sex, sex, sex! That’s what makes propzishuns interesting,” Denny insisted indignantly.

“This is—you’re joking, right?” I sputtered.

“I’m not sayin’ I woulda been into it, but it makes for a mush better story, ya know? Mush mush better.”

Uh…I had nothing.

“I hate to disappoint you, but I’m not in the habit of propositioning men for sex.”

He cocked his head curiously. “ ’Cause you’re shtraight?”

“No, because I’m not a creep,” I retorted, wondering why I was sparring with a drunk.

“Are you straight? Or gay or bi or somefin else?”

“That’s none of your business,” I snapped.

Denny huffed in mock dismay. “You propositioned me, remember? I should know what I’m getting into.”

I was officially unsure where I’d gone wrong.

I should have introduced myself in the bar pre-tequila. That was on me. I hadn’t been able to figure out how to get him alone at first, but I hadn’t been overly concerned ’cause I’d learned more about Denny Mellon than I’d bargained on from the bartender and the locals over a couple of beers.

They’d said Denny was intense, smart, competitive, and that he had an instinct for hockey that couldn’t be taught.

It was nothing I hadn’t heard from rabid fans and sports analysts who were cautiously optimistic that the rookie was the one to watch. He was special. The media was already swarming and big endorsements would surely follow. We wouldn’t be able to afford him this time next year.

The locals had also said he was painfully quiet, but this guy hadn’t shut up since I’d tracked him down in the parking lot and now, I had to admit, Denny Mellon was throwing me off my game. He shouldn’t be here, and we definitely shouldn’t be talking about indecent proposals.

Sure, he was sexy as hell, but this was not a one-night stand in the making, damn it. This was business.

I scowled. “How drunk are you?”

“Very.” Denny’s eyes twinkled merrily as he reclaimed his water, gulping the rest till the screech and crinkle of plastic echoed off the walls. He smashed the bottle in one hand and tossed it into the trash before flopping onto the sofa. “I told you…tequila. It hits funny, you know. One minute, you’re fine and the next, you’re hot and horny. Tired, too. Or maybe just hot. I’m kinda hot. Are you hot?”

“No, I’m fine, and I—what are you doing?”

Denny jumped up again, unzipping his leather jacket as he strode to the sliding glass door.

“Need fresh air,” he announced, pulling the curtain aside and unlatching the lock.

I grabbed another water bottle and hurried after him to the balcony. “Are you going to be sick?”

“No, I never felt better. ’Cept my skin is like an oven.” Denny yanked his tee over his head in a whoosh, stuffed the fabric into his back pocket, and thrust an arm toward me. “Feel it. Seriously.”

I set my hand on his forearm and yes, he was warm to the touch. He also happened to have the body of a god. No kidding.

Every dip and valley from his pecs to his torso and abs was defined as if he’d been sculpted by a master. He was all lean muscle, not an ounce of extra fat anywhere. I was no stranger to exercise and I liked to think I was in decent shape, but I couldn’t begin to compare to an athletic specimen like Denny.

My gaze stalled on his tapered waist and the hint of a happy trail under his exposed belly button. Keep it together, Cunningham.

I swallowed hard, thrusting the water at him with more force than necessary. “Drink this.”

Denny tipped his chin in thanks and guzzled the whole thing, dragging his wrist across his full lips before letting out a monster belch. “Did ya hear that?”

“Yes, I heard that. Please don’t smash the plastic. It’s—” Crunch. I snatched the empty bottle from him with an exasperated growl. “Okay, this was a mistake. You need to go home.”

“You’re right, but MK has my ride.”

“You’re in no shape to drive anyway. Do you have Uber here?”

Denny giggled. Yeah, a real live giggle. “In Elmwood? No, sir. We do not. We have a taxi…one taxi. I don’t know who’s driving tonight. Sometimes it’s Darren. He’s nice. Sometimes it’s Sal. He’s a ashwipe, but ’s okay. I’m gonna walk anyway.”

No, no, no.

I wasn’t sure why or how he’d become my problem, but I couldn’t in good conscience let Denny Mellon drunkenly stumble home in the pitch-dark on a country road leading to a sleepy town.

“Do you live nearby?”

He furrowed his brow thoughtfully. “I live in Denver.”

“I meant here in Elmwood.”

“Oh, yeah. I live here too. I have a house.”

“Great. Where is it, Denny? Concentrate.”

He nodded hard enough to give himself whiplash. “First I gotta walk up the hill into town and go to Main Street and three more blocks to Spruce and one more block to⁠—”

“I’ll drive you,” I intercepted. “C’mon.”

“No, no. I wanna walk. Fresh air feels good.” Denny’s face contorted as he stretched his arms over his head and yawned. “I’m just tired. Gimme a second to cool off. Do you have more water? I gotta dilute the tequila.”

“You can’t sober up here. That might take hours, and⁠—”

“You’re right. I should rest first. I’ll take a nap on the sofa.”

“No.”

He widened his eyes as if insulted by my lack of hospitality. “Okay, I’ll stay outside.”

“It’s freezing, Denny. It might even snow tonight.”

“Really? Good ’cause I’m hot.” He unbuckled his belt and unzipped his fly.

“Whoa! You can’t undress here,” I whisper-hissed. “This is public property, for fuck’s sake.”

He wrinkled his nose and pointed at the trees. “No one cares. Only owls, and ’sides, you’re not gonna propzishun me anyway. I guess I’ll keep my boxers on. ’S like going swimming…but no pool. Totally decent. I’ve never done any indecent exposures. Imma genzleman. You’re the one who’s naughty. You got the propzishuns, not me.”

“This is the slurring part.” I was getting more alarmed by the second.

Denny snickered. “Told ya…so ’barrassing. Grams recorded me one night to warn me I had a blabbermouth. She said, ‘You gotta wash it, Den. If you can’t hold your liquor, best put your glass down.’ I don’t even know what that means.”

“I think it means you should know when to stop drinking.”

“Oh…thas prolly it. Have you met Grams?”

“No, I have not met your grandmother,” I deadpanned.

“You gotta meet her. She’s funny, but unin—uninhabited? No, thas not it. Unin…the thing where you’re not tryina be funny and that makes it funnier.”

He wrinkled his nose as he kicked off his shoes and stepped out of his jeans.

“Unintentional,” I offered weakly.

Sweet Jesus. Even his quads were a thing of beauty.

“That’s it! She calls people on their shit and gets away with it. Every time.” Denny slipped his thumbs under the elastic of his boxer briefs.

“No, Denny.”

“ ’S true. Grams dresses as the Grim Reaper at Halloween and sits in the town square smoking cigarettes and telling anyone who bugs her to watch the fuck out or they’re next.”

“That’s kind of…mean.”

He chortled merrily. “Yeah, she’s terrible, but like…she’s awesome too.”

“I’m sure she is,” I agreed, clearing my throat noisily. “Stop doing what you’re doing.”

Denny froze. “What’d I do?”

“Your hands. Just…put ’em up.”

Wrong thing to say. His eyes lit up like a Christmas tree.

“Oh, now this is a good propzishun. You should do a citizen arrest.” He raised his arms and dropped them with a frown. “No, don’t do that. I can’t go to jail. My coach would be pissed. I think I’m gonna have a headache tomorrow and I have to get on a plane. That’s gonna suck. Do you have aspirin? Do you have a bed?”

Great.

“I have Advil. Let’s go inside.” I pushed him toward the open door, pausing to gather his clothes and shoes. “Put these on and—holy shit.”

He was naked.

Naked.

There was a naked hockey player standing in the middle of my hotel room, hands on his hips, his flaccid thick penis resting proudly between his sculpted thighs.

I licked my lips and swiped at the corner of my mouth in case I was drooling. Hey, I was only human and this man was a work of art. I wanted to paint him, touch him, fuck him hard and put him away wet and ready for round two, round three.

But he wasn’t working with a full deck, and I wasn’t a lowlife asshole. I had to deal with this situation maturely and reasonably.

Christ, this evening had utterly and officially spiraled out of control. I wasn’t sure how we’d devolved to this point. It was…shocking, puzzling, absurd.

Denny set his hands on his hips and winked. “You’re staring at my dick. I don’t blame you. It’s big, huh?”

“Denny…”

“Watch this. I can make it bigger.” He swayed back and forth, then gripped his pole at the base and stroked.

“Denny…no. Stop. You need aspirin, right?”

“Aspirin?”

“Yes,” I choked out. “I’ll get that. Just…please, put your clothes on so I can take you home.”

“ ’Kay.” He flashed a sleepy smile and scratched his gorgeous balls.

Yeah, I looked. I couldn’t help it. He was all out there—big and beautiful, not a hint of shame.

“All right. I’ll…” I gestured to the bathroom. “Gimme two seconds.”

“Thanks, cowboy.”

My mind spun with a new game plan as I rummaged through my toiletries. I shouldn’t try to take him home myself. It would be smarter to call one of his friends for help. I’m sure he’d agree…when he was sober.

So it took me closer to fifteen seconds than two to return with ibuprofen. Not enough time for anything catastrophic to occur, right?

Wrong.

Denny Mellon had passed out.

Buck-ass naked.

On my bed.

Fuck.

Me.

I set the Advil on the nightstand and tapped his arm. “Denny, wake up.”

Nothing.

I tried again with a bit more force, nudging his shoulder and chest.

He smacked his lips together and rolled to side. “Nhgn.”

“Denny!”

The little fucker was out cold.

Shit.

I hunted in the pockets of his jeans for his cell, but of course, it was locked. I shoved the screen in front of his face, hoping facial ID would work as a password. If I could get to his contacts, one of his friends could bail me out and take over. I wasn’t sure I could explain how this happened without sounding desperate, conniving, and possibly depraved, but I’d work that out later.

Unfortunately, Denny chose that moment to slide his arm under the pillow and curl into a ball like a koala. Snoring commenced shortly after. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Now what?

Sure, I was strong, but I couldn’t physically move a massive professional athlete by myself.

This was what I got for agreeing to this fuckery.

You need someone in Vermont, Dad? No problem.

You need water, rookie hotshot hockey star? No problem. I’ll grab you a bottle, and maybe you’ll agree to do me a solid for my dad’s sake.

I paced the perimeter of the bed, mulling over my predicament, and came up blank. I supposed I could go down to the bar and ask Bill for assistance. But we’d left separately over an hour ago and under the current circumstances—you know, naked drunkenness and all—that was probably just enough time to do some damage to our reputations. Not something I was willing to risk. I was new in town, and this guy was their pride and joy.

So I made an executive decision to do—wait for it…nothing. I figured it was in both of our best interests to ride out the tequila and leave this till morning.

I manhandled the duvet from underneath Denny, chanting his name in a last-ditch effort to jostle him awake. No luck. I gave up and tucked the cover over him, then grabbed one of the pillows from the other side of the bed and tossed it at the sofa.

Yeah, it was going to be a long night.

I showered, changed into sweats and an old tee, and made a little nest on the glorified love seat, watching reruns of The Office before tuning into ESPN. Basketball news gave way to hockey highlights, followed by pre-playoff speculation about who had a shot at the Stanley Cup this year.

“Denver,” one analyst said.

“Absolutely. They’re my pick too. Minorsk and Trinsky on offense, Jelen on D, and Petrov in goal…yeah, I can see it,” his cohost agreed. “And they have Mellon.”

“The rookie is phenomenal. He’s persistent, fearless, inventive, and best of all, he’s passionate. It’s fun to watch him. The Condors drafted wisely. I’ve got a good feeling this kid is going to make his mark in the league in a big way.”

“No doubt about it. Next up, we have preseason baseball news and…”

I glanced over at the snoozing rookie phenom across the room. This was the guy they were talking about…making his mark by drooling in my bed.

Wow.

I turned the television and lights off, and willed myself to sleep.

Four hours later, I awoke to a loud, rattling noise as if someone were trying to open a door. I sat up with a start and swung my legs around, blinking at the stream of illumination from the bathroom slicing across the carpet like a laser beam.

I reached for my cell to check the time—2:55 a.m.—and noticed a missed message from Dad.

How is it going?

A moment later, the telltale sound of retching echoed through the room.

I dropped my phone on the sofa and scrubbed my hand over my face.

“Denny?” I leaned against the doorjamb, out of his line of sight for privacy, wincing as he heaved.

I retrieved my last water bottle from the room and slipped into the bathroom.

Damn, he was a hot mess. Sweat glistened along his spine and curled his hair at the nape where his neck was bent, hovering over the toilet. No part of this was cute—even if he was a ridiculously sexy pro hockey player. I didn’t want anything to do with this train wreck. Walk away, Hank. You’re good at that.

I couldn’t, though.

And the crazy thing was that I probably should have been angry. He was upchucking, naked, in my hotel bathroom, for fuck’s sake. But I wasn’t mad. I just wanted to fix this. Fix him.

“Ungh. Nnn, g’way,” Denny whined, cradling his head.

I left the water on the counter and ran cold water on a washcloth before handing it over. He grunted and yes…proceeded to get sick again. I held his hair like we were best friends and when he sat on his heels, I pressed the cool cloth to his sweaty forehead.

“Can you stand up?”

Denny mumbled something unintelligible as he slowly straightened and took the washcloth. He wiped his mouth, meeting my gaze in the mirror with his eyes half-closed. “Who are you?”

“Hank.”

“Oh. Hi, Hank.”

“Hi, Denny. How do you feel?”

He gave a humorless snort. “Bad. Do I know you?”

“We’re new friends.” I tugged his wrist and guided him into the room. “Why don’t you go back to bed?”

“Mm…’kay. Is this your house?”

“Sort of,” I replied, pushing him onto the mattress. “Just…get some rest. You’ll feel better in the morning.”

Denny rolled to his side, drew his knees to his chest, and shivered. “Hope so.”

I pulled the duvet over his shoulders. “Me too, big guy. Me too.”

3

DENNY

The tile was cold and unforgiving on my knees, the light was blinding, and my stomach was extremely unhappy with me.

I wiped sweat from my brow and gingerly crouched on my heels, afraid to move and start the cycle again. Every time I thought the worst was over, I ended up racing to the toilet to puke my guts out. I did feel better than I had earlier, though. At least that was something.

Was this really tequila’s fault? Had I eaten last night? Had I eaten something bad? I couldn’t remember.

My mind was fuzzy as fuck. I couldn’t think while my stomach was churning, but I was beginning to register that nothing was familiar. This wasn’t my bathroom or Grams’s or MK’s or Niall’s or— Shit. Where am I?

I licked my dry lips, clutching the counter as I slowly…oh, so slowly…stood, squinting at my reflection.

Geez, I looked like hell’s newest arrival. My face was ghostly pale, and my hair could have doubled as a bird’s nest. I washed my hands and splashed water on my cheeks, begging my brain to cooperate so I could think.

I’d met my friends at the bar. It had been fun and nice to see everyone. MK had seemed good and⁠—

Knock knock

“You okay in there?”

I froze.

Oh. Fuck.

“Uh, yeah. All good. Thanks,” I rasped.

“Can I come in?”

“Just a sec.” I dried my hands on the towel, yanking it off the bar and wrapping it around my waist.

I never slept naked, and that was just one of the mysteries piling up. I wildly scanned the bathroom for clues, zeroing in on the unzipped leather toiletry bag at the far end of the counter. Not mine, but it belonged to a man for sure. I snooped for a prescription bottle or something with a name, sighing at the lack of helpful evidence. There was nothing here but toothpaste, deodorant, and fancy-looking cologne that smelled like⁠—

The cowboy.

Oh, wow. If something sexy had happened between us and I couldn’t fucking remember, I was going to be seriously pissed at the universe. I examined my reflection for hickeys or bite marks or anything conclusive.

Had we fucked? No, there was no way I’d have forgotten that. And my ass didn’t hurt. Maybe I’d fucked him and maybe I’d been a terrible lay. Or maybe⁠—

“Denny?”

“Hang on.”

I stole a smidge of toothpaste and finger-brushed my teeth, rinsing my mouth and gargling till I felt as if I could communicate without singeing anyone’s eyebrows off.

I didn’t feel even halfway human, but I couldn’t put off the reckoning any longer.

So I opened the door, stepped out, and…there he was, sleep-rumpled with messy hair, a pillow crease on his stubbled cheek, sleepy eyes, and a hesitant smile.

He stepped around me to use the bathroom, closing the door behind him and leaving me to process puzzle pieces and make sense of my current situation.

His name was…Hank.

Hank.

Good. And I’d met him at the bar. No, in the parking lot. He’d had a proposition. I’d followed him upstairs and he’d given me a water bottle, and⁠—

Oh, fuck. I think I propositioned him.

Ew.

I was a lowly, gross worm. The worst of the worst.

“How are you feeling?” Hank asked, joining me in the room a few minutes later.

He poured water into the coffeemaker on the dresser and fussed with the complimentary cups, glancing over at me expectantly.

“Uh, bad. Very bad,” I admitted, rubbing my nape as I finally met his gaze. “I don’t know how to apologize.”

His eyes crinkled at the corners. “We’ve all been there a time or two.”

“Not me. Not like that. I almost feel like I was drugged or⁠—”

“I did not drug you,” he interrupted sharply.

I held up a hand, nodding slightly to preserve the integrity of my gray matter. “I know. I know. Unfortunately, it’s all coming back to me, and I remember almost everything. I don’t think embarrassed is a strong enough word.”

Hank’s lips twitched with humor. “You were kind of funny.”

“Doubtful. Did you hold my hair while I…” I couldn’t finish that sentence. It was too mortifying.

He nodded.

Oh. My. God.

“Do you take sugar or cream in your coffee?” Hank asked as if this wasn’t a weird-ass way to start the day.

“Just black is good.”

“Here you go.”

I thanked him for the coffee and sat on the edge of the mattress, briefly thinking it was inappropriate to sit on someone’s bed uninvited. But maybe the rules changed if you’d staged an unintentional takeover. I winced at the lumpy pillow and the thin blanket strewn over the nearby sofa. He’d probably slept with his long legs flung over the armrest. Poor bastard.

“I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I’ll pay for your room and⁠—”

Hank sat at the desk chair, scooting it to face me. “That’s not necessary.”

“I took your bed,” I scoffed, cradling the cup in my hands like a wounded bird. I didn’t know a nice way to ask, but I had to know. “I see that you slept on the sofa, but…did we do anything?”

He narrowed his eyes. “What do you mean?”

“You’re going to make me say it,” I grumbled, sipping a fortifying gulp of coffee before blurting, “Did we…you know?”

Hank pursed his lips in amusement. “No, we did not.”

“Right. I didn’t think so,” I bluffed. “I have another embarrassing question.”

He made a flourishing gesture. “Please continue.”

“Did I…” Ugh, this was even more painful. “Did I come on to you?”

“Yes.”

I squeezed my eyes shut. “Oh, crap. I’m so⁠—”

“Cool it. You’ve already apologized. It’s fine.”

“Not really. I’m naked under this towel. How’d that happen?”

Hank snort-laughed. “You sure you want to know?”

“No, I don’t want to know, but yes…tell me.”

“You stripped, then passed out on my bed.” He paused at my loud groan of dismay and added, “I couldn’t wake you up, and I didn’t know who to call. I considered going downstairs to the bar, but I didn’t know how to explain this, and I wasn’t sure who you trusted, so…here we are.”

“That’s pretty awful. Thank you for letting me stay. You have no idea how big a scene that would have caused. People talk in this town, and I’ve never been drunk in public.” I eyed him over the rim of my cup. “I’d appreciate it if we could forget last night. Forget we met and erase every weird and unfortunate thing that popped out of my mouth from your brain. Please.”

“No problem.”

My shoulders sagged in relief. “Thank you. You’re very cool. I don’t know how to make this right, but I can get you game tickets if you want. Are you a hockey fan?”

“I am, but…I have season tickets. I’m covered. Thanks.”

“Oh. Well, I’ll take care of the hotel room for sure, and I can leave you some money for⁠—”

“The room is paid for and I don’t want your money, Denny.” The look in his eyes indicated that he wanted something, though.

“What do you want?” I swallowed hard. “Oh, uh, did you change your mind? Do you want…sex?”

Hank barked a laugh. “For fuck’s sake, no. I don’t want sex. Like I told you last night, I don’t use sex as a bartering tool, and I’m too old for you anyway. What are you…twenty-two?”

I frowned. “Yeah, how old are you?”

“Twenty-nine.”

“You’re not that old. But if you’re not interested, that’s fine. Just say so. No…” I pinched my nose and tried again. “I didn’t mean that. I’m not interested either.”

“You were last night,” he teased.

“I wasn’t in my right mind.”

“Understood.”

I sipped my coffee, feeling smaller by the second. “Since I came on to you and made a total fool of myself, I guess you know that I’m…”

“Bi?”

“I’m not out, though.”

Hank inclined his chin. “I know.”

“Did I tell you that last night?” I wrinkled my nose in distaste.

“No, it was a guess. Don’t worry…I won’t say a word.”

We shared a smile, but his didn’t have the “Thank God that’s over, let’s move on” spark I was hoping for.

“What’s the catch?”

Hank set his cup on the desk. “There’s no catch.”

“But…” I prompted.

“I could use your help.”

I hung my head and released a theatric gush of air. “So this is what extortion feels like.”

He snorted. “I have no mal intent whatsoever. I don’t want money, hockey tickets, or ten seconds worth of fame. However, I would like ten minutes of your time to convince you to do a commercial and an ad campaign for the mill.”

“A commercial,” I repeated, adding in a confused tone, “That was your proposition. I sort of remember now.”

“Yes, I would normally go through your agent, but he hasn’t answered our calls. In a way, I get it. We’re a family-owned business based in Denver, and it’s hard to make wood sound sexy without being crass.” Hank gave a sophomoric grin, adding, “We’ll pay you, of course, and⁠—”

“No, I’m sorry, but…I can’t.”

I slid my cup next to his on the desk and sheepishly stalked over to the pile of clothes he’d probably folded for me after I’d performed a drunken striptease.

Yeah, it was all coming back to me, and the shame was real.

I wriggled my boxer briefs on under the towel, let it drop, and then finished getting dressed.

Hank sighed heavily. “It wouldn’t take much of your time. A couple of hours, tops. We’re a solid company with⁠—”

“Doesn’t matter,” I intercepted. “It wouldn’t work. I can’t—I can’t talk to people.”

“We’re talking right now.”

“Yeah, I know, and it’s weird. Maybe that’s because last night happened, and I feel like I know you better than I should. But new day, old me. I play hockey. That’s it. I don’t do commercials, and I avoid talking to the public whenever possible.” I pulled my socks on and shoved my feet into my shoes. “Honestly, it would have been easier if you’d just wanted to have sex.”

Hank’s eyebrows shot to his hairline. “That would be extremely unprofessional, not to mention morally suspect on my part.”

“Yeah, yeah. But easy. In and out, one and done. No drama.” I slipped my jacket on as I moved toward the door. “You’re hot, you’re nice, you have a cowboy hat…”

He followed me. Of course, he did. “A cowboy hat? What does that have to do with anything?”

“I like cowboy hats,” I said defensively.

“Yeah, you mentioned that last night. More than once.”

“It’s not weird. I like ’em on girls too.”

“Good to know, but I’m more curious that you’d seemingly rather have sex with a stranger than learn a few lines for an ad campaign. Or did I get that wrong?”

“No, you’re correct.”

Hank regarded me like a bug under microscope. “Guide me through the thought process on that one, please.”

“My inhibitions were compromised last night. If the chemistry and the timing was right, maybe something sexy would have happened…if you’d been interested.” I shrugged impotently. “But I admit, it’s weird in the daylight. I don’t know anything about you. You could be happily married with a beautiful family, cats and dogs. Oh, fuck. Please, please, please tell me you don’t have a wife and kids.”

He barked a laugh. “Geez, no. I’m not married.”

“Do you have a girlfriend?”

“I’m single…and gay,” he confirmed. “Which means less than nothing here. You and I were never going to have sex.”

I rolled my eyes. “My point stands, though—sex is easy. I’m assuming it would be easy with a guy too. I’ve never done that. I’m definitely interested, but wow…I shouldn’t have said that. Don’t quote me. And this is why I can’t talk. Talking is hard.”

“And yet he’s still talking,” Hank snarked.

He was right. If I kept this up I’d be out of words before noon. “Look, I know you got more than you bargained for last night and maybe I owe you that ten minutes, but it would be a failure. Trust me, you don’t want me. You’ll have to think of another form of payment.”

“Okay, be my friend.”

“Huh?”

“You owe me one, so…be my friend,” he replied. “For six months. Then we’ll be even.”

I repeated his new proposition in a measured, even tone as if testing the words to see if they made sense. They didn’t.

“Be your friend. How? Your family owns the mill in Wood Hollow. No offense, dude, but I don’t see us being business associates, let alone friends. We don’t like the kind of change that involves losing our forest to make way for new construction in Elmwood. I appreciate that you’re providing job opportunities, but it’s a double-edged sword.”

Hank nodded. “Exactly. That’s why I need you.”

“Oh. I get it. You need me to make you…likable.”

“That’s one way to put it. Yes. And that’s how you can pay me back for last night,” he intercepted, resting his shoulder on the door. “Forget the ad for now, and just…be my new best buddy.”

“What does that even mean? I can’t pretend to be friends with someone I threw myself at…and vomited in front of. As soon as I walk away, I’m going to do my very best to forget I know your name.”

“That’s not going to happen,” he insisted obstinately.

“It will. If I were you, I’d take the hockey tickets and sell them to the highest bidder.”

He unlocked the door and twisted the knob. “I’m not doing that. Look, I’m exhausted, and I’m sure you are too. I’ll be at the game next weekend in Denver. Let’s meet up afterward.”

I shook my head, glancing both ways in the empty corridor before stepping out. “No.”

Hank cast his eyes skyward as if seeking celestial intervention. “Fine, let’s play it your way. I’m officially extorting you.”

“How does that work?”

“I don’t know. I’m new at bribery and extortion, but I guess I could use the selfie we took last night and post it everywhere.”

“That was my cell, not yours.”

“Yeah, but I sneaked one too. For posterity.” He shrugged nonchalantly.

I blinked. “You’re joking.”

“Am I?”

He was bluffing. He had to be. I didn’t completely trust my memory, but I was pretty sure I was the one who’d taken the pic.

“I…”

Hank raised his hands in surrender and sighed. “Just give me an hour of your time in Denver next weekend. You owe me, and that’s what I want. We’ll talk when we’re both coherent. If you say no, I’ll leave it alone. Promise.”

I narrowed my eyes. Meeting up with him didn’t sound terrible now, but it might later.

Still, he’d been pretty cool about last night, so…

“Okay…maybe.”

“I’ll take a maybe.” We exchanged contact info and yes, he double-checked to be sure I hadn’t given him a bogus number. “Let me get my jacket. I’ll give you a ride.”

“No, I’ll walk. Thanks, but you’re hard to explain.”

Hank’s wolfish smile made my cock twitch in my jeans. “Got it. I’ll see you next week, Denny.”

He closed the door in my face. Smart move. I was about to change my answer, but I definitely wasn’t going to make a scene in the hallway at the Black Horse Inn at too-fucking-early a.m. I had to get out of here. Stat. I’d worry about the cowboy later.

“You look like shit. Good for you.”

I scowled. “Why would looking terrible be good for me?”

Grams shuffled to the kitchen table, her bony fingers clutching the handle of an orange juice pitcher for dear life. “It means you had some fun.”

I put my hand over the empty glass my grandmother was attempting to fill. “No, thanks. I’m fine with coffee.”

Her arm trembled as she set the container on the table, then slid onto the chair next to mine. “Tell me all about it.”

Uh, no way.

“I had too much to drink. That’s all.”

“And…?” she prompted, pulling a cigarette and lighter from her pocket.

Oh, boy. Grams was in storyteller mode—entertaining unless you were the subject of the story. Things could get embarrassing very quickly. It was almost more concerning than her smoking habit. She’d definitely cut back on cigarettes over the past couple of years, but I doubted she’d ever give them up completely.

First of all, she was eighty-seven. Grams liked to tell anyone who’d listen that she had no plans to live to a hundred and she was going out on her terms. If she wanted to smoke, drink, and eat maple cookies every damn day from now till she punched in her time card on planet Earth, she’d damn well do so. And yes, those were her exact words.

Things to know about Annie Calhoun Mellon: She was five foot nothing with a cloud of white hair and a birdlike frame. She claimed her brilliant blue eyes and high cheekbones were her finest features as a young woman.

I’d seen photos of Grams in youth, and she wasn’t exaggerating. She’d been a truly beautiful woman in her day. She could have been a model or a movie star, or maybe just married a rich man and lived part-time on a tropical island, sipping cocktails under an umbrella while devouring romance novels one after the other.

“You know what happened to me, Denny? I married for love. What an idiot! Yeah, yeah, I’d do it all over again, but it’s a sucker move if ever there was one. Grandpa and I never had a dime to our names. We couldn’t afford a nice house or fancy vacations. I had to work at the bakery to put food on the table, and I was one of the only women in town who had a job in those days. Folks didn’t approve. Hell, family didn’t approve either. Your great-grandmother and my monster-in-law—bless her evil soul—hated me. She wanted me to beg for money to support my children, and you know what I said? I said fuck that, fuck you, and fuck the high horse you rode into town on.”

I’d gasped at the idea. “You did?”

“Not to her face. I have some fuckin’ class, you know.”

Yep, that was my grandmother.

She pulled no punches. If she’d ever had a filter, it had been faulty for years and was pretty much gone now. If she thought it, she said it. No in between. Grams was spry, smart as a whip, and she had the biggest heart in the world. She just didn’t want anyone to know. But I knew.

Grams had opened her home to me when I was fifteen. I’d had no real options at the time. My dad had died, Mom had been in rehab, and my brother in college. I’d been sure I’d hate it here and that I’d hate living with an old lady I barely knew, but she changed my life.

Seven years later, I owed her…everything, and she wanted nothing in return. She’d owned her house for years, didn’t drive—thank God—rotated her favorite cardigans, and had no desire to travel anymore. I caught on that the only thing Grams wanted was for me to come by once in a while. So I’d bought the house next door to hers, and I did my best to visit regularly.

Even if it was just for a night. Like this trip.

It was no hardship. I loved her and loved hanging out with her…even if she busted my balls, looking for a story I definitely didn’t want to share.

“Nothing happened last night,” I lied.

“Bullshit.” She lit her cigarette and inhaled, eyes twinkling mischievously as he exhaled. “You walked home and let yourself in your front door at 6:20 a.m. Mary-Kate dropped your truck off at 8:39 on her way to the rink, which means you weren’t with her. From this information, I deduct the following…you got shitfaced, slept on someone’s sofa…or bed. Who is she? You can tell me anything. No reason to pretend you and MK are still lovebirds with me. I know love when I see it and you’re…well, it’s not love.”

I was in no shape to outmaneuver Grams’s PI-style interrogation. My hangover had a hangover. My headache had eased to a steady throb and my stomach didn’t object to coffee, but my brain was mush and weird things ached…like my hair and my eyelids. I couldn’t believe I had to get on a plane like this.

“I didn’t sleep on a sofa,” I said, sipping my lukewarm coffee.

“Ah-ha! Now we’re cooking with gasoline. Who’s the new girl? Is it Penny’s niece? The one with the small tits and a big smile?”

I choked on my coffee. “Jesus, Grams. No, I’m not seeing anyone else.”

“Hmph. Well…then where were you? Don’t spin a yarn, kiddo. I was listening at the screen door like a proper snoop when you were talking to Mary-Kate. I heard all the good parts. She left early last night and you stayed, but you weren’t with the boys.”

“How do you know that?”

“I ran into Niall at the bakery this morning and he told me you had a few too many, but not to worry ’cause Mary-Kate took good care of you.” She took another drag, arching one brow as she stamped out her cigarette. “So…what’s the deal? You can tell me anything. I’ll confuse it with another story by tomorrow anyway.”

Not true at all. She was sharp as fuck.

“I don’t want to tell you. It’s embarrassing,” I admitted.

“Oh! That’s my favorite kind of story. Feel free to embellish. Your idea of embarrassing is cute.”

I barked a laugh. “Okay, I recognized the guy who runs the mill from Denver. We were talking outside but I was drunk and thirsty and I didn’t want to go back to the bar, so I had water in his hotel room…and passed out.”

Grams frowned. “You passed out?”

“Yeah, I told you, it’s embarrassing. One minute, I was fine and the next…not so much.”

“That’s not like you at all. I saw a Dateline episode about scumbags putting drugs in drinks. They get you at your most vulnerable, take photos, and bribe you to keep them out of social media. And does this so-and-so know you play professional hockey?”

“Sure, but⁠—”

She gasped theatrically. “Who is this fucker? Let’s get him. I’ll call Bud. We’ll get the police to swarm his room and⁠—”

“Whoa! Hold up. He didn’t do anything wrong, Grams. That was me.”

“Oh. Did he take pictures?” she asked, her eyes narrowed in suspicion.

“No.” To be determined, I amended to myself.

“Hmm. Well, what the hell is wrong with you?” Grams stood abruptly and swatted me upside the head.

“Ow.”

“Drinking too much, passing out, crawling home like a zombie…you’re old enough to know better than to give the wheel to Jim Beam or Johnnie Walker, for fuck’s sake.”

“It was Jose Cuervo.”

“Jose’s a real schmeckle too. The world is full of ’em. You gotta be on your guard. I can’t do it for you. Believe it or not, I’m not going to be around forever. I’m on what you call borrowed time, Den. Don’t make me blow it worrying about you landing on the front page of the Forest Tribune in your damn birthday suit.”

“I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t publish a naked pic in the Tribune,” I said gently, patting the chair she’d abandoned in her tirade. “And don’t start up with the borrowed time stuff. You’re going to live forever. You’re too mean to die, remember?”

I added that last line ’cause it always made her smile and I really didn’t want to think deep, scary thoughts involving a world without Annie Mellon. Not now.

Grams toddled over and took her seat, surprising me when she grasped my wrist in a firm grip. “I got ’em fooled, Den. I’m not as mean as I used to be. I had my hand raised in case God was looking for any volunteers to cut the line to the pearly gates…until you came along and gave me a reason to stick it out. I intend to be here for as long as possible just to make sure you end up okay. Either that or I will haunt your ass from here to eternity, so work with me and don’t do anything stupid. For my sake…please.”

Okay, I think that was a guilt trip, but don’t quote me. I wasn’t in the best mental shape.

“I was a little stupid last night, but it’s nothing to worry about.”

She rolled her eyes. “Tell that to my ulcer, my arthritis, my bursitis, and my aching back.”

I hid an indulgent grin, relieved she’d moved on to her cranky old lady routine. It was better than dwelling over the ugly facts of life.

I wanted to preserve this moment in bubble wrap and revisit it again in ten years, twenty years, thirty years—minus the hangover. The smell of coffee, cigarette smoke, and Dior perfume, the hum of the refrigerator and the ticking of the ancient cuckoo clock over the kitchen sink. I wanted to memorize every wrinkle in my grandmother’s face…the crow’s feet she claimed she’d had since she was twenty-one, the laugh lines around her mouth, and the loose skin under her chin. I wanted to remember her smoke-tinged voice and the girlish tone she took when she spoke of my grandfather.

I didn’t like the idea of her being reduced to memories, but if I ever had kids, I’d want them to know how amazing it felt to sit in this kitchen and know you mattered more than life itself to my grandmother. Daunting too.

Grams was larger than life. It was kind of remarkable that someone so tiny and seemingly fragile could fill a room the way she did. I felt a strong sense of duty to honor her, and last night had been an utter failure.

“Hey, Grams? I’m fine. Just…hungover and embarrassed. Let’s keep this between us.”

She twisted her lips and huffed. “Who would I tell?”

“Elmwood. If you mention this to Penny at the bakery, she’ll tell Ivan at the coffee shop, and he’ll accidentally pass it along to JC or Nolan at the diner…or maybe he’ll slip in front of Mary-Kate, who’ll wonder why I hadn’t gone back to the bar and⁠—”

“I won’t say word. Girl Scout’s honor,” she assured me, flashing a peace sign.

“Were you ever a Girl Scout?” I asked suspiciously.

“Yes. For three days. I got kicked out for changing the lyrics to some goody-two-shoes line in one of their songs. What a crock. I couldn’t in good conscience sing a bullshit song about being best friends forever while sitting next to Kath Woodrow. Evil demon. She put a spider in my lunch box and told Dale Kittridge I had a hole in my underwear. I know what you’re thinking. She’s a sweet little old lady now, but she was a little shit eighty years ago. I’d trip her on Main Street if I thought I could get away with it.”

I barked a laugh. “Don’t trip Mrs. O’Neil, Grams. And please don’t repeat anything I told you.”

She made a zipped-lips motion and changed the subject. Phew! It was almost time to return to my regularly scheduled life in Denver, and I didn’t want to end my weekend on a low note.

Mistakes were lessons that occasionally came with price tags, like hangovers from hell and cloudy memories of flirting with a sexy cowboy.

Cue my fifteenth round of embarrassment shivers. If the universe gave even the smallest shit about me, my head would miraculously not feel like the human equivalent of a bowling ball attached to a cornstalk and better still…Hank Cunningham would develop a sudden case of amnesia and forget he’d ever met me.

4

HANK

“You have urgent calls on lines one, two, and three, sir. And an important message.”

I glanced from the red lights beeping on my desk to my new assistant hovering in the doorway with a Post-it note in her hand. Christ, I was in over my head without a life preserver, and though I knew how to swim in these waters, it had been a few years since I’d had to.

And c’mon, why give me three calls and a message at the same time? If it didn’t smack of paranoia, I’d swear there was a conspiracy going on where every vendor or contractor in the area had agreed to sync up and call me at once.

No…this was an internal situation. I had a bad feeling my dad’s Wood Hollow employees had devised a secret sneaky plan to drive me insane.

From the outside, everything seemed to be going well. My secretary, Emily, a pretty brunet in her midtwenties with a cool ink sleeve on her right arm and a penchant for the color purple always greeted me warmly, asked how I was doing, and offered to bring me coffee. I’d thought that meant she liked me. But the coffee kind of sucked, and you didn’t purposely try to overwhelm your boss with competing “urgent” calls and important messages on the hour if you liked him, did you?

“Uh…thanks, Emily.” I took the yellow sticky note and fixed it to my monitor. “Which call is most important? One, two, or three?”

She smacked her gum, narrowing her eyes thoughtfully. “Gosh, that’s hard to say. Three’s my lucky number, so I’d go with that. Can I get you anything else before I go home?”

I peeked at my watch. “It’s not five o’clock yet.”

“Oh. That’s like…fifteen minutes from now. Did you want me to stay till then?”

