Eliot stuck a little closer to Danny this time, near enough to feel the warmth of his body, be assured he was right there.
They couldn’t have been more different people if they’d tried, but there was definitely something between them. Something more than mutual respect, or lust, or self-interest.
Eliot was falling for Danny, hard and fast.
Or, no, maybe not fast. This had been happening since the first time they’d met. It was just that for every hour he spent with the other man, Eliot came to like him more and more. He actively wanted to spend time with Danny.
Not that Danny needed to know any of that. The last thing Eliot wanted was to scare him away now. As long as he played it cool and tried to read what Danny wanted, he didn’t have to look desperate or needy or any of the things he was quickly realizing he felt.
“So, uh…” Danny said softly as the evening started to wind down. “Obviously feel free to say no, but, umm… you wanna come home with me?”
Eliot laughed at Danny’s nervousness. Maybe he wasn’t the only one who wasn’t completely sure where they stood with each other. “I have to, my car’s there.”
“That’s not… that’s not what I meant.” Danny cleared his throat. “I meant, will you stay the night?”
Eliot didn’t even have to think about his answer. He knew what he wanted, and there was no point in trying to deny it to either of them. Life was too short not to do things like this. “I’d like that,” he said, reaching out to brush his fingertips against the back of Danny’s hand.
To his surprise, Danny grabbed his hand and linked their fingers together instead. Eliot’s heart pounded in his chest, surprised by the strangely tender gesture.
“Thanks,” Danny said, looking down at his feet. A tiny, shy smile spread across his features.
Eliot was starting to think that he could spend a hundred years with this man and still be surprised by him sometimes.
He was starting to think he could spend a hundred years with Danny, full stop. Terrifying as a feeling that big was, it was also exciting.
He couldn’t wait to get back to Danny’s place.
Chapter Sixteen
Danny hummed happily into Eliot’s mouth as he woke, reaching out to grab hold of him. He could get used to waking up like this.
He was starting to think he wanted to get used to waking up like this. He’d been so sure he wasn’t ready for a relationship, but Eliot…
Eliot was different. Completely different, not like anyone Danny had ever been with before. That should have meant they were totally incompatible—they barely had a single thing in common—but Danny couldn’t help feeling at peace when Eliot was around.
They made a strange kind of sense together. It was early days, and maybe Danny was getting ahead of himself, but it didn’t seem like the kind of feeling he should just ignore.
“Morning,” he murmured, his voice rough from disuse. Eliot made a soft, happy sound as he broke away, pressing his nose into Danny’s cheek.
“Good morning, gorgeous,” he said, beaming broadly as he backed off far enough for Danny’s eyes to focus on him.
Danny’s eyes rolled back in his head as Eliot wrapped his hand around his cock and gave it a single, quick tug. He whimpered as Eliot took his hand away again, dismayed.
Eliot chuckled. “That’s just to remind you how much you want me,” he said. “I hate to leave you like this, but I have to get to work.”
“Call in sick,” Danny said, hopeful. He didn’t want Eliot to go, especially on a day when he didn’t have anything else to do.
Eliot had told him on their first date that he liked sex. That had definitely turned out to be true. Everything they’d done had felt good.
Not just physically, but emotionally, as well. There was no guilt, no worry, nothing other than bone-deep satisfaction and a tiny bit of disappointment that Eliot wasn’t going to stay.
“Any other day, I would.” Eliot smiled slowly, leaning closer to kiss Danny again. It was soft, and warm, and Danny wanted as much of it as he could get.
He wanted to kiss Eliot until they were both breathless and exhausted, reduced to lying there together, curled up under the blankets and touching from knees to shoulders.
Danny couldn’t remember ever wanting that before. Not with a specific person, at least. He’d always wanted to feel that way, but he never had.
Whether or not it was a good idea, he was falling for Eliot. Had been falling for Eliot.
Maybe, had already fallen.
“But today, I really, really have to go,” Eliot said as he broke away again, rolling out of bed and starting to gather his clothes. They’d been left in a winding trail that went from the front door to the bedroom, right next to Danny’s.
Danny glanced at the clock. Five am.
He smiled to himself. Eliot was up at five for him, despite the fact that he’d declared it too early when they’d first met.
That felt good. He must have known how early he’d need to get up if he stayed the night. He must have set his alarm in the car on the way home.
And he’d still stayed.
To Danny, that meant the world. It was such a tiny thing, but it was proof that he wasn’t alone in being way more invested in this than he was supposed to be.
“I’ll text you,” Eliot called from the hall, having gathered everything he needed from the bedroom. “Later, beautiful.”
Danny laughed.
No, Danny giggled. Not that he was ever going to admit to that.
