Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 80035 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 400(@200wpm)___ 320(@250wpm)___ 267(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80035 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 400(@200wpm)___ 320(@250wpm)___ 267(@300wpm)
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.