I nodded. “Yes, that’s part of the deal. Eight to five and an hour for lunch.”

Her smiled dimmed. “Okay. I’ll be at my desk if you need me.”

I gave her a thumbs-up as I adjusted my Airpods and tackled the blinking lights.

Report: the call on line one dropped, number two was a solicitor, and number three was the contractor in charge of the entire Wood Hollow building project. Long story short, I should have taken Emily’s advice.

By the time I finally got to the Post-it note, she was gone for the night along with the rest of the staff. Apparently, no one at the mill worked past five p.m. We had a new shipment coming in at dawn tomorrow and if I wanted to be sure it didn’t get unloaded in the parking lot, I had to be here at the ass crack of dawn.

Get this…I hadn’t been able to bribe anyone to come earlier. I’d asked the manager to handle it, but he had a dentist appointment and wouldn’t be in till ten. It was glaringly obvious that if I wanted anything done, I had to do it myself. There was no way I could continue at this rate and remain sane in this town.

And that was why I needed the hockey player. Denny was my ticket out of here.

My cell buzzed, pulling me back to reality.

“Hankster! How’s it going in the land of maple syrup?”

I smiled for what felt like the first time in hours and sat back in my chair. “Hey, Cassy. I’m okay. How about you?”

“Great. I wanted to thank you referring the Crane kid. I hooked him up with Jazzy. Remember her? She’s that Appaloosa I was telling you about. She’s just as sweet as Bess, and Max took to her right away.”

“That’s good news,” I replied.

Cassy agreed and launched into a report about the goings-on at the stable and a new client she’d taken on who’d recently been in an accident. She was an animated single mom in her forties who’d started out assisting me at the stable and had basically taken over. Temporarily. I couldn’t decide if I was grateful or jealous.

Definitely jealous.

I hummed as cued, ignoring the pang of homesickness while I stared out the window at the forest. I thanked Cassy for the update, assuring her I’d visit on my trip to Denver next weekend. Then I grabbed my hat and keys, pushed away from my desk, and at the last second, snatched the dog-eared Post-it note stuck to my computer screen.

A green melon…and a phone number.

A green melon? Mellon maybe?

Denny?

No, he wouldn’t call the mill directly. I checked my cell for a message from him, but there wasn’t one. Emily had handed over the note first, so maybe this green melon message had been important too.

And now, I was looking for clues to interpret messages at work. Wow.

I locked up and headed out to the lone truck in the lot. I started the engine before inputting the number. A woman answered on the second ring. I explained that I was returning a call, apologizing for not knowing her name as I navigated toward the main road.

“Oh, the wood guy,” she said around a cough.

“Well, yes. I guess I am. How can I help you, Ms.…”

“Mellon. Denny’s grandma.”

My eyebrows shot to my hairline. What the fuck? Denny’s grandmother?

“Uh…”

Confusion caught my tongue, but she didn’t notice. “I think I’m being uncool, but I don’t give a rat’s ass. I want to meet you to be sure you aren’t a psycho looking for a cheap story. I don’t drive anymore, and I’m not paying that cranky old Sal to take me on a joyride to Wood stinkin’ Hollow. You’ll have to come to me. I can offer you cookies or bread for your trouble. I work at the bakery in Elmwood on Tuesdays at ten a.m…or whenever I feel like coming in. Just ask for Annie. I have nothing else to say, so don’t make this weird. Good-bye.”

She hung up.

I stopped at the corner of Pecker and Belvedere to stare at the screen on my dashboard. This was a new one. I’d never been summoned to meet an acquaintance’s grandmother. And that was all Denny and I were…acquaintances. Nothing sexy had happened and he hadn’t agreed to help me out, so we weren’t even business associates. Or friends.

We were just…

Okay. Fuck it. I didn’t know what was going on, so I scrolled for the number I’d inputted a few nights ago and texted Denny.

Your grandmother wants to meet me.

I continued along the winding road to Elmwood, passing Lake Norman and the giant copse of elms near Carlton Creek. The moon shone like a spotlight on bare trees, church steeples, and quaint homes dotting the wintery horizon. I missed Denver, but I had to admit this place was charming and idyllic, like a picture straight out of a Vermont travel brochure.

I stopped by my father’s new house and checked in with the contractor finishing up the kitchen and bathroom remodel. It was very…nice.

The house itself was unassuming—a two-story white colonial with green shutters and a narrow porch. The hardwood flooring was in decent shape and the rooms were spacious with large windows overlooking a grassy field and the forest beyond. The kitchen and bathrooms had been stuck somewhere in the eighties and desperately needed updating, but it had good bones.

Dad hadn’t been willing to go from a sprawling ranch in the mountains of Colorado to a tired, hundred-year-old Wood Hollow house. He’d wanted the comforts of home, including a tricked-out, modern kitchen, space for his horses, and privacy. This was a humble version of Red Robin Ranch, but he would have approved.

It was mine for six whole months now, and nope, I wasn’t happy about that.

My situation was looking bleak as hell at the moment. The mill was plodding along at the same rate it had for decades, which wasn’t anywhere near what was needed to meet the demands of new construction. And after two years of hanging out with horses and therapy patients, I was out of practice in dealing with corporate assholes and angry workers.

I walked through the kitchen with Steve the contractor, oohed and aahed at the restaurant-grade appliances Dad had ordered, and admired the giant quartz island and the breakfast nook that supposedly had a nice view of the forest. It was too dark to appreciate the scenery at this hour, but I believed him.

“Thank you. It looks amazing, Steve. How much longer will you need?” I asked.

Steve smoothed the edges of his full mustache as he peered around the kitchen and great room area. He was a big man in his fifties with rosy cheeks and a beer belly. “One week to paint and clean. I don’t know if you need movers, but my son and his friends would be happy to help.”

“That’s nice of you, but I don’t have anything to move. Just a suitcase. I’ll have to order furniture online. Unless you have any stores here.”

“Not in Elmwood. You’ll have to go to Pinecrest. It’ll be pricey, but you’ll want nice things for this house.” He swept his arm wide and continued conversationally. “This is turning into a fancy section of town. I don’t know if you follow hockey, but Vinnie Kiminski is your neighbor. Your property abuts his on the other end of the creek. Vinnie and his husband, Nolan have two kids now. Gee, they must be seven and four or five. I saw them sledding down that little hill from your window a couple of weeks ago. Technically on your property, but I’m assuming you like kids, and I sure as heck hope you don’t have a problem with a family with two dads.”

“Well, I⁠—”

“I know not every place is like Elmwood, but I’ll tell ya something…we pride ourselves on diversity and⁠—”

“I’m gay, Steve. Of course, I’m cool with it,” I intercepted.

I’d commuted regularly between Vermont and Colorado over the past month, initially splitting the week with three days in Denver and four here. Every freaking time I stepped foot in Elmwood or Wood Hollow, you’d think I was brand-new to the area. Which meant I heard the same spiels about inclusivity and equality over and over again.

The “Don’t be a dick or we’ll run your ass out of town” speech had become a mantra of sorts. I’d heard a few variations since I first arrived, usually delivered in the same congenial tone of my contractor.

Look, I appreciated their commitment to protecting their neighbors, but I wasn’t the enemy. Sure, I was the guy whose family was cutting down trees in their forest, but we were doing it the right way.

Seemingly, my queerness gave me the hall pass our commitment to sustainable forestry lacked.

The ironic thing was that I’d had zero plans to come out to the good folks in the Four Forest area. I had a strong belief that who I fucked was my business and no one else’s. Elmwood was different, and if shared sexuality put me in the same cool category as some of the town’s elite hockey citizens, I might as well lead with that info.

Hey, it worked on Steve.

The older man didn’t bother hiding his surprise. “Oh. Good for you.”

“I’m also a hockey fan. I followed Vinnie’s career religiously in my teens. And Riley Thoreau’s.”

He beamed and clapped my shoulder. “I knew I liked you. Did you know Jake Milligan is from here too? He plays for Boston. And Denny Mellon is Colorado’s new rookie who⁠—”

“I met Denny last weekend.”

“Great guy,” Steve gushed. “I went to high school with Denny’s dad and his uncle, Daryl. They were wild and crazy…always taking dares. Denny must take after his mom’s side of the family. God rest her soul. Poor kid has lost both parents now. All he’s got left is Annie. No, no. I think he has a brother too. Never met him, but—I need to shut my gob and get home or I’ll be late for dinner. Have a good night, Mr. Cunningham.”

“Hank,” I corrected. “Just Hank.”

He paused at the kitchen door and inclined his chin. “All right. See you tomorrow, Hank.”

I cast an appraising glance around the shiny new kitchen as I pulled my cell from my pocket and called home.

“Hello, Cunningham residence. May I ask who’s calling?”

Side note: A, someone had been answering the phone in my childhood home with that exact greeting for the past forty years or more. B, my father would never ever get rid of his landline. He was a sporadic texter at best, and if he had a lot to say, he called…or emailed.

“Hi, Margaret. It’s Hank. How’s he doing?”

“Okay,” his nurse replied hesitantly. “Your father fell today. He was trying to lift himself from his chair. It was a bit traumatic, but he’s fine.”

I swallowed hard in an attempt to dislodge the ball of panic wedged in my throat. “Did you call Dr. Hellman?”

“Yes. He left an hour ago. He prescribed a blood thinner and rest. Your dad will downplay it, but I thought you should know.”

“Thanks.”

“Would you like to speak to him?” Margaret asked.

“Yes, please.”

A couple of minutes later, my dad’s familiar Texas twang rattled the line. “Well, is it a shit show over there or what?”

The answer was yes. One thousand times, yes.

“It’s not too bad,” I hedged, scratching my temple. “It’s going to take a bit of work, but⁠—”

“You got him!” Dad intercepted. “You got the hockey star.”

“Not exactly, but we talked and I’m going to see him when I’m in Denver this weekend.” I hoped.

“Then you got him. I knew you were the one for the job. I knew it.”

“Nothing is done, Dad. I just met him. This may take a while,” I reminded him.

“Hmm, I don’t have a while,” he countered. “Sell him on the idea, Hank. Offer him something no one else can. Something titillating and unique.”

“Titillating and unique?” I repeated

“Make it sexy.” Uh… “I believe in you, son. Will I see you this weekend?”

Okay, my mind was still stuck on the titillating comment, but I rallied.

“Of course. How are you feeling?” Yeah, I knew the answer, but I had to ask.

“Right as rain and fit as a fiddle.”

“I heard you fell.”

“Oh, please. That was nothing. I got right back in the saddle. Don’t you worry about me,” he huffed.

I nodded impotently. Margaret was right. Dad would downplay personal danger all day long. Poking for more info would only piss him off.

We talked for a few minutes, trading our standard bullshit lines. I was fine, he was fine, everything was fine. “Fine” had become a high bar. How sad was that? It scared me to think this was as good as it got.

The father of my youth had been larger than life: tall, barrel-chested, twinkly-eyed, charismatic, energetic—and an all-around good guy. He wasn’t a saint by any means. Dad had a wily, cutting side, and by his own admission, he was occasionally ambitious to a fault.

Now he was fussy, cantankerous, and only sporadically engaging. But I was the only one of his kids who gave a damn about the family business. Trust me, I didn’t want to care. In fact, I tried very hard not to care, but I did. And here I was. Stuck in Elmwood.

“Glad you’re feeling better. I’ll see you in a few days, Dad.”

My cell beeped with a new notification just as I ended the call.

A missed text from Denny Mellon.

Who is this?

Hank, I responded. Your new best friend. You stole my bed the other night. Ring any bells?

Thumbs-up emoji. What’s up?

You tell me. Your grandma called me.

Face-palm emoji. Do not talk to her.

The hint of playfulness made me smile and damn, I really needed something to smile about. Are you kidding? I’ve been summoned. If you won’t help me, maybe she will.

Three dancing dots, pause. More dancing dots. Good luck with that.

See you Friday night.

Eye-roll emoji. I have a game.

And we had a deal. This is part two of the proposition. Nothing. No eye-roll emojis, no thumbs-up. I waited a minute and added, Meet me at the Oak Tavern on Olivera Street. It’s close to the arena. I’ll be there at ten.

No response.

I stared at the screen, waiting for those damn dots.

Fuck it. If he showed, he showed. If not, I’d have to go all bounty hunter on him again. Or let it go and figure something else out.

I opened the sliding glass door to the deck. A dusting of snow covered the wide planks and the steps leading to the sprawling lawn. No porch lights, no street lamps, just a sliver of moon in the otherwise pitch-dark sky. I wished Bess were here. I missed my old life. The one I’d had two years ago. Christ, I even missed my ex. I was in exile in a strange land where no one but the bartender remembered my name.

This was hell. It was a pretty version, but…it still sucked.

I pulled my cell out and hallelujah, there was a message from Denny.

Okay.

I breathed out a sigh of relief. Thank you, baby Jesus.

Remember when I claimed to be charming? Not impressed so far? Fair. I needed another shot. I was going to charm the hell out of Denny Mellon if that was what it took to win the PR game and turn this mill around. Dad was right. I had to make this offer so appealing, he couldn’t say no.

And yes…I was going to wear my fucking cowboy hat.

5

DENNY

Sweat dripped from my brow, tickling my nose. I ignored it.

I had strict rules about face-off etiquette. No blinking, no talking, no unnecessary movement. I didn’t goad the opponent with silly distractions. I didn’t rely on tricks, and I didn’t feel the need to intimidate. I didn’t need to read anyone else’s mind or worry about who they’d pass to on the off chance they should win.

My only focus was the puck. It was mine. All mine.

“How’s it goin’, Mellon? Got any plans tonight? Hot date? You’re not ugly. I could probably hook you up with my ex…or her brother. You into dudes?”

The urge to roll my eyes was strong, but I didn’t flinch. My mind and my body worked like a well-oiled machine. Nothing Dallas’s forward could say would pull my attention from the circle. Sure, I was new to the NHL, but I’d heard it all. Disparaging remarks about my family, my friends, my girlfriend, my looks, my sexuality…bring it. None of that registered.

When I was on the ice, I had ice in my veins. It was like an elemental sync. I was the ice I skated upon. I was connected to the blades on my feet and the stick in my hands. And once I had the puck, I was unstoppable. I was fast, I was savvy, I played hard and sometimes mean. This was my game, and no one could fucking take this from me.

So, sure moron…I was into dudes. Specifically, the cowboy I couldn’t stop thinking about—and propositions. The things I wanted and things he wanted. I should have been freaked out of my mind. He’d seen me at my worst—drunk, naked, slurring, sick. And he knew I was bi. Hank had ammunition to make my life very uncomfortable. Yet all he wanted was an ally.

It was…confusing.

More about that later. I had a face-off to win.

I relaxed into my pose, a firm but supple grip on my stick as the ref slid between us with the puck in hand. A second later, it was on the ice in the center of the circle. A nanosecond later, it was mine.

Told you.

I raced to the blue line and passed to Trinsky, deking around Dallas’s enforcer and losing him as I neared the goal. The angle was shit, but I’d practiced this shot till my fingers had bled in high school, and I’d kept it in my back pocket for moments like this when my team needed a mini miracle to pull off a win.

Dallas was a better team, but the fact that this was a tied game with a minute left in the third period meant we had a chance to pull off a win. I just needed Trinsky to play keep-away with Farmer so I could get free and—here it was…a narrow gap in the lower left side of the net that the goalie couldn’t defend if Farmer passed to me…now.

The puck hit my stick like a magnet. I boxed out the defender, lowered my hip, and let it fly. And boom! The lamp lit and my teammates swarmed, tapping their sticks to mine and roaring their approval.

Fifty seconds later, we won. It wasn’t pretty, but it was a W and damn, it felt really fucking nice.

The crowd stomped their feet, chanting “Hotshot” as I skated the perimeter. With my stick raised and a stupid grin on my face, I soaked up the hometown good vibes. I didn’t love the nickname and I wasn’t a showboat, but this was my happy place.

I could happily stay out here till well after the lights were turned off, skating, skating, skating. Life was easy on the ice. I was confident, assertive, and decisive. I could lead the team…no problem.

But the familiar claw of uncertainty weaseled its way under my collar as I headed for the tunnel, telling me I was a fraud, a fake. I didn’t belong here. My throat tightened with every step, restricting air till I felt like I might choke on my own breath.

Trinsky bumped my elbow, pulling me to the surface. “Nice game, man.”

“Thanks.”

My entire team was great, but Trinsky especially had gone out of his way to take me under his wing. He was roughly my height, a six-foot-four beast with short dark hair, green eyes, wide shoulders, and colorful tats. I think his first name was Jason or Mason. Don’t quote me. Everyone on my team was referred to by their last name or a spur-of-the-moment nickname that stuck. Like Hotshot.

Lucky me.

I hadn’t known Trinsky long enough to put him in the same category of cool as my friends back home, but he was getting there. Of all my teammates, I felt the most comfortable around him. He had the protective older brother vibe down pat, and I appreciated it since I rarely saw my actual brother.

“Heads up, Adam is gonna want you to give a few words.” Trinsky tipped his chin toward the team’s PR guru waiting at the end of the tunnel.

I sighed aloud. “Cover for me? I’m meeting someone tonight.”

Yeah, Trinsky’s coolness earned him complete sentences.

He cast a curious sideways glance my way. “Sure. Got a hot date, Hotshot?”

“No.”

“You’re blushing.” Trinsky elbowed me and waggled his thick brows comically. “I get it. You’re meeting someone who’s not your girlfriend.”

Okay, cool or not, he was still kind of a bonehead. I rolled my eyes but was saved from further explanation in the melee of bodies as we neared the hallway. I ducked into the locker room, shucking off my jersey and undoing my pads as I hobbled to my section.

As much as I would’ve loved to make a quick escape, I was contractually obligated to represent the team “to the best of my ability.” That clause had been added by my agent, who’d caught on early that I wasn’t leading-man material. They didn’t need me to be Mr. Charisma. We had plenty of other guys to charm reporters. Like our captain, Oskar Petrov—or Petey.

Petey was a gregarious and funny-as-fuck Russian in his midthirties and a talented goalie. His thick accent made it tricky to understand him sometimes, but he was inspiring, intelligent, and playful.

I overheard Petey mention my name as I hurried to get dressed after showering.

“That last goal was—how do you say…ridiculous, yes? We owe this win to our rookie, the hotshot boy,” Petey said, pausing when the locker room chanted, “Hotshot, Hotshot.”

My face was on fire as I shoved my feet into my shoes and yanked my sweater over my head. I had to get out of there, and that was me being my usual awkward-as-fuck self.

Yes, I’d been captain of my high school and college teams, but that was thanks to Coach Smitty, who’d been a gifted former AHL defenseman in his own right. He’d tapped me for the job at Elmwood High and he’d refused to take no for an answer. Coach had been tight with my college coach and had advocated on my behalf, suggesting that I’d be considered for a leadership role.

Maybe Coach Terrell had lost a bet to Smitty and owed him one? I’d never been as motivational or charming as Petey, but I’d done all right. And I’d probably never get another shot at it.

No one gave free shots in the NHL. You had to prove yourself every damn night. I’d moved up from third line to second line, but I was gunning for first. I was ambitious, I played to win, and I was willing to work my ass off to improve my game. That right there was the sound bite every reporter was looking for.

It was basic sports jargon—nothing special. But that shit was mine. My goals, my ambitions, the heart and soul of my relationship with the ice wasn’t something I could share. The words were too deep to access. I was always left with a suffocating sensation as if there were something obstructing my windpipe. Geez, choking out monosyllabic post-game replies felt a minor miracle some nights.

Like tonight.

A reporter cornered me before I reached the exit and shoved a microphone in my face.

“Congratulations on your win, Denny. The Condors are looking great just in time for the playoffs.”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

The poor guy hesitated a beat and tried again. “How’d you feel about the game tonight?”

“Good game.” The microphone was still there, and the reporter was smiling like he expected insightful repartee. Fuck. You got this, Denny. Say something, anything. “We played hard.”

Weak sauce. The reporter knew it and no doubt every hockey fan in the world would agree, but at the moment, it was all I had.

And I had somewhere else to be.

Fifteen minutes later, I parked in the lot the Oak Tavern shared with a taqueria joint, a dry cleaner, a yogurt store, and a bike repair shop. It looked like an unassuming hole-in-the-wall. Of course, I’d googled it beforehand. I wasn’t an idiot, for fuck’s sake. I would never meet Hank Cunningham in some high-profile bougie sports bar where running into puck bunnies and super fans was a given…especially on a weekend. I tried not to go to those places anyway.

I’d also googled the Cunninghams.

There wasn’t much on Hank, per se. He was the youngest of Bruce Cunningham’s three kids, twenty-nine years old, graduated from Boulder, and…not much else. His older brother was thirty-three and lived in Texas, his sister was thirty-two and lived in California, and his mom had passed away almost twenty-five years ago. That was it.

But there was a lot of info about Bruce, the lumber pioneer who’d originally hailed from a tiny town near Lubbock, moved to Denver in the seventies and opened a successful lumber enterprise. Another article touched on Bruce’s recent health battles, but I didn’t delve any further. I wasn’t interested in his dad or the mill. I was here because…well, for blackmail reasons.

And to warn Hank to stay away from my grandmother. I’d tried to tell Grams to leave Hank alone too, but she kind of did whatever the hell she wanted, so it was up to me to nip any weird feud or alliance that might pop up between them in the bud.

The Condors were playoff bound, and depending on how far we got, I wouldn’t be home for summer for another six weeks or more. I couldn’t worry about Grams and Hank.

I did my usual breathing exercises outside the bar and wiped my clammy palms on my jeans before catching the corner of the door just as someone was exiting.

The interior was almost as dark as the Black Horse but much newer. The professionally antiqued mirrors reflecting the bottles on the shelves behind the bar and wagon wheel chandeliers were a little hokey, though probably perfect for an establishment that catered to pool and pinball enthusiasts. Two pool tables ate up the bulk of real estate around the bar, and a row of pinball machines and classic video games lined the walls near the front.

I adjusted my ball cap and lowered my head as I made my way toward the rear, pausing for a beat when I spotted the cowboy straddling a barstool at a high table in the farthest corner of the bar. The fluttery sensation in my chest took me by surprise. Okay, I’d known I was attracted to him, but I’d kind of hoped the feeling had dimmed in light of last weekend’s unfortunate episode.

Hank glanced up as I approached, and fuck me, my pulse raced faster than it had on the ice earlier tonight.

Goddamn that hat and that snug-fitted blue flannel shirt. Or was it his crooked smile and that sparkly look in his eyes that hinted at a secret he couldn’t wait to share? Or was I the secret?

“Good game, man. I bought you a beer.”

“No, thanks.” I shook my head. “I’m not drinking.”

“You look better than the last time I saw you. Not quite so green around the gills.” He fixed me with a teasing once-over as he slid a glass toward me. “You can have my water.”

“Did you poison it?”

Hank snickered. “No, I need you alive and kicking.”

“Right.” I circled my wrist meaningfully. “Let’s get this over with. What did you want?”

“Ouch. I can’t remember the last time anyone was happy to see me,” he groused without heat. “Except Steve the contractor. He likes me okay, but he’s being paid well. Our employees do well too, but sadly, they don’t like me at all.”

“I can’t help you with that. Sorry.”

Hank sipped his beer and shrugged. “Yes, you can. I’m extorting you, remember?”

“Oh…yeah.” I chuckled.

And fuck, I didn’t want to be amused. I didn’t want to like Hank at all, but it was hard not to appreciate his self-deprecating honesty. He emanated “nice guy” vibes with the right amount of edge. No wonder drunk me had gotten flirty with him. Fortunately, sober me knew he was more than I could handle.

Which was fine since Hank wasn’t interested anyway. He wanted my alleged star power, not me.

So why was I grinning like an idiot?

Fuck, I had a bad feeling my eyes were twinkling too. I had to rein that shit in, stat.

“So…let’s make a deal,” he said, thankfully unaware of my inner detour. “I need an Elmwood buddy. My dad gave me the all-clear to make my offer sexy, so…what’ll it be?”

I bugged my eyes out. “Sexy?”

“Yeah, something interesting. If it’s money, name your price. Tell me what you want in exchange for your time.”

You.

The word tripped to the tip of my tongue. I bit it back and swallowed it, clearing my throat to be sure it was gone.

“I just…want to make sure that whatever I blabbed while I was wasted off my ass stays between us.”

“Yeah, but I’ll do that for free. You can trust me.”

“I don’t know you,” I retorted.

“True,” he conceded, sipping his beer. “But you don’t really have a choice. I can’t prove that I won’t sell you out. It’s a trust thing. Let’s talk about the sexy angle, ’cause I need an Elmwood buddy like yesterday.”

“I can’t believe I’m asking this, but…what does an Elmwood buddy do?”

“He shows the new guy the ropes.” Hank leaned in. “Introduce me, give me tips on who’s who and what to avoid. I suck in Elmwood and I need a champion, a liaison…a friend. That can be you.”

I huffed in amusement, feeling strangely at ease. He was charming as fuck and I was not immune. “How can you suck in Elmwood? Everyone is cool there.”

He slumped on his stool. “I don’t know, but I’m even worse in Wood Hollow. I don’t get it. People in Denver like me just fine. Even you like me.”

“No, I like your hat.” I reached for his water and winked.

I fucking winked.

Me.

That was me flirting. Ugh. Bad, Denny. Bad.

I felt surprisingly relaxed with him. Like I had last weekend when I’d spilled my guts and…other things. The point was, I could talk to him without feeling immediately depleted, and that alone was a minor miracle.

Hank kicked my shin playfully. “Nah, you like me. You did last weekend, anyway.”

“I was drunk, and I’m still mortified. Go easy on me.” I took a swig of water as if I were knocking back whisky.

“I’ll try, but…you shook your dick at me, then fell buck-ass naked in my bed, so c’mon.”

My eyes had to be saucer-sized. “I shook my dick at you?”

He inclined his chin and winked in a touché move that made my cock swell against my zipper.

“A week later, I’m still thinking about it,” Hank drawled.

Whoa. Was he serious?

“I didn’t think I was your type.”

Hank snorted. “A dark, broody jock with big muscles…you’re everyone’s type.”

“I don’t think of myself that way. At all.”

“Well, you are. You’re single, easy on the eyes, and successful. You must have puck bunnies following your tail everywhere.”

“I don’t see any.” I glanced over my shoulder as if to double-check. “I don’t pay attention, anyway.”

“Why not?”

I skewered him with an annoyed look. “I’m not interested in hooking up with random women.”

“Or men?”

“I’ve never done that.” I leaned across the table and whisper-hissed, “And I thought we agreed not to discuss this.”

He made a button-lip gesture and shrugged. “My bad. I’m just curious. But you were drunk and maybe there were other factors at play, like bad breakup blues or⁠—”

“No, that wasn’t it,” I snapped. “I don’t want to talk about my ex. You’re supposed to be asking about Elmwood…as a friend.”

“I know, but I’m working out my pitch for that titillating angle, and I can’t help wondering if…” He stared at my mouth as if in a trance, raking his teeth along the side of his lip. “Never mind.”

Never mind? Fuck that.

Blood zipped through my veins, sending my heart rate through the ceiling. He was toying with me like a lion pawing at a mouse. What did he want from me? I was too afraid of misreading signals to think we might be on the same page.

Don’t ask me what that meant. I wasn’t sure what I wanted.

No, that was a damn lie. I knew exactly what I wanted.

“Say it. What are you wondering?” I asked before taking a sip of water.

Hank propped his elbows on the table and tipped his hat. “I’m wondering if we should start over…with a sexier proposition.”

My jaw dropped on cue and since I currently had a mouth full of water, it dribbled over my chin. Classy much?

Wait. It got worse.

I set the glass down with a thud, sloshing water over the sides and onto the table. I tried to pull it out of the way but knocked it over instead, spilling the contents directly in Hank’s lap.

He jumped up, cursing under his breath and brushing at his jeans ineffectually.

“Damn, I’m sorry.” I waved a server over.

She cleaned the watery mess on the table and handed Hank a wad of napkins.

“Thanks.”

“No problem. Can I get you—” She froze as she turned to me. “Hey, you’re Denny Mellon. The hockey player, right?”

Shit. Could I deny it? No, that was dumb.

“I—yeah. I am.”

Her face lit up, and she let out a shrill squeal that echoed throughout the bar.

“I watched the last period on my break, and oh my gosh, you were amazing! Can I get a selfie, please? I never ask, but I can’t resist. You’re my favorite new player. I’m Kelly, by the way.” Her phone was out and she was plastered to my side before I could get a word in.

I swallowed my unease as heads swiveled our way.

Okay, this had happened once or twice. It wasn’t a big deal. In fact, it was an honor. I was a hockey fan too. I still got jazzed when I saw some of my idols, and playing with them in the pros was seriously next level. But I wasn’t used to the rabid attention off the ice.

I thought I did okay, though. I smiled for the camera, signed a napkin for Kelly, and for the couple next to us. Someone was filming from the pool tables and that was fine too. I mean…I would have preferred to be left alone, but at least no one expected a speech. And their questions were easy.

“How do you like playing for Denver?” Love it.

“You’re from here, right?” Yes, I am.

“Do you think we’ll bring home the cup this year?” I hope so.

Simple questions, simple answers.

“Thank you! Drinks on the house. How do you feel about wings? Or nachos? Ours are the best,” Kelly gushed.

Not sure why that was the moment I froze, but words wouldn’t come. Panic threatened for no good fucking reason. I opened my mouth, hoping for the best and prepared for the worst.

Silence hung in the air, vanishing when Hank stepped forward. “We were just on our way out.”

Kelly didn’t bat an eyelash at his authoritative tone or seem surprised that he’d inserted himself. Hank’s “Don’t fuck with me” aura was strong, and with his cowboy hat pulled low over his face, he looked mysterious and imposing. And yeah, at that very second, I would have followed him any-fucking-where.

I waved at the small crowd of hockey fans then made my way to the exit with Hank, cool and casual, as if we were the best of friends.

Reality: my pulse was racing, my insides were goo, and my brain was bouncing all over the place. Unexpectedly running into fans was long forgotten now. I wasn’t agitated, I was…excited. What was wrong with me?

Oh, I knew the answer to that one. Two words—sexier proposition.

“My jeans are sopping wet and it’s your fault,” he said, breaking the charged silence in the parking lot.

“Sorry. You could have staged a fit and gotten us out of there sooner.” I pointed out, rescuing my keys from my pocket.

“I didn’t want to get in the way. And if you don’t mind me saying so, you were inspiring back there. Cool under pressure, available but not overeager. You looked like a real star.”

“Shut up,” I scoffed.

“I’m serious.” Hank’s lopsided smile was laced with something I couldn’t read. Something sultry and maybe even dirty. “It was kinda hot.”

Desire rose in my throat and my heart beat like a drum. That was an offhand, teasing comment, not a real flirtation. He was trying to put me at ease and butter me up, but he was obviously blissfully unaware of the effect he had on me.

“Right. I should go.” I gestured at my truck.

“But we have unfinished business, Denny.”

My mouth was open again.

Don’t judge. He did this to me.

I licked my lips nervously and let out a weak huff. “A proposition?”

Hank tipped his hat to meet my gaze. He was maybe an inch shorter than me, but right then and there, he was larger than life. “Okay, but let’s call it a trade. I want something, you want something. And if I remember correctly, you said this would be easier if it was just about sex. Now that would be unethical, but we can make a sexier deal.”

Oh, my God. Yes. That’s what I wanted. A sexy deal.

“How so?” Yeah, my voice fucking cracked. Smooth, Den.

“Well, is there something you want but wouldn’t do for yourself?” Yes, yes, yes. “Like…heli-skiing in Whistler, fly fishing in Wyoming or⁠—”

Huh?

“Dude. Stop.” I narrowed my eyes. “What the fuck? Those are not sexy propositions. At all.”

He huffed in exasperation. “Help me out, Denny. What do you want?”

“I’ll tell you what I don’t want. I don’t want to go fucking fly fishing. Fishing is not sexy.”

Hank threw his hands in the air. “What is sexy to you?”

“Sex is sexy. Sex.”

Silence. City silence.

I was vaguely aware of the hum of traffic and laughter in the distance, but I was locked into this moment like I was on the ice–as if this was a real life face-off and we were stuck in time, waiting for the puck to drop.

Hank’s nostrils flared as he dragged his tongue over his teeth. “Sex.”

Gulp.

I swallowed hard. “Yeah.”

He flashed a pirate’s smile. “Okay. You want to know what it’s like to be with a guy, right? Maybe I can help you.”

“How?” My voice rose an octave.

Hank inched closer, like a panther sizing up his next meal. The hungry glint in his eye was predatory and dangerous. “I can find someone for you to get your gay on with.”

Wait. What?

“Find someone?”

“Sure. I know a few guys who could be discreet and⁠—”

“No.”

He cocked his head. “No? Am I wrong?”

“I didn’t—I don’t…”

Hank furrowed his brow. “Did you want something else?”

“Yeah, dummy. You.”

He went still and pointed at his chest. “Me. You want me to be your bi experiment?”

I licked my lips. Did I want that?

Fuck, yes.

“Yes, you,” I choked out.

“You want me,” he repeated. “Are you sure about that?”

Uh…

“Yes,” I bluffed. “What do you want in exchange?”

“You know what I want. A town escort. I need to be seen with you in public. You can introduce me as your buddy from Denver or something like that.”

“And in private…what do I get?”

He regarded me intently as if seriously mulling over my proposal. Gay sex ed for faux friendship. “It’s not a good idea.”

“No, it’s not,” I admitted.

“Okay, good. Forget about it.”

“Yeah, and you’re too old for me anyway. You said so yourself,” I added hastily, smirking at his indignant scowl.

“I’m surprised you remember that,” Hank huffed. “Age was never really an issue. You were just drunk as a skunk that night and⁠—”

“And you were a gentleman.”

“Was I?”

Neither of us moved. We stared at each other, awareness buzzing like static electricity between us. I willed him to break the silence, but I opened my mouth first and all kinds of embarrassing things just…fell out.

“I don’t know, but I trust you,” I said quietly. “This might be my only chance to ever…”

“Be with a man,” Hank finished.

“Yeah, so…what do you think?”

When he opened his mouth again, I knew this was a done deal.

“You’re on.”

I swallowed hard. “Okay, okay…that’s good. Uh…what if I don’t like it?”

“You will.” Hank’s eyes sparked. “But if you don’t, it’s over and we’ll try something else. No question. Ultimately, I want the commercial, but public endorsement via friendship might work too. Either way, I guess we both get what we want.”

I was practically vibrating with lust. I hadn’t come here for this, but damn, I wanted it. I wanted him very much, thank you.

This was the proposition I would never have uttered aloud if it hadn’t been for tequila. I’d told him what I wanted that night. I wanted him—the sexy cowboy fantasy. I wanted to ride him, fuck him, turn him inside out, and give myself a taste of this forbidden thing I’d craved for years. But this was…reckless in the extreme.

“Do you really want this? Or is it too much?” I whispered.

“Yeah, it’s definitely too much.” He chuckled low and filthy. “But Christ, Denny. I’m rock hard.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Hank stepped so close, his breath feathering my cheek. “If we weren’t in a public parking lot, I’d back you against that truck and stick my tongue down your throat. I’d unbuckle your jeans, slide my hand under your boxer briefs, and grab your cock. I’d stroke you, squeeze your balls, slip my finger in your ass, and you’d beg for more. You want me to suck you? No problem. I love giving head. I love rimming, I love fucking…giving and receiving. Do you want to fuck me too or⁠—”

“Got it.” I was fighting for air here—panting like a dog in heat.

“So…what’ll it be? My place or yours?”

I shouldn’t do this. The timing was all wrong. I had bigger things on my mind than taking my bisexuality for a test run. The playoffs were weeks away, and I was a rookie with a lot to prove. Personal life distractions were a no-no.

Let them think I was straight, wholesome and boring, and still with my high school girlfriend. Let them think hockey was the only thing that consumed me.

I met Hank’s eyes under the sloping brim of his hat, prepared to lie my ass off and pretend I was joking. I wasn’t interested in a covert bisexual experiment. Not with him, not with anyone. I didn’t have to say much. Two words would suffice. No, thanks.

I only got one out.

“Mine.”

6

HANK

Denny lived in a luxury glass-and-steel condo on the riverfront. It was one of those uber-modern buildings that boasted views of the Rocky Mountains and sweet amenities that appealed to corporate types…or professional athletes.

I followed his truck across town and snagged a spot in the visitors’ lot. The complex was ghostly quiet, but I knew there were cameras everywhere, recording my movement as I made my way to his two-bedroom unit on the tenth floor per his instructions.

He wordlessly opened his door, shrugged off his jacket and dropped it on the bench in the foyer. I did the same and followed him into the great room, where he removed his shoes and clicked a button on the panel affixed to the wall. Contemporary shades silently slid from a hidden canopy on the ceiling to the floor, covering the bank of windows. The whirl of the motor was the only sound in the sparsely furnished space.

A leather sectional sofa anchored by a geometric-print rug faced the enormous flat-screen on the faux-stone accent wall. And a generous island delineated the kitchen from the living area with light wood cabinetry that matched the hardwood floors.

But it was anonymous chic with zero personal pizzazz. No photos, no books, no cozy touches…like throws or decorative pillows.

Don’t get me wrong, it was very nice. But this wasn’t a home. It was where he slept and stored his belongings. I’d bet big bucks Denny’s thoughts on Denver were similar to mine on Elmwood. It was his purgatory. A place to be endured for a short time only.

Interesting thoughts since he was originally from Colorado. Something to remember, I mused, setting my hat on the island.

“Want a drink?” Denny swiped his hand through his hair nervously. “I have…water.”

“No, thanks. You’re a loose cannon around a glass of water, and I’m still damp,” I joked, hoping a little levity would get him to relax.

It didn’t work. Tension radiated from him in waves. Any second now, he’d change his mind or ask me to leave. And I’d agree this wasn’t the sexy angle either of us needed.

But I was wrong.

Denny grabbed a handful of my shirt and slammed his mouth over mine.

I was too surprised to react for a beat, but I caught up quickly, cupping his neck as I slipped my tongue inside. He moaned, tilting his chin to meet me thrust for thrust. He untucked my shirt and slid his open palms along my spine.

We made out for a while, exploring each other with deep kisses and roving hands. Even fully clothed, Denny Mellon’s body was a work of art to be worshiped with reverence. I ran my fingers through his thick hair, down his chest, and along his sides while he plunged into my mouth, sucking the air out of me.

I broke for oxygen, nibbling his bottom lip, my fingers resting on his belt buckle. When he inclined his chin, I threaded the leather strap through the loop, undid the button, and unzipped his fly. He caught my wrists, held them behind my back, and recaptured my mouth.