Eliot thought he was beautiful.
He flopped back on the bed, looking up at the ceiling and feeling more or less like a sixteen-year-old with a crush. His heart swelled in his chest as he thought of Eliot, even though he could hear him leaving.
It didn’t matter that he was leaving. It mattered that he’d been here, and that he wasn’t running away.
The next time he looked at the clock, it was a little after seven. He hadn’t intended to doze off, but Eliot had worn him out. Even though he didn’t go for a run in the morning anymore, his body still usually woke him at around five and wouldn’t let him go back to sleep.
This time, though, his stomach was complaining. He hadn’t eaten anything substantial last night, and it was well and truly time for breakfast.
While Danny waited for a fresh pot of coffee to finish brewing, he unlocked his phone and hesitated with his thumb hovering over Eliot’s last message.
Was it too soon to text him? It’d only been a few hours, after all.
After another moment of consideration, Danny started a reply anyway. Life was too short to worry about playing cool.
Now that I’m awake, last night was awesome, Danny texted. He didn’t expect an immediate response—Eliot wouldn’t have left in a hurry if he wasn’t busy—but he wanted the message to be there when Eliot next looked at his phone.
He wanted Eliot to know that this was important to him. That it meant more than casual sex, that he wouldn’t have done it with just anyone.
Danny had no idea where they were going from here, but he was excited to find out.
Chapter Seventeen
Eliot didn’t let himself look up from his computer screen until he’d made his noon deadline—with just fifteen minutes to spare. He’d known that he was stretching himself thin by agreeing to go out with Danny after he’d already agreed to write this article, but he’d managed to do both without having to compromise on either.
He sat back and picked up his phone to see if anyone had tried to get in touch with him while he’d been tuning everything out to work, and smiled when he saw a message from Danny.
Glad you thought so, he responded, we should do it again sometime.
I was thinking Friday night, Danny texted back almost immediately. That didn’t necessarily mean he’d been staring at his phone waiting for an answer, but it was nice to think that he’d been expecting one.
If someone had told Eliot just a handful of weeks ago that he’d be grinning and
blushing over getting attention from a hockey player, he would have laughed at them. Now…
Well, now he was grinning and blushing. His heart soared as he tapped a reply into his phone.
Deal, he sent, not wanting to make Danny wait again.
I’ll cook, Danny promised.
You don’t need to sell it to me, I’ll come over.
Okay. Did you get your work thing done?
Just finished. For the record, I had a great time last night, too. In case that wasn’t clear.
Eliot smiled to himself as he thought back to the night before. Not just to the sex, but to the moments in-between and after, when they’d both been exhausted and satisfied and happy to curl up beside each other, talking softly until they’d both passed out.
He was paying for it today, and looking forward to going home and straight to bed the moment he got approval on his article from Ben, but Eliot couldn’t bring himself to care. Danny was worth it.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this happy,” Meg said from behind him, making Eliot jump. He hadn’t heard her approach, too lost in his own thoughts. “What gives?”
“I stayed over at Danny’s last night,” Eliot said, unable to stop himself from smiling stupidly. Meg was right—he’d rarely been this happy in his life.
“You didn’t look like this the last time that happened,” she responded.
Eliot’s stomach sank. He was supposed to have slept with Danny before. He’d practically said that to the rest of the world.
“Uh.” Eliot panicked, thinking desperately of a way to cover up the mistake he’d just made.
“We, umm, we were taking it slow,” he started. “But Danny was afraid that if people knew we were together but not, y’know, together, his teammates might give him crap about it.”
That was a terrible cover up, but it was the one he was stuck with now.
“And I really like him,” Eliot added. “So please don’t tell anyone?”
He gave Meg his best sad puppy look. Danny’s was better than his by a long way, but Danny wasn’t here.
Meg looked at him suspiciously, but then nodded. “Secret’s safe with me,” she said. “I don’t actually care about your sex life.”
Eliot wanted to ask why she’d interrogated him, then, but he realized that was panic talking. Meg didn’t mean any harm, she’d just been making conversation, and now he was being weird.
“Sorry,” Eliot said.
“You get that article finished?” Meg asked.
Eliot nodded. This was much safer territory. “With a few minutes to spare, even.” He smiled wryly.
“Sounds about right. I’ll let you get back to work,” she stepped away from his desk and turned to walk away without another word.
Eliot couldn’t quite shake the feeling that he’d just said something really stupid. He couldn’t afford to forget that he and Danny had been pretending to be together since long before they actually got together.
It didn’t stay in the forefront of his mind because nothing seemed to have come of it. Danny had been expecting advertising deals and team sponsorships from companies eager to show how gay-friendly their products were, but as far as Eliot knew, that hadn