Jesus, that did something for me.

I hadn’t been with someone who could physically overpower me in a long time. I forgot how much I liked giving someone else the reins.

He dragged his stubbled jaw along mine and nipped my earlobe.

“Take your jeans off,” he commanded gruffly, releasing my wrists.

I unbuckled, unbuttoned, and unzipped in a flash, then hooked my thumbs through my belt loops. “I’m still wet. This is gonna take a while.”

Denny leaned casually against the counter, looking surprisingly confident for a guy who’d never been with a man. “We have time, and it’s your turn to do a striptease.”

“Fair warning. It’s not going to be pretty…or sexy.”

“Was mine?”

“Uh…no,” I admitted, pulling my T-shirt over my head.

“The bar is low, cowboy. I think you can do this.”

I furrowed my brow in faux exasperation and wiggled the denim over my ass. It wasn’t a dance, nor was I shaking my hips. Okay, I was a little bit, but that was because the fabric was uncomfortably wet and tight as fuck.

By the time I’d rolled my jeans to my knees, I was practically sweating…and very much aware of Denny’s heated gaze traveling over my torso.

“My knees are trapped. Help me peel these off.”

Denny froze. I could practically see the wheels in his brain turning, weighing consequences and repercussions. There’d be no pretending this was the product of last weekend’s drunken madness or desperation now. This was something new.

I might be getting the better end of this deal, but God, I’d make it worth his while.

He had to make the next move, though. He had to be sure.

I held my breath and waited.

Denny licked his bottom lip and trapped it between his teeth, his eyes fixed on my mouth before sliding slowly south. I didn’t want to spook him, but my dick had a mind of its own. There was no way he didn’t notice the massive tent in my boxer briefs.

Just as I wondered if this was too much, too real for him, Denny shoved my boxer briefs out of the way. My cock sprang free, bobbing enthusiastically as if it were personally greeting a new friend, drooling precum and all.

There was probably a joke to be made here, something to lighten the mood and keep this fun so neither of us would regret it in the morning, but Denny didn’t seem tentative or nervous in any way. His confidence was back, and he was more determined than ever—as if my cock were his number-one priority.

“Can I touch you?” he asked.

“Yes.”

He brushed his thumb along my shaft and gently cupped my balls, weighing them like precious orbs.

“You don’t have to be so careful,” I choked out. “Tighten your grip. That’s it.”

Denny obeyed, curling his fingers around my base, testing his hold before gliding up and down. Goose bumps rose over my skin. I shivered with need, torn between being mesmerized by his curiosity while fighting the urge to take over.

But no…this was his show. I was here for the ride.

He stroked me faster, then slower, experimenting with pressure. His brows were drawn together, his lips parted as he explored. “Does this feel good?”

“Yeah. Do what you like when you touch yourself. I bet I’ll like it too.”

Denny nodded, squeezing my cock on the upstroke, milking my slit. He dragged a thumb through the precum and used it as lube, circling the tip over and over. It was too much and not enough.

“Can I taste?” he asked, gazing at me through hooded lids.

I slicked my forefinger and pressed it to his lips. “Try it.”

He opened his mouth and sucked my finger. Denny’s obscene moan echoed off the high ceilings and wrapped me in knots of thick desire. I hadn’t “experimented” in years, hadn’t realized I’d signed on for torture. And make no mistake, he was fucking torturing me.

Denny released my finger and narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. “Salty, but good.”

“Have you tasted your own cum?”

“Yeah, but this is different. Better.” He tilted his chin, jacking me in long, languid strokes. “I don’t know if I’m ready to suck your cock, but I feel like I should do everything at once. This is a dream. It’s like it’s not even real.”

“It’s real,” I assured him, nibbling his bottom lip before crashing my mouth over his.

I held nothing back. I ground my bare cock against his denim-covered one, pumping my hips in a quest for friction as I sucked on his tongue. I couldn’t get close enough. He tasted like mint and he felt like sin personified, I mused, pushing his jeans over his ass.

It was a moment of truth. If he was going to freak out, it would happen now.

But he didn’t.

He angled his head, deepening the connection. His hands strayed from my pecs to my waist, and finally, he clutched my ass, meeting me thrust for thrust. No hesitation.

I could have come like this but damn, I wanted this to be good for Denny. And I just…needed to touch him.

I palmed his erection through the cotton barrier, slid it along his shaft, then slipped my hand in the front of his boxer briefs. I wrapped my fingers around his thick cock, stroking him to the rhythm of our dueling tongues.

“Oh, fuck. That’s good,” Denny gasped, shoving his jeans and briefs completely out of the way.

I nipped his jaw, rolling his nipples between my thumbs. “I can make it better.”

I kneeled at Denny’s feet and swallowed him whole.

Maybe I should have proceeded with care, taken it easy, and made an effort not to overwhelm him, but I’d lost control a while ago. I wanted things I couldn’t ask of a newbie. I could hint at them, though. I massaged his inner thigh and pushed his legs apart, ghosting my thumb over his crack. Denny pumped his hips faster, almost, but not quite fucking my mouth.

I loved it. I fucking loved it. I picked up the tempo, sucking him with gusto as I traced his entrance with the tip of my fingers. He stilled for a beat, but when I oh, so gently pushed one inside, Denny went wild.

He grabbed a fistful of my hair and let his hips fly. I jerked my cock, teasing his entrance with one finger while he fucked my throat in earnest. Tears blurred my vision. He was big and strong, and he was giving me everything he had.

I added the tip of a second digit and that was it.

Denny cried out a warning. “I’m coming. I’m…”

I swallowed every drop, shuddering through my own orgasm. Cum hit his ankles and spurted at his feet. I grabbed the rung on the nearest barstool, trembling through aftershocks.

I felt unraveled and undone as I licked my numb lips and tried to remember my name. It would have been nice to bask in a post-orgasm glow, but as my breathing evened out, I braced myself for anything.

This was no ordinary hookup. I’d just blown Denver’s rookie hotshot and while I was pretty sure he’d enjoyed himself, there was a chance I’d just taken the “sexy angle” a step too far.

I stood, kicking my jeans and boxers aside to avoid tripping, and regarded him carefully. “You okay?”

Denny nodded slowly. “Yeah. That was…good.”

I arched a brow. “Good?”

He smirked. “Very, very good.”

Okay, so not too freaked out.

“That’s more like it.” I gestured to the floor. “Got anything to clean this up with? I think we’ll need a mop.”

“Yeah, I’ll stick your jeans in the dryer too. Be right back.” Denny gathered the discarded clothes and disappeared down a short hallway off the kitchen.

He returned a couple of minutes later with a damp towel, dressed in sweats and a Condors tee. I put my boxer briefs and T-shirt on and helped wipe up the mess we’d made. Then I wandered into the living area and sat on a corner of the sectional, thanking him when he handed me a water bottle.

“Nice place,” I commented.

Denny perched on the edge of the sofa, leaving a cushion between us. His body language was all over the map—ankles crossed, fingernails scratching at the label on the bottle, yet…his posture was the epitome of relaxed. Evidence suggested he was nervous in a “What the fuck am I supposed to say to this guy now?” way. Totally understandable.

“Thanks.” Denny worried his lips as he tore the paper sleeve from his water bottle. “So…if we’re friends now, I think I need to know more about you.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t google me.”

“I did. There’s not much info, and your social media feed is Zen quotes and pictures of horses.”

Fair enough.

I rested my knee on the cushion between us. “I’m an open book. Ask me anything, but first…I have a couple of questions for you.”

“Shoot.”

“You seemed to know what you were doing.” I made a lewd gesture with my fist. “Was that really your first time?”

Denny’s ears turned pink. “Yes. I’ve just done my research, and it’s something I’ve been thinking about for a long time. Like…years.”

“My dick?” I joked.

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, right. Next question.”

“Why did your grandmother summon me? What did you tell her?”

He chuckled, shaking his head with fond exasperation. “The truth minus the naked proposition part. I had to. Grams lives next door and saw me come home that morning just before my ex dropped my truck off. She’d already run into my friends at the bakery, so she knew I wasn’t out late with them. She thought I’d hooked up with someone new and that I didn’t want Mary-Kate to find out. That would have blown up in my face, big-time.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah,” Denny agreed ruefully. “I learned a long time ago that it’s easier to stick to the truth. Elmwood is a small town, and people talk. That’s why…if we’re friends, I need to know more about you.”

“Well, okay. I’m twenty-nine, just finished my second stint of grad school. I have a master’s in business and psychology, and I recently opened my own business—which I’ll have to put on hold for a few months. It’s a bummer, but this little assignment in Wood Hollow will help me fund and expand faster.”

“You’re a horse whisperer therapist. How’d that happen? Aren’t you supposed to be a logger?”

“If you ask my dad, the answer is yes. I have an older brother and sister, and he fully expected one of us to take over the family business. I’m the only one who stuck around and gave it a shot. I went to college in Boulder, fell in love, and figured the mill was my destiny.” I opened my hands like a preacher at a pulpit, shaking my head ruefully. “I interned for Dad and tried to learn the ropes. It wasn’t…terrible, but my father likes to call all the shots. My great contribution to RM Mill to date is that fucking billboard.”

Denny flashed a Cheshire cat grin. “My favorite billboard. Tell me everything.”

I sank into the upholstery with a sigh as if hoping it led to a magic portal. “In addition to being a shameless opportunist, my ex is a photographer. My dad mentioned at dinner one night that the mill needed a brand makeover, something sexy. It’s my dad’s mantra. ‘Make it sexy.’ You gotta understand, my dad has this larger than life, super exuberant personality. He was always the loudest, the funniest, the most charming guy in any room. You wanted to be the one he noticed, you know? Seth, my ex, got caught up in Dad’s sunny orbit. He wanted to do the photography. It would have been a huge career boost for him, and I didn’t have anything to do with marketing, so it didn’t matter to me. But get this…one day, Seth says, ‘Hey, baby, let’s take the horses out and check out sites in the forest. For inspiration.’ He took dozens of photos of trees and a few of me with Bess.”

“Your horse?”

“Yeah, she’s a beauty. Those were supposed to be for him…for fun. I didn’t care that he showed Dad, but I did care that he took them to his meeting with the head of marketing. They loved them. They wanted me to be the face of RM Mill, and wasn’t that an honor?” I huffed sarcastically. “It felt like betrayal. He sold me out for a buck. Needless to say, that was the end of us.”

Denny frowned. “Did your father know you were against those photos?”

“Of course.”

“And he still used them?”

“Of course.” I chuckled at Denny’s irate expression. “My dad loves money. He thought I was being ridiculous. It was a photo, no big deal. But I had a business degree, damn it. I wanted to help lead the company, not be a fucking model. It was insulting.”

“You could sue.”

“Sue my dad?” I scoffed. “Yeah, I don’t think so. I’m a Cunningham. I doubt I’d win that lawsuit. It would have resulted in a lot of extra publicity…in addition to the billboards. Great for Dad’s wallet, not mine. The whole thing pissed me off. I broke up with Seth, gave my dad my resignation, and took a job mucking out stalls at a neighboring stable for a few months while I figured out what I wanted to do next.”

“Work with horses?”

“Yep. One of the owners had a group of kids with Down syndrome who’d come by once a week to ride. They were teenagers with big personalities, and their outlook on life was so pure. They were in awe of the animals, the color of the sky, the crest of the trails. Every day was an adventure, a chance to learn something new.”

“That’s cool.”

I nodded. “I was hooked. I got my certificate so I could help out, and went back to school for a masters in psychology and counseling. I’d just gone out on my own when Dad got sick.”

“I read about that. I’m sorry. Heart attack?”

“And cancer. His mind is sharp, but he’s weak and frail.” I cleared my throat and looked away briefly. “I agreed to help, ’cause even though he pisses me off, he’s still my dad.”

“That’s cool. I admire that.”

“He also offered me a lot of money, so don’t be too impressed.”

Denny raised a brow. “Hmm. Sounds like you’re trying to get me to do the ad you didn’t want to do.”

“I was tricked. That’s different. I’m not tricking you. I’m being up front and honest. I need your help, I need your name. No BS here. I need to make the mill sound sexy to the Four Forest area and⁠—”

“News flash, no one thinks a lumber mill is sexy, Hank. And no one in Elmwood will like you if the only thing you talk about is the mill,” he interrupted.

“Hey! I’m very likable…once you get to know me.”

Denny smirked. “I’m sure you are, but the least likable thing about you is your connection to the mill. I did some homework, and your mill is the first corporate entity in the Four Forest area. Everyone is pretty pissed at the former owners.”

“Why?”

“The Larsons pulled a fast one on the city council by not disclosing that they’d taken on a silent partner. They sold a piece of Wood Hollow to your dad three years ago and finalized the deal six months ago, which coincided with a contract for a new housing development.”

“That’s business.”

“Maybe to you, but in my town, your family are opportunists who pose a danger to an insular community that’s used to doing business with handshakes over a beer at the inn.”

“Well, I⁠—”

“And the fancy house in Elmwood is another problem,” he continued, clearly on a roll. “The only other folks who live on the outskirts of town are Vinnie Kiminski and Nolan Moore. They’re both natives and Vinnie’s famous NHL royalty too, so they get away with it. Plus, they’re super active in the community. Vinnie runs Elmwood Rink and the juniors camp. And Nolan runs Elmwood Diner with JC Bouchard, who’s married to another NHL legend, Riley Thoreau.”

“So you’re saying we’ll have to get married,” I deadpanned.

“I’m saying that based on my research, you’re an outsider who’s labeled an enemy. Your image problem is epic. Honestly, I’m not sure how to justify hanging out with you.”

“That hurts.”

“Sorry, but I’m keeping it real.” Denny uncrossed his legs and sat back on the sofa.

“You haven’t kicked me out yet…so that must be a good sign.”

“Yeah, well…it was a pretty fucking awesome blowjob.”

My grin probably had a feral glint, but after a barrage of negative feedback, I was thirsty for praise. “Good. I had my doubts, but this might work out after all.”

He uncapped his bottle and took a sip. “Maybe, but it doesn’t make sense that we’d suddenly be friends. We don’t have anything in common.”

“I like hockey, and you play it,” I offered.

“Have you ever played?”

“No, I’m not a good skater. I played baseball and soccer when I was a kid. I didn’t do either very well,” I admitted.

“Oh.”

“Can’t you just say you met me after a game in Denver at a bar—we talked and hit it off, and voila, we’re friends?”

“Nope. I don’t ‘hit it off’ with people. It has to be believable…and likable. Like therapy with horses.” Denny stared into space for a beat. “I think I’ll have to be your client.”

“My client.”

He nodded slowly. “Yeah. Do you have a horse in Elmwood?”

“No, Bess is here for⁠—”

“Bring her to Elmwood this summer. We’ll say I hired you as a therapist to help with my anxiety.” Denny scratched his nape and wrinkled his nose. “Horses make me nervous, but if it’s just for show, it’s cool. People like horses and people who help others. They also like businesses that give to the community. Maybe volunteer too, or…I don’t know. I’m spitballing, but I’m on to something. You aren’t likable, but your horse is.”

“Gee, thanks.” I scrubbed my hand over my face and gave him a weak evil eye. “It’s a good idea.”

“Yep. It’ll work…and it’ll give us an excuse to see each other this summer.”

“We could start sooner.”

“I’m not going to be home till the season is over. And I can’t ride a horse and risk injury either, but…we can practice here if we happen to be in town at the same time.” Denny blushed and damn, that was adorable.

I nudged his shin playfully. “I like the sound of that. I’ll be in Denver to check in on my dad and Bess. We can hook up whenever we’re both able to.”

“Cool.” He inclined his head. “Can I meet her?”

“Bess?”

“Yeah, I’m just…curious about her. Your face lights up when you talk about your horse. And she’s a famous billboard model too, ya know.”

My smile was a little too big for my face. “Just say the word. I happen to be pretty tight with Bess, and I handle her calendar.”

“Okay. Text me.”

I figured that was my cue to leave. “I should go, but I’m gonna need my jeans.”

Denny set his hand on my thigh, wordlessly anchoring me in place. His palm was big and warm, like a bear paw—the weight and heat of it burrowing under my skin. He squeezed my quad, flexing his fingers one by one as if he were playing the fucking piano as his gaze drifted to my crotch.

I waited for him to make a move.

And waited.

And just when I thought this was as far as he wanted to go, Denny pushed me flat on my back and dove on top of me.

His kiss was greedy and reckless. Our tongues dueled and found rhythm in the suggestive tilt and sway of our hips. Just like that we were off to the races again, shedding clothing as we explored the finer parts of this new arrangement.

To be perfectly honest, I didn’t think either of us knew the rules, but that was okay. This was a fuck-buddy situation. We weren’t going to become real friends. We were shamelessly going to be using each other for our own gain—and for now, that was all the clarity we needed.

7

DENNY

Make a left onto Interstate 70.

I doubled-checked Siri’s route on the console screen, veering right as an incoming call buzzed in.

“Trinsky. What’s up?” I answered.

“Yo, you’re coming tonight.”

“Where?”

“To Meyer’s barbecue. I’ll pick you up at five.”

I switched lanes for no real reason. “Uh…I can’t⁠—”

“You cannot bail,” he insisted. “You’re the newbie, the rookie, the baby. As your older, wiser mentor, you gotta listen up and go to this one. Meyer’s wife is an awesome cook. She makes killer ribs and potato salads and shit. You’ll love it. Oh, and she has a few very nice, very single friends and—oh, shit. My bad. Don’t tell Mary-Kate. She’ll think I’m a dick. And I want us to be buds when I see her this summer.”

I was used to Trinsky’s bulldozer, rapid-fire monologues now. No doubt we got along so well because we were complete opposites. I was quiet, and he never shut the fuck up. Sometimes I just nodded and grunted till he got tired of the sound of his own voice. But every once in a while, he stumped me.

“Huh?”

“Yeah, didn’t I tell you I’m doing that camp with you? Vinnie Kiminski called me, man! Can you fuckin’ believe it? I’m stoked. I’ve never done the Elmwood camp. I feel like the only one in the league who hasn’t gotten the invite. That’s totally on Jake fuckin’ Milligan. That turd hates me.”

True. Jake did kind of hate Trinsky, but I doubted he’d blackballed him from coaching summer camp. I was just surprised Trinsky was interested at all. He was a California boy and a surfer off-season and…okay, fine. I wasn’t sure I liked the idea of a teammate who was also a friend hanging out in Elmwood this summer. I couldn’t even verbalize why.

“That’s cool,” I said, flexing my fingers on the steering wheel.

“I can only do it for a couple of weeks at the end of summer, but it’ll be fun. Oh, and I may need a place to crash. We can talk deets later. Remember…I’m picking you up at five tonight. Later, man.”

I sighed heavily. No, I didn’t want to go to a team barbecue, and I definitely didn’t want to think of Trinsky in my guest bedroom. One caused immediate social anxiety and the other, future anxiety and general unease.

I blasted some metal music to drown my thoughts. I didn’t want to think, period. If I did, I’d wonder what the fuck I was doing. So I hummed loudly, beating my thumbs erratically on the wheel and the dashboard the way I did when the ghosts sat with me for too long.

The goal was neutrality. No unwelcome emotions, no recriminations. Just static.

I’d almost achieved my desired detached mindset, but the familiar billboard cresting the hillside in the distance fucked me up. No shit. My mouth watered on cue, same as always, but different.

The cowboy wasn’t a mystery anymore. He was a flesh and blood, sexy man. Now that I knew what it felt like to touch him, I needed more. Hank’s hands on me, his body pressed to mine, his mouth on my cock…

Maybe it wasn’t smart and maybe I shouldn’t be on this road, but I wasn’t turning around now. I was going to let it happen. Zero expectations—just a simple give-and-take arrangement.

At least that was the idea. It had been two weeks since we’d agreed to try this “exchange of favors,” but I didn’t have anything new to report. I’d been on the road or at practice, and Hank had been busy at the mill. We’d texted a few times, and that had felt more like an awkward schedule sync than sexy correspondence.

Hank told me he’d missed Grams at the bakery, and I gave him permission to avoid her. He congratulated me on my hat trick in Edmonton, and I thanked him…after staring at my cell, wondering what I could add that wouldn’t seem too enthusiastic.

I thought about Hank all the time, but I sure as fuck wouldn’t text that to a guy. I wanted to see him again, if only to test this out and see if it was a fluke, a dream, a one-off, never-to-be-repeated anomaly. I had a feeling he was waiting for me to make the next move, and fuck, that didn’t come naturally. I sweated over what to say, typing and deleting messages till my fingers cramped.

This morning, I’d finally settled on, I’m in town this weekend. Can I see your horse?

The dark-chestnut horse whinnied as she meandered to the fence. She bent her head and leaned into Hank, grazing his shoulder as if in greeting. Hank flashed a wide, toothy grin, petting her neck affectionately.

“Hello, beautiful. I brought you presents, and I have someone I want you to meet. Be nice to him. He’s a little”—Hank’s Stetson tipped, sending a shadow across his handsome face as he whispered into the horse’s ear loud enough for me to hear—“skittish.”

True. I was very skittish. Bess was a regal-looking beast with a beautiful chestnut coat and a white patch between her eyes and nose, but damn, she was huge.

I bristled anyway. “I’m not. She’s just…big.”

Hank pretended to cover the horse’s ears. “I’m sorry, sugar. That’s no way to talk to a lady…or anyone. I know it. I’ll give him a piece of my mind. Don’t you worry.”

I barked a laugh. “I meant tall and enormous…all over.”

“Rotten to the core he is,” he drawled mournfully. “Let’s give him some slack, though. He hasn’t spent much time in the company of a real lady like yourself. Come closer and say hi, Denny.”

“Hey, Bess.” I inched forward and waved like an idiot.

“You don’t expect her to give you a high five, do you?”

I shot him an annoyed glance and copied him, running my hand along the horse’s side, skimming her mane with my fingertips. Bess allowed the attention with a sort of bored air for a minute or so, then dipped her neck, jostling my baseball cap off my head on the upswing. The sudden movement made me jolt, much to Hank’s amusement.

“Fuck you,” I huffed without heat, stuffing my hands into my pockets. “Sorry for the language, Bess. Your owner is a dick.”

Hank chuckled. “I promise you, she’s a gentle soul. She’s playful, too. Here. The best way to make friends is with food. Want to give her a carrot?”

“No, thanks. I need my hands to hold my stick. If she takes a bite out of me instead of the carrot, I’m toast.”

Hank grinned, pulling a carrot from his pocket and feeding it to the horse. “Sorry. I didn’t realize you’d be this nervous.”

“I’m not nervous. I’m just…cautious.”

“Hmm.”

I studied the horse and owner for a moment, their heads bent as Hank stroked her muzzle and fed her treats, whispering sweet nothings. I didn’t have to know anything about animals to know they had a strong bond. Hank’s voice was calming, his hands sure and soothing. Honestly, I was a twinge jealous of Bess. I would have loved to have his hands all over me.

Christ, look at him. Hank could have stepped right off that billboard in his form-fitted jeans, leather jacket, and yes…that fucking hat. I tore my gaze away to avoid embarrassing myself in front of Bess and scanned the fields surrounding the Cunningham ranch and the majestic mountains in the distance.

Yellow wildflowers and daffodils popped through the patches of grass interspersed with traces of snow, dotting the vista in gold and green till it met the blue horizon. A few other horses were in the paddock adjacent to a big red barn, and beyond that was a copse of trees leading to a sprawling ranch house.

It was peaceful and serene, like Elmwood…minus the Rocky Mountain backdrop.

“Do you live here?” I asked.

“No, I have a condo nearby.” He tilted the brim of his hat and glanced toward the house. “It was a nice place to grow up, though. My brother and sister and me used to run wild, playing hide-and-seek, fishing with homemade rods, and riding horses down deserted country lanes with a posse of cousins and school friends. It’s weird that it’s so quiet now. Everyone is gone but my dad.”

“How’s he doing?”

Hank shrugged. “Same. He’s…mercurial. Cranky some days, weirdly pleasant other days.”

“Weirdly? Is he usually cranky?”

“Nowadays, yes. Not when I was a kid, though. He was a lumberjack superhero, a rock god, and a cool action star all wrapped in one. I idolized him. I thought he could do no wrong.” Hank’s lips tugged at the corner. “The real truth is that he’s kind of an ass, but it was a sweet illusion at a time we needed it most.”

“What do you mean?”

“My mom died when I was five, and Dad just…made things okay when they weren’t. He stepped up, spent time with each of us individually and together. My brother loved football.” Hank pointed at the field. “You’d see them out there tossing a ball around for hours. My sister was a theater kid. He helped her recite lines and of course, we went to all of her plays.”

“And you were the horse kid,” I guessed.

“Yep. Horses were Dad’s passion too, so I probably got more of his time than anyone.”

“That’s cool.”

“Maybe. He’s a piece of work too,” he said cryptically. “I try to remember the good parts when he’s driving me batshit crazy and asking me to track down hockey stars.”

I smiled. Hank’s easygoing repartee had a nostalgic bent that invited shared experiences. I suddenly wanted to tell him about my dad. He’d been a superhero too, the biggest star in my galaxy. I had good memories, I had great stories, I had so much to say, but⁠—

I slammed my mouth shut and swallowed the words.

“Do your clients know how to ride, or do you teach them?”

Not the smoothest topic change ever, but Hank didn’t seem to notice. “Your skill level isn’t important on the right horse. Bess is ideal. She’s gentle, sensitive, and wise. She’ll be perfect for you.”

I pointed at my chest. “For me?”

“Yeah, you. C’mon, let’s put a saddle on her and⁠—”

“No.” I shook my head adamantly. “I’m not here for that. I told you…no broken bones allowed.”

“Ah, that’s right.” He inclined his chin in agreement, however, the twinkle in his eyes was hard to miss. “But are you sure you don’t want to hop in the saddle and go for a ride?”

“This is corny innuendo, right?”

Hank snickered, patting Bess’s flank. “It is.”

“Well, I think you should probably lead by example and sit in the saddle first, cowboy.”

“Gladly.”

“Just like that?”

“I’m not shy about sex, assuming that’s what we’re talking about. If it feels good and nobody gets hurt, do it. YOLO.”

I raked my teeth over my bottom lip. “I agree in theory, but I’m not very adventurous. I had the same girlfriend for years.”

“She’s the only one you were ever…intimate with?”

“No, we took a short break our freshman year of college, so there were a few others.”

“What about guys?”

“No.”

Hank hopped over the fence, whispered in Bess’s ear as he pulled a lead rope from his pocket and attached it her harness. “So your bisexual curiosity has been on simmer for years.”

“You could say that. What about you?”

“Gay. A hundred percent gay. I tried to be straight. I really did. But boobs did nothing for me. Kissing girls was fine, but touching them felt all wrong. Too soft where I wanted hard. I did some mild experimenting in high school and pretty much fucked my way through college. Men only. I’ve done it all and then some—sex in clubs, in cars, parking lots, at roadside stops, in the barn. One partner, two partners…and on one memorable occasion, a mini orgy in Aspen. Sex is life. It’s beautiful proof we’re alive and able to communicate joy and happiness.”

My lips twitched. “Is that so?”

“Absolutely,” he enthused, opening the gate for Bess. “And I’m a fully qualified sexpert in the homo arena.”

I had a million questions about that Aspen orgy, but I just nodded. “Oh, good. I’d hate to be extorted by a novice.”

Hank rolled his eyes and motioned for me to follow him toward the barn. “Are you planning on coming out?”

I blew my cheeks out like a chipmunk and sighed. “No. I mean…eventually, yes. But not anytime soon. It would require a major conversation, and I can’t deal with that during hockey season. No one even knows MK and I broke up.”

“So your ex is your beard?”

“Well…maybe. It was her idea to keep it private till the end of summer, and I didn’t argue. I don’t do well with external distractions in regular everyday life, but especially not now. No matter how inclusive a team claims to be, that’s not the spotlight they want on their rookie. Once I say the words, I can’t take them back. What if I’m not bi? What if the more we do, the less I like it? What if the sex is terrible?”

Hank stopped at the wide entrance of the stables. “With me? Unlikely.”

I barked a laugh. “I like your confidence.”

“That’s not confidence, that’s a guarantee.” He cocked a lopsided grin and hiked his thumb. “Now get your head out of the gutter and come meet the gang.”

Hank’s deep voice echoed in the cavernous structure as he gave me a small tour of the stalls, the tack room, the office, and storage area. A musky scent of animals lingered, but it was a pristine space with ceiling fans affixed to the wood beams above to keep the horses cool in warmer months.

He led Bess to her stall and introduced me to her friend, Fred.

“Nice to meet you, Fred,” I said awkwardly. “Are they…a couple?”

“No, just companions. Bess likes everyone, but Fred is kind of picky. She’s a calming influence. Some horses, like people, get crusty with age. She’s eighteen and she’s a regal old lady with…”

I listened absently to his idle chatter, his tone dropping to a soothing coo for Bess’s benefit as he watered her and brushed her coat. I watched his sure movements, his strong hands on the brush. I didn’t know anything about horses but I could tell he was good with them. He was patient and confident and…somehow, that felt like a character reference of sorts.

He left Bess and Fred with promises to return soon, then washed his hands in the office bathroom while I perused a wall of framed photographs of the Cunningham horses.

“They’re beautiful,” I commented when he joined me. “This whole place is…so nice. Thanks for showing it to me.”

Hank beamed. “You’re welcome.”

“I mean it. Bess is awesome, and the barn is cool and…it’s nice to see you in your preferred habitat in daylight,” I added with a playful shrug. “It makes this seem less…sleazy.”

“Sleazy?” He pulled his hat off and tossed it onto the desk.

“You know what I mean.”

“I do, but…that’s not the right word. Think of a new one.”

“Crazy?”

“Nope.” Hank shook his head and slipped his fingers through his hair. “I don’t like that one either.”

I didn’t have any more words. My tongue was tied.

I studied his chiseled stubbled jaw, crooked nose, and full lips. He had a face with a view. Every perfect feature was offset by a quirk—the divot in his cheek, his unkempt wavy hair, the long, jagged scar under his chin he’d told me was from the time he’d fallen off a tractor. Hank was super handsome yet interesting-looking too.

And his body was…HOT. All caps. I’d held his balls, stroked his cock, and run my fingers up and down his chest. I’d licked his nipples, flicked my tongue over the sensitive flesh till he’d groaned. I’d kissed him dirty, raked fingers through his hair as I’d cleaned his tonsils and writhed against him. I’d come in his mouth, on his hands, and all over his chest.

Two weeks later, I was very aware that there was so much more to do. I wanted to do it all. I wanted to suck him, lick him, fuck him. I wanted him to fuck me too—to know what it felt like…if only once.

And I really wanted to kiss him again. I could do it now. We were alone. No one in the office or the stable or⁠—

I stopped thinking and acted, pouncing on Hank like a greedy cat. I grabbed his neck and slanted my mouth over his.

Fuck, it was better than the first time. And it escalated just as quickly. One second, we were making out and the next, we were humping and grinding, straining to get closer than physically possible with so many layers of denim in between.

“Want to touch you,” I panted, sliding my cock over his.

Hank groaned, his nostrils flaring as he eyed me. “Come this way.”

He didn’t wait for a reply. He strode into the main section of the barn and headed up a short flight of stairs to a hayloft. Bales were stacked high and neat, covering the entire loft. It was very…private.

We continued where we left off, sucking face like a couple of vampires. My shirt was bunched around my chest, my lips were swollen, and my cock ached behind my zipper. I couldn’t stop kissing him.

He finally broke for air, unbuckling his belt, then mine.

“We shouldn’t do this here,” I panted.

“It’s already done. Touch me…or just lick me. Are you ready for that?”

“I…yeah.”

His pirate’s smile was wicked in the extreme. “Good boy. C’mere. On your knees.”

I obeyed.

I kneeled on the hay-strewn loft floor and gazed up at Hank with sex-drunk eyes as he unzipped. He lowered his jeans and boxer briefs over his ass, and his half-hard penis twitched as if in anticipation. I circled him at his base and slowly stroked him to his tip, squeezing his slit, and tracing the prominent vein along his shaft.

“Am I doing this right?” I whispered, glancing up at him.

Hank’s lopsided lazy grin was the sexiest thing ever. Part of me wanted to knock him flat on a bale of hay, climb on top of him, and rub up on him like mad, but his cock had my full attention.

“You’re doing so good.”

“What turns you on?”

“This—you on your knees,” he replied huskily. “The way you’re looking at me. Do whatever you want, Den. You’re running the show here. We stop when you say.”

I stroked him lazily. “Okay.”

“Try this.” He squeezed precum onto his thumb and held it up like an offering. “For you.”

This wasn’t new, but it was so damn good, and I fucking yearned to taste him.

“Mmm.”

“You like it, don’t you? Lick it all. Go on. That’s right. Now, lick it off my cock,” Hank urged. I flattened my tongue over his pole and hummed with pleasure. My dick pulsed against my zipper. He was still talking. “Again. That’s it. Suck the tip. Oh, yeah. Take a little more, touch my balls. Damn, you’re a fucking natural. Such a good cocksucker. Next, you’ll be wondering how this bad boy is going to fit in your ass.”

Every dirty command, every nasty compliment egged me on. I opened my mouth wider and sucked with gusto.

Was I great? No. Probably not. I gagged more than once and I was a little sloppy, but Hank didn’t seem to care. He moaned encouragement, occasionally reminding me to mind my teeth, suck harder, use my hand.

I was so hard, I was in danger of passing out. Sitting on my heels, I released him with a pop to free my aching erection.

“I’m gonna fuck you,” I growled, twirling my tongue around his crown as I jacked myself.

“Mm, and I’m going to love it,” he purred. “Suck your fingers for me. You’re going to need to practice stretching me open. Or have you already done that?”

I bit my bottom lip. “You want me to put my finger in your…”

“Ass,” he finished, kicking his jeans to pool at his feet. “If that’s where we’re heading, you’ll need to know what to do. For educational purposes.”

“So, you want me to suck your cock and stick my finger⁠—”

“No, you don’t stick it. You massage your way in. Carefully,” he added. “Ideally, you’d use lube. Lots of saliva will do for now. Show me what you got, Hotshot.”

I smacked his ass cheek and glared up at him. Slicking my fingers with saliva, I lifted his balls and trailed a digit along his crease. “Like this?”

“More.” He shrugged his jacket off, laid it over the bale of hay, and kicked off his boots and his jeans. My mouth went dry when he sat on the haystack, opening his legs wide for me.

“Holy fuck,” I choked out.

The view was incredible. I tried again, sliding my thumb over his hole, massaging his pucker. He tapped his erection against my cheek in a not-so-subtle request for me to get back to work, so I did, licking his crown as I slipped a digit inside him. Hank groaned his approval and before I knew it, I was a multitasking motherfucker, sucking cock and fingering my lover’s ass while jacking my throbbing dick like a pro.

Honestly, I didn’t recognize myself. Sure, I loved sex, and I liked to think I was good at it, but I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been blown away. If I had any lingering questions about my bisexuality, they’d been answered. I was bi and sucking cock was my new favorite thing.

Needless to say, I didn’t last long. Hank’s hands in my hair and his whispered commands of the “You got this, you’re doing so good, such a good cocksucker” variety were all it took to shove me over the edge.

I came like a freight train, shooting over my fist, on his leg, and all over the haystack too. He pushed my head away and finished himself off…with my finger in his ass.

I couldn’t hear above the rush of blood pounding in my ears, and I definitely couldn’t speak.

But I’d never felt better.

Maybe it wasn’t fate, but I couldn’t help thinking this felt right. Who knew? Maybe the cowboy was my good luck charm after all.

8

HANK

“He was here? In the stable?”

I nodded. “Yes.”

“That’s good.” Dad pointed at the sofa in his den, quietly commanding me to take a seat and file my report. “Tell me everything.”

No way. Not happening.

My father’s heart had gone through enough lately. He was well aware of my homosexuality and supportive in his own way, but the barn shenanigans might just push him over the edge. Moot point ’cause I didn’t kiss and tell.

But damn, I had a hard time keeping my shit-eating grin under control. Hey, sex did wonders for the body, mind, and spirit, and today had been all kinds of amazing.

Denny was a surprise. I hadn’t been sure he’d come by. And when he did, I’d half expected him to say this was a mistake and that after careful consideration, he wasn’t interested in getting his gay on with me.

No hard feelings. I would have understood. Sex wasn’t a big deal to me. It was feel-good fun between consenting adults. No hearts and flowers required. But I was older than Denny. I’d had my heart broken more than once, and I’d learned not to attach sentiment to naked horizontal encounters. That was a new muscle to flex for a guy with a limited dating history.

He'd shown up, though. And wow, just…wow. Christ, Denny had no idea how fucking beautiful he was with that glossy-eyed intensity, his fingers probing my ass, his mouth on my cock. In the fucking barn, no less.

I knew there’d been little to no chance of being discovered. Garrett worked alone on Sunday mornings, and he had a bum knee and bad hearing. But the element of danger added something for sure.

So yes, I was fighting a smile that gave me the mental fortitude required to deal with the clusterfuck I’d taken on. I’d left Elmwood on Friday disheartened at the notion of being the town pariah in New England’s version of Siberia, but I was feeling cautiously optimistic now.

“Not much to tell,” I commented, settling on the sofa. “The mill is plodding along, the house in Elmwood is nice, and…everyone hates me. But I see light at the end of the tunnel.”

With a red blanket covering his legs and the wispy remnants of his once-full head of hair sticking straight up, Dad looked too thin, too tired, too small. But his potent, no-BS stare still spoke volumes.

“What about the hockey player?”

“What about him?”

“C’mon, Hank.” He circled his wrist impatiently. “I’m old and I’m dying. Don’t leave me hanging.”

I furrowed my brow. “That’s not funny.”

“Yeah, yeah. Just tell me what he said today.”

“Nothing much. I’d mentioned my work with Bess, and Denny thought that was interesting and wanted to meet her. This isn’t a quick sell, Dad. He’s not a professional actor or model, he’s an athlete. This is going to require some finesse since I’m not going through his agent.”

“Hmm. Do you think he’ll do the ad?”

I considered the question for a moment and nodded. “Yeah, I do.”

Dad smacked his hand on the arm of his wheelchair. “Well done! Endorsements bring followers, employees, and good will. Mark my words, this is the beginning of a success story.”

“Success story” was pushing it, but my outlook on life in the Four Forest area had improved by a thousand percent recently. I knew change wouldn’t come fast or easy, but I had Denny Mellon in my back pocket. The fact that he might not physically be in town for another month didn’t bother me. I had an ally.

Now, I had to learn a little something about this place. Not just the mill, the whole area.

Starting with Elmwood.

I’d already done the Google search. Population, history, and topography didn’t give me enough info, but in case you’re interested…population had increased over the past decades in all four towns, thanks in part to the hockey boom. The first settlers arrived in the 1700s, and were most likely hunters. The area was still covered in forest, with gorgeous hillsides, and sweeping panoramic views of Lake Norman and the picturesque New England townships.

No, this wasn’t Colorado, but it was beautiful too, I mused as I drove the winding road into Elmwood.

I eased my truck into a parking space near the fountain on Main Street and turned off the engine, absently watching a couple sitting on a bench sipping coffee and a gaggle of preschool age kids skipping while their parents chatted nearby.

On a whim, I scrolled to Denny’s contact info. If you were new in Elmwood, what would you order at the bakery?

He replied immediately. A maple cookie, but do NOT get into a big discussion with my grandmother. If she’s there, introduce yourself. That’s it.

You’re extremely bossy for someone who’s two thousand miles away, I typed, my lips curled in amusement.

That’s cuz I know what I’m talking about. Be cool.

I sent him an animated ice cube gif. Any other tips? Town specialties, things to do, people to avoid?

Ivan makes a mean latte at Rise and Grind. Everything at the diner is delicious, especially the burgers and poutine. Say hi to JC and Nolan. If you’re interested, there’s good hiking near the lake. Meet the coaches if you can…Vinnie, Riley, Court, Ronnie. There’s a movie theater in Pinecrest, sledding in Fallbrook if there’s still snow, and you should check out the bookstore. Just don’t be weird around MK. People to avoid: my grandmother.

My cheeks hurt from smiling now. Wow, you wrote me a book. Don’t pro hockey players work for a living?

Ha. Ha. I’m at the gym. Just got out of the shower.

Oh! What are you wearing?

A towel, perv. You?

I looked down at my ensemble. Jeans, a sweater, and a jacket.

I’m not sure where to go with that.

Me either. I chuckled.

Later. Watch out for Grams. She will eat you alive.

On that note, I stepped out of the truck, tipped my chin in greeting to a passerby, and strode purposefully toward Henderson’s Bakery.

The bell above the door chimed and a pretty middle-aged woman with bobbed blond hair and a sunny smile glanced up from the pastries she was arranging in a pink box.

“Good afternoon. What can I get for you?”

I wasn’t a huge sweet eater, but damn, this place smelled amazing. I perused the selection of cookies, cupcakes, fruits tarts, and breads, lingering on the chocolate éclairs.

A core memory resurfaced out of the blue: I was four years old, standing in a bakery with my face pressed against the glass, my mom’s hand on my shoulder, telling me I could choose one thing. Anything I wanted. I chose an éclair.

“Uh…” I snapped back to reality and homed in on the cookies shaped like maple leaves, drizzled with icing. “I heard the maple cookies are fantastic.”

The woman nodded graciously. “They’re our signature specialty, first made by my husband’s great great-great grandparents a hundred or so years ago. Other than adding icing options, we’ve stuck to the original recipe, so yes…they’re worth a try for sure.”

“Great. I’ll take two, please. And…an éclair.”

“You got it.” She grabbed a small box and a pair of tongs for the éclairs. “You’re new in town, aren’t you?”

“Yes, I’m Hank Cunningham.”

“Penny Henderson. Nice to meet you,” she said warmly. “Welcome to Elmwood.”

“Thank you. I haven’t had a chance to really settle in yet, but it seems like a great little town and I⁠—”

“Ah, I should have known you were a kiss-ass.” A gravelly voiced old woman with a halo of white hair shuffled in just then, untying an oversized apron with gnarled, shaky fingers.

“Annie!” Penny gasped in dismay, sputtering as she slid the pastry box across the counter. “I’m so sorry. I⁠—”

“Oh, relax, Pen. This is the mill guy from Wood Hollow. He’s layin’ it on thick so we don’t boot his booty outta town.”

I grinned. “You must be Annie Mellon.”

“I am.”

Penny gave a nervous laugh. “Annie doesn’t mean any harm. Please don’t take offense.”

“Don’t tell him that. I want him to take offense,” Annie corrected, reaching for a pink coat on a wall hook near the entrance. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’ll be outside. I need a smoke.”

I pulled out my credit card.

“Those are on the house,” Penny insisted. “I’m sorry. Annie’s a good soul, but she’s got a big mouth.”

“I was warned. I, um…know her grandson.” Commence Operation Name Drop.

She tilted her chin curiously. “Denny?”

“Yeah, we met in Denver. We’re…friends.”

“Oh. Well, that’s great. Does Annie know you’re friends? ’Cause generally speaking, she loves Denny’s friends.”

“With any luck, she’ll like me too. Eventually.” I thanked Penny and headed outside with the box of goodies.

I found Annie on the bench where the couple had been sitting earlier. There was a decent chance she’d told them to get the fuck out of here so she could sit in peace and quiet. Denny’s story about her dressing up as the Grim Reaper at Halloween made a whole lot of sense now.

The funny thing was that she looked so…fragile…and kind of sweet in her oversized pink coat, puffing away on a cigarette.

She motioned for me to join her but kept her gaze on the fountain. “Cunningham.”

“Hank Cunningham. It’s nice to meet you, ma’am.”

“Took you long enough to come around.”

“I tried a few times, but you weren’t in,” I replied.

She blew a stream of smoke before turning to face me. “Denny told me you were a good guy. I have no reason not to believe him, and you have a nice…aura. I don’t think you’re an asshole, so welcome to Elmwood.”

I chuckled. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

I opened the pastry box and held it out. “Want a cookie? I hear they’re tasty.”

Annie raised a brow. “I made that cookie. Of course it’s tasty. You can break off a piece for me if you’re inclined to share, but it’s so delicious you’ll be sorry you offered.”

“I’ll buy more.”

“And I’ll make more.” She thanked me, holding up the piece of maple leaf with her head cocked thoughtfully. “I’ve been baking those cookies for seventy-five years now.”

“Wow.”

“Long time. I’ve seen a lot in my day…in this town anyway. And I remember a Cunningham coming through these parts a while ago.”

“My dad,” I guessed. “I know he made a trip to the area five or so years ago. That must have been when he met with the Larsons.”

Annie grunted her disapproval. “Money-grubbin’ traitors. If they get bitten by gators in Florida, it’ll serve them right.”

I barked a laugh. “That’s a little harsh.”

She shrugged. “They sold their town out. I can’t tell if you’re brave or foolish for taking your dad’s place. No one likes the name Cunningham right now.”

“Do you think I should change my name?”

“Definitely.” Annie winked, brushing crumbs off her coat. “But anyone with a long memory—like me—will remember your daddy’s had his sights on this forest for thirty odd years now. Thought quite highly of himself…couldn’t believe the Larsons wouldn’t sell in the nineties.”

I cocked my head in confusion. “I knew my parents had been here together, but I didn’t know Dad wanted to buy the mill back then.”

She nodded, crushing the butt of her cigarette on the bench. “So I heard. I met your mother that trip, too. Her name is Rose, right?”

I froze. “You met my mom?”

“She was pregnant…maybe with you? I remember because my daughter was expecting at the time too. She’d just moved to Canada, and I missed her terribly. I managed the bakery in those days, like Penny does now, and I was at the counter when your parents walked in.”

I hadn’t met anyone who could tell me something new about my mother in years. Shock gave way to rabid curiosity. “Really? I—what did she say? What did she look like?”

“Long brown hair, feathered at the sides. That was the style, and she was certainly stylish. Your parents were fancy folks with nice clothes and a shiny car. I hate that shit and I wouldn’t have given them the time of day, but the pregnancy part got me. I asked a few questions and found out she was from a tiny speck of a town in Texas and was five months along. She didn’t know if she was having a boy or girl, didn’t want to know. She had one of each at home, and only prayed for a healthy child. If she had a girl, she’d name her Hannah, if she had a boy, he’d be called Henry. You must be Henry.”

I swallowed hard. “I…yeah.”

“She said you gave her heartburn and a sweet tooth. I sold her maple cookies and told her the baby would love ’em. If you’re that baby, my prophecy has come true,” Annie said smugly.

“I…you’re sure it was her?”

“It was her,” Annie assured me. “She introduced herself. ‘I’m Rose Cunningham and this is my dickhead husband, Bruce.’ ”

I snorted. “She called my father a dickhead?”

“No, I’m ad-libbing, but she didn’t have to say a word. The rich geezer she was with peeled off a few bills and waltzed out the door like a real so-and-so. He was too good for these parts. I could tell she was embarrassed, and it made me mad on her behalf. So I wrote his name on my Dickhead list.”

“Your…what?”

“My Dickhead list. If anyone crosses me or my family, they make the list,” Annie explained. “Martin Fogerty from Fallbrook pissed me off in 1975. He’s still on the list. Yvonne Ingalls from Pinecrest made the list in 1962, but we patched up our differences in ’85 and I switched her to the Favorites list in 1999. Favorites get freebies…a cookie, a cupcake, a complimentary coffee. Dickheads don’t. The list is mainly for locals, but every so often, a tourist makes the cut, for better or worse. Like your father.”

“He’s not that bad,” I commented, biting into a piece of cookie. “He’s just…driven. He can come across as a bulldozer at times. Especially when it comes to business.”

She regarded me dubiously. “Imagine my surprise when he showed up five years ago. I heard him pumping Penny for info about Wood Hollow, and that got my hackles up. Wood Hollow has always been good for three things—logging, fishing, and football, but it’s the smallest of the Four Forest towns, and there’s not much else to do there. They don’t have a proper town square, and the main street is only wide enough for trucks to haul wood. Youngsters from Wood Hollow usually migrate here or to Fallbrook or Pinecrest after high school. Or…they fuck off to Burlington. So what on Earth would a city slicker, Cadillac-driving out-of-towner like Mr. Cunningham want with Wood Hollow? Now we know he wanted to buy the mill, deforest the hillsides, and rob us blind for a buck.”

“That’s not exactly true. We’re sustainable harvesters who⁠—”

“Don’t give me that new-age hooey,” Annie groused. “You can put lipstick on a pig and it’s still a pig. Those business transactions were done in secret because your father knew he wouldn’t be welcome. Sneaky bastard. I’m sure you’re a nice man, but you’re here to do your daddy’s dirty work, and everyone knows it.”

This was where I was supposed to deny her accusations and feed her a line about having the best of intentions. It wouldn’t be a downright lie, either. But the mill was a business, and I was here for a buck, doing my father’s dirty work for my own personal gain.

I wasn’t sure how to sugarcoat the truth, so I fixated on the water bubbling at the base of the fountain. “Am I automatically on the Dickhead list too?”

“You shared your cookie, so…no. Or not yet. Maybe you take after your mom.”

“That would be cool.” I smiled at the thought. “I barely remember her. I was five when she died.”

Annie patted my hand. “Oh, honey. I’m sorry for your loss. She was lovely.”

I passed over another piece of cookie. “Thanks.”

We sat quietly for a minute or so. It was strange to think that my mom had been in that bakery, had seen this fountain, and had talked to this woman. I was hungry for details I doubted Annie could give, but she had other things on her mind.

“Just so you know, Denny told me that he met you in your hotel. He said to be nice to you. And he meant it.” She shifted on the bench to aim a grumpy look my way. “But I don’t want to be nice to you. I want to be mad, so what are you gonna do about that?”

“Uh…buy a lot of cookies?” I tried, pleased that her annoyed snort morphed into a chuckle.

“Hmph. I might be old, but I’ll kick your butt if you mess with him.”

“Denny and I are friends. He’s the first friend I’ve made here, and I don’t take that lightly. Maybe you’re my second?”

Annie rolled her eyes as she stood, fiddling with the buttons on her coat. “Don’t get ahead of yourself. Maybe Denny’s right and you’re a good egg, but now you know why not everyone will be rooting for you, so…you’re welcome for the information. See you later, Henry.”

I stayed put long after Annie headed back to the bakery, my mind buzzing with rogue memories, old loss, and the confirmation that I was on a diplomacy mission. If what Annie had shared was true—and I didn’t doubt her—my father had misjudged the notion that the Cunningham name was an asset here. It wasn’t.

But I wouldn’t get anywhere if I didn’t make an effort.

Starting now.

9

DENNY

Playoff hockey was a whole new kind of stress. I thought I knew what I was in for: nonstop travel, high-profile press conferences, and physically grueling games. My two trips to the Frozen Fours with Denver and my AHL playoffs last year were a glimpse into the future, but the reality was ten times more nerve-wracking.

As per my usual, I was one thousand percent in the zone while I was on the ice and a complete basket case in street clothes. Well, not really. I was actually doing okay lately. I used breathing exercises and mindset awareness techniques to talk myself through a few spur-of-the-moment interviews where I’d been cornered, a microphone shoved in my face. They worked.

That was bigger news than I wanted to admit. I mean, last year, I’d had a panic attack in a crowded elevator that had brought me to my knees. Yeah, that was mortifying. The team doctor had diagnosed exhaustion, which my coach decided sounded better than a bout of crippling anxiety.

I’d known from the start that if I wanted a career in the NHL, I was going to have to find creative ways to handle my stress. Most of the time, I called a friend from home—usually MK. She had a calming voice, and she knew me. I didn’t have to pretend I was okay with her.

But we weren’t who we used to be. There was an unspoken tension between us neither of us wanted to address. She had someone new and I didn’t want to interfere with that, which meant we probably needed to make a clean break and tell our friends and family members. It was the right thing to do—after playoffs.

For now, I needed to concentrate on my game. I didn’t have the bandwidth to deal with outside complications. That should have included Hank, but in a twist, my gay fuck-buddy was the ultimate stress reliever.

There wasn’t much to it. We saw each other two more times in Denver—once early on in the playoffs and after a nail-biter where I’d scored the winning goal that propelled us to the next round and helped the Condors move one step closer to the Stanley Cup. Exciting stuff, right?

When he buzzed into my apartment building later that night, my heart pounded faster than it had during the third period. We came together in a heated tangle of tongues and grabby hands, tearing at clothes in a frantic effort to get to skin. We were desperate for friction yet unwilling to stop kissing long enough to speed things along.

Or maybe we knew speed wasn’t the issue. I came the second Hank took both of us in hand, sliding his cock alongside mine. Three strokes and I was done. Later, we took a lazy shower. At some point, he fell to his knees on the tile and sucked the life out of me while I threaded my fingers in his hair. He milked me dry, then stood, turned me to face the wall, and rubbed his cock against my ass, spurting cum over my lower back.

I vaguely recalled drying off and stumbling into my room, satiated and exhausted.

We’d sat in my bed, talking about the game, the playoffs in general, and next thing I knew we were at it again, sucking, licking, biting…whatever it took to get as close as possible.

He maneuvered me on the bed, so we could blow each other at the same time. That was another first for me. He’d fingered me while he deep-throated my dick before changing tactics to licking my balls and the sensitive skin around my hole. I’d gone perfectly still but didn’t stop him. And when my orgasm hit, it wrung me out for the night.

He’d left my place at three a.m. with a quick kiss on the cheek and a sleepy “good luck.” I’d thought about asking if he wanted to stay, but…no. I didn’t want this to feel complicated for either of us.

It occurred to me the next day that we’d never once discussed Elmwood.

Maybe Hank saved Elmwood questions for texting.

I went to the diner yesterday and asked the chef’s opinion about using pre-minced garlic.

JC? I’d typed.

Thumbs-up emoji. I think that was a mistake. He started speaking French and threw his arms in the air. I might be barred from the diner for life.

The next day…Problem solved. I brought JC a garlic plant. He’s speaking to me again. In English.

I’d read that particular text in the locker room and had busted up laughing, accidentally drawing attention my way. “Winning feels good, eh, rookie?” someone had teased.

“Tell your girl we said hi, Hotshot.”

“Ask her if she has a friend!”

“Ask her if she has two friends!”

I hadn’t responded, obviously. “My new fuck-buddy is funny” would have required a bigger explanation than I was ready to give.

In another text, Hank had mentioned that he’d met a few of the coaches and their significant others in Elmwood, and had been blown away by how normal it was to see same-sex couples in town.

This place is wild. JC asked me if I’d met his hockey star husband and two minutes later, I saw Ivan the barista kissing Court in front of the coffee shop. No one seemed to notice.

Except you, I’d replied.

Shrugging emoji. It’s inspiring.

I supposed it was. It made me proud of my town and pleased that Hank appreciated some of the cooler quirks of the Four Forest area. And that he’d made a real effort, like he’d said he would.

Grams reported that my new “friend” had become a regular at Henderson’s Bakery, Rise and Grind, and the diner. She said he smiled and waved like an annoying car salesman.

“He buys a maple cookie every damn day. It’s disgusting,” she grumbled on the phone. “I like him.”

Based on our text messages, I got the impression that she wasn’t the only one who’d thawed toward the new guy. Hank mentioned JC often enough that I could picture the gruff French Canadian leaving his post in the kitchen at the diner to spar with Hank, or bellied up to the counter at the coffee shop chatting with Ivan while he waited for his latte.

Mary-Kate liked him too. “I met the new cowboy.”

Okay, I’d almost veered off the interstate at that one. “The…who?”

“You know, the guy from Colorado we saw at the bar,” she explained. “Hank Cunningham. He popped into the bookstore the other day. He’s even better looking in daylight.”

Yeah, I agreed, but I couldn’t say that. Could I?

“Uh…”

MK had laughed and changed the subject to my game that night and her thoughts on how the playoffs were going. She hadn’t brought up her new guy in Burlington again, and I hadn’t asked. We’d seen each other after my game in Seattle, but she’d been with her family and an in-depth conversation hadn’t been possible.

Fine by me. Hockey was easy, Elmwood was easy, and surprisingly, so was Hank.

In cynical moments, I reminded myself that Hank was just buttering up the natives for his own gain, but then he’d comment about the blooming wildflowers on the hill between the Black Horse Inn and Main Street and how beautiful the lake looked on the drive to Wood Hollow. And that shit got to me.

See, he’d become an unwitting conduit to home. During the most important games I’d ever played, I wasn’t plagued by homesickness, depression, or my old friend anxiety. I felt surprisingly calm and whole. On and off the ice.

My focus was rock solid. I was playing the best hockey of my life, doing whatever was necessary to be an invaluable asset…a go-to scorer, a fierce defender. I was smart, I was tough, and I worked my ass off.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough.

We were about to lose the Conference Final.

We left everything on the ice, but we’d been outplayed from the start of this series. Boston had a deeper, younger bench than Denver. They had young superstar talents like Jake Milligan, Sergei Balic, and Ace Turner. We had Trinsky and me…and a few veterans. A number of Condors were injured and worn out, and it showed.

Personally, I’d been nursing a tweaked hip since game one, and I could feel it slowing my transitions off the boards. A half a second loss of speed was the equivalent of swimming in honey with a team as tightly honed as Boston. We couldn’t catch them, couldn’t defend against them. We were just…done.

I hated that this was how my last game as a rookie would go down—with me chewing the fuck out of my mouthguard as I chased Jake Milligan, deking in between players built like Mack trucks only to have him outmaneuver one of our D-men and sink the puck in the crease with deafening precision. Petey never stood a chance.

The score was 4–1 Boston with less than a minute on the clock in the third period.

I growled in frustration. There was nothing quite like getting your ass handed to you by one of your teenage idols. And that was what was happening here. Jake was schooling me the way he had almost seven years ago when he’d started coming around occasionally to help Coach Smitty with practice at Elmwood High.

Jake had been playing in the AHL at the time, and that was enough to impress a group of hockey hopefuls. Sure, Coach had played pro too, but Jake was only a few years older than us and for some reason, that made our own pro aspirations seem doable.

He was a smart, wily player; a lightning-quick skater; and a shrewd strategist. He could suss out scoring opportunities based on the slightest clue: the turn of a wrist, the tilt of an opponent’s stick, the rate of speed they bounced off the boards. I knew I was good, but Jake was better and I’d looked up to him.

All these years later, it fucking sucked to know that the climb to greatness was steeper than I’d realized.

And now, time ticked like a doomsday gong.

I wished I could conjure four more goals out of thin air and save the day, but that wasn’t going to happen. This was why I hated that fucking nickname. I could see the headline now: “Hotshot Unable to Deliver.” The promising rookie who’d failed…in front of some of his favorite people, no less.

Coach Smitty was here with Bryson and their kids; Mary-Kate was here with her dad and her uncles, Vinnie and Nolan; and I was pretty sure Niall, Micah, and Abe were in the stands somewhere too. Grams couldn’t make it. She was still a ballbuster, but she was frail and I didn’t want to worry about her worrying about me, so it was for the best.

Hank wasn’t here either. Again, for the best.

However, I superstitiously wondered if I’d have played better if he was in the building. Like some kind of good luck charm.

Three seconds, two seconds, and…buzz.

My first season in the NHL was officially over.

Jake skated to my side and pulled me in for a bear hug. He was my height and lean like me with dark-blond hair, blue eyes, and a winning smile. As much as I was bummed for my team, I was happy for him.

“Congratulations,” I said in his ear, aware of the swarming cameras.

“Thanks. Great game, Den. Great series.” He patted my shoulder and punched my chest in a bro show of affection. “I’ll see you this summer.”

“Bring it home, man.”

“It” was the cup, never to be mentioned by name until it became a reality. I wanted it for myself, but if it couldn’t be me this year, I hoped it was him. Elmwood deserved a win.

Jake grinned and moved on to celebrate with his teammates while I commiserated with mine.

I was bummed for sure, and after an agonizingly awkward press conference, I was even more frazzled. How many ways were there to say “Losing sucks, it’s been a good year, looking forward to next season?”

But the second I spotted my friends waiting for me in the corridor afterward, my heart squeezed in my chest. I blocked out the photographers who followed me and greeted them, falling into a monster group hug with some of my favorite people in the world.

Cameras clicked and for once, I didn’t give a fuck.

Then Mary-Kate pulled me aside and launched herself at me, wrapping her arms and legs around me like an octopus. It was a silly post-game tradition she’d started in high school well before we were more than friends. She’d said it was her way of getting me to loosen up and not take every win or loss so seriously. It worked. Sixteen-year-old me had looked for her after the games, and I supposed that was how we’d begun.

We were over now, but apparently, the octopus hug tradition remained. I didn’t expect the fierce lip mash, though. Cameras clicked away, and our friends hooted.

I laughed as I released her. “What was that for?”

“Just giving them something to talk about.”

“Your new boyfriend won’t like those pics,” I teased, peeling her off me, limb by limb.

“Meh, that didn’t work out. And someone somewhere would comment if I didn’t greet you properly. Can’t have that,” MK said breezily. She met my concerned gaze a moment later and went still, whispering, “Oh, shit. You met someone.”

“What? No,” I sputtered.

“You’re blushing! I love it. I can’t wait to hear all about her.”

Okay, she was messing with me now, riling me up to get my mind off the cameras and press and a harsh loss. She knew me well, ’cause yeah, it still worked.

“There is no her, MK.”

“Mmhmm, sure.” She laced her fingers in mine and tugged my arm. “Are you ready to go home?”

Yeah, I was ready.

I missed Elmwood, I missed Grams, and…I missed Hank.

It was just sinking in that we’d have the whole summer together.

Sure, we were using each other for sex and profit and things I should have been ashamed to want, but fuck it. I didn’t care. This summer was going to be all about saying yes before I had to say no again.

10

HANK

Elmwood loved hockey. We established that, right? But I had no idea their love of the sport was borderline cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs. Seriously, Denny’s homecoming was unlike anything I’d ever witnessed. The town pulled out all stops for their NHL hero and then some.

Check this out: A welcome home banner spanned the width of Main Street, and every storefront pasted his number on their door. The Hendersons named a brownie for him—Denny’s decadent brownie, in case you’re curious. Ivan and Court gave a free “drink of choice” for a day at Rise and Grind, and all the baristas wore Denny’s jersey.

And they might as well have renamed the diner Denny’s Diner. The menu was revised so that every item began with “Denny’s.” Denny’s pancakes, Denny’s waffles, Denny’s burger, Denny’s fries, Denny’s pot pie, Denny’s…everything.

But Elmwood Rink might have outdone them all with their supersized poster, a photo of Denny in action that covered the entire side of the building. I was told there was another one at the high school rink, but I hadn’t seen it yet.

I walked through town with my mouth open in awe of the outpouring of love and support. I’d never seen anything like it. This wasn’t corporate-sponsored rah-rah bullshit. This was a community effort, funded privately by proud citizens who’d rooted tirelessly for Denny all season and wanted to thank him for representing Elmwood. It was unbelievably cool.

Yet all I could think was…

“He’s going to fucking hate this,” Annie grumbled.

Yeah, what she said.

I stared up at the welcome sign and rocked on my heels. “It’s nice.”

She sighed. “They’ll do the same thing for Jake. We don’t play favorites here. Well, I do, but he’s my grandkid, so who cares?”

“Understandable.”

“Mmhmm. He’s loved and appreciated. That’s not the worst thing in the world, is it?”

Sounded amazing to me. But hey, I was the outsider, dodging suspicious glances on the regular, so you know…perspective.

Okay, things had improved slightly for me over the past month or so.

I’d hired a couple of employees at the mill. I had another ninety places to fill, but it was better than nothing. The personnel issues had calmed just as a slew of newly constructed homes were slated to break ground. That was a relief, for sure, but at the rate the orders were coming in, we’d be forced to transfer employees from Denver to handle the overflow.

“Trust me, you don’t want to do that,” our new manager, Cooper, warned. “We need locals. I’ll help you as best I can.”

Good. I needed help.

Hiring Cooper McMurry was possibly my greatest contribution as CEO of the Wood Hollow Mill, or whatever the fuck my temporary title was. Cooper was a single dad in his late thirties originally from Fallbrook who’d worked for the Larsons since he was a teenager before taking a job in Upstate New York.

But he was back, and thank fuck he was also extremely qualified to lead hardcore lumberjacks. His expertise was forestry and trust me, everything about him screamed legit. Cooper was gritty and fierce-looking with a bushy dark beard, sharp eyes, a barrel chest, and biceps that tested the integrity of his T-shirts on the daily.

I felt like a plaid-shirt and faded-jeans-wearing wannabe in comparison. I’d overheard a tall guy with shaggy hair and tats named Niall refer to me as a GQ model posing as a blue-collar worker to his shorter, heavier-set friend, Micah. Yep, those fucking billboard ads had been unearthed by an intrepid Internet sleuth and let’s just say, Wood Hollow wasn’t impressed. No one mocked me outright, but I felt like I had a target on my head.

These idiots obviously had no idea that it took a lot more than a few suspicious looks and whispered character assassinations to rattle me. But I wondered what Denny would think if he knew his high school buddies were some of my biggest haters.

Not important. It was static noise. I ignored it and tried to concentrate on the little wins. For instance, Emily still fucked up my calls on the regular, but she didn’t try to leave before five and to her credit, she’d actually stayed late to finish a work order the other day. So…better.

Elmwood was kinder to me. Bill poured a beer for me the second I walked into the bar, Ivan greeted me warmly every morning at the coffee shop, Penny sneaked an extra maple cookie into my orders, and JC found a new topic for us to debate whenever I stopped by the diner.

Like today.

“Why do you order zee scramble with no mushrooms?” JC demanded in his melodic Quebecois accent, hovering at the counter with his arms crossed. “Mushrooms add zee flavor and interest. You take them away, what do you have?”

Jean-Claude was a big dude with reddish hair and a quirky sense of humor. Some days I couldn’t tell if I was on the cusp of starting a war or if he simply enjoyed making me squirm.

“A better omelet,” I snarked. “I hate mushrooms.”

He narrowed his eyes as if sizing up the enemy, then shrugged. “C’est la vie. I will give you leeks instead.”

“That’s okay. I don’t⁠—”

And he was gone.

The man filling saltshakers at the end of the counter chuckled softly as he glanced over. “Unless you’re allergic, I’d go with the flow if I were you. JC speaks in food. It’s his way of welcoming you. And possibly a reminder that as part owner of the diner, I should formally do the same.”

I swiveled to face him. “You’re Nolan Moore.”

Of course, I knew who he was. This town was the size of a thimble, for fuck’s sake. I’d nodded a greeting to Nolan a few times and he’d been perfectly pleasant, but he’d seemed busy too, and I hadn’t pushed it.

“Yes.” Nolan brushed salt from his palms and offered his hand. “Welcome to Elmwood.”

It might have been my imagination, but I swore there was a beat of silence in the room before the regular hum of conversation resumed.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Hank Cunningham.”

“I know. We’re neighbors. My husband, Vinnie, and I live across the creek from you. If you see two kids skipping rocks or trying to catch frogs on your side, they probably belong to us. Feel free to send them home.”

“No, no. I wouldn’t dare disturb them,” I replied. “How old are they?”

“Alec is almost seven, and Ava is four and a half. They take after Vinnie for sure. He’s the king of jumping first and hoping he remembered a parachute later.” Nolan’s eyes creased with paternal pride as he described the harrowing reality of parenting two mini daredevils.

Okay, this was a pinch-me moment. I’d grown up watching Vinnie Kiminski play hockey for Seattle along with JC’s husband, Riley Thoreau. And I’d met both men courtesy of my diner and coffee shop habit. They’d been cordial for sure, but I hadn’t had a real conversation with either of them. More like surface pleasantries you spared for strangers.

This felt…sincere, and after months of feeling as welcome as a fart in a spacesuit, it was almost embarrassing how much I appreciated it.

“Sounds like you have your hands full,” I commented, chuckling at Nolan’s faux-exasperated nod. He was a handsome man in his early forties, lean and toned with kind eyes and a winning smile. I liked him immediately.

“They’re nonstop. Alec is playing Mighty Mites hockey this summer, but Ava is still too young for hockey camp. Wish me luck finding something to keep her—” Nolan stopped abruptly and waved at someone over my shoulder. “Whoa! Well, look who’s here.”

I didn’t have to. I sensed Denny’s presence like a warm breeze and a slice of sunshine on a cool day. The accompanying surge of butterflies surprised me, though.

Fuck, I missed him, and I hadn’t expected to. Not like this.

Sure, I watched the games, and maybe I’d been more invested in Denver’s win than normal, but I’d chalked that up to Elmwood’s playoff fever.

We hadn’t communicated much over the past few days, but our last thread from earlier this morning read,

Just got home last night. What are you doing?

Going to the diner, I’d replied. Meet me?

Denny had sent a thumbs-up emoji twenty minutes ago, and I’d been nursing a coffee I didn’t need while waiting for him, wondering why I was so churned up.

I swiveled on my stool to get a glimpse of the hockey god slapping high fives and shaking hands with his hometown fans. I studied Denny as he paused for a selfie, admiring his quiet grace under pressure. His flushed cheeks and the twitch in his jaw were the only indication that he was wildly uncomfortable with the attention.

To his credit, he only flinched a teensy bit when the diner erupted with, “Hotshot! Hotshot!”

He was better at peopling than he credited himself for, I mused as Denny made his way to the counter. He hugged Nolan and Dierdre, the waitress, and fist-bumped JC, who set my omelet on the counter and immediately pulled Denny into a crushing embrace.

Everything in me wanted to jump up and greet him with a monster hug too, but there was no way to do that without inviting a lot of questions. So I admired his broad shoulders, his tight ass in his black joggers, and willed my cock to behave when he raked his fingers through his unruly hair. Those fingers had been in my ass, for fuck’s sake. I wanted so much more. I wanted⁠—

Denny flopped onto the stool next to me and bumped my knee with his. “Hey.”

“Hey, yourself.” My grin split my face in half. I picked up a fork to give my hands something to do and gestured to the omelet. “Hungry? The food’s pretty good here.”

Christ, I’d lost my game.

“Pretty good?” JC huffed incredulously. “It is tres bon. Eat your breakfast. You will love. If not…you will try the mushrooms. You will notice zee menu is Denny’s menu. Choose whatever you like, and zee new guy will pay for it. I am kidding! It’s on the house!”

“Merci.” Denny scrunched his brow as if in deep thought. “Je prendrai l’omelette au fromage, s’il te plaît.”

JC beamed like a proud papa, patting Denny’s shoulder before skirting the counter, spouting rapid-fire French on his way to the kitchen.

“You speak French?” I cast a wide-eyed look at Denny, my voice dripping with the sort of reverence befitting an astronaut landing.

“My mom was from Montreal,” he replied, glancing over at Nolan, who was hovering curiously nearby.

“So you two know each other?” Nolan asked.

Denny nodded. “Yeah, we’ve been friends for a while.”

Once again, a slight hush fell over the diner.

Was it me, or was this what the dawn of acceptance in Elmwood felt like? A welcome from Nolan and an acknowledgment of friend status from one of the town’s hockey heroes. Wow, I could practically hear an angelic chorus from on high.

Voila. You’re in the door, Hank. If you don’t fuck this up, you might be outta here by the end of summer.

Nolan inclined his chin. “Cool. Glad to have you home, Den. Rest up. Camp starts next month, and you know Vinnie is ready to go. If I were you, I’d lay low or he’ll volunteer you to deal with registration.”

Denny widened his eyes comically. “I’ll hide.”

“Good idea.” Nolan chuckled. “I have a stack of paperwork calling my name in the office. Enjoy your breakfasts.”

I speared a bite of omelet and darted a sideways glance at Denny, cradling a cup next to me. “I think the poster of you on the side of the diner is twice the size of my cowboy billboard. Just sayin’.”

“No way. Yours is huge.”

“Why, thank you,” I teased.

He snorted and lowered his voice. “I love these people, but the celebration stuff is over-the-top. I mean, we lost. I shouldn’t be celebrating at all.”

I kicked his shin lightly. “Don’t be a buzzkill. You’re a lucky dude. No one ever named a hamburger after me.”

“Too bad. Hank’s hamburger rolls off the tongue.”

“True.” I took another bite of omelet. “Happy to be home?”

“You have no idea.” He sighed. “It always takes a few days to acclimate, but I’m looking forward to doing absolutely nothing.”

“Really? I can think of a few things I’d like to do with you…and to you,” I whispered.

Denny choked on his coffee, casting a wicked glare at me as soon as he could breathe again.

“Not here. Geez, this is harder than I thought it would be. I wish I could…touch you,” he admitted softly.

I rested my calf against his. “You will.”

His lips parted and his nostrils flared. Of course, my dick noticed. Before I could say anything clever like, “Fuck breakfast, let me eat you,” Dierdre showed up with his scramble.

Denny cleared his throat and thanked her, setting a napkin on his lap…possibly to hide his own boner situation.

We ate in companionable silence for a few minutes, legs pressed inconspicuously.

Don’t ask why, but the innocent contact felt as intimate as holding hands. It made me less stabby about the constant interruptions: autographs, more selfies and congratulations. It was a lot of one-sided “You’re the best” speeches that were probably really gratifying to be on the receiving end of, but damn, I couldn’t wait to have Denny Mellon to myself.

I wanted to lick his muscular, sexy body from head to toe, trace the planes and valleys of his abs with the tip of my tongue, suck his balls, lift his legs over my shoulders and taste him while he begged me for things we hadn’t done yet.

I fucking burned for the hockey boy. Yep, I was hard and horny. I was also stuck at a diner counter in a wholesome town with a stiff cock and a head full of pornolicious thoughts, unsure how to make a graceful exit without scandalizing the masses and earning an unflattering new nickname.

The Bone, Stiffy, Woody Cunningham?

Meh, fuck it. I paid for my breakfast, brushing against Denny’s arm as I stood, mumbling a barely intelligible good-bye.

Head down, I moved to the exit, my fingers flying across my cell screen. I read my text once and pushed Send.

See you at my place. Hurry the fuck up.

11

DENNY

I’d wanted this for weeks. No…for years. Many years.

This was day one of my big gay summer, and I couldn’t wait to get the party started.

I drove through town, wincing as I passed under the Welcome Home sign. It was so fucking big. I didn’t mind having my number painted on store windows. Less in-your-face, you know? That was me, though…subjectively contrary.

I cut down Myrtle and took the hillside road, following Carlton Creek to a dirt lane leading to the old Hamilton house. I’d never been inside, but I was familiar with it. Vinnie and Nolan hosted a lot of hockey-themed celebrations at their house next door. You couldn’t help noticing the red barn from the other side of the creek.

I pulled into the driveway and took the porch steps two at a time. I raised my hand to knock just as the door swung open and a boxer-brief-wearing, messy haired man pulled me over the threshold.

Hank didn’t bother with a greeting. He wrestled my T-shirt over my head as he kicked the door shut and slammed his mouth over mine.

God, it had been way too long. I really fucking missed this. Missed him.

“Take these off,” he mumbled, tugging at my belt. “Now.”

I obeyed, hands trembling as I chased his mouth, exposing my neck when he licked my throat and bit my shoulder. He helped undo my buckle and zipper while I kicked off my shoes in between soul-stealing, passionate kisses. I didn’t know what it was about us, but we had a habit of going from zero to a hundred in seconds flat. I was strung out and needy and damn, I was so hard it hurt. I’d never wanted anyone the way I wanted Hank.

“Mine. Give it to me,” I growled, fisting his hard-on through his boxer briefs.

Hank grunted, switching our positions against his foyer wall with embarrassing ease. I was still getting used to being with someone who matched me in size and strength. But I didn’t hate it. In fact, I was in the mood to be manhandled right now.

“You want my dick? You want me to stretch your sweet hole and fuck you?”

The deep timbre of his voice moved through me, holding me in place, demanding my attention. “I—yeah.”

“Yeah…what? Say it. Let me hear it,” Hank rasped, capturing my wrists and pinning them above my head as he alternately bit and kissed a path along my neck while pumping his hips suggestively.

The cocktease shit was killing me. No doubt I was sporting a nice wet spot on my boxer briefs. My prick was a steel rod begging for mercy. I needed friction, and I needed it now.

“Yes, do it. Fuck me. I want your cock.”

He licked my ear, tugging the lobe between his teeth. “Upstairs.”

I barely registered my surroundings. I think the room was gray and white, but don’t quote me. All that mattered was getting to the bed. We kicked the duvet aside and rolled all over the mattress, consumed with reacquainting ourselves with the feel of being naked and entwined. It felt too good to stop. I could have done this all day. But when Hank ghosted a finger along my crack, I rolled on top of him, caging his body and straddling his torso.

I stroked my cock with my right hand and his with my left, dragging my thumb over our slits where precum gathered and rubbing it along our shafts.

“What do I do now? How do I get this inside me?” I whispered.

“Oh, fuck, Den.” Hank let out a ragged breath and damn, that made feel kind of powerful. I loved knowing he was as strung out as I was. That he wanted me as much as I wanted him.

“Should I suck you first?” I squeezed his cock and slid between his thighs, my lips hovering at his tip.

I didn’t wait for a response. I just opened up wide and took as much of him as I could handle, gripping his base in a tight fist. My blowjob game was improving. A few weeks ago, I’d gagged and choked in my efforts to impress him. Now, I took my time. Let me just say, patience really did pay off.

Hank flattened his feet on the mattress, grabbing my hair and thrusting into my mouth. I relaxed my throat and let him take what he wanted. Five or six strokes in, he pushed me off his dick, his eyes hazy with desire as he scrambled for the lube on the nightstand.

“C’mere. Lie down. Show me your pretty hole, sweetheart.”

Christ, I was blushing. I had to be. I wasn’t supposed to like being called sweetheart. It was corny. And no one had ever told me I had a pretty hole. That was…weird, wasn’t it? It didn’t matter what I thought—my cock was on board. I obeyed, spreading my legs wide while Hank slipped a lubed digit inside me.

We’d done this often. I fucking loved having a finger or two inside me. Ass play was hot. It didn’t have to lead to anal, but I wanted it. I was so ready, it wasn’t even funny. I’d read countless how-to-please-your-lover-and-yourself articles online and I’d watched a little gay porn over the past couple of months. Hell, I’d even played with a newly purchased dildo. We’d both been tested, so there’d be no condom barrier. Just us.

This was a well-planned foray into uncharted territory and not gonna lie, I was nervous.

Hank removed his third finger, added more lube, and guided his cock to my entrance. “Look at me, Den.”

My eyes fluttered open. I hadn’t realized I’d closed them or that I’d chewed my lower lip raw. “Yeah?”

“We’ll go slow. If you need anything, just say the word.”

“I need you to fuck me,” I replied, raising my hips meaningfully.

He gave me a sweet, lopsided smile and brushed my hair from my forehead as he slowly eased his way inside. Slow, slow, slow. His cock was bigger than three fingers, but I was stupidly surprised by the burn. My lungs felt too tight, and my heart was pretty much lodged in my throat.

“Breathe, Denny. Breathe.” Hank kissed me, sweeping his tongue over the seam of my mouth as he pulled almost all the way out, his cockhead buried in my ass, before plunging inside again.

“It’s not—I don’t—oh, fuck, oh, fuck. That’s good.”

I let out a whoosh of air, pleasure chasing pain away in an instant. Like magic. I was shaking. It was too much and not enough at the same time. I needed more.

Hank knew exactly what to do. He covered me, resting his forehead on mine…and began to move.

It was incredible, mind-blowing, life-altering. Yeah, cheesy, I know, but I’d been transported to another realm, so give me a break. I hooked my legs around his ass, drawing him closer still, chanting, “Yes, more, fuck me.”

Hank delivered. He upped the tempo, rocking his hips to a rhythm I instinctively knew how to follow. I met his thrusts, digging my heels into the meaty flesh of his ass cheeks, gliding my tongue with his as Hank nailed my prostate over and over. I was overwhelmed, happily drugged on the weight and feel of him. But I couldn’t fight off the tingle at the base of my spine. No chance.

I slid my hand between us and stroked my cock as he moved faster, harder, deeper.

“Come for me, Den. Come, sweetheart. I got you.”

“Oh, fuck, oh, fuck!” I roared, pleasure bolting through my veins. I came so hard, cum shot over my belly and chest as I rode out wave after wave of bliss.

Hank didn’t stop. He pistoned his hips till he lost the tempo and fell apart. I could feel him come inside me, and that was definitely a new one.

I blinked up at him and draped my arms over his neck. “Wow.”

He dipped his chin to kiss me. “You okay?”

“Yeah, but I don’t think I can move. You’ll have to stay here…just like this. And then I want to do it again.”

“No problem.”

“And I want to fuck you too, so…I hope you didn’t plan on getting any sleep tonight.”

“Sleep is overrated,” he conceded.

“That’s the spirit. Oh, hey…and next time, wear your cowboy hat.”

Hank barked a laugh and blew a raspberry on my neck. “You got it.”

We didn’t sleep much that night or the next. I was already a BJ and hand job sexaholic, but I’d officially entered a new phase of sexual discovery, and this was better than I’d imagined. There were so many positions, so many ways to touch and make each other feel good. I had a lot to learn, and only a real slacker took a break from their studies. And I was no slacker.

I couldn’t get enough of Hank. I was obsessed with his dick. I wanted to ride him, bend over for him, let him fuck me against a wall, a tree, or the side of his truck. And yes, I wanted to return the favor.

Hank had zero hang-ups about sex. He didn’t subscribe to heteronormative notions of masculinity. Being “on top” was just a position and a preference that might change depending on your partner or the moment. He was versatile and willing to try almost anything.

The first time I fucked him, he was on his knees with his cowboy hat on, white-knuckling the headboard. I’d taken a moment to drink in the sight of this muscular hunk offering himself like a gift. My hand had been shaking as I’d guided my cock to his puckered entrance.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” I’d rasped.

“Denny, stop thinking and start fucking. You’re killing me, sweetheart.”

I’d chuckled at his playful, put-upon tone. He didn’t give me a chance to overthink…anything. He was so open and honest and real.

And as I’d eased my thick cock inside his tight channel, a whole new constellation of stars had flooded my vision. It had felt like a religious experience. New and sacred. Every push and pull had sent pleasure coursing through my veins. My hands on his hips, my mouth on his shoulder. I’d fucked my cowboy like a champ, thrusting deeper and deeper, chasing his release and mine. The sweat, cum, and sheer adrenaline was unlike anything I’d ever felt.

I was hooked. I wanted to do this every day, multiple times a day, please.

I fucked him on a kitchen barstool, his ass perched on the edge, knees pulled to his chest while I drilled his hole. I fucked him in the shower and on the rug in front of the fireplace. It wasn’t a matter of taking turns. We just did what felt right. And we talked about it.

Okay, that was me, asking a million questions.

“Do you have a favorite position? Do you like it fast or slow? Do you like dirty talk…if so, how dirty? Do you have fantasies? What about kinks?”

Hank had answered them all in stride. “If I’m in the driver’s seat, I like missionary. If I’m on the receiving end, I prefer being on my knees. Fast or slow…yes to both. Talk dirty to me, baby, and yes, I have lots of fantasies. Especially about hockey players.”

“And kinks?” I’d pressed.

“Well…”

“Don’t be shy, now.”

He’d hesitated a beat and shrugged. “Being blindfolded can be a turn-on.”

“Ooh. Okay, we’ll do that next time.”

“What about you?”

“Everything you do turns me on,” I’d gushed. “Every position, everything you say. You’re my cowboy fantasy. And I don’t know if this is a kink or not, but…I love the feel of your cum dripping from my hole, and I love seeing mine drip from yours and⁠—”

He’d shut me up with a passionate kiss, pushing my boxer briefs off and licking his way down my body. I surrendered control, utterly and completely. It probably should have freaked me out, but there was no way to lose here.

12

HANK

Isat on the chaise next to Denny’s, staring out at the expanse of lawn and the field of wildflowers abutting the forest and the rambling creek nearby. Puffy clouds dotted the blue sky and other than the warble of a sparrow, it was peaceful and quiet.

Melting into the cushions, I drank in the view, which was almost as compelling as the guy stretched out nearby in holey jeans, a snug white tee, and my cowboy hat pushed low over his eyes to block the sun.

“You look good in that hat, sweetheart.”

Denny laughed, a sweet, unfettered sound that had me grinning like a loon. “I’m gonna get one of these…sweetheart. That’s such a goofy thing to say. Sweetheart. Why do you call me that?”

I shrugged. “I dunno. You’re sweet…ish. Should I call you something else?”

He smiled. “You do you. It’s better than Hotshot.”

“Why do you hate that so much?”

“It’s a pressure nickname. Too much to live up to on days you don’t kick ass the way the fans and media expect you to.” Denny tipped the brim of the hat. “I love hockey, and I can handle the pressure on the ice. Bring it, I’m ready. But the media stuff is a whole other ball game. They were all over me when our season ended, asking what happened. What could I say?”

“The truth,” I suggested. “You played hard. There’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

“Maybe not, but the real truth is, we were too beat up to compete. It felt like we’d given up by that last game, and I fucking hate giving up. It’s easy to say next season will be different, but you never know what’s coming. Denver has at least three players retiring, a couple who’ll probably be traded. That means new teammates and new chemistry, and…it’s tough starting from scratch.”

“You sound like an old fart,” I chided.

He laughed. “Fuck off.”

“Seriously. You’re twenty-two. You’re supposed to have at least five more years of unabashed enthusiasm before cynicism sets in.”

“I’m not cynical. I’m realistic, and I want to win. Failure isn’t an option. I’ll do whatever it takes to improve my game, minimize mistakes, skate faster, be better. And if I have to switch teams, hire a new agent…I’ll do that too.”

I widened my eyes comically. “I had no idea you were so cutthroat.”

“Only about hockey.”

“Yikes. Do you tell the camp kids to get their asses in gear and quit fucking off like a drill sergeant?”

“No, summer hockey is chill. I don’t coach big groups. They usually give me one or two teens at a time who need to work on shooting,” he said. “Or I assist Jake…or Smitty.”

“Your old coach?”

Denny nodded. “Yeah, he’s awesome. He can be a hardass in the regular season, but he’s a goofy teddy bear at camp. Like Vinnie. They entertain the kids while I remind them to keep their eyes on the puck.”

“I bet the kids will freak the fuck out having you as a coach this year.”

“Nah, I’m not the fun one. Too serious.”

“I don’t think you’re too serious,” I argued, plucking my hat off his head. I put it on my own head and offered my sunglasses in trade. “I think you like having fun as much as anyone, but you’re a control freak. Type A to the max.”

Denny pushed the sunglasses on and nodded. “True. Are you like me, or are you a slob?”

“Oh, I’m a hot mess. You wouldn’t know it looking at me. I fake having my shit together.”

“You? No way.”

“Way. I have good ideas, but I’m not great with follow-through. I have a reputation in my family for not finishing what I start. They’re not wrong. I feel like I’m always going backward. The fact that I’m working for my dad when I swore I’d never do it again tells you something about me.”

“That you wanted to help him out so you could live in his fancy house in Elmwood with not one, but two toilets in your bathroom?”

I tipped the brim of my hat. “You caught me.”

“What’s up with this house? It’s so extra.”

“I have no idea. Some designer from Dallas probably drew up plans for the remodel and Dad signed off without a second thought. He can be kind of showy with the high-end BS—the nicest cars, best table at the finest steak house, and beautiful homes filled with rooms no one goes in. But it’s all for show. My dad grew up dirt poor. He worked on oil rigs in the Gulf and met someone who needed loggers and was willing to pay more. Ten years later, he took over that mill, and five years after that, he was selling products to home-building emporiums and lumber supply chains across the country. Not too shabby for a high school dropout.”

“Impressive.”

“Yeah, it is,” I agreed. “Of course, your grandmother would say that anyone with two toilets in one bathroom was full of shit, so do me a favor and don’t tell her.”

He barked a laugh. “You already know her well.”

“I’m a quick study. She’s the town’s bullshit police. I saw her at the market the other day raising hell over the price of tomatoes.”

“Grams takes some getting used to,” Denny conceded, his gaze fixed on the horizon. “I wasn’t happy about coming here and living with her. I didn’t know her well at all, and she seemed so cranky and old. My plan was to wait till summer, then make my escape. But she grew on me. For everything she complained about, she did a good deed…almost as if she were covering up being nice. She made breakfast every day, signed me up for hockey, refurbished my dad’s old bicycle. She never asked for anything in return. I don’t think she knows how to.”

“She might be a handful, but people respect her,” I said. “And you too.”

“That’s ’cause I play hockey.”

“So I’m gonna have to learn how to play hockey, huh?”

“It wouldn’t hurt,” he joked.

“All right. You’ll have to teach me how to skate first.”

He raised a brow. “You really don’t know how?”

“Nope. I tried once, and it was ugly. I fell twenty times in less than ten minutes. Everything hurt,” I groused. “Especially my butt.”

“I’ll give you lessons this summer. If you want, you can strap a pillow around your ass to cushion your fall.”

“You’re too kind.” I rolled my eyes, hiking my legs off the edge of the chaise. “I’ll do the same for you. Are you ready to learn how to ride?”

“Uh…a horse?”

“A horse,” I confirmed, checking the time. “You’re not in a hurry, are you?”

“No, I’m meeting up with my friends later, but I⁠—”

“Excellent. Be right back.”

I slipped inside the house and returned a few minutes later with a baseball cap for Denny, two water bottles, and a pillow. I set the cap on his head and motioned for him to follow.

“Where are you going?” He scrambled to his feet. “This is a sex thing, remember? I’m not actually riding a horse, Hank. Hank!”

I cupped my ear and shrugged, a big ol’ smile on my face as I continued to the barn.

He found me cooing to Bess while I wrestled a saddle onto her back.

“Say hi to Bess. She missed you, Den.”

“Hey, Bess.” He grabbed one of the water bottles I’d set on the ledge of a stall, and uncapped it as he checked out the barn. It was half the size of the one in Colorado but equally as nice. Three stalls lined one side of the structure with an office and tack room opposite. He set the bottle on the ledge and addressed the horse. “Hank is being tricky. How do we handle this?”

“She says you just listen to the master and hop on up.”

“The master.” Denny laughed, then pointed at the black horse munching on hay in his stall. “How’s Fred doing?”

“He’s doing great, and he’s gonna hang tight while we take a walk with Bess. C’mon over.”

Denny shook his head. “No, that’s okay. Maybe tomorrow. I’m not ready for⁠—”

“Sure you are,” I intercepted. “This is our reason to spend time together, remember?”

“No, it’s sex.”

“That’s the bonus. I’ve been here for a while on my own and you were right, Den. No one will buy us being friends without a reason. So get your ass in the saddle, and let’s do this. I’ll get you a helmet and…I brought a pillow. Helmet is nonnegotiable, but the pillow is your call.”

He gritted his teeth. “Very fucking funny.”

I chuckled. “C’mon. We’ll take her outside, and I’ll show you how to mount.”

I walked Bess into the sunlit paddock next to the barn and talked Denny through a series of simple instructions. Foot in stirrup, hike your leg over, gaze forward, straight posture, rely on your balance, be in sync with the horse’s movements, and gentle with the reins.

“Why don’t I just watch you do it?” Denny suggested.

I inclined my chin in agreement and glided onto the saddle, nice and easy. “It might feel awkward at first, but like anything, you get better at it with practice. As for Bess…she’s a gentle soul. She’ll need a minute or two to get used to you, too. But you’ll get to know each other quickly.”

Denny wrinkled his nose. “I don’t know about this.”

I dismounted like a pro, and held a hand out. “Your turn. Do you trust me?”

“Yeah, but, I have a hypothetical question…what if she bolts? Is there an SOS code or something?”

“Help!”

“I’m glad to see you’re taking my safety seriously,” he huffed sarcastically.

“I did offer you a pillow,” I singsonged.

“Don’t you need a horse too? Why is Fred alone? Who watches them?”

“Fred is fine. They’re horses, not kids. I hired someone from Fallbrook to help out at the barn. She’ll be around tomorrow morning, but we’re alone now, so…let’s go.” I clapped, motioning for him to step up. “I’ll hold the lead and walk with you. Ready?”

“As ever.”

The next fifteen minutes were comedy gold. No kidding. Someone should have been filming this reel of unintentionally hysterical bloopers. There was something endearing about a professional athlete good-naturedly trying an activity outside of his comfort zone…and sucking at it.

Denny put his left foot into the stirrup, misjudged the amount of oomph he needed to haul himself onto the saddle, and ended up falling on his ass like a cartoon character.

I bit the inside of my cheek to keep my smile from spreading. “Want that pillow?”

“Very fucking funny.”

I smacked his butt and squeezed it. “Dust off and try it again.”

He did, and he fell…two more times.

Ten minutes later, he was finally in the saddle.

I cautioned him to use a light grip on the saddle horn and above all, to relax.

Denny scoffed. “This is not relaxing. This is the opposite of relaxing.”

“That’s because you think you’re in control here, and you’re not.”

“Bess is? Well, that’s fucking terrifying.”

“No, smartass. I’m in control. I’ve got the lead,” I reminded him. “Your only job is sit up tall, face forward, and enjoy the scenery. After a while, you’ll get used to the sway and the rhythm of her movement. She’s a sweet girl. She’s sensitive, too. She can feel your tension, but it doesn’t bother her. She’s patient. Stay with her. That’s it.”

I kept up a small dialogue, assuring him that he was in good hands…over and over while we rambled around the paddock. I couldn’t tell if it was him or Bess or the late May sunshine, but I sensed the moment he found his center.

This was what I loved about equine therapy. Helping someone else find peace in movement and a soothing gait. I had immense respect and awe for this majestic animal. Bess was powerful, graceful, and intimidating with it. Moreover, she was incredibly patient.

I wished I were more like her: quietly confident, no heavy thoughts, no worries about the future. She stayed in the moment and reminded me to do the same.

I walked us into the pasture, pointing out a few new discoveries, like the goldfinches, robins, the elms near the creek, the sugar maples at the bottom of the trail leading to Lake Norman. It was…pleasant.

By the time we returned, the sun crested the ridge, sending long shadows across the fields. Perfect for a late picnic. I tied Bess to a post in the yard and went back to the house to make sandwiches. We took a cooler to the table next to the barn and let Fred out to join Bess in the pasture.

Blue skies, chilled wine, turkey sandwiches, and easy conversation with a handsome hunk made for a lovely afternoon. I jabbered about the healing power of horses, the time I fell off one and broke my wrist, my mild obsession with Star Wars, and the certainty that there really was nothing more delicious than warm apple pie with a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream. Denny disagreed.

We debated the merits of chocolate versus fruit pie fillings as I cared for the horses, brushing them, feeding them. He could have left then. We’d checked off every item on our to-do list, and he’d been there for hours. He had friends to see and errands to run, but I was selfishly happy he’d stayed.

“Thanks for today,” he murmured eventually.

I smiled, brushing his nose against mine. “Anytime.”

“What’s Bess doing tomorrow?”

“I think she’s free.”

“Cool. Tell her I’ll see her soon.”

I watched him walk to his truck. I felt the ghost of his touch on my lips and the stir of longing for something I couldn’t identify as he pulled away, his taillights disappearing down the long driveway.

A veil of mist settled at the fringe of the forest, blanketing the night in silence. It was never this quiet in Denver…or at the ranch. It was the kind of quiet that forced introspection.

Why was I here? What was I doing?

On the surface, I was doing a job, making some money, biding my time in a tiny town while having amazing sex with a famous, closeted athlete. All good stuff, but the questions were still there.

I didn’t have any answers, but that was okay. We had all summer. Real life could wait.

13

DENNY

Mary-Kate chased after me, her stick poking mine from an awkward angle in a manic attempt to wrestle the puck away. Not gonna happen. I leaned hard to my left and upped my speed, skating toward the goal, my elbow cocked and ready to fly.

“Boom!” I raised my arms in the air triumphantly as the puck breezed into the goal. “Did you see that?”

She hip-checked me with a growl. “You suck.”

I grinned like a fool. Yep, I sucked—often and I loved it.

Summer was just getting underway. Campers and pros would be descending on Elmwood in droves, and life at the rink would be nonstop busy. No problem. I was living in the world’s sweetest bubble. At home on my ice, surrounded by all the things and people I loved, having secret sex with a hot cowboy.

If you asked me, Hank and I were both fucking crushing our goals. He was slowly integrating into life in Elmwood while I explored my sexuality and…him. I’d spent my first month at home in his bed or on his horse, which was amazing, but my friends noticed my absence. Especially MK.

She’d shown up at my house unannounced an hour ago with her skates and dragged me to the rink. Like she used to when we were in high school. I was freshly showered and a little tired, but as she was quick to remind me, we hadn’t seen much of each other since I’d been home. And this was fun.

“Okay, I’ll let you win the next game,” I teased.

MK punched my biceps. “No, I will kick your ass fair and square. But winner buys a burger…and I’m hungry, Hotshot. Feed me.”

That was how we ended up at the diner on a Thursday night, huddled in our usual booth under a funky starburst chandelier, scarfing fries and catching up on hockey news and town gossip.

“Let me get this straight—Steph is dating…Jack, the guy with the tiny nose and the mullet?” I asked, slurping my milkshake.

“Mmhmm. It’s new, and she says he’s hot in bed.” MK waggled her eyebrows.

I barked a laugh. “Ew. Please stop.”

She snickered, kicking my calf under the table. “You’re funny. Can I make a totally annoying, eye-rolling comment?”

I preemptively rolled my eyes. “Go for it.”

“You look happy. Are you sure you aren’t dating anyone?”

“I’m not.” I cocked my head. “You don’t believe me.”

That was okay by me. Our honesty policy didn’t extend to summer-based propositions with visiting cowboys. I supposed I could have told her about Hank. I trusted MK with my life. The thing was…I didn’t want to pop my happy bubble by talking about my sexuality with my ex. That felt heavy. Nothing about Hank and me was heavy.

We discussed lighthearted topics on horseback and contemplated the stars on his deck with glasses of wine after fucking our brains out. I’d learned more about Star Wars and the damn Mandalorian in the past few weeks than I’d ever admit, and it was…fun.

MK held her hands up in surrender. “I do, I do. Just an observation. One more observation…your cowboy friend is hot.”

I almost choked on my shake. I averted my gaze and cleared my throat.

“He’s not a cowboy. He just owns horses.”

“Whatever. He’s still hot,” she chirped. “You see a lot of him, huh?”

“We’re friends and he’s my, um…equine therapist.” I replayed those last two words in my head and decided that was close enough to the truth. “Did you know horses help with anxiety?”

“No. Huh, that’s cool. I thought he ran the mill, though. How can he do both?”

“I think I’m his only client here,” I said. And now…on to something else. “Who do you think needs a new goalie next season?”

MK didn’t take the bait. “Hmm. I’d have to think about it. You know…Micah and Niall are still down on the new guy for the usual reasons. If you’re buddies with him, you should bring him around, like to the barbecue.”

I was lost. “What barbecue?”

“Smitty and Bryson’s Start of Summer barbecue, dummy.”

“Oh. Right. Good idea.” Great idea, actually. I chomped a few fries, dragging them through the last of the ketchup on my plate. I reached for the bottle and held it up. “No judging.”

“I’m not judging, I’m⁠—”

“You’re…” I prodded as the first warning bell sounded in my head. “What’s up?”

She nibbled her bottom lip and blurted, “Sometimes I wish we were still together.”

I froze. “Oh…”

Mary-Kate made a funny noise, half cry, half squeak. “Don’t say anything. You don’t feel the same way…I get it. I wish I knew what happened. I wish I could undo whatever I did and⁠—”

“Hey, stop.” I grabbed her wrist and laced our fingers. “You didn’t do anything.”

“Then what—never mind.” She waved as if erasing an invisible chalkboard between us. “I’m sorry. We already did that dance. There’s no reason to rehash anything. Tell me about riding horses. Maybe I should try. Is he giving lessons? Vinnie and Nolan’s kids would love that too and…”

I pushed the ketchup aside and took a sip of water. My mouth was dry as dust as I nodded along, grateful she didn’t expect a response. Good, ’cause guilt was a hard pill to swallow.

I hated that I’d hurt her, but I wasn’t sorry I’d initiated the breakup. Shared high school memories, afternoons at the rink, post-practice fries at the diner, or a drink at the Black Horse weren’t enough. It wasn’t the distance, like I’d told her. It was a feeling in my gut that I couldn’t ignore.

We were great friends, and I loved my friend. But I wasn’t in love with her. I’d told her she deserved someone who’d put her first. Someone who wasn’t broken and fucked up.

But this was me. I couldn’t say all that again.

So I held her hand instead and hoped she’d let it go.

Let me go.

Honestly, it stressed me out. And when my agent called, my anxiety ratcheted up a few notches.

New York wants you. Big money, Hotshot. BIG money. Time to talk.

Panic hit me like a fucking brick dropping out of the sky. I sank onto my bed, hands between my knees, and worked on my breathing exercises. Inhale good vibes, exhale the bad. Over and over.

When I had my pulse under control, I picked up my keys and headed for the door, passing all my old haunts and safe spaces. I needed something new. Someone new.

If Hank was surprised I came by unannounced, he didn’t say. He made me an omelet and told me about some new contract he’d scored for the mill. He seemed pretty excited about it, so I just listened.

And when we fell into bed, I thought this would be where I’d fuck him into the mattress and finally lose this tension. That didn’t happen either. He held me and called me sweetheart while he moved inside me.

Sweetheart. What the fuck was that? Why did I like it? What was happening to me?

14

HANK

Denny came by for lessons every day. Each time was the same. I’d open the door and we’d come together, sparking into an inferno strong enough to burn a house down. We’d shed clothing as we stumbled into the living room, collapsing on the sofa or the rug in front of the fireplace.

We couldn’t get close enough, fast enough. There was a manic edge to us, a craving that consumed us. We couldn’t form coherent sentences until we were sated, panting in a mess of cum and sweat.

I was pretty sure I’d licked every square inch of his gorgeous body. He’d finger-fucked me, rimmed my ass, and sucked my cock till I’d seen stars. And I’d paid him back in kind. It was…glorious. I’d had plenty of sex, but this felt different and I couldn’t figure it out.

I also didn’t try too hard. Denny was the perfect distraction from difficult days at the mill, where every other suggestion or new procedure I implemented was questioned. It was exhausting. I craved the company of someone who just seemed to like me.

And my horse.

Denny loved Bess.

He saw Bess and Fred each time he came by. If it was later in the evening, he’d bring them apples or carrots and help Bella, my stable hand from Fallbrook, and me brush them and feed them. If he arrived earlier, he’d ride Bess, and I was happy to report that he’d improved. He was confident in the saddle, rolling his hips with the horse’s cadence. As we moved, he talked.

Denny was naturally reserved, but he was never quiet with me.

There were things he didn’t discuss that were obvious signposts leading to dark places. I knew his father died when he was thirteen, and that it was definitely a profoundly life-changing event. But he’d persevered and conquered some frightening demons to become an elite professional hockey player.

Denny had real friends and a community that loved him. He was young and talented, with the world at his feet, but something was unsettled inside him. Something muted him, haunted him.

But I wasn’t his therapist; I was his lover and I respected his boundaries. We had an arrangement based on sex and a perceived friendship I hoped would boost profit margins at the mill.

Sometimes I wished I had the right to ask for more.

Let’s be real—I had the easier part of this arrangement. A young, hot jock wanted my bod. Amen. Sign me up all day long. Denny, on the other hand, was the one who had to advocate for the outsider running the mill. That had to suck.

But he did it.

Denny suggested meeting for coffee one morning on my way to the mill. He didn’t introduce me to anyone, but he didn’t need to. Being seen together was enough. We were buddies and pals, and if Denny Mellon didn’t hate the idea of spending thirty minutes in my company, maybe I wasn’t so bad.

He was a mini celebrity up and down Main Street. Just walking through the doors at Rise and Grind stopped the presses. Everyone greeted him warmly, shook his hand, clapped him on the shoulder, or kissed his cheek. He turned five shades of pink, but he took the attention in stride as I chatted amicably with Ivan, the dark-haired, rainbow-pin-wearing owner.

“It can’t be helped.” Ivan snickered in amusement. “We love our hockey boys!”

Ivan didn’t think twice about Denny’s monosyllabic grunted agreement. Neither did anyone at the bakery, where he was treated to a similar enthusiastic greeting. I was given a few cursory curious glances, but as I’d hoped, being with Denny offered an automatic hall pass amongst most of Elmwood.

A cute little old lady named Mrs. O’Neill, who Denny later told me was his grandmother’s nemesis, was a bit suspicious, though.

“Mr. Cunningham, we’re worried about you,” she’d said in a warbly voice. “I heard you’re putting in a Starbucks in Wood Hollow.”

I’d shaken my head. “No, that’s incorrect. I don’t have anything to do with Starbucks. We’re a family-owned business and⁠—”

“Maybe it was a McDonald’s,” Mrs. O’Neill had insisted. “They have nice french fries, but nothing like the ones we have at the diner. Now, in my day, we⁠—”

“For cryin’ out loud, Kath, don’t get your panties in a twist, we’re not getting a damn fast-food joint.” Annie had rounded the bakery counter. “Leave him alone, and no cutting in line.”

I was pretty sure I’d heard an indignant, “Well, I never!”

By June, I didn’t feel like a pariah in Elmwood anymore. People said hello, asked about the horses, and talked about hockey…nonstop.

“Prepare to be amazed,” Nolan had warned me. “The coaches and kids will start trickling in next week for hockey camp. The week after that is the beginning of summertime madness.”

“It’s true,” JC had chimed in. “Hockey players everywhere. They eat a lot…good for business, oui?”

Denny had simply nodded while I’d asked a dozen questions, genuinely interested in the town’s hockey fever. It was another world to me, and it felt kind of special to be on the inside…like I belonged here.

With him.

No, no. That was crazy talk. Elmwood might like me all right, but they wouldn’t understand Denny and me. And any attempt to explain would only make me look bad. As in…terrible human being status.

Denny was a young, hot star exploring his sexuality, but I was an opportunist using him to make our brand palatable to locals. I mean…hey, they say the truth will set you free. But in this case, it would only fuck things up for me.

If Denny told me tomorrow that this was over, and he didn’t want to be my friend and that he’d do his bi exploration on his own, it wouldn’t be a matter of simply moving on to Plan B for me. I was hooked on him. For myself…not the mill. In fact, I barely thought about the mill when I was with him and honestly, that would probably bite me in the ass at some point.

But that was a worry for another night. Tonight, he was quiet. Like the other night when he’d come over, agitated and wild-eyed. I’d made him something to eat and talked about fuck knew what till he seemed calm again. I hadn’t asked what was on his mind, but I had a feeling it was still eating away at him.

I figured I’d let Bess work her magic tonight.

We took the horses on the trail leading to the water’s edge. I guided us to a clearing and dismounted, loosely tying the reins to a low-hanging branch before sitting on a huge tree stump overlooking the creek. Water babbled gently over the rocks. Farther along, the current picked up where the creek widened, and on some days, it was downright noisy. But here…it was a pleasant, melodic sound in an idyllic forest setting.

Denny stretched his arms as he breathed in the fresh evening air.

“It’s beautiful here,” I said.

“Hmm. A good thinking spot.” He sat next to me on the stump, shoulders pressed against mine.

“What are you thinking about?”

“Nothing.”

“Are you sure ’cause⁠—”

“My agent says New York wants me,” he blurted.

“Whoa! Really?”

“Yeah.”

“And you’d be willing to leave Denver?”

“According to my agent, it’s more money than a sane person would turn down. Besides, Denver isn’t home anymore. My parents are gone and…I guess I’m thinking about them too. I had a panic attack the other day.” Denny gnawed his bottom lip. “I haven’t had one of those in a while. My head is just…too full. It always goes dark when I get overwhelmed and—sorry. First-world problems.”

“Talk to me, Den,” I cajoled. “I’m a good listener.”

“You are.” He smiled wanly. “I’ve been thinking about my dad a lot. I wonder what he’d think of all this.”

“He’d be proud, I bet,” I replied carefully.

“Maybe, but he didn’t know me as a hockey player. My life would be foreign to him.”

This was new ground…and a gift of sorts. This was Denny opening the vault.

I didn’t want to disturb the fragile thread, but when the silence stretched, I prodded gently. “How so?”

“My dad was a skier.”

“Yeah?”

“I was too. And I was pretty good.” Denny cast a cocky half smile my way. “It was our family sport and obviously, the mountains were in our backyard in Denver. I grew up in ski clubs, went to meets every weekend. I won awards and…it was cool ’cause it was something we had in common. Did Grams tell you her son was in the Olympics?”

“Your dad was an Olympic skier?”

He nodded proudly. “Yep. He didn’t win any medals, but he was in Calgary in 1988. He moved to Whistler for a while and worked as a ski instructor. That’s where he met my mom. She was from Montreal.”

“You mentioned that.”

“I did?” Denny furrowed his brow, his eyes focused on the creek. “Yeah, they were ski rats. They followed the snow for years. In the summer, they’d go to New Zealand, teach there till winter hit the north. They didn’t get married till Mom was expecting my brother, Kai. He’s five years older than me. I think they still traveled more when he was little, but they morphed into a typical suburban family after I was born and founded a ski clinic in Denver with another partner. Dad was an instructor while Mom handled the books and became one of those uber-involved PTA types, always volunteering to head a committee. They were pretty…incredible.”

His voice broke, but he didn’t seem upset—he seemed determined to share a piece of his history.

I set my hand over his on the tree stump and kissed his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

“Me too.” Denny squinted at the creek, unseeing.

“Can I ask what happened?”

“My dad died in a freak accident,” he replied matter-of-factly. “It was a normal day, nothing different, nothing special. Dad finished his last lesson of the day and he was tired, but I wanted to practice on a black diamond run we’d done a million times. Challenging but nothing for him. He didn’t want me to do it alone yet, so he was skiing behind me, to check my technique or whatever. Halfway down the slope, I…stopped. I just sensed he wasn’t there. They said an animal had most likely darted onto the trail and that Dad was going too fast to avoid a collision. He fell hard enough to dislodge his helmet and hit a rock and…he was gone.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah.” Denny exhaled and closed his eyes. “Everything died on the mountain that day. Everything. My dad was gone, my brother was in college and never came home, and my mom lost her fucking mind.”

“What do you mean?”

“She drank and drank and did whatever she could to make the pain go away.”

“That’s sad,” I said softly.

“Everything they say about life changing in a flash is true. I was thirteen. I lost my whole family and—poof. I wasn’t me anymore. I had no identity. No purpose. No one knew what to say or how to act around Mom and me. We’d been part of a strong unit, valued members of a ski community, and then…we were sad victims of a terrible tragedy. You can only bring over so many casseroles before you give up. My pre-Elmwood days after the accident were a blur. A slow slide into silence. I didn’t want to talk about it, I didn’t want to ski…I just wanted to be left alone.”

“What made you try hockey?”

“My mom said she thought it was dangerous. And I wanted to hurt her. I wanted to scare her into paying attention to me.” Denny slid a glance my way. “Family dysfunction at its finest. Two years after the accident, we were unrecognizable. My mom was a junkie and an alcoholic, and I was a weird kid who’d alienated my old friends and played hockey like it was my job.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah. When I was on the ice, I couldn’t hear myself think. I was too busy learning, keeping time, doing math in my head. I ignored my mom, and she ignored me. It probably would have gone on like that till I graduated, but she started a fire in the kitchen in a drunken haze. Family services swooped in to rescue me. I suppose they could have called my dad’s sister, but she lives in Canada. They called my grandmother instead, and…that’s how I landed in Elmwood.”

“Jesus, Den. And your mom?”

He sucked in a deep breath. “She never got better. She died three years ago from an overdose.”

“Fuck, that’s so…sad.”

“Yeah. But the truth is that my mom died of a broken heart. She couldn’t cope without him. Sometimes it pisses me off that she didn’t choose me and Kai. I think it made us bitter. That’s how I feel, anyway. I don’t know about Kai. We rarely talk anymore. Thing is…I can’t judge her. She loved him so much, you know? I’ve never loved anyone like that. I never will.”

“You don’t know that.”

“That shit’s not for me. Honestly, it’s one of the reasons I broke up with Mary-Kate. I love my friend, but I can’t do the big romance. I don’t feel it for her, and she asked me why the other day and…I didn’t know what to say.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Oh.” Denny sighed heavily. “She’s an amazing, cool person. She looks out for people. Fuck, she barely knows you, and she told me to bring you to Coach’s barbecue ’cause you’re my friend and she wants to help.”

“I’m not following…” I hedged.

He grunted. “Doesn’t matter. Geez, you didn’t sign up for all this. Sorry.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” I chided without heat. After a minute or so, I spoke again. “You know, my parents had the big love story too. My mom died when I was five, and my dad has mourned her for twenty-four years straight. His addiction is work. He worked too much before she was gone, but it got worse after. Late nights, always traveling. He wasn’t a bad father, though. He tried.”

“And that’s why you’re here.”

“He offered me a hefty sum, Hotshot. Not NH-fucking-L money, but not too shabby.”

Denny scoffed. “It’s not about the money for you.”

“No, it’s not,” I admitted, resting my elbow on my bent knee. “I love the guy. He stood by me when I came out, accepted me no questions asked. That’s a bigger deal than it sounds like ’cause it involved a small personality transplant and a willingness to change his thinking. And he did. For me. Dad used to be flippant with stereotypical insults—this is gay, that’s gay. I was scared shitless to come out, but I didn’t want to live in the closet, so I gathered every ounce of courage I had, packed a bag in case I needed to make a quick exit, and told him my truth.”

“How old were you?”

“Eighteen. You know what he did? He gave me a hug. I wasn’t sure if that meant we were cool, so I asked. Dad smacked me upside the head and told me not to be an idiot. Of course we were cool. To which I said, ‘Then quit being a prick.’ We were good until that stupid billboard episode, but I didn’t hesitate when he called me. I’m not suggesting that I was excited about a brief sojourn in Vermont. I wasn’t. But there’s this side story: my dad brought my mom here years ago and she loved it. Supposedly, she joked that he should sell everything and buy a small house here. He could work at the mill and she could tend horses and raise us kids.”

Denny narrowed his gaze. “He bought the mill in Wood Hollow for your mom?”

I rolled my eyes. “Not quite. That’s the story he tells and it’s a nice one, but I know my dad pretty well and if the mill wasn’t a good investment, he wouldn’t have bothered. He pulls the sentimental strings to sway me to do his bidding. It’s a dance we do…the Cunningham waltz. We make deals and we talk around pesky things like feelings through contracts.”

“And propositions.” He smirked.

I bumped his shoulder and laughed. “It sounds cold and calculated. Trust me, I know it does. It’s just how my father communicates. Most of us don’t get that sitcom-perfect upbringing with no scars and no heartache. We get a potpourri of good intentions and bad follow-through. We get fucked over when our heroes die too soon, and we’re left with a parent who can’t cope or have unconventional coping mechanisms. And where does that leave us?”

“Fucked?”

“Maybe, but there’s no point in being bitter or lamenting what could have been. This is where you’re supposed to be now. This version of you—the sought-after, superstar hockey player. Maybe everything was always leading you here. You aren’t the same scared kid who moved to this town, Denny.”

“No, I’m not. I’ve turned into Hockey Man. It’s what I do. It’s my superpower. On one hand, it’s an honor. I fucking love the game. But it’s become my new identity, the thing I hide behind. I know that about myself. I’m all for one thing at a time. I’m not the guy who can be a bunch of things at once. I can’t be an out and proud hockey player and someone’s significant other, so I have to choose.”

“And you choose hockey.”

“Yeah. Doesn’t that suck of me? Some of the best people I know are out and proud. My coaches, my mentors. I feel like I owe them, but I can’t do it. The scrutiny is already so intense.”

“Hey, stop beating yourself up.” I splayed my palm on his knee and squeezed it. “Good thing you’re with me. See, the cool thing about our deal is that I don’t expect you to come out for me, and I never will. You gotta follow your gut. You’ve worked your ass off to get where you are, Den. Enjoy the ride as best you can. And quit being so fucking hard on yourself, sweetheart.”

Denny covered my hand with his and tilted his head skyward. “Thank you. And fuck you. I’m not a sweetheart.”

I chuckled softly, holding his chin as I brushed my mouth over his. “Not so sweet at all. C’mon. Let’s go before the mosquitoes eat us alive.”

Denny nodded, but instead of getting up, he grabbed my shirt, slipped his hand around my neck, and fused his lips to mine.

We stayed like that for a long while, connected in a light and breezy kiss that felt startlingly poignant.

Until he bit my lip and pulled away.

“You’re coming to that barbecue.”

“Huh?”

“Coach Smitty and his husband, Bryson, do a yearly pre-camp barbecue. It’s fun and…it’ll give you a chance to meet everyone. That’s what you wanted, right?”

Yes, that was why I was here. To ingratiate my family to the community. To grow a business and finish what my dad had begun. This was a job. Nothing personal.

But it was beginning to feel very fucking personal.

15

HANK

The Paluchek-Milligan Start of Summer Barbecue was apparently an annual affair. This year it coincided with Jake’s return home from Boston and an influx of the NHL and AHL players who’d arrived early to coach Elmwood’s wildly successful juniors camp.

It was a gorgeous day for a party—seventy-five degrees and not a cloud in the sky. The sweet summer vibes were impossibly idyllic and welcoming. I soaked up the scenery, my gaze bouncing across the spacious yard decked out in red, white, and blue bunting.

A sea of smiley folks gathered on the lawn, sipping sodas and summery cocktails while kids and dogs ran circles around them, howling like mini lunatics. A familiar Bob Marley tune piped through a Bluetooth speaker, reminding everyone that every little thing was gonna be all right. For a few hours, I believed it.

I was greeted warmly and handed a beer within seconds of arriving solo to the barbecue, where I was the undisputed outlier. Denny had been asked to help set up, and that was cool. There was no reason for us to be attached at the hip, and I was perfectly capable of holding my own socially. The trick was to not talk about the mill.

Not a problem. Hockey, vacation plans, and the weather were safe topic changes if I got stuck with anyone who wondered who’d invited me, since I obviously didn’t know our hosts.

I wasn’t shy, though. I introduced myself to Bryson Milligan, an impossibly handsome silver fox holding a sleepy toddler with olive skin and a pink bow in her curly dark hair.

“Nice to meet you,” he said. “I’m Bryson, and this is our daughter, Charlotte. She’s almost two…and she’s a little tired, aren’t you, baby girl?”

Charlotte shook her head, burrowed into her father’s shoulder, and held up three fingers. “I’m three.”

“Wow. That’s a good number,” I commented.

Bryson chuckled softly and whispered, “She ages herself to be like her brother, Nathan, who’s out there running amok. Make yourself at home. Smitty is at the barbecue with Denny and their high school all-star team. Denny’s talked about you and…I know Smitty would love to meet you too.”

I spotted Denny at the far end of the yard, standing with MK. Her arm was around his waist in an affectionate embrace as they chatted with a giant tattooed man with broad shoulders and a jolly aura. I hadn’t met the high school hockey coach yet, but I’d heard a lot about Smitty. I stepped off the deck, intending to weasel into the conversation.

Something stopped me, though.

I paused under an umbrella and observed Denny, my heart thumping in my chest for reasons unknown. He looked genuinely happy and relaxed in the company of people he allowed to know him—his ex and his coach. His skin was golden from hours in the sun with Bess, his smile wide and open as if he didn’t have a care in the world. My gaze roamed over his toned biceps to his perfect ass…just as Mary-Kate dipped her hand, skimming her fingers possessively on his lower back and⁠—

“The new neighbor!” Vinnie Kiminski, my teenage hockey crush thrust his hand at me. He was a muscular man with dark hair and a contagious grin. And once upon a time, he’d struck fear on the ice in the NHL. “Good to see you, man.”

“You too.” I shook his hand and narrowed my eyes at the blond kid hopping on one foot beside him. “Jumping beans or ants in your pants?”

The boy snickered, flashing missing front teeth.

Vinnie ruffled the boy’s hair affectionately. “Someone slipped Alec a soda…or two.”

“Only one, Dad,” Alec huffed, hopping around me. “Do you have a horse? I saw one in your field when we were catching frogs at the creek.”

“Ah, I actually have two horses,” I replied. “Bess and Fred. They’re super nice. Well…Bess is nice. Fred can be ornery.”

“Oh. I rode on a pony at the fair two times, but I’ve never been on a horse.”

Vinnie blinked in faux surprise. “Wow, I feel like I know where this is going.”

“Can I meet your horses?” Alec asked, undeterred. “I’m almost seven. That’s old enough to ride a horse, right?”

“Absolutely. Come by with your dads sometime.”

Alec whooped with joy. “Yes! Thank you! I have hockey camp all summer, but I can come after camp.”

I smiled, loving his unrestrained enthusiasm. “I’ll give your dad my number, and we’ll figure something out.”

“Woohoo!” He jumped, punching his fists in the air before darting away.

Vinnie snort-laughed. “That’s what we call the Alec avalanche. Congrats. You just won a friend for life.”

“Lucky you,” JC drawled, joining the conversation. “I have to rely on food to make friends.”

“How’s that going for you?” Vinnie teased.

“Terrible. Kids are bad for my waistline. They like zee shakes and pomme frittes and gateau au chocolat. I should get a horse like Hank. No calories, eh?”

Vinnie shook his head mournfully. “Meh, Riley will never go for it.”

“Go for what?” Riley asked, snaking an arm around JC.

Yep, another hockey idol. Apart from the occasional up-nods in town, I hadn’t had a real conversation with Elmwood’s elite hockey crew. Not only was Riley Thoreau a great player, but coming out publicly when he was still in the league had elevated him to rock-star status in my mind.

“We’re getting a horse, mon cher.”

Riley rolled his eyes. “It would probably decimate the veggie garden, and that would just piss you off.”

“True. Well, it was a nice fantasy while it lasted.” JC sighed.

We all laughed. Our circle grew as conversation shifted to camp news and the higher than anticipated influx of newbies.

“It sounds like a six-week party,” I observed.

“Oh, hell yeah!” Vinnie launched into funny camp exploits from the past.

I chuckled along with everyone else as my gaze drifted across the yard to Denny and his friends, which now included Jake and a couple of guys I recognized from the mill…Niall and Micah, who definitely didn’t like me.

This was a perfect opportunity to charm them. This was why I was here in the first place—to make friends and spread goodwill, on behalf of Bruce Cunningham and RM Mill. I wasn’t Denny’s date. This was a job.

But now Denny was making his way to me…and fuck, I needed to control my smile. I was too obvious.

“The prank war needs to stop,” Riley was saying. “It was out of control last year.”

“Say what?” Smitty bounded forward, his arms raised like goal posts. “You’re just jealous ’cause my team out-pranked yours.”

“No snakes in my rink, Smitty,” Vinnie growled while everyone guffawed.

Smitty turned to me and winked. “They were fake. My kid loves critters and for some reason, Bryson was against getting a real amphibian, so Nathan has a collection of rubber snakes. I took a few on the first week of camp, spread ’em around the rink, and lowered the lights. Those idiots wouldn’t get on the ice.”

“The snakes were moving, Coach,” Denny deadpanned.

“One or two might have been battery operated,” Smitty admitted with a shrug. The group chuckled. “I was thinking of trying out Nathan’s plastic cockroaches this year.”

Vinnie almost choked on a potato chip. “Don’t you dare. Our camper-to-volunteer ratio is too low to withstand any fallout. Behave, Paluchek.”

Smitty lowered his sunglasses and waggled his brows. “I always behave.”

Another howl of laughter. I joined in, sneaking a sideways glance at Denny when his arm brushed mine.

“I’m happy to volunteer if you need any help,” I offered.

Vinnie pointed at me. “Better be sure, new guy, ’cause we’ll take you up on that.”

“I’m sure.”

“Get that man a beer!” Smitty called out, pushing a hand toward me. “Smitty Paluchek. Denny’s old coach. He tells me you’re cool, so you must be. Welcome to Elmwood.”

Someone slapped me on the back, someone took away my warm beer and replaced it with an ice cold one, someone organized a volleyball game at the nearby net and included me on their team.

I wasn’t sure what to think of my newest stamp of approval, but I wasn’t complaining.

Denny and I played volleyball on opposite sides of the net, we talked to other people, we lost sight of each other off and on throughout the afternoon, but I was always aware of him. Always. Those secret looks and clandestine touches tethered me to him like an invisible string.

I noticed that Denny was good with kids, liked spicy mustard on hot dogs, and that he loved JC’s potato salad. I also noticed that Mary-Kate stayed close to him…like a doting girlfriend.

The afternoon gave way to soft evening shadows, and though the party was still going strong, I didn’t want to overstay my welcome. I thanked my hosts, slipped out the side gate, and immediately ran into Denny’s friend Niall.

“Mr. Cunningham.”

“Hi, there. Nice to see you,” I said, offering my hand and a smile that felt a tad plastic. Like I was trying too hard.

He stared at my hand for longer than was polite before shaking it in a loose grip. “You know Coach?”

“We just met tonight. I’m a friend of⁠—”

“Denny’s,” he intercepted. “I know. See you at the mill.”

Niall stepped around me and headed for the gate.

Okay, so that was odd. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think I’d just received my first face-to-face “Fuck off and get out of town” warning. And yet, he hadn’t said a word. It was all vibes.

I was halfway down the block when Denny called my name. “Can I get a ride?”

I turned, hands in my pockets, and waited for him. “Are you sure you’re ready to leave? It’s early.”

“I’ve had three beers, and someone was talking about tequila shots. You know how I get.”

“Disaster,” I commented.

“Total disaster.” He quirked his lips. “Save me, Hank. Where’s your truck?”

“I walked.”

“All right. I’ll walk with you. Just don’t go too fast—I overdid it with the hot dogs.”

Denny cast a quick glance over his shoulder and waved at Niall, who was standing at the curb. Great.

We walked along Walnut Street under the canopies of lush green trees. Neither of us spoke. I had things to say and questions to ask, but it was difficult to focus now that I had him to myself again. The accidental brush of fingers on the narrow sidewalk was enough to make my dick perk up and take notice.

Denny pushed the button at the crosswalk on Main Street. “Did you have fun?”

“Yeah, it was great. They’re good people.”

“They like you.”

“Your high school buddies look at me like I’m as slippery as a pocketful of pudding,” I drawled. “But everyone else is cool.”

Denny wrinkled his nose. “A pocketful of—ha! I’ve never heard that saying before in my life.”

“Really? That’s a Bruce Cunningham staple. Or a Texas thing. My dad has a saying for everything. If someone is shy, he says they wouldn’t bite a biscuit. If someone’s experienced, he’d call them a three-jump cowboy. If someone’s cheap, they’re tight as a wet boot. If a guy is a little nutty…Dad says he’s got a big hole in his screen door.” I bit the inside of my cheek while Denny chuckled merrily. “I could keep going.”

And I did. Hotter than a honeymoon hotel, cold as a banker’s heart, tough as stewed skunk…

Denny laughed aloud as we continued along Main Street, the setting sun bouncing off the tidy awnings and the hodgepodge flower boxes decorating the storefronts. He pointed out the giant banner spanning the width of the street that was now dedicated to Jake. Next week, they’d hang a new one welcoming the campers and their families.

“The ice cream shop will stay open every night till nine o’clock at night. Later if there’s a line out the door.” He hooked his thumb toward the bakery behind us. “Henderson’s Bakery and Rise and Grind will stay open till eight. In case you’re curious, Grams has big opinions about that.”

I snorted. “I bet she does.”

“In her day, if you wanted sweets, you’d ‘take care of that craving during respectable business hours, damn it.’ ” Denny grinned, brushing his arm against mine. “Personally, I’m a fan of summertime late night ice cream runs. My friends and I used to go after practice, order triple-scoop cones and eat them at the park. Chocolate, vanilla chocolate chip, and mint chip. Niall got all rocky road, Abe got sherbert…’cause he’s weird like that, and Micah would get whatever color spoke to him that night. On a green day, he’d get mint chip, blue days would be that bubblegum flavor no one is supposed to like after puberty.”

“That stuff is pretty awful,” I agreed as we passed the fountain in front of Town Hall. “What about Mary-Kate?”

Denny tilted his chin curiously. “She wasn’t with us. It was just me and the guys. Even with hockey, it took me a long time to make friends here. I was good at my sport, but I didn’t know how to be good in a group. Coach Smitty used to tell me that I couldn’t play hockey alone, and he sort of pushed me into making an effort.”

“How?”

“He made me team captain and had me work with my teammates on drills. I thought for sure they’d hate me. Like…who does this dude from Denver think he is, bossing us around? I didn’t want to do it. I didn’t want to talk to anyone on that team.

He paused, his gaze locked forward. “I didn’t care about making friends or having a life here, but my team—Niall, Micah, Abe, Richie, Ewan, Steph, Tim, Harry—didn’t give me a choice. They adopted me, accepted me. No questions. It was a lifeline I didn’t know I needed. I think we’re all protective of each other because we bonded at a critical time. We were all new to Elmwood High, and the team was new, so…we didn’t judge each other harshly. They’re like my brothers.”

“I see. And you’re telling me this because…let me guess—you noticed your friend was kind of a dick back there?”

Denny winced. “I’ll talk to him.”

“Don’t.” I scoffed. “That’s ridiculous. He didn’t do anything wrong. He just doesn’t like me.”

“It isn’t you personally. Or even the mill. They don’t trust new business,” he stated bluntly. “Trust takes time. But volunteering to help out at camp is good juju.”

He shot a sly smile at me as we crossed the street to the dirt path parallel to the creek.

“And now I’m nervous.”

“You should be,” he teased. “But you’ll get more karma points for that than you will for hanging out with me.”

There were no lamplights on the road leading to my place, but there was little to no traffic here, and twilight was still an hour away. I glanced up at the pale-blue sky streaked with pink against the hillside dotted with trees, houses, and steeples in the distance; and the road to our left, hugging the edge of the forest. It was gorgeous.

And quiet.

The whisper of a breeze through the trees and the occasional trill of birds was the only sound for miles. It was like stepping into a landscape painting saturated with color, steeped in serenity.

“I like hanging out with you,” I said, breaking the silence as we stepped onto the front porch.

Denny beamed. “The feeling is mutual.”

“Must be something in the water.” I rested my hand on his hip and moved into his space, pulling him closer and nuzzling his neck. “Strong stuff. ’Cause I want you all the fucking time.”

Denny licked my bottom lip, hiking my shirt up as he splayed a palm on my chest. “Then what are you waiting for?”

I captured his mouth, molding our hips and dragging my arousal against his. He was impossible to resist. Every touch made me want more than my share.

I pulled away with a strangled sigh and adjusted my throbbing cock. “C’mon, Romeo. Let’s check on the horses.”

Denny’s theatric groan made me laugh. He tugged at my belt loop as we bypassed the house and made our way to the barn, grumbling about cockteases and his jumbo-sized dick.

Maybe I was guilty of deflection, but I needed a minute to rearrange my thoughts before I dove in headfirst again. I was jealous of his ex and worried I’d lost sight of my goal to get out of this town ASAP. And I wished I had the right to touch him in public. You name it—my issues were growing by the day.

And the biggest issue by far was that this felt less like a mutually beneficial “friendship” to me and more like my undoing.

The unraveling had already begun.

16

DENNY

Hank moved a new bale of hay into the stable, refreshed Bess and Fred’s water, and checked the alarm system while I wandered around the stall, restless and edgy. Or maybe I was just horny. My worlds had collided today, and it had gone pretty damn well.

I shouldn’t have been surprised. Hank was always charming, and he seemed to navigate new social situations with ease. I was proud of him.

Weird sentiment, but it fit. Watching him from across the lawn at the barbecue today, chatting away with my old high school coach and my friends, had given me a funny, buzzy feeling. He looked like he belonged. It was hard to remember this was a ruse.

I pushed the thought aside and spent a few minutes brushing Bess’s mane.

“Do you ever braid her mane? I saw this documentary about show horses and they were doing all these detailed braids. Looked cool. I must have been bored out of my mind at a hotel in between games. I’m not much of a documentary guy. I’d rather watch sports. Any sport…or play video games. My brother gave me his old console before he left for college. I dragged it with me to Grams’s house and she still has it. Not sure why. I bought a new one for myself. I sent one to Kai too. A belated thank-you, I guess. It took him two weeks to acknowledge the gift. I guess he travels a lot for work. It’s like, ‘Fuck you, so do I,’ but I wouldn’t say that. Grams thinks I’m too non-confrontational for my own good. She’s probably right.”

I was babbling and I knew it. I bit my tongue to shut myself up and chanced a look at the hunk spreading hay on the other end of the stall. God, Hank Cunningham was a sexy motherfucker.

He glanced up on cue. “What’s wrong? You went quiet on me. First time in an hour. Did you swallow your tongue?”

“Yeah, but that’s your fault,” I replied in a huskier than usual tone. “You look so hot.”

Hank snorted. “You’re drunk.”

“No, I’m not.” I followed him out of the stall and grabbed the hat he’d left on the ledge. I set it on Hank’s head and whistled. “This, right here, is a fantasy moment. You in that hat…fucking me like an animal.”

He stared at me for a beat, and damn it, my cock swelled on command.

“C’mere,” he rasped.

I walked to an empty stall, away from the horses, unbuckling my belt and wiggling my shorts and boxer briefs over my ass. “No, you come here.”

Hank obeyed, smacking my hard ass enough to leave a handprint before whirling me to face him. Then he crashed his mouth over mine as if to quiet my yelp. I groaned, fumbling with his belt and zipper. My dick was a steel rod and damn it, I needed to touch him.

Hank sucked my tongue, squeezing my ass and parting my cheeks as we feverishly humped and made out like horny teens.

“No lube, sweetheart. We should go to the house.”

“My back pocket. I bought those travel packets…just in case of emergency,” I croaked out. “This is an emergency. I need your cock now.”

My mouth was dry, and my veins were thrumming with desire. The way he looked at me, like I was something special, was an incredible rush. Everything in me wanted to pounce and claim him, but I wanted him to do the taking tonight.

And just like that, he dropped to his knees behind me and got to work, licking, laving, feasting on my hole. His hat fell off his head as he pushed the tip of his tongue deeper still, adding fingers to the mix.

I bucked my hips, demanding more as I stroked my cock. He knew what I wanted, but I’d beg if I had to.

“You want me to take you for a ride, sweetheart?” Hank taunted.

“Fuck, yes. Ride me.” I twisted to offer him my mouth. “Hat.”

He chuckled as he bent to pick up his hat, setting it on his head and shoving his boxer briefs lower. “Better?”

He slathered my hole with lube, then lined his dick at my entrance and slowly slid inside.

There was nothing romantic or pretty about it. This was raunchy sex—the slap of skin, roving hands, sloppy kisses, and a chorus of grunts and nasty commands—and I fucking loved it. At some point, I lifted my leg to rest on a higher slat on the stall door. It changed the angle and fuck, it changed the game.

Hank’s balls slapped obscenely against my ass as he drilled me, holding my knee with one hand and reaching around to jack me with his free hand. Pleasure tingled up my spine, and I knew that was it for me.

“I’m gonna come.” I shot my load over his fist and on the hay, shivering through the aftershocks.

Hank pulled out and waited for me to stand, his cock thick and proud and begging for release. I turned slowly and met his gaze. And damn, I was positive no one had ever looked at me like that in my life.

He tugged his shirt off and laid it on one of the bales he’d brought down, pointing earnestly. I didn’t need to be told twice.

I lay flat on my back and opened for him, moaning like a ho as he slid home. Hank fucked me relentlessly, pumping his hips double time, his rhythm faltering just before he fell apart.

I held on tightly, pulling him close so our noses brushed. I breathed him in and felt something shift inside me. It took the air from my lungs and burned my eyes. I didn’t know what to do with the excess emotion, so I buried my head in the crook of his neck and hid like a child.

Clarity washed over me like a tsunami.

This felt right and real.

And probably bigger than a summer fling was supposed to.

“Where’ve you been?” Grams asked, pointing at my house from her kitchen window. “I haven’t seen your truck in your driveway any night this week.”

“I’ve been around. Hey, I’m going to change the battery on the bedroom fire alarms, then head over to the rink. Kids are checking in for camp and we’re skating tomorrow, so I might be busy and I don’t want to forget,” I babbled.

My grandmother folded her arms across her tiny frame and regarded me suspiciously. “You can tell me anything, you know.”

“Grams, I’m fine. Nothing to worry about.”

“Hmm. Does Mary-Kate know?”

“Know what? Never mind,” I huffed. “MK and I aren’t together.”

“And I’m the only one who knows about that.”

I winced. “Well, yes…”

“All right. Not my business, but you smell funny. Take a damn shower,” she grumbled, shuffling down the hallway.

I sniffed my pits and scowled after her. I’d showered before I’d come by, which meant that was her crafty way of telling me she knew something was up. I loved Grams, but I had no plans to tell her about Hank. We were fuck-buddies, not boyfriends.

That didn’t explain the butterflies in my stomach at the sight of Hank at a volunteer table in the lobby at Elmwood Rink an hour later. I’d known he’d be here. I’d known he’d be wearing a lanyard, looking official and friendly as he greeted the new campers and handed out backpacks and name badges. I hadn’t counted on him looking like he belonged here.

Fuck, he had a great smile—warm and open, as if he’d been waiting all damn day for the next person to approach his table to say hello. I wanted a piece of that. I wanted⁠—

“Denny Mellon! How ya doin’, Hotshot?”

Half the lobby turned, twittering curiously. Shit. I’d forgotten I was a minor celebrity.

I waved at the campers and strode toward Jake and our loudmouthed agent, Gary McDermott, lurking in the doorway to the rink. I greeted them with fist bumps and followed them inside, inhaling the intoxicating scent of refrigerated ice. I hadn’t known Gary was going to be in town, but he was a prolific agent and Jake and I were a couple of his recent success stories. Maybe he had business with Jake. Maybe he wanted to talk about New York. If so, I wish he’d called. He knew I hated surprises.

“McD just happened to be in the neighborhood,” Jake reported as if reading my mind.

“That’s true,” the older man commented. “Vinnie mentioned that camp started this week, and you’ll probably notice our PR team around town.”

“One of them shoved a camera in my face while I was eating breakfast at the diner this morning. If I have parsley in my teeth, that’s on you.” Jake clapped my back and inclined his chin. “We should check in with Ronnie and Vin. Good to see you, McD.”

“Hang on, Denny. I need a quick minute of your time.” He waited for Jake to move on before getting straight to the point. “Are you thinking about New York City?”

“Why? Do you have news?”

“They want you, and they’re willing to make it very worth your while. I need fifteen minutes to give you the scoop, including contract buyouts and logistics, but it’s interesting stuff. No…it’s outrageous, Den. Out-fucking-rageous.”

He looked like a kid with a big secret who might literally burst if he had to hold it for another second. I’d never seen him so…giddy. Gary McD was slick and kind of full of himself. I didn’t associate him with barely-contained, childlike enthusiasm.

In the end, he folded like a cheap suit, spouting a string of numbers so insane I was sure I hadn’t heard him correctly.

My mouth dropped. “That’s more than you said on the phone.”

“Oh, hell yeah.” Gary hooted, shoving my chest playfully. “This is why I’m here, man. I had to see your expression in person. Priceless! Listen, we’ll talk this afternoon. Lots to think about and there are a lot of moving pieces, but my God…I’ve been doing this for years, and I’ve never seen anything like this. The press is going to freak out when the news leaks and I’m going to need you in front of the cameras, but it’s okay. We got this. Your rookie season has made you the most sought after player in the league. Congrats, Hotshot. You’re on your way.”

I had no words. Not an uncommon thing for me, and neither was the sudden surge of panic. It didn’t make sense. More money was good, recognition was good, but darker emotions were bubbling to the surface that didn’t feel so great.

And this, right here, was what was wrong with me. I couldn’t be happy like a normal person. The desire and pressure to be the best was countered by deep-seated, ugly guilt.

It was my fault they were gone.

If I hadn’t insisted on taking one more run down the mountain, my parents would both still be here. They’d be happy and together, and life would be different. There’d be no multimillion dollar contracts. There’d be no fans calling my name, kids wearing my jersey, looking for my autograph.

I didn’t deserve this kind of success. I didn’t deserve to be happy at all.

That was wrong. My therapists had helped me work through some of my worst demons, and I knew it was wrong, but my head was a messy place. And there was only one way to lose my ghosts.

Skate.

I glided onto the ice, right foot over left, gaining speed and momentum with each pass.

Skate faster, skate smarter, practice, practice, practice. Again and again and again.

Ten minutes in, I sensed I was being watched. I spun in a circle, my chest heaving as I looked up at the stands at a group of young teenagers, probably thirteen or fourteen years old, staring, eyes wide with admiration.

For me.

I almost glanced over my shoulder to see if they were looking at someone else, but no…it was me. I wanted to scream at them, “I’m not special, I’m not amazing. I’m not a fucking hero.”

The words were stuck…like all the others. I wiped my brow and let out a jagged breath just as a new face stepped up to the boards.

Hank.

He smiled.

That was it. Just a lazy smile, a silent “Hey, how are you?”

But somehow it shook me out of my spiral and grounded me—reminded me to stay in the moment and fucking relax ’cause right this second, everything was good, and I deserved a measure of happiness, and I was enough the way I was.

Not the hotshot hockey player…just me.

I didn’t know how he did it or why it mattered, but it felt kind of amazing to have Hank Cunningham in my corner.

17

HANK

Volunteering for camp registration was my best and worst idea ever.

The town was electric with energy and overflowing with people. There were lines every-fucking-where. If you wanted a cup of coffee at Rise and Grind, you’d better be prepared to wait a few minutes or try your luck at the bakery next door.

It was nothing compared to the lobby at Elmwood Rink. Talk about sheer chaos. Campers and parents jockeyed for space in line while famous hockey players filed through, some pausing to give autographs and take selfies on their way to the ice. I waited ten minutes longer than usual for my latte, picked up my lanyard at the lobby from the bubbly receptionist, and settled behind a makeshift desk to do some community service.

I put in two hours checking off names, handing over backpacks, schedules, and QR codes for stores and businesses in town. Elmwood had it going on, I mused as I overworked my facial muscles, smiling like a prom king. Wood Hollow was so…blah in comparison. There was no bakery, no coffee shop, no fun places to hang out. There was a tiny market, the smallest post office known to mankind, and a gas station. The mill outsized everything. If you asked me—and no one had—they needed to do more with the town to sell those houses they were building. I had so many ideas, but…that wasn’t my job.

I’d headed to the mill after my stint at the rink, where I shamelessly made sure Emily knew I’d be dividing my time between Elmwood and Wood Hollow off and on throughout the first week of camp. It was called karma points, and I needed those.

The mill had been running relatively well since Cooper had taken over as manager. He handled shipping, delivery, hiring, and employee morale while I dealt with the contractors handling the new housing development, and…marketing. I wasn’t doing so great on advertising, but I wasn’t failing either.

Being at the rink, volunteering in the neighboring town for an internationally renowned juniors camp was real marketing in the Four Forest area. They didn’t care about how many likes we got on Instagram or Facebook. I wasn’t suggesting that social media wasn’t important, but showing up was better.

We’d hired five new employees last week, Emily didn’t drop any of my calls, and her notes were shockingly coherent, so yay. My father seemed encouraged by my weekly reports too, and he was feeling better. His blood pressure had stabilized and he was strong enough to visit the stable, which was a very big deal to him.

Of course, nothing was happening fast enough. In a perfect world, Dad would have liked every job title filled so we’d be ready to ramp up production when they broke ground on the new houses in Wood Hollow later this summer. Frankly, that wasn’t realistic.

“Things are moving in the right direction, but I think it’ll take a year for the mill to run like a well-oiled machine,” I’d told him on the phone last night.

“You said you could do it in six months,” Dad had grumbled.

“I did not say that. I said⁠—”

“Yeah, yeah. Slow and steady wins the race and all that. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

No problem.

Day two, I’d pasted a smile on my face at camp registration, checked off names and handed over backpacks, housing instructions, and itineraries for the morning groups, and returned in the afternoon to help clean up.

By day five, I had to admit, I was having fun.

I’d worked all week alongside MK; Shelby, a recent high school graduate; and her dad, Marshall, a talkative Elmwood native who ran the market with his brother, Stanley. Somehow they were related to the Hendersons of Henderson’s Bakery, and needless to say, he had a few stories to tell.

From a business standpoint, sitting next to Marshall was a good networking opportunity, but I would have preferred to talk to Mary-Kate. She was friendly, vivacious, and everyone seemed to know her and like her. This program was her grandfather’s legacy, and the rink was owned by her dad and her uncle. But her connection to Denny was the one that pulled at me.

I didn’t pry, though. Her relationship with Denny was none of my business. I couldn’t warn her off or stake a claim. He wasn’t mine. Not really.

And if she was curious about me or wondered why I slipped into the rink to watch him at work, she was too polite to ask.

I didn’t belong there, but I couldn’t resist watching Denny in his natural habitat, helping to guide a new generation. He was so at home on the ice, not a hint of anxiety. He smiled often and showed off a bit with fancy footwork and jaw-dropping speed. He looked like what he was…a professional athlete on the rise.

Christ, hockey players were underrated. Zipping around the ice on thin blades at breakneck speed and gauging scoring opportunities while being chased by opponents who would happily resort to violence to get to the damn puck took amazing athleticism. Not to mention coordination, spatial awareness, and stamina. And the campers…God love ’em, had none of that.

They looked like a nice bunch of hockey youths, but as far as I could tell, there were no standouts amongst the players Denny and Jake coached on offense. Granted, this group was in their early teens. And yes, I was the definition of an armchair expert, so what did I know?

I concentrated on him instead, admiring his grace and speed and⁠—

“Denny’s impressive, isn’t he?”

I cast a sideways glance at Mary-Kate and smiled. “He is.”

Her long ponytail swayed as she shifted to face me. “Have you always been a hockey fan?”

“Definitely. I grew up watching Denver get murdalized every year. That part wasn’t fun, but I liked the energy.”

“Hmm. I didn’t like it all. I got hurt on the ice when I was little and took a long break. My Uncle Vinnie bribed me to give it another shot, and I fell in love again. It was like I needed time away to appreciate it, you know?”

I hummed in acknowledgment, my eyes locked on Denny demonstrating proper form to a kid struggling with his backhand near the net. “I get that. Sounds like you’ve done well in the sport.”

“Thanks. Unfortunately, women don’t get the same recognition as our male peers. I could have continued after college, but I didn’t want to travel all the time. I know it’s been hard for Denny.” MK gestured to the ice. “He seems to be doing better now, though. Like he’s ready for the next level.”

Somehow I knew what she meant. There was an empty spotlight with Denny’s name on it. He’d be the face on some of the biggest campaigns in the sports world; he’d sell tickets, merchandise, and dreams. And he’d do it with grace and poise…like a true champion in the making.

And me? I’d watch him on TV or maybe from the stands, and hopefully I’d be content with a handful of memories.

Denny met me at the barn later that night, flushed and pumped up with camp stories. The smartass from Tennessee who’d challenged Vinnie to a chess match, the show-off from Michigan the coaches had voted most likely to burn out within a week, the geek from Seattle who couldn’t skate worth a damn, the prankster from Vancouver who’d spent lunchtime recruiting campers to wreak mayhem.

“We’re keeping our eye on that guy,” Denny snickered, patting Bess’s flank. “Hey, can we take them out? It’s late, but we have sunlight for a while.”

I checked the time and nodded. “Let’s do it.”

We followed a well-worn path along the creek wide enough for two horses to walk side by side. The summer breeze felt refreshing after a day inside an air conditioned rink and office. The golden light of the setting sun, the sound of Denny’s deep voice, and sway of the horse lulled me into complacency. I could be happy here. This was all I needed.

“We have more campers than ever,” Denny reported enthusiastically. “Four different groups meet at two rinks usually, but Pinecrest offered the use of their rink this year too. They just want the publicity, the little fuckers. Whatever, we need the ice. Thankfully, we have enough coaches to make it work. Housing everyone is an ongoing issue. In the beginning, they’d billet with families who were willing to help out for a week or so. We still have that program, but we also have a couple of dedicated houses…kind of like dorms. You couldn’t pay me enough money to sign up for RA duty. I like coaching better anyway. I got teamed up with Jake this year. He’s funny, I’m serious. He’s chatty, I’m quiet. It works.”

I shot Denny an amused glance. He’d been talking nonstop for an hour now. “Quiet, huh? I don’t know that guy.”

He snorted, keeping a light grip on the reins, his posture ramrod straight as he matched Bess’s gentle cadence in the saddle. Like I’d taught him. “Not gonna lie, I get boned up seeing you at the rink.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. You looked super hot in that Elmwood Eagles hat.”

I wrinkled my nose. “Vinnie gave it to me. He said I wasn’t allowed to wear the Pinecrest Penguins hat I had on.”

“The fuck?” He glowered. “Where did you get a Penguins hat?”

“Jake’s mom gave it to me. How was I supposed to know?”

“Jake’s mom pranked you hard.” Denny knocked the heel of his palm against his forehead. “Okay, memorize this. Elmwood good, Fallbrook…fine, Wood Hollow…indifferent, but we sort of feel sorry for them, but Pinecrest is evil. They’re snot-nosed assholes who think they’re better than everyone else. If anyone had seen you in that thing, you’d be back to square one, babe.”

I beamed.

He’d called me babe.

And he didn’t seem to notice. The endearment had slipped from his tongue…so casually. I didn’t want to read too much into the sentiment, but the more I got to know Denny, the more I realized he didn’t give anything freely. You had to earn his trust, his time…his affection. Somehow, I was on the inside. It felt pretty damn amazing.

“What’s the stupidest thing you ever did as a kid?” he asked out of the blue.

I didn’t have to think about it. “I jumped from a tree onto a pile of leaves on a dare and broke my collarbone. I also superglued my eyelids open ’cause I was afraid of the dark and didn’t want to go to sleep.”

Denny hooted. “No fucking way.”

“Way. I was not what you’d call a brainiac. How about you? Stupidest thing ever…go.”

“I went skiing in my jeans and got caught at the top of the mountain in a freak storm. I looked like the iceman by the time my dad came to rescue me. Do you ski?”

“I do. Very well, thank you,” I bragged.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. We should go sometime,” I said, unthinking.

I wished I could press rewind the second the words were out. There would be no “sometime.” This summer was it for us, and the clock was ticking like a time bomb.

Denny cocked his head, blissfully unaware of my inner turmoil. “I haven’t been on skis in ten years. I should get on that horse again, huh?”

“When you’re ready.”

“Not during season, though. There’s always a story about an idiot athlete doing something extra stupid, like breaking a bone snowboarding or spraining an ankle skateboarding on a day off. That won’t be me, but yeah, it would be cool to go skiing with you…someday.”

We rode in silence, side by side through the forest to the main trail, where a half moon lit the night in shades of indigo. And when the barn crested over the hill, Denny held his hand out. I didn’t hesitate. I reached for him, wordlessly threading our fingers. Holding hands while on horseback was a little awkward, but damn, it was kind of romantic.

No, no…wrong word. We weren’t a couple, and sweet sentiments didn’t belong here. We were just a couple of dudes with a side agenda who’d become very good friends.

Once we’d tended to Bess and Fred, we headed for the house and climbed the stairs. We undressed unhurriedly, pulled the sheets aside, and rolled to face each other. We’d been going at it fast and furiously for months now. What started as a tentative exchange of pleasure had matured to something more confident. I was part of Denny’s bi journey, and I was more than happy to be along for the ride. But I was kidding myself if I thought I could remain neutral.

“I want you, baby. I want you inside me.” I traced his stubbled jaw with my thumb and raked a hand through his hair, loving his responsive moan of approval.

Denny covered me, pressing his body against mine, trapping my legs as he devoured me with soul-stealing kisses. He rocked his pelvis, rubbing our erections together. It was good, but nowhere near enough.

Thankfully, I didn’t have to beg for more. He sat up abruptly, grabbed the lube, and gestured for me to get on my knees.

I braced for cool wetness and a probing digit, but he licked me instead. I groaned at the feel of his tongue on my hole. He pushed the tip in, flicking it as I fisted the sheets and begged for his cock.

Denny released me, added more lube, and entered me, slow and steady. He grazed his fingers along my sides, leaving goose bumps in the wake of featherlight touches as he moved. I grunted for more and he delivered, holding my shoulders for purchase and fucking me like a boss.

My boy was a quick study. He licked my neck and pinched my nipples as he snapped his hips. I jacked myself, sliding up and down his shaft. He sat on his heels and pulled me onto his lap, giving me room to take over. I rode him hard, letting my head lull sideways to rest against Denny’s while he circled himself around me protectively…one arm on my stomach, a hand cupping my balls.

I wasn’t going to last.

Denny tightened his hold, thrusting and bucking as he pulled my chin toward him. The angle was terrible, but the kiss was potent. I came with a gasp, shuddering in his arms, and he was right there with me.

I carefully disengaged our bodies and dove onto the pillow, fucked out and exhausted. Denny laughed and lunged on top of me. A halfhearted wrestling match ensued, silly and handsy, and kind of sweet.

This was the kind of thing that made me nervous.

In a twist, I was still capable of doing the stupidest things…like falling head over fucking heels for a hockey star.

18

DENNY

“You’re going to have to peel away from the board, babe.”

Hank nodded, removing one hand, pausing to test his balance before removing his other hand and…promptly falling on his ass. Again.

I crouched low and tugged at his elbow.

“No. Leave me here,” Hank grumbled.

“Hey, don’t give up now. You’re doing great.”

Total lie. He was terrible. Hank was overthinking the whole blades on ice thing ’cause balance definitely wasn’t the issue for a guy who’d spent years in the saddle. It was a mind fuck, and I wasn’t sure how to get him to relax enough to move instead of letting gravity take over.

“Until skating on your ass becomes an Olympic event, I think we can both agree this isn’t going well,” he snarked.

“C’mon. Let’s get you up and try again.”

He sighed but allowed me to help him to his feet. “Now what?”

“Let go of my arm. Okay, now bend your knees and keep your weight over your skates, head up.” I skated backward, nodding in approval. “That’s good. Now pretend there’s an invisible string tied to the rafters that won’t let you fall, but you only activate it if you move your feet. Remember, lean forward.”

Hank glided toward me on his right skate, and left, and right, and—wobbled, swinging his arms like a helicopter about to take off before eating it. “I can’t do it. It’s not in my genes.”

“If you can ski, you can skate.”

“Not me.”

“You can do it,” I insisted.

“Just leave me here. I’ll be all right.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’m not giving up.”

I’d specifically waited till the coast was clear to give Hank his first lesson. Not that this was a secret. It wasn’t. I didn’t care who saw me attempt to teach a newbie how to skate. There were probably a few people in the lobby and I was pretty sure Vinnie and Riley were in their offices, but I figured Hank was probably happy not to have an audience.

“You should.” He got to his feet, bracing one hand on the boards as he glanced around the deserted rink. “Is a pillow strapped to my ass still an option?”

I laughed. “No, but I promise to kiss it better later. I’ll even blindfold you if you want.”

“Using sex as a weapon,” he tsked. “You play dirty, sweetheart.”

Geez, I think I blushed. I skated into his space and brushed against him. “I like that…sweetheart.”

Hank flashed a sultry smile, incongruous to the white-knuckled grip he had on the boards. It shouldn’t have been sexy at all. But it was. “Want to get outta here?”

“Skate lesson first. C’mon, big guy, you got this,” I cajoled, praising his itty-bitty strides and offering pointers along the way. Push and glide, head up, knees soft, shift your blades.

You know, it wasn’t pretty, but twenty minutes later, Hank was kind of, sort of skating. It was shaky, like a baby giraffe learning to walk, but at least he’d stopped falling every other minute.

“Hey, not bad,” he said, arms wide, a silly grin on his handsome face. “I’m doing it. I’m skating!”

I clapped. “You’ll be ready for the Elmwood adult rec league next year.”

Except…Hank wouldn’t be in Elmwood next season. And technically, I’d only be here for another couple of weeks. I had a contract to finalize and details to deal with, and if I was moving to New York, I needed to do that before preseason training started. Our window was closing, little by little every day.

He smiled wanly. “You never know.”

I lifted Hank’s fingers to my lips, unthinking, and pressed a kiss to his knuckles, then opened his reddened palm and kissed it too. Seriously, what was I doing? Anyone could pop their head in, and I wasn’t sure there was a logical explanation for holding his hand.

“Your hands are cold.”

“So is my butt.”

I snickered. “You’re a good sport. Can I buy you ice cream to make it up to you?”

“What happened to blindfolding me and fucking me senseless?” he groused.

“Fine print, baby. That was only if you could skate the length of the rink. We’ll try again tomorrow.” I held his hand and guided him to the exit. “Chocolate chip sound good?”

Half the town was in line at Ye Ol’ Elmwood Ice Cream Shoppe. I’d been at the rink all day, but even at eight thirty p.m., the temperatures were still in the seventies. Camp kids and locals looking for a cool treat at the end of the day were either here or guzzling milkshakes at the diner. I liked both options, but the ice cream store was quick and inexpensive. The Wellers hadn’t raised their prices in the past ten years.

In fact, nothing much had changed in the shop. They had the same black-and-white tiled floor, the same frosted case featuring twenty flavors, and they played the old-time music, which meant it was probably the music my dad heard when he’d come here as a kid.

“Two scoops chocolate chip, Denny?” Mr. Weller asked, holding up a cone.

“Yes, please.” I hooked my thumb at Hank. “My friend is⁠—”

“I know who your friend is. He’s here almost every day.” Mr. Weller winked. “Two scoops vanilla and pecan pralines and cream, Hank?”

Hank grinned. “Yes, sir.”

“Comin’ right up.”

I smiled at the teenagers I recognized from camp as I shuffled to the register with Hank. “I didn’t know you were a regular.”

“I like ice cream and they have the best—” He paused, angling his head toward the window. “I think your friends are here.”

Sure enough, a group of my buddies were waving like goofballs from the picnic table on the side of the shop under a string of fairy lights. Niall, Abe, Micah, Harry, MK and a few of her friends. I waved, handing over a wad of cash and thanking Mr. Weller for my ice cream.

“I should say hi.”

“Yeah, go on,” Hank urged. “I’ll see you later.”

“Nah, come with me. They’re cool.”

“I know they are, but they want to be with you—not their boss, and not the guy they think is making moves on their girl’s boyfriend.”

“They don’t think that.”

Hank snorted. “I’m sure they do. Besides, I need to ice my ass.”

I rolled my eyes. “That’s ridiculous.”

“The ice or my astute observations? You know I’m right, Den,” he said in a low voice. “I’ll see you later.”

He was gone before I could respond and that was…fine. I mean, we weren’t dating, we weren’t a couple. We were the very definition of temporary.

But that motley crew out there were my people, and they would always be part of my life. I licked my ice cream, ignoring the pang in my gut at the thought of losing Hank…of meeting him after a game next year or bumping into him on the street and pretending we never happened.

Okay, that was bleak.

I forced unhappy thoughts from my head and pushed open the door, smiling as my friends greeted me with a round of “Yo,” “ ’Sup, man,” and even an annoying, “Here’s the hot shit…I mean hotshot.”

I flipped Niall the bird and sidled next to MK on the bench.

“You made it!” Mary-Kate scooted to make room, elbowing me playfully. “How are you? I haven’t seen much of you.”

“Just busy.”

“No one’s seen much of this guy since he started riding horses in his spare time,” Micah piped in, crunching into his cone.

“Riding horses?” Harry asked. “In Fallbrook? Why? I didn’t know you liked horses.”

Harry had played hockey with us in high school, but he’d never been into it. His passion was food, and he’d spent the last year in Paris studying at an elite culinary institute and was currently visiting Elmwood for a short vacation. We had a secret bet that he’d be working for Jean-Claude and Nolan at C’est Bon when he came home for good. His time out of the country had left him out of the loop and the guys were happy to fill him in.

“Our boss is his instructor.” Niall scraped the bottom of his cup with a plastic spoon and shrugged in a universal “Don’t ask me how that happened” gesture that made me want to kick him under the table.

Harry’s brows creased in confusion. “Huh? I thought you worked at the mill.”

“Don’t remind us,” Micah griped, polishing off the last of his cone. “Hey, the pay is good and the work is steady, but you can’t help feeling like you’re selling your soul.”

I bristled on Hank’s behalf. “What do you mean?”

Niall rolled his eyes. “Oh, c’mon, Den. This isn’t news. The Cunninghams are chopping up our forest to give that new construction company supplies to build houses on every open bit of land in Wood Hollow. A bunch of outsiders are going to buy places in our area, take our jobs, and where the fuck will we be? Twenty years from now, will we even have a forest?”

“They wonder why they’re having a hard time hiring,” Micah huffed. “No offense to your new buddy, Denny, but let’s be real, this is some grand-plan bullshit. They stole the mill from the Larsons and they’re brainwashing us into thinking they’re doing us a favor.”

“No one stole the mill,” MK reminded him. “The Larsons sold out. And how are they brainwashing us, moron?”

“They sold it for a song, which means they probably got cheated. And the new owners brainwash us by sending over a slick cowboy who fucking brown-noses his way into everyone’s good graces.” Niall pushed his empty cup aside, gaze hardening as he warmed up to his list of grievances. “Look, I know you like the guy, Den, but you gotta admit it’s suspicious that he showed up, befriended a successful hockey player, and started volunteering for homegrown causes out of the blue. This is how corporations plant the seeds for mass takeovers. They buy a small business, ingratiate themselves in the community, then buy another business…and another. Little by little, they own more and more of the land. And natives, like us, are shit out of luck.”

MK snorted. “Wow, your pessimistic outlook is bordering on conspiracy theory territory. If you’re so against the new ownership, why work for them?”

“Where else would we go? They pay well, the benefits are great, and the mill is really nice. We’re like lambs being fattened up before a slaughter. They want us fat and happy, eyes on the shiny coin so we won’t notice when Wood Hollow is unrecognizable. It’s gonna happen, man. It’s gonna happen.”

I bit into my ice cream cone as I considered my reply. I wished I had my grandmother’s quick wit and claws. If we were on the ice, I’d know what to do without thinking twice.

See, this was tricky ’cause in a way, Niall and Micah were right.

Everything they said about the Cunninghams was basically true. Hank’s dad had bought the mill for profit. It was a business move, plain and simple. Hank was an ambassador, the friendly face sent to assure residents they came in peace. The difference was that I believed Hank in spite of the fact that he’d asked for my help to do exactly what my friends were accusing him of.

And I’d agreed…for sex.

That sounded creepy, like I’d been complicit in selling out my town, and that wasn’t true. What happened between Hank and me was personal. It had nothing to do with Elmwood or Wood Hollow.

Or maybe that was delusional thinking.

Maybe I’d unintentionally put myself in the middle of this debate.

Fuck.

Diplomacy wasn’t my thing, but I had to speak up.

“Change can be good,” I said after a long moment. “New blood, new ideas, new growth. Maybe it doesn’t always go smoothly, but if you want to get real…ask yourself how we build a high school or invite hundreds of kids and their families to spend their hard-earned dollars for hockey camp and not invest in our infrastructure? You can’t expect people to commute from fucking Rutland, for fuck’s sake. You can’t have it both ways. Something has to give. It doesn’t have to be the end of an era or of the forest. It can be a beginning.”

My friends stared at me in frozen silence for a beat, no doubt wondering why the guy who conserved words like a miser was suddenly giving speeches. For the enemy, no less.

“You’re sipping some interesting Kool-Aid, bro. But hey, I could be wrong.” Niall fixed me with a harsh look. “I don’t think I am. I think they’ll hire outside of our area and the cowboy will fuck off back to Denver at the end of summer or fall at the latest. He’s not one of us. He’s pretending to be to get what he wants. If he were staying for good, that would be different.”

I furrowed my brow. “How so?”

“It would mean he gave a fuck about this place.”

“Okay, enough about the mill.” MK slapped one hand on the table and squeezed my knee with the other. Maybe in solidarity, maybe in warning that this wasn’t a battle to be won over the dregs of ice cream on a hot summer night.

She guided conversation to camp news—the kids who’d lined up to get autographs from goalie legend Olaf Gustafson, the parents who’d cheered their son obnoxiously from the stands during a drill, and how much more boisterous this group seemed compared to the last one with kids trying to outskate, outscore, and out-BS each other.

The stories turned to our camp days when we’d thought we were immune to the pomp and circumstance of hosting famous athletes for a few weeks during summer. News flash: we weren’t. We’d been in awe of those players, tongue-tied at the idea of sharing the ice with them.

“That hasn’t changed,” I commented, gesturing to the long line outside of the ice cream shop. “I bet Mr. Weller makes more money this summer than ever. There’re two sides to every coin.”

Niall kicked my shin under the table and Micah gave a rude hand motion while everyone else snickered, reverting to adolescents who relied on silliness to get out of uncomfortable discussions. Fine by me. I’d made my point. I could figure out my part in this later. Right now, it kind of made my head hurt.

19

DENNY

“You were fierce back there.” MK linked her arm through mine as we strolled away from the ice cream shop. “It sounds like you’ve given the issue with the mill some thought.”

“Not really. I just know that Hank isn’t a bad guy.”

She pursed her lips, slowing her steps in front of the fountain. “No, he’s not.”

I watched her through hooded lashes, tuning out the kids splashing in the fountain.

The square in front of Town Hall was a summertime hangout spot where young parents let their offspring run wild and couples canoodled on benches. It wasn’t private or quiet, but no one cared. It was just nice to cool off outside after a scorching day.

I chuckled at a toddler with popsicle juice dripping from his chin and glanced over at MK to point him out. But she seemed suddenly tense and the faraway look in her eyes freaked me out.

“You okay?” I ventured.

She perched on the edge of a bench and patted the space next to her. “Yeah, yeah, I was thinking about…us. I’m kind of mad at you.”

“What did I do?”

Mary-Kate chewed on her bottom lip and fussed with the hem of her sundress. “I just thought that when we said we’d be honest and still be best friends, you’d still talk to me and⁠—”

“Hey, hey, hey.” I reached for MK, unthinking, and squished her to my chest. I was aware of a few curious stares and a cell phone or two aimed in our direction, but I blocked them out. “We are best friends, and I talk to you all the time.”

She pushed out of my arms and glared. “You didn’t tell me about New York. Vinnie did.”

Oh. True. Her uncle had beat me to it. My mind had been elsewhere.

“It’s not a done deal,” I hedged.

“I know that. It’s something you’d usually tell me first, and I hate that I sound like a jilted ex. I just—I wish you’d talk to me.”

“Sorry. I’ve had a lot going on and I’m…”

“Seeing someone new?” she finished softly.

I could lie. I could totally lie again. I had no intention of coming out now. I was ten to fifteen years away from any big sexuality reveal.

Or I could claim it was nothing—fun but not a big deal.

I was the quiet guy. I was the gifted hockey player. My peace had always been more important than my voice, my thoughts.

The truth was…my whole world had been shaken like a snow globe with pieces falling into new, interesting places. Lately, I felt like an updated version of myself, one who was willing to give an unpopular opinion regarding local politics. I also felt more confident about dealing with the pressure and stress waiting for me the moment I left Elmwood.

And this updated version of me knew my best friend deserved my truth.

“Yes,” I admitted, my eyes trained on hers.

“Not a woman.”

I shook my head, then rubbed my neck feeling suddenly itchy and uncomfortable. “Not a woman.”

“Hank,” she guessed.

“Yeah.”

“You’re bi?”

I cleared my throat. “I am.”

MK nodded. “Okay. That’s cool.”

“I…I’m sorry.” My voice cracked. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I needed time to figure it out and I just⁠—”

“Shh.” She laced our fingers. “Shh. It’s okay.”

I raked my free hand through my hair and let out a ragged breath. “I don’t know how to do this. I can’t come out. I just…not for a long time. But you’re my best friend and I⁠—”

“And I always will be,” she intercepted. “You don’t have to explain. I knew something was different. You seem so happy and you have all this goofy energy, and I figured it was someone new. He’s the only new person I’ve seen you with, so…I wondered. And I’m here for you…no matter what.”

“Thank you.”

She sidled close and dropped her head on my shoulder. “I like him.”

“Me too.” I kissed the top of her head. “I don’t think he’s as popular with the guys.”

“Yeah, that’s complicated. Will you tell them?”

“No,” I replied quickly. “Hank and I—this isn’t…possible. Not really.”

“Oh, Den. Anything is possible. You should know that by now. Anything at all.” She squeezed my arm. “By the way, I love you to pieces, but I think it’s time we officially broke up. You don’t need me anymore. Not like that.”

I bit the inside of my cheek. “Thank you for looking out for me. You’re pretty fucking amazing.”

“I am, aren’t I?” Mary-Kate tickled my side till I squirmed and put her in a headlock.

She wriggled away and changed the subject to fuck knew what as I melted into the bench beside her.

I just came out.

Okay, it was to one person, and she happened to be someone I trusted emphatically. And yes, it was as weird as I’d thought it would be, but it was freeing too, as if a heavy weight had shifted, cracked, and fallen from my shoulders. Mary-Kate was right…I was happy.

Happier than I’d allowed myself to be in ten long years.

20

HANK

The temperature cranked up a few notches in August. If you weren’t hanging out at the ice rink, you were probably at Lake Norman, jumping from docks or zipping across the water on a boat at top speeds on your day off.

Me? I was at the mill.

“What time can we expect the delivery tomorrow?”

I blew my cheeks out like a chipmunk and slumped in my chair. “What time do you need it?”

“Seven a.m.” Glen Ackerman of Wood Hollow Construction was my new least favorite person.

“Seven? That’s a little early, Glen, and it’s a huge shipment.”

“That’s what I paid for. Prompt delivery of a lot of lumber. We broke ground last month, concrete has been set, and we’re rolling. You have the wood, don’t you?”

“Yeah, we have it. I’ll do my best to get it to you early, but there’s a fair chance you’ll receive part of it at noon and⁠—”

“Not acceptable,” he barked. “Listen Cunningham, when you took over for the Larsons…”

I tuned him out. I wondered how long it would take for locals to stop referring to how the Larsons did things. It wouldn’t do any good to remind them that the Larsons had literally done business in the middle of a forest and couldn’t supply half the lumber we’d delivered.

I’d been working my ass off for months, and nothing moved fast enough in a town with one fucking streetlight. Go figure.

“Glen, I understand where you’re coming from. We’ll do our best.” I hung up on the man sputtering indignantly on the line and reached for my Stetson. I needed a breather.

My cell buzzed with a new text and an incoming call. I read the text from Denny first.

Meet me at the Black Horse after work? I have a friend in town who wants to meet you.

I sent Denny a thumbs-up emoji and answered the call.

“You’re alive!” Cassy shouted into the connection. “How’s it hangin’, Hankster?”

I chuckled. “Not bad. How’re you?”

“Peachy. I wanted to give you an update on the Crane kid. Better yet, I’ll send you a video in three, two, one—check your messages. I have a kid from Golden starting next week and the hospital referred me for an outpatient gig, so I guess I’m calling to see how long you’ll be stuck in the trees doing tree things.”

I moved to the doorway and looked past Emily’s desk to the controlled chaos of the mill. Cooper spotted me and tilted his head in a friendly acknowledgment. Everyone else ignored me…including Emily. Just another day at the office, wishing I was at the stable, hanging out with the horses.

A call from home reminding me of what I’d given up couldn’t have come at a worse time.

Except, that wasn’t entirely accurate. Don’t get me wrong, I loved being with Bess and Fred, but I wasn’t itching to go home. My mind was buzzing with ideas for this town. Wood Hollow needed new life and a purpose—better roads, better shops, better…everything. I couldn’t help thinking the mill could be part of that growth. Maybe.

“I don’t know,” I replied. “A couple of months.”

“You don’t sound happy about that.”

“I am. I’m just…” Failing at life, a.k.a. floundering as CEO, falling for a hockey player who’d be gone in a matter of days. I cleared my throat. “I’m fine. And I’m glad Max is doing well. Tell him hi for me.”

“Will do, Hank.”

I ended the call and glanced over at Emily who was motioning to me wildly. “What’s up, Em?”

“Lines one, two, three are for you. Glen Ackerman says you hung up on him, the saw thingy you had fixed is ready, and someone clogged the toilet in the men’s room. Again.”

Wow. Just wow.

Hey, it wasn’t all doom and gloom. We’d hired thirty more employees over the past few weeks, and things were running relatively smoothly. Dad was ecstatic and he was doing better health-wise. He’d improved to the point he was able to walk with a cane for short stints.

The general sense that things were progressing as planned made for pleasant conversations, but days like this felt like one step forward, two steps backward. It was frustrating. I was torn between wanting out and being afraid of what came next.

So I concentrated on the positive. I woke up with a sexy man in my bed. We fed the horses together, exercised them, stealing errant touches and kisses like newlyweds, then went to the house for breakfast before parting ways. Denny headed for the rink, I headed for Wood Hollow, and while we occasionally met for coffee or lunch at the diner, we usually waited till evening to see each other again.

He was busy with camp, and there were a fuckton of hockey players in town who’d wonder why he wasn’t hanging out with them. I understood. I wasn’t in a position to ask for more, so I took what I could get and did my best to make every second count.

And to not get aggravated with interruptions like the arrival of Mason Trinsky, Denny’s teammate from Denver.

Trinsky was an enormous tatted human with a jolly demeanor and a lust for life. He was the type of guy who challenged strangers to drinking games, bought rounds for the entire bar, and told outlandish stories that made you simultaneously roll your eyes and laugh. He was a loveable goofball and a force on the ice.

Denny told me Trinsky was the guy who’d looked out for him and made him feel at home in the NHL. I’d expected to like him, but I hadn’t expected Trinsky to know much about me. I was wrong.

“Holy fuck! It’s the billboard cowboy!”

Oh. Right.

My smile dipped for a beat, but I shoved it into place, ignoring the curious patrons at the Black Horse, including a couple of mill employees.

“Hank Cunningham.”

“Trinsky.” He crushed my fingers, nodding as he studied me as if I were an endangered species he hadn’t counted on running into. “You are a fuckin’ celebrity, dude. Fuck hockey. Do you know who this is? This is the billboard cowboy!”

“Ah, that was a long time ago.” I thanked Bill for the beer he slid toward me and glanced at Denny.

His lips tilted at the corners and then…he winked at me. I was used to the constant yearning now—the head over heels, how did I get here, dizzy feeling whenever he walked into a room. The insta butterflies shouldn’t have been a surprise, but they were.

“Denny told me you were here,” Trinsky said, ripping me from my reverie. “The team freaked out at the selfie he took a few months ago. You’re a goddamn legend in our neck of the woods, dude. Like wow. Jakey baby, do you know who this is?”

Jake gritted his teeth and elbowed Trinsky in the stomach. “Don’t call me Jakey, asshole. And yes, of course I know Hank. His family owns the mill nearby.”

“Mill, shmill. No one cares about the mill. Trust me, they don’t care about it in Denver either. He stops traffic on I-70 on the daily. They talked about the billboard on a podcast I was listening to last week about the natural habitats of beavers and river otters and somehow, they brought up that billboard.”

“River otters? Really? What the fuck is a river otter?” a hockey player whose name I couldn’t remember piped in.

“It’s an otter that lives in the river, dumbass,” Trinsky huffed. “What the fuck else would it be? They’re little and cute and they hold hands when they sleep. Oh, and they’re super furry all over.”

“Like you?” someone called out.

“Well, yeah,” Trinsky countered.

Our section of the bar burst into laughter while the other half looked up to see what was so funny. I took the opening to slip to Denny’s side.

“Sorry about that. I knew he’d be excited, but I forget how hyped Trinsky gets after a beer or five,” Denny whispered, brushing his arm against mine.

“No worries. Now you know why I’d like to see that thing gone for good.”

“The billboard? No way,” Denny huffed, narrowing his eyes. “You guys don’t ruin the natural habitat of river otters, do you?”

“Absolutely not. We don’t harvest near the river at all. Sustainable harvesting means⁠—”

“I know what it is. If you guys are protecting little critters, you should put them in your ads,” Denny suggested.

“Dude, that’s a great idea. Do one of you standing next to your horse with a river otter in the saddle,” Trinsky chimed in, frowning when someone laughed. “Yo, it’s a good idea. Come on, do it, do it, do it.”

Whether anyone knew what he was talking about or not, Trinsky soon had the entire bar chanting “Do it, do it.” Someone called for shots and soon after, a tray was passed around.

I set my glass on the bar untouched and melted into the shadows, content to watch Denny interact with his peers. He was more engaged and at ease than I’d ever seen him in a group setting, laughing at silly jokes and outrageous ribbing. I supposed it made sense.

He was home, and now that he’d finally begun to face his grief and fundamental truths about himself, he seemed lighter. This place cleansed him, made him whole.

This was where he belonged.

I envied that. My life had been in a state of flux for years. Denver was home, but I wasn’t settled there. My closest friends lived in the suburbs of Boulder or had moved away after college. The only one left was my father. And while I was grateful that he’d orchestrated a job that would enable me to establish myself, money couldn’t buy what Denny had here. A sense of community, a connection, home.

I inclined my chin to the guys from the mill, set a twenty on the bar for Bill, and lightly tugged Denny’s arm in a wordless good-bye before stepping outside.

The night sky was awash with stars, layer upon layer. I walked with my head held high, key fob pointed at my truck.

I slid behind the wheel and started the engine just as the passenger side door opened.

“I’m coming with you, cowboy.”

I snorted. “Billboard cowboy to you.”

He chuckled. “Now you see why I needed that selfie?”

“Feels like a lifetime ago.”

“Yeah.” Denny stared up at the stars for a beat before climbing into the truck. He fastened his seatbelt and twisted to face me. “I’m leaving for New York in two days. They want to talk to me in person…and so does Denver.”

“Oh yeah? They’re in competition for you, eh?”

“Something like that.” He shrugged. “Hey, I’ll be back for the end of camp scrimmage, but it’ll be a quick trip. If I miss you here, I’ll see you in Denver. I mean…we’ll talk obviously, but summer is almost over and…I’m not saying good-bye, but⁠—”

I tipped my hat slightly and set my finger over his lips. “Don’t worry. We’ll work it out, sweetheart.”

His Adam’s apple slid in his throat as a smile ghosted the corners of his mouth. “Yeah, we will.”

We held hands on the way to my place. We walked quietly upstairs, undressed, and reached for each other.

We moved as one, a beautiful dance for two with tender kisses and soft sighs. And afterward, we lay in the moonlight, sharing skin like a blanket. We didn’t speak…there was no need for words. We were nearing an end, hoping it led to a beginning.

The next day, I knew it was over.

21

HANK

The day started out all right. I stopped by the diner to chat with JC, ordered a latte with wonky art from Ivan, and said hi to Annie at the bakery.

I’d come here hoping to hoodwink the locals into liking me well enough to give the mill some positive press, but I was the one who’d fallen under a spell. And now…I loved this town.

Elmwood was beautiful and safe and welcoming.

Wood Hollow was…not.

It was lovely on the surface, but the town seriously needed improvements. The roads needed to be widened, and potholes needed to be filled. The trees on Belvedere Street were horribly overgrown and though the houses had character, most needed a face-lift.

According to Bryson, Smitty’s husband and the premiere real estate agent to the Four Forest area, Wood Hollow was like the ugly stepsister who showed up to every party and sat in a corner giving everyone the stink eye.

“It’s hard to sell houses there because there’s no real commerce. Their market is tiny, the gas station has two pumps, and if you want a cup of coffee, you better make it at home,” Bryson said.

Cooper had a similar take. “I live in Fallbrook ’cause of my kids. The school is better, the park is nicer, and it’s easier to get around. If you get stuck in Wood Hollow behind a logging truck hauling a load on icy roads, you’d better have the patience of a saint.”

“Why haven’t they made any improvements?” I’d asked.

“Money. They don’t have it.”

Every day I made the trek up that hill, I pondered ways they could raise money. But then my day would go sideways with the usual bullshit of dealing with unreasonable assholes, and all I wanted was to get back to Elmwood. Wood Hollow could be someone else’s problem.

But today was Monday and a weekend away from the grind made me feel optimistic. I couldn’t help admiring the stately walnut trees, some with hollow openings lining the main drag. The town had character…sort of.

I pulled into the lot at the mill, adjusting my sunglasses as I headed for the entrance, my mind swirling with fundraising ideas.

The mayor would have to get involved and he was kind of a dick. And town council would⁠—

A swath of red spray paint in my periphery stopped me in my tracks.

My heart hammered in my chest as I studied the side of the mill, covered in hundreds of blown-up shots of that fucking Denver billboard pic with a spray-painted message,

Go home, Cunningham! No corporate mill!

I stared at the crude lettering in shock.

Adolescent-style graffiti a la penises had greeted me when I’d first arrived. The offensive artwork had been painted over immediately, and we hadn’t seen anything like it since.

Definitely nothing like this.

It was seven a.m. and the lot was nearly empty. A few employees were probably in and had seen this and…

Fuck…

Just…fuck.

I took a couple of pictures, called the local police, and thought about calling my dad. It was five o’clock in Denver, though, and what the fuck would he do about this? Close the mill? Not likely.

This was my responsibility. I’d signed up for this. And like it or not, I had to see it through.

Within the hour, the town was buzzing with the news. You learn a lot about people in the midst of crisis—who you could trust, who was good under pressure, and who was a douchebag.

Emily was an unexpected ally. She gasped in dismay, then made a beeline to Rise and Grind in Elmwood for more coffee, and returned to diligently watch the phones.

And Cooper was a rock star. He blew a fuse, irate at whoever had dared to deface private property and fuck with production. See, the culprits had covered a portion of a rolling door with their handiwork and when the door was opened, the paper rolled into the grooves of the pulley.

Cooper called a meeting, ranted and raved about our no-BS policy, and demanded to know who was responsible. No one fessed up, and the video footage had been tampered with, so…no leads.

He didn’t think it was necessary for me to speak at the meeting, but I disagreed. That was my name on the building. I was the Cunningham they wanted out. I sincerely doubted anyone would have dared pulled a prank like this on my dad. He wasn’t the kind of guy you wanted to piss off. He was intense and scary with it.

I was…the peacekeeper, the temporary Band-Aid. I was a pawn who’d taken a paycheck to oversee a project I hadn’t given a fuck about.

But that wasn’t true anymore. I cared more than I wanted to admit.

I hated the general malaise and mistrust. I hated that the locals railed that they had no voice but did nothing to invite change. I hated that I was everything that they thought I was—a grifter, an opportunist with an agenda. A phony cowboy.

At least, that was how it had started. I wasn’t that guy anymore. I didn’t want to take without giving, I didn’t want to be a corporate figurehead, an out-of-touch cowboy. I wanted to make a difference. And somehow, I had to get my point across to my employees and the entire Four Forest area.

So I addressed a warehouse full of operators, machinists, and mechanics with Cooper’s microphone.

“I’ll keep this quick and to the point. Change is hard, and new ownership makes people nervous. I get it. Rocky Mountain is a corporation, but that’s not a bad thing. Hear me out. We have the ability to pay good wages with benefits, which immediately affects your wallet. In the long term, we can help rebuild this town and fix what’s broken. And don’t tell me nothing is broken—I’ve driven by the burned-out neon sign for Wood Hollow Elementary, the busted swing set in the park, and the rusted trash bin in front of the post office a hundred times. Those are simple fixes, but they aren’t getting done. I’m not here to ruin the town. I want to make it better. That’s going to take change and planning.”

The rumble of dissent frustrated me. Before I could tackle it, someone yelled, “What does a cowboy know about building houses anyway?”

“Nothing. I run a mill,” I shot back. “I know about forestry. I know how to drive a tractor, run the kiln, and how to load a twenty-six-thousand-pound capacity truck. You need me to prove it, I’m all in. But you need someone to run this place too. The job orders to build homes were initiated years ago. We’re here because we know how to do the job better than anyone else without ruining the forest. You don’t believe me…let me prove it. Nothing happens overnight—except maybe photocopying a hundred ancient photos of me and taping them to the warehouse door. Trust me, no one hates that picture more than me, but it doesn’t change anything. We have a business to run and important things to do for this town. I need everyone here on board. If you’re not interested, you know where the door is.”

The warehouse was quiet for a long moment. And it stayed quiet.

A few people moved to the exit, while one or two clapped. It reminded me of the time I’d signed up to play the guitar for the school talent show. I’d taken a handful of lessons and thought I was ready for prime time. My fifth grade classmates hadn’t agreed. It was cringeworthy and embarrassing. Needless to say, I never touched the guitar again.

The desire to join the few folks walking out the door was strong, but the desire to help was stronger.

However, I had a sinking feeling that no matter how much I wanted to do the right thing, I was already in over my head.

22

DENNY

News about the graffiti protest at the mill spread throughout Elmwood like wildfire. This was the final week of camp so the town was still in hockey mode, but the locals threw themselves into a hearty debate on the subject. By the time I’d wrapped up at the rink and headed to the diner with Trinsky and a few other coaches, Wood Hollow was a hot topic.

“I don’t blame them for being leery of corporate takeover,” Court said, popping a fry into his mouth.

“Yeah, but no one’s done much of anything in Wood Hollow in the past hundred years. It’s time to get with the program. I mean, look at this place.” Vinnie gestured to the diner from his perch on a stool at the counter. “Look at the happy campers chowing on burgers and fries. This diner has been here forever, but it didn’t look like this until Nolan made it happen and JC added to the menu. And JC is from fucking Quebec!”

“Trust me, I had a lot of angry customers who didn’t want broken jukeboxes removed from the tables,” Nolan added, resting his hand on his husband’s shoulder. “They didn’t care for the chandeliers I’d chosen, they wanted the ancient cigarette and candy bar vending machines to stay, and they were very leery of JC.”

JC nodded sardonically. “Can you believe it? Me? I am a great guy. It makes no sense. But food makes sense and once they were finished hating my accent, they realized zee new menu was better than zee old. No one is complaining today. We have a full house every day, every night.”

Even now the diner was bumping. Every table was spoken for, indoors and on the outside patio too…with good reason. The food was amazing and the atmosphere was a perfect blend of sophistication and small-town charm. The diner had been written up in travel guides, along with Rise and Grind and Henderson’s Bakery.

Elmwood took pride in its revitalized identity. Wood Hollow had no identity outside of logging and no pride whatsoever. Maybe Hank’s trip to Vermont had started as a quick fix way to make a few dollars and help his dad, but I knew Hank cared…probably more than he’d wanted to.

Buzz buzz

I pulled my cell out as I strode to the exit, answering on the second ring without checking caller ID. It had to be Hank. I’d texted him a dozen times since I’d heard what went down. No reply so far.

“Hey, how are you?”

“Great! Oh, man, I’ve got sweet news for you, Hotshot,” my agent gushed. “Are you sitting?”

I combed my fingers through my hair. “No, um…can I call you back, McD?”

“This will only take a minute and you want to hear this. Are you ready? Denver upped your salary. Philly is in the race too, and their numbers are even bigger. We’re talking into the stratosphere.” McD named a number that didn’t seem real…or possible.

“That’s… Look, I can’t talk right now. I⁠—”

“And that’s not all. The endorsement offers are coming in faster than I can keep up. We’ve got men’s razors, workout gear, beer, soda, soap, shampoo. Those are just the ones I can remember. I know you’re new to the ad game, but you gotta do it while you can. Some of these campaigns are worth millions of dollars. Ask Vinnie and Riley if you don’t believe me. We’ll get you the best ones. My inbox is overflowing with options and⁠—”

“I have another one for you,” I blurted.

“Another what?”

“It’s a local thing.” I paced to the corner and gazed out at the bistro tables with umbrellas in front of Rise and Grind, an idea churning in my head. I didn’t think, I just…spoke. It probably sounded like gibberish, but I didn’t stop until I’d shared this kernel of an idea.

“Whoa. That’s nice, but you’re a star, man. You can’t put your name on shit like that. You gotta aim higher and⁠—”

“Nonnegotiable. I’m doing it. Put it in my contract.”

“Wait up, Denny. I⁠—”

I hung up and hurried down the street to rescue my Bronco from the parking lot at the ice rink.

I drove to Wood Hollow, looking for Hank, but his receptionist told me he’d left for the day. It took another twenty minutes to get back to his house in Elmwood.

I knocked on his door. No answer. I skirted the house and went to the barn. The horses were there, but no sign of Hank. I returned to the house and sat on the top step of his deck, studying the landscape—the field of emerald and gold, the endless blue sky, and the red barn in the distance—then texted him again.

Where are you?

“Here I am.”

I frowned when Hank plopped onto the deck beside me, his shirt hopelessly wrinkled, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, his Stetson pulled low over his eyes. I set a hand on his knee.

“Hey, I heard about what happened.”

Hank shrugged. “Yeah. It sucks. Feels like failure.”

“Don’t say that.”

“Hmph.” He opened his palms and sighed. “It’s true what they say about me. I don’t have pure intentions. Never did. I signed up for six months and even if I don’t complete the job as promised, I’ll be compensated for my time and it’ll be more money than any one person in Wood Hollow will make in ten years. Can you blame them for hating me? ’Cause I sure as fuck can’t.”

“You’re not doing anything wrong. You’re running a business. It’s okay to have your own goals, you know. And I want to help. I’ll do the commercial. I talked to my agent an hour ago and told him I’m doing it.”

Hank quirked a tired smile. “That’s nice of you, but I don’t think that’s going to be enough now.”

“It’s public support and it’s worth a shot,” I insisted. “I bet a few other hockey players will jump in too. Support is what you need, and you have it. You never know, it might start a hiring boom. Then you can go home early, open your practice, do what you love…and be happy.”

He rolled his lips between his teeth thoughtfully, his jaw clenched. I got the feeling I’d tripped the wrong wire. This wasn’t the reaction I’d expected.

“Happy,” Hank repeated dully, yanking his hat from his head. “That’s a nice sentiment, but don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

I pressed my knee against his. “Talk to me, Hank.”

He closed his eyes briefly. “I don’t know where to begin. I’m filling holes in a sinking ship with platitudes and phony bullshit, hoping for the best when I should be swimming like hell. I can’t walk away now.”

“You’d stay…here? What about your business in Denver?” I pressed.

“There’s nothing there, Den. Just an idea.”

“But that’s your dream. Don’t give up your dream for the mill. It’s not right.”

Hank squinted at something in the distance. “I’m not giving up. I’m changing course…making an adjustment.”

“But you’ll lose time and⁠—”

“It was never mine to lose,” he intercepted.

Something in his tone set off an alarm in my brain.

“What do you mean?”

“I told you once that I’ve never committed to anything or anyone and seen it through to the end…and it’s true. I’m always aiming for something just out of reach. And just as it gets close or something goes wrong or I get spooked, I fuck it up…and leave. Start over. Don’t get me wrong. I love working with horses and I’m good at it, but it all began with me walking away. Here I am again. But I’m not running this time.”

“I want to say that’s good, but you don’t seem happy.”

Hank scrubbed his hand over his stubbled jaw. “I’m not unhappy, I’m just…overwhelmed. I’m going to Denver to work shit out with the board and see what they’ll need for a long-term plan. They might want to hire someone else. Who knows? You’re leaving soon?”

“Tomorrow. But I can postpone my trip and⁠—”

“Don’t do that. You have to do your thing now, sweetheart. You can do this, you know. You can handle the press, you can do whatever you set your mind to. You’re going to be fucking amazing.”

I frowned. “Why does it feel like you’re saying good-bye?”

“I can’t take the easy way out anymore, Den. I have to be a fucking grown-up and do the right thing. Just like you do. New team, new adventure. You won’t be the rookie anymore. You’re a star, and we can’t pretend we can go on like this indefinitely. It’s a nice dream, but it’s not realistic and⁠—”

“Stop. I don’t know why we’re having this conversation, but there’s a chance I’m staying in Denver, and we’ll see each other whenever I’m in town…here or there. It doesn’t matter where either of us lives…we’ll still have this. We’ll have us.”

“Jesus, Den. It’s not that simple.”

“Of course it is,” I insisted. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Because I love you.”

Holy fuck.

“I…”

He shoved his hat on his head again and grunted. “I didn’t mean to say that. It’s true, but I wasn’t going to…never mind.”

I opened my mouth like a fish out of water. “You love me.”

“Yeah, inconvenient, huh? It’s been there for a while, months. I thought I could talk myself out of it. You’re too young for me, we don’t live in the same state, you’re not out…good reasons to walk away, but nothing has changed…except the way I feel. I love the way your eyes light up when you smile. I love that nervous tic in your cheek when you’re in the saddle. I love your silly side, your wild hair, and the way you look first thing in the morning. I love you. And every day, I fall a little deeper for someone I can’t have.” He gave a humorous laugh. “The irony here is off the charts. I didn’t want anything to do with this place, but I can’t leave now and you have to go.”

“You make it sound impossible,” I whisper-croaked.

“Isn’t it? Jesus, Den, everyone still thinks you have a girlfriend.”

“That’s…not for long.”

Hank stood slowly, the brim of his hat casting a sharp shadow across his cheekbone. “It’s okay. That’ll happen when you’re ready. But me…I’m in over my head, and it kills me to know I’m bad for you. Bad for your reputation, bad for your image. I don’t want you to worry about the mill. I don’t need you to save me, Den. As your friend, as someone who worships the ground you fucking walk on…I want you to be the greatest ever. You deserve nothing less.”

He grazed his finger along my jaw and walked away.

I heard a screen door open and click shut, and then…nothing.

What the fuck just happened?

I let the sound of birds and the rustle of leaves take over, afraid to move and disturb the balance.

Or maybe I was afraid that leaving now would really mean this was over.

I wasn’t sure what I’d expected. I’d thought we’d have more time before we had to contemplate future plans. I’d assumed he was content with being friends with benefits. I’d figured we’d revisit the terminology at some point in the future, but I hadn’t thought that day would be today.

And now what? Was I supposed to let go? Just like that?

A grapefruit-sized ball of emotion swelled in my throat and brought tears to my eyes. I didn’t know what to do or say, how to act or feel.

So I sat on the step, wrestling with old demons and the ugly voices in my head that insisted I was better off alone…and that maybe it was what I deserved.

Music thumped through the door and rattled the windows of my house. Shit. I forgot about Trinsky and the other guys staying with me. I stood on my front porch for a hot second and quickly decided I wasn’t in the mood.

It was quieter next door at Grams’s and her hearing wasn’t great, so I doubted the incessant drumbeat registered at all. Of course, she’d ask what was wrong and why I’d shown up out of the blue. Not ideal, but it was better than getting shitfaced and spilling my guts to a teammate and a couple of strangers.

Yeah, Grams was safer.

“What the hell are you doing here?”

I stood in the foyer, surrounding by faded family photos, unsure how to answer that question. I opened my mouth, hoping something clever would come out, but that fucking lump expanded.

“I…”

Grams cocked her head curiously, her gaze softening as she reached for my hand. “Come in, love.”

I followed her into the living room, unsurprised by the flash of déjà vu of teenage me standing in front of her fireplace, lost and shaken, reeling from my mom’s sudden spiral into darkness. I’d never felt more alone in my life, and this tiny gruff woman had seemed like the least likely safe space ever. I’d been wrong. She’d hugged me as if she’d known me all my life, not just an unknown kid she’d sent birthday and holiday cards to over the years.

She looked me up and down now and opened her arms wide.

I’d grown a few inches taller since high school, but I bent low and let her hug me. Maybe my eyes leaked a bit…so what? I was fucking wrecked, and I couldn’t think straight. Nothing added up. Math failed me, words failed me. I was a walking bundle of emotions I couldn’t compute. It was easier to lean on Grams.

She didn’t fuss or ask uncomfortable questions that night.

She waited till morning.

I showered and got dressed for a day at camp, hoping to sneak out of the house without disturbing Grams, but she was up and serving coffee.

“Good morning,” I mumbled. “I’m going to head to the rink and get some reps in. I’ll grab a latte in town.”

Grams pointed at the old wooden kitchen table. “Sit.”

I obeyed. “Okay…one cup.”

She handed me a mug and sat across from me. “It’s okay, you know.”

“What is?”

“To be sad.”

I sipped my coffee. “I’m fine.”

“Tell me about him.”

My eyes snapped to hers. “Huh?”

“You’re not the sharpest tool in the shed in the morning, are you? Did you really think I didn’t know about you and the cowboy?”

I squinted, burying my nose in my mug in temporary avoidance. “Hank?”

Grams nodded. “Yeah, him. He’s cuckoo about you. I knew it the first day he came to see me at the bakery. He smiled when he said your name. It was cute. At first, I felt bad for him. I thought, ‘That man is barking up the wrong tree. Too bad, ’cause he’s handsome as all get out.’ But after a while, I noticed it wasn’t so one-sided.”

“Oh.” Yeah, I’d lost command of the alphabet.

“Are you gay or the other one…” She tapped her fingers on the table. “The one where you like both.”

“Bi. Yes.”

“Okay. Well, I don’t know if you need to hear it, but I love you no matter what.”

“Thanks, Grams.”

“I know I’m being nosy now, but I don’t see the problem. You like him, he likes you…what else is there? Hockey?” She waited a beat for me to respond. When I didn’t, she continued. “Does anyone care about who’s schtupping who anymore?”

I snorted my coffee. “Jesus, Grams.”

She pursed her lips primly. “As long as you’re happy and no one gets hurt, why does it matter?”

“I don’t know,” I said…just to say something.

Grams shook her head, suddenly looking small and fragile. “You don’t talk about your feelings, never have, and I understand. It hurts. Life can be cruel, but Denny…it can be beautiful too. Don’t close yourself off. Don’t hide behind a hockey stick your whole life. It might be satisfying for a few years, but if you’re not careful you’ll wind up with a cold bed and a stick up your ass.”

I chuckled around that stupid ball in my throat. “Thanks for the visual.”

“You’re welcome.” She leaned on the table as she stood and set her gnarled, thin hand over mine. “Be brave, my boy…on the ice and off.”

“Thanks. I’ll try.”

She squeezed my fingers and toddled to the refrigerator. “Good. Now I’m making pancakes. You might as well invite those morons next door. It’ll give me a chance to yell at the tattoo boy for playing his damn music so loud.”

“You got it. Hey, Grams…”

“Hmm?”

“I don’t know if I’ve ever told you this, but…you’re my hero.” To my horror, my voice cracked, and that was the kind of display that mortified my stoic grandmother.

Grams grinned through a sheen of tears. “And you’re mine. I love you, Denny boy. Very much.”

I hugged her till she squawked and shooed me out the door.

Once upon a time, I would have gone straight to the rink to lose myself on a patch of ice. Hockey hadn’t solve my problems, but it had given me purpose and had introduced me to some amazing people.

Including Hank.

Yeah, I was still sad, confused, and I had no idea how to make things right, but the sun was shining, there were pancakes on the griddle in my grandmother’s kitchen, and a group of campers waiting for me at the rink.

It was a start.

23

HANK

My heart hurt like hell. And the only cure I could think of was work.

I hired additional help in the stable so I could spend extra time at the mill. I arrived early every morning and suited up for jobs I hadn’t personally done in years. I drove the forklift, worked the kiln, and unloaded shipments. I met with the builder, the loggers, the mechanics. I set meetings to talk to leaders in the Four Forest area in the hopes of generating interest and in opening discussions about fundraising.

I didn’t linger on any specific chore, I didn’t waste time with idle chatter, and I avoided Elmwood like the plague. I was a fucking chicken. I was raw and miserable, and one “Where’ve you been?” away from a breakdown.

And yes, I was afraid of running into Denny. I’d hurt him, and I hated myself for it. I vacillated between thinking I should never have uttered those three stupid words and being glad I’d been honest. I did love him, and it sucked to know there was no way we could make it work.

Our worlds were too different. Denny would be off to preseason training soon and the media would be hounding him, analyzing his game and debating whether he was talented enough to warrant an astronomical pay raise. No doubt it would be easier to keep up the charade that he and MK were still together than let them know he was single and bisexual. But he had to navigate that on his own.

And I had a job to do. Celebrity endorsement was a nice idea but what the mill really needed was leadership, so I rolled up my sleeves and got to it.

“Oh, good, you’re here. Your dad is on line one.” Emily pointed at the blinking red light on her console and shoved a plate of cookies at me. “I made those last night. Chocolate chip, peanut butter. They’re delicious. Don’t leave them at your desk, or I’ll be offended.”

My assistant loved me now. Go figure.

“Uh…thank you.” I gave what I hoped passed for a smile, then took the cookies into my office and picked up my phone. “Hi, Dad. How are you feeling?”

“Don’t fuss about me. I’m calling to check on you.”

“Everything is going well at the mill and⁠—”

“I meant you, not the mill,” he intercepted.

“I’m fine.”

“Hmm. Are you sure? I know you didn’t count on dealing with a protest…in a forest in Vermont of all places.”

I perched on the edge of the desk and gave him a mini report of recent goings on, adding, “I probably should have started out by meeting with town council members in January, but I doubt they’d have been receptive then either. I’ll be in Denver in a few days. I’ll talk to Carl and your team there to discuss a plan for Wood Hollow.”

“What about the hockey player? You’re friends, right? Maybe ask him about the promo again while he’s still in town.”

“He offered to do it,” I said, biting the inside of my cheek.

“Hey! That’s fantastic! Geez, you’re a damn natural, kid,” he gushed. “Get that set up and come home. Let Cooper handle the meetings. Once the promo is out, we’re golden. We’ll hire a CEO and a⁠—”

“I’m not going anywhere, Dad.”

“What are you talking about? You wanted six months—it’s been six months, and you’ve done what you set out to do. Rome wasn’t built in a day. Wood Hollow will take some time getting up to speed, but you’ve done your share. Bring the horses home, buy a couple more, and call Cassy. She’ll be more than happy to help you get your practice started. You’ve earned it, Hank.”

I paced to the window and stared out at the slice of forest behind the warehouse at the enormous flatbed truck, the row of forklifts, and neatly stacked timber. Sure, there was more to do, but someone else could take over and damn…that was tempting.

I opened my mouth to tell him so, but something else came out. “They need me, and I think I can make a difference.”

Silence.

“I thought you hated it there,” he huffed skeptically.

“Well…I don’t.”

“What about the therapy practice you wanted?”

“I think this is more important now.”

My father hummed thoughtfully. “Christ, Hank, I’m proud of you.”

Whoa. That stopped me. I hadn’t heard those words in…ever.

“I…thanks, Dad. But I haven’t done anything yet. It’s still the same here.”

“But you will. You’re going to see this through, aren’t you?”

I bit the inside of my cheek. “I am.”

“Good. Your mom would be proud too. Love you, son. Hey, did I tell you about…”

I caught every other word for the duration of the call. Honestly, I was still reeling from his praise.

I knew my dad loved me, but it was safe to say I frustrated him. He wanted at least one of his kids to be like him, and I’d tried, but man, those were hard shoes to fill. I never seemed to get it right. I used to think being gay was a hurdle he hadn’t really gotten over, but it wasn’t that. He’d known early on what he wanted from life and I was just figuring it out now.

In Elmwood, of all places. And Wood Hollow.

Between mornings and evenings at the stable and long hours at the mill, I’d neglected some basic necessities…like purchasing coffee. And I hadn’t realized I was out till it was too late to put in an order for delivery. If I wanted caffeine, I was going to have to venture into town and buy it from Rise and Grind. I supposed I could go without, but I wasn’t a masochist. And if I went early enough, I wouldn’t run into anyone I knew who might ask probing questions, like…

“Where have you been?” JC motioned for me to join him and Riley in line, turning to the guy I’d cut in front of with a quick, “Sorry, but this is important. You know my friend, Hank Cunningham, oui?”

“I do. I work for him.” Niall offered his hand and shook mine with gusto. “I haven’t had a chance to say anything yet, but…I wanted to thank you for your speech earlier in the week. It was good, ya know? I think we all needed to hear that you’re committed to the town.”

I nodded. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Niall released my hand and patted my shoulder. “Glad to hear it. Let me buy you a cup of coffee.”

“No, no, we are buying his coffee. You will try again tomorrow,” JC insisted, pulling me along with him in line.

Riley chuckled. “Go along with it. Jean-Claude doesn’t take no for an answer.”

“My husband is a smart man. So…ça vas? Why are you hiding from us? You haven’t been to zee diner in a week. Did you eat something bad? If so, it was not in my kitchen. Check the dates on your condiments, eh?”

“I’m fine, but thanks for⁠—”

“No, you’re too skinny.” JC barreled to the front of the line and greeted Ivan. “We will have three lattes and three croissants, s’il te plaît. No, make it four. Two for the cowboy without the hat. He needs food.”

“You got it,” Ivan enthused. “You’re going to freak out. I’ve been practicing new art and I’ve got something fun for you.”

“That is frightening, but…merci.”

I joined Riley and JC at the side counter, clutching a bag of croissants and making small talk about the weather, the new menu at the diner, the movie star sighting in Pinecrest, and the raccoon who upended Mr. Jenkins’s trash and was seen gnawing on a VHS jazzercise video.

“Jazzercise? That’s awesome,” I commented with a half laugh.

“The best part was that a fourteen-year-old camper found the tape and had no idea what it was,” Riley reported. “Listening to Vinnie and Ronnie trying to explain old technology to a bunch of teenagers was freaking hysterical. We all appreciated the moment of levity. The big scrimmage is tonight and tensions are high. Well…not really, but we pump it up all week, so this is serious stuff.”

“Former pros and current pros compete,” JC added. “It will be a bloodbath.”

“Hey!” Riley huffed.

“In a good way.”

“Ta-da! A cactus!” Ivan set our lattes on the counter with a flourish. “What do you think?”

JC rubbed his beard, lifting one eyebrow. “It’s a kinky cactus. Like a penis with thorns.”

Ivan threw his hands in the air in mock surrender. “You’re the worst. Have a good day, boys.”

I chuckled as I followed them outside, feeling lighter than I had all week. “Thanks again for the latte and the croissants. I appreciate it.”

“You’re welcome. See you at the scrimmage tonight,” Riley said, hooking his arm in JC’s.

I was definitely not going to the scrimmage, but I lifted the to-go cup as I turned—and immediately ran into the man I’d been thinking about nonstop for days.

“Sorry about that. I—Denny.”

And this, right here, was what I’d hoped to avoid. My pulse raced and my hands went clammy as I drank in the sight of him like a man dying of thirst.

He looked sexy as always in his black joggers, snug tee, and a Condors ball cap, his longish hair spilling out the sides. The desire to touch him was so strong—a brush of fingers or elbows…something, anything.

“Hey.” He cleared his throat and inclined his head toward the bakery. “I just dropped Grams off.”

“Coffee.” I pointed at my cup awkwardly.

“My next stop.”

“Good call.” I stepped around him. “I should⁠—”

“Come to the scrimmage,” he blurted. “I heard Riley and he’s right…you should come.”

I swallowed hard. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“It’s a great idea. Everyone will be there and…you’re kind of a hero in town.”

“They’re just impressed that I know how to operate a forklift,” I snarked.

“I’m impressed too.” Denny’s lips curled on one side.

“Yeah, well…”

“Come by,” he whispered. “One last time…please.”

The urgency in his tone was my undoing. Or maybe I was charmed by the contrast of his boyish shrug and masculine jocklike aura. It wasn’t smart and I knew it would hurt, but I couldn’t say no.

“Okay.”

24

DENNY

Ihad a bad week. Like super sucky.

All I could think about was Hank. I thought about him constantly and heard about him all over town. He’d become a mini celebrity with locals who were impressed with how he’d handled the situation at the mill. Suddenly, everyone was talking about him.

“Hank Cunningham is just what the Four Forest area needs.”

“Hank’s a good man.”

“Oh, my gosh, he’s dreamy too.”

Yeah, I agreed. He hadn’t needed my help. He’d done it himself. I wanted to tell Hank I was proud of him, but I wasn’t sure he’d want to hear from me. And to be honest, I was a little angry with him. He’d blindsided me, told me he loved me, and now I didn’t know what to think.

A week of meetings in New York, Philly, and Denver, smiling for the press and assuring everyone I was ready for whatever the fuck came next, and I was mentally and physically depleted. I’d come to the conclusion that I didn’t know how to just be…happy.

My value, my purpose, my reason was hockey. What else did I have?

I had friends, I had a home, I had Grams. That should have been enough, but I wanted more.

I wanted Hank.

I admit it, I was greedy. My agent was more excited than me about contract negotiations and PR, and I couldn’t have cared less.

“That’s it! We’re set. I’ll meet you in Denver on Tuesday,” McD said. “We’ll chat before the press conference and get our ducks in a row. You don’t have to say much. Something simple about how happy you are to stay in Denver will work. Any questions?”

There was that word again…happy.

I fiddled with my AirPod and sank onto a bench in the empty locker room at the El Rink. “No.”

“Great. Sounds like we’re ready to go. Talk to you soon, Den.”

I disconnected the call and picked up a roll of tape, spinning it idly on one finger as I checked out the familiar surroundings with its lingering aroma of sweaty jocks and ammonia. I rested my elbows on my knees, tossing the tape as I formulated a speech in my head. Not for the press. This one was for Elmwood.

I didn’t know how much I’d share, but I knew it was time to speak up.

The Elmwood Juniors’ end of camp scrimmages were a highlight every year. We hosted playoff games between our winningest teams and a skills competition where players could show off their stick-handling ability, shooting accuracy, and speed.

The final event was the coach’s game, featuring visiting pros and the El Rink and Elmwood High hockey staff, which consisted of former pros who in some cases had been retired for a decade or longer. It was supposed to be fun and silly. No one wanted to risk injury. Or as Smitty put it, “If I have to take ice baths for a month after this, I will be fucking pissed.”

We taunted each other good-naturedly on the ice and tried to deliver an entertaining show for the parents and teens. And the entire Four Forest area, along with a contingent from the press.

Our audience ate it up.

Jake, Trinsky, and I skated circles around Vinnie, Riley, Court, and Smitty, showing off our NHL prowess while the older guys hammed it up. Vinnie played air guitar in between puck drops and Smitty made up a ridiculous dance that had the crowd roaring with laughter. It was hysterical, and it reminded me to stop taking myself so seriously and just have fun. So I did.

I showed off my speed, slowing at the net to pass to Jake. At the last second, I deked past Vinnie instead and buried the shot myself.

“Be kind to your elders,” Vinnie huffed.

“Oh, right. Like you would do?” Jake teased.

“Fuck, no.”

I laughed, tapping my stick to Jake’s as I scanned the crowd, looking for Hank.

I thought I’d spotted him earlier, but I couldn’t be sure. I checked again at the end of the scrimmage, and again when we lined up for a brief award ceremony where each coach gave a short speech, thanking the kids and their families.

Grams was in the second row next to MK, Niall, Micah, and his girlfriend. I saw Nolan, JC, and Bryson, but…no Hank.

He wasn’t here.

“…to thank everyone in Elmwood. You guys rock! I’m coming back next year. Save me some cookies, Grams,” Trinsky hollered, passing the microphone to Jake.

“I want to thank our juniors for being so dedicated and…”

“Thank you, parents! Has anyone thanked the parents yet?”

I clapped through speech after speech. And then, the mic was in my hand. I stared at it for a beat, glanced up at the fans once more, and skated forward.

“Hi, everyone. I usually keep it super short, but I wanted to say something kind of personal,” I began, blocking out the curious twitter in the arena. “I came here when I was fifteen almost sixteen, and it was a rough time for me. I’d lost my dad, and I didn’t know anyone, and hockey was my thing. It taught me some big lessons about cooperation, friendship, and gratitude. As a bisexual athlete who’s struggled with depression and anxiety, I know the value of community. Elmwood rocks, and I hope every teen who’s come through our camp this summer has felt a little bit of the magic of this incredible place. Hope to see you again next year.”

I skated to the blue line and handed off the microphone. Thunderous applause rained from the rafters, and in an instant, I was surrounded by my teammates and the coaches I’d grown up idolizing in a group hug.

“Holy fuck, Mellon. That was more than three fucking words. And did you just fucking come out?” Trinsky asked, gripping my elbow.

“Yeah, I did.”

Trinsky thumped my shoulder. “Hey, I’m proud of you, man.”

Jake squeezed my head, Court jabbed my side, Vinnie and Riley tapped their sticks to mine, and Smitty hugged the living daylights out of me. I laughed as I gazed up at the audience, looking for Hank one last time.

And…there he was.

Hank stood in the aisle, clapping, his Stetson cocked slightly, a broad smile on his face.

And you know, this was happiness.

It was him.

I sent a text as soon as I was off the ice. I had another speech to give. And this one mattered most of all.

The light next to the barn door illuminated the picnic table and the nearby paddock where a cowboy stood leaning with one foot on the fence, speaking softly to his horses. It was like a scene out of a movie or the cover of a Western-themed romance, complete with a hint of mist on the horizon. He looked solid and safe. Like home.

Hank tilted his hat and met my gaze. “Congratulations.”

“For what?”

“Coming out. You knew the risk, and you did it anyway. That was brave.”

“I don’t know…maybe.” I tugged at the brim of my ball cap, took it off my head, and put it on backward to give my hands something to do. Fuck, I was nervous. “There’s a chance that the Condors management will have second thoughts about me. I might get to Denver and be asked to clear out my locker.”

Hank scoffed lightly. “I sincerely doubt that will happen.”

“Doesn’t matter. I have no regrets.”

My heart was pounding in my ears, and my hands were shaky as fuck. I didn’t trust myself with words. I’d already used my quota for the week at the rink, but damn it, I’d come here to say something, and I wasn’t going anywhere now.

I stepped closer, drinking in his cool, confident aura. I wanted the right to move into his space, lay my head on his shoulder, and just…be. And maybe I could have it all if I could find my voice one more time.

But he was talking. “I’m glad. Good luck in Denver and in⁠—”

“No. No good luck, no good-bye,” I choked out. “I have something to say, and I need you to listen.”

“What is⁠—”

“I love you.”

Hank stilled his hand on Bess’s flank. “You…love me?”

“Very fucking much.” My voice cracked, but I didn’t stop. I couldn’t stop…not now. “I’ve been my own worst enemy for a long time. Maybe I’ve had good reasons, but I don’t want to let days and months and years go by, living in a bubble on the ice, living for the next shot, the next game, the next season. I want more. I want you.”

“Denny, I⁠—”

“No, I mean it. Remember when I said I didn’t want the big love story? I was lying. I’m just…scared. But I do want it. With you. I want your stories, your smiles, your body, your brain, your patience. I want to ride horses with you, make dinner with you, talk to you, sleep with you, wake up next to you. And I want you to call me sweetheart every day ’cause it’s the only fuckin’ nickname that matters to me. You matter to me, Hank. I love you.”

He pulled me close and crashed his mouth over mine, kissing me till we were both breathless. “I love you too, but it’s not so simple. You have a big life ahead of you, Den. A hot career and a lot of eyes on you. Admitting you’re bi is one thing, but being in a relationship with a man is another.”

I nodded. “I know. It’s probably naïve to think we can have everything we want right away, but I have a proposition.”

“Oh, yeah?” His eyes shone and his lips twitched in amusement.

“Be mine from now until…always.”

“Done.”

“That’s not how a proposition works. It’s an exchange of goods and services,” I reminded him with a shy smile. “I tell you what I want, and you tell me what it’ll take to close the deal. Say the word, and I’ll do whatever it is to make you the happiest motherfucker in the world. I’ll muck out horse stalls, bring you coffee in bed, run errands…you get the gist. I want you…what do you need from me?”

Hank held my face in his hands, tracing my jawline with his thumbs. “I want you to play hockey.”

“Wait, I wasn’t talking about hockey.”

“It’s what I want, Den. I love you, and I want you to crush your goals and every record on the books. If we’re in this together, we can have it all. I want you to make your dreams come true. And I’ll be here for you…in the background. I’ll be the guy waiting at home, clothing optional. You be the hotshot. I’ll be your compass, your home for as long as you want me, sweetheart.”

“Forever.”

He beamed. “Forever it is.”

We kissed again, slowly as if we had all the time in the world. And maybe we did.

I let go of fear. I said good-bye to my old ghosts, and opened my heart completely…to Hank. He was my rock, my home, my cowboy, my happy place. And this was the beginning of our big love story.

EPILOGUE

“Come live in my heart and pay no rent.” —Samuel Lover

Five years later

Time Magazine

Fresh off his second Stanley Cup win, Denny Mellon has catapulted to an unprecedented level of fame, thanks to his talent on and off the ice. In fact, he’s entered the single-moniker name status. Just Mellon will do.

Out Magazine

Mile High City’s Number 11 is flying high! Even if you’re not a hockey fan, you’ve probably heard of Mellon. The twenty-seven-year-old star famously came out as bisexual five years ago and is rumored to have secretly wed his partner, developer Hank Cunningham.

Travel + Leisure

The Four Forest area is Vermont’s greatest secret. Quaint towns along the winding rounds through picturesque forests provide an enchanting backdrop. The newly revitalized Wood Hollow is a must see! Its transformation from mill town to vibrant community is thanks in part to mill owner Hank Cunningham and sponsorship from some of hockey’s biggest stars.

People

Hockey star marries long-time partner! Exclusive pics coming!

Hank

The stalls had been cleaned, the horses fed and watered. There were no other chores, but I was itching to do something. I could pull another few bales of hay down, maybe take Denny’s new colt out for a quick walk along the trail.

“Don’t even think about it,” Denny warned, stepping into the barn. “Everyone’s waiting for us, including Grams and your dad. Let’s not be late.”

I tipped my hat back to deliver a proper scowl. “The guy wins the Stanley Cup again, and suddenly he’s Mr. Bossy.”

“You know it,” Denny snorted. He wrapped his arms around my waist and pressed a chaste kiss on my cheek. “Hey, this is your moment. You did this, and you should be so fucking proud. I know I am.”

I lifted his fingers to my lips and turned his palm up to trace the letters tattooed on his wrist—HCDM VI XXX—our initials and June 30, the day we’d secretly tied the knot. Well, okay, it wasn’t a complete secret.

We’d invited our closest friends and family to the small party at the barn to celebrate Denver’s epic Stanley Cup win in game seven against Ontario. It wasn’t the only gathering in Elmwood to celebrate the exciting event. There’d been parades, block parties on Main Street in all four towns in the Four Forest area, and a semi-private party at the diner. But we’d wanted to host one of our own for a more intimate group and surprise them with a brief round of “I dos.”

There was no press, no outside photographers or videographers. Just thirty of our favorite people. Was it really a surprise? Doubtful.

Denny came out officially at the beginning of his second season in the NHL. He didn’t confirm that he was seeing anyone at the time, just that he was bi and wanted to be a role model for kids who might be struggling with their sexuality. In his words, it was his turn to step up and be present.

“I want to do this now, when I’m at the beginning of my career, playing great hockey. I want to be visible. I want kids to know they can literally be anything they set their minds to. Being bi isn’t a weakness. It’s just who I am. I’m driven, I’m competitive, I play hockey, and my goal is to win the cup at least twice before I’m thirty. And I’m going to do it. Any questions?”

Denver won the Stanley Cup that year and the next, so…it was safe to say, the hotshot meant business. Denny was Denver’s franchise and one of the biggest stars in the league. His career trajectory was everything sports analysts, coaches, and hockey fans had predicted from the start. He read the ice like a book and seemingly scored at will, putting on a show in front of sold-out arenas across North America.

He’d been a guest on a medley of late-night talk shows, hosted SNL once, and had given commencement speeches at a few universities, as well as Elmwood High. The man who’d guarded his words like a miser now gave them freely. He spoke about his struggles with anxiety, depression, and grief in the hopes of helping others. That was his mantra: Give back. Be there for someone else. Pay it forward.

His energy and dedication were humbling. Watching him grow into a true superstar was an incredible honor. And to know I was the one he looked for in the crowd or signaled to after every interview with a reporter was…well, kind of fucking beautiful.

We’d split our time between Denver and Elmwood as evenly as possible over the past five years. I went to his games when I was in Denver and traveled to away games when I was able to, usually with friends. If a nosy reporter asked if he was dating anyone, Denny gave a standard, “My private life is private.” And that was fine by me.

We didn’t advertise our relationship, but most of the folks in Elmwood knew we were together. I mean, we shared a house, horses, and even went into business together. More about that in a second.

Getting married hadn’t been on the agenda, but he’d come home to Elmwood after a series of games in Canada, worn out and sore. He’d been quieter than usual, pensive. We’d sat in front of the fireplace one night with our dog, George, curled at Denny’s feet, and he’d blurted, “I want to marry you.”

Romantic, right?

We discussed a quick trip to town hall, but ultimately, we wanted our favorite people to be there, especially Grams and my dad. Grams was ninety-two and showed no signs of slowing down, but my father wasn’t doing as well. His trip here this week would probably be his last. But he’d insisted, and I was glad.

I kissed Denny and nodded. “You’re right. Let’s do this.”

We drove up the hill, our truck hugging the curving road leading to Wood Hollow. The copse of hollowed out trees thinned as we approached Belvedere, giving a sweet view of the new homes built near the lake. We continued along the widened road past refurbished lamplights and the quaint fountain donated by Pinecrest. Crisp black awnings covered the colorful storefronts.

I smoothed my palm on my khakis, idly noting the line in front of the new Rise and Grind.

“Are you nervous?” Denny asked, reaching for my hand.

“Yes, and I don’t know why. It’s just a formality. A silly pat on the back with pictures.”

He snorted. “I don’t think anyone here would agree with you. Wow. Geez, Hank. This is amazing.”

Denny parked the truck in my space at the mill and bumped my elbow as we headed toward the red ribbon draped across Main Street. I stopped at the sidewalk and gazed out at the sea of familiar faces who’d gathered for the official ribbon-cutting ceremony for the revitalized township of Wood Hollow.

This was the result of the efforts I’d spearheaded five years ago to raise money to rebuild Wood Hollow. Denny and I had started a foundation to revamp parks, schools, and infrastructure. There was a real market now, a yoga studio, a ceramics shop, a bakery, a diner, and a coffee shop. The new construction had brought a flood of new citizens, but the foundation gave the old-timers a say in the renovations.

Not everyone loved the influx of visitors, but the majority agreed that this old town had new life, thanks to the mill…and maybe me. It hadn’t been easy and this wasn’t the project I’d set my sights on, but like Denny, I wanted to give back, so I’d rolled up my sleeves and gotten to work.

Denny linked his pinky with mine. “Hey, I have another proposition for you.”

“Oh?”

“I’ll let you hold my hand if you kiss me on Main Street.”

I smiled at my man. “But someone might see, sweetheart.”

“Let ’em. You in?” he taunted.

I brushed my mouth over his and kissed him. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

My heart swelled in my chest as he slipped his hand in mine. Within twenty-four hours, I had a feeling the world would know their favorite hotshot hockey player was married to a guy. I didn’t mind at all.

I was proud of us…the things we’d overcome, the life we’d built. This was our truth, our big love story.

Our forever.

Thank you for reading Denny and Hank’s story!

Turn the page for more information about the Elmwood Stories and get a sneak peek of my next release, Winnie Take Paris. And be sure to subscribe to my newsletter, Lane’s Letters for upcoming release news, and check out my website for free short stories, including “It’s a Baby Thing…”, featuring Smitty and Bryson from Thin Ice!

A NOTE FROM LANE

Have I mentioned that I love small-town romances? I’ve had the best time creating and spending time in Elmwood, and I’m so happy you have too! I want to slide into a booth at Elmwood Diner, watch at game at the rink, grab a latte from Rise and Grind, and order a maple cookie from Henderson’s Bakery. I love it when places and characters feel tangible. Like…there really must be a town just like Elmwood out there!

I’m happy to report, I have one more book planned for the Elmwood Stories, and then we’ll be moving on to a new town. Wood Hollow? Pinecrest? Fallbrook? Which would you choose?

But first up, we’re going to Paris! My next release, Winnie Takes Paris, is a low-angst rom-com set in the city of light. An uber-fabulous hairdresser in need of a break takes a short-term job acting as an assistant to an absentminded British professor. These two couldn’t be any different, but somehow…love strikes! Take a peek on the next page.

Happy Reading! Lane Hayes

EXCERPT FROM WINNIE TAKES PARIS- COMING FALL 2024

“To Paris!”

I tapped my teacup to his flute glass. “To Paris.”

Winnie watched me cautiously. “Did I get your tea right? Raine said you like a smidge of milk and sugar.”

“Uh, yes. It’s brilliant. Thank you.”

He grinned. “You’re welcome. What should we do now?”

“Wait for the train,” I replied evenly.

Winnie threw his back and laughed, drawing a few curious glances our way. The lounge wasn’t exactly a library, but there was an unspoken acknowledgment that this was a quiet zone.

“Got that. I meant, what about work? I’m your assistant. If you need me to do anything, just say the word and I’m there.”

“Thank you. I appreciate your diligence, but there’s no need. Enjoy your champagne,” I said in a tone that clearly marked the end of the conversation.

Winnie didn’t take the hint. “Do you like champagne?”

“No, I do not.”

He flattened his hand over his heart. “Why not? Champagne is the elixir of the gods, sunshine in a flute, bubbles for the soul.”

I shrugged. “I’m afraid I don’t care for bubbles at all. I don’t want to drink them anyway.”

“Mm, you’re missing out. I would bathe in champagne bubbles if I could,” he hummed indulgently.

“That sounds…sticky.”

Winnie’s lips twitched. “You’re right. It also sounds like a waste of a good thing and I wouldn’t sacrifice a single sip of this stuff.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond or if I was supposed to, but this was probably a good time to remind Winnie that I didn’t need him to entertain me or vice versa. Or perhaps this was a good time to ask him a few questions and be done with the prerequisite niceties.

What sort of questions, though? I had no clue. This was the sort of thing Raine usually handled for me.

When in doubt, ask Google.

I set my cup on the side table, pulled my cell from my pocket, and typed, Questions for a new acquaintance.

Google suggested the following: Number one, ask personal information—likes, dislikes, favorite color, hobbies. Not a chance. In my admittedly limit experience, that line of inquiry invited reciprocity, and there was no point in pretending we shared any common interests.

Number two, comment on something pleasant, such as the weather. I glanced out the rain-streaked window and quickly abandoned that suggestion. Too dire.

Number three, pay a compliment. That seemed like a safe option. Winnie was very…winsome. He had beautiful olive skin, perfectly coiffed hair, a flair for fashion, and⁠—

“You have lovely eyes,” I blurted.

Winnie froze mid sip, quirking his head as he slowly lowered his flute. “Are you flirting with me, Professor?”

“I—no! No, I…no,” I sputtered, wrinkling my nose, licking my lips, and blinking in rapid succession. “That was a statement, not a flirtation. I don’t do flirtations, so you’re quite safe there.”

“Am I?”

He was teasing. The spark in his eyes held pure mischief, but I didn’t know the rules of engagement. Was I supposed to say something clever in return? Possibly, probably. Witty banter wasn’t my strong suit, so I went with the truth instead.

“I couldn’t help noticing that you’re wearing makeup and…you look quite smart.”

His megawatt grin hit me like a bolt of lightning. “I do? How so? I’ve never been told my application of Chanel Stylo Yeux in espresso gave collegiate vibes. Thank you.”

“Uh, no. I didn’t mean smart in that sense. That is to say, I’m sure you’re very intelligent, but I meant you look…nice.”

His smile didn’t waver. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Well done, old chap. Now, leave it alone. Unfortunately, I couldn’t shut my gob. This was bad…very bad. “Ancient Egyptian men wore cosmetics, and depending on their rank and social class, they wore a lot of it. The kohl liner they used had practical purposes too. It shielded one from the sun’s rays and repelled insects. They used animal fats and oils to create moisturizers, shampoos, and even to prevent baldness. Interesting, isn’t it? They’d rub fat from a snake or a⁠—”

“Okay.” Winnie held his hand up. “That’s a lot of information.”

“That’s hardly the tip of the iceberg,” I assured him.

“I bet.” He gestured to the corner of his eye. “I made a last minute trip to Sephora for this stuff. Much easier than wrangling a snake.”

“Sephora, derived from the Greek sephos, or beauty.”

Oh, bloody blooming bollocks. What was wrong with me?

I was afraid of this. I didn’t actually think it would be this bad, but in my gut I knew I couldn’t function normally around someone like Winnie. I hadn’t realized I’d turn into a human encyclopedia, though. Not good.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lane Hayes lives in sunny Southern California with her amazing husband, who thankfully doesn’t mind cooking, and their fabulous fox red Labrador, George, who’s pure mischief. Both provide oodles of inspiration for the low-angst, humorous books Lane loves to write.

She’s been telling stories about sexy, funny, sometimes geeky and quirky men who find love for a dozen years now and loving every minute. In her previous life, she sat at a desk and dealt with numbers, so yes…romance is much more satisfying!

Lane loves tea, travel, and chocolate…in any order. Add a book and she’s set!

*Join Lane’s reading group, Lane’s Lovers for immediate updates!

ALSO BY LANE HAYES

The Elmwood Stories- Small Town/Hockey Series

You, Again

Next Season

Holiday Crush

Thin Ice

Hot Shot

Standalones

The Humbug Holiday

Fairy Cakes in Winter

The London Chance

Falling For Raine

Winnie Takes Paris - Coming Fall 2024

The Script Club- Nerd/Jock Romance

Following the Rules

Rules of Play

The Jock Script

The Holiday List-

The Professor’s Date

Love and History

Starting From Series

Starting From Zero

Starting From Scratch

Starting From Here

Starting From Somewhere

Starting From the Top

Starting From The Complete Collection (Including Five Short Stories)

The Baxter Chronicles

The Real Baxter

Baxter’s Right-Hand Man

Out in College Series

Out in the Deep

Out in the End Zone

Out in the Offense

Out in the Field

Out on the Ice

Out in Spring

Out on the Serve

Out in Winter

Out for the Holidays/Out for Gold

Out in the Surf

Light Kinky Fun from Ace’s Wild Series

Stick to the Script (Ace’s Wild Series #13)

San Francisco/Winery Romance

Leaning Into Love

Leaning Into Always

Leaning Into the Fall

Leaning Into a Wish

Leaning Into Touch

Leaning Into the Look

Leaning Into Forever

Leaning Into Series-The Complete Box Set (Including Two Short Stories)

Where it all began… DC/Lawyers & Friends

Better Than Good

Better Than Chance

Better Than Friends

Better Than Safe

Better Than Beginnings (A Matt & Aaron Short Story Collection)

Better Than Home (A Matt & Aaron Short Story)

NYC Rock & Roll Series

A Kind of Truth

A Kind of Romance

A Kind of Honesty

A Kind of Home

LA Friends and Lovers

The Right Words

The Wrong Man

The Right Time

NYC Working Man Romance

A Way with Words

A Way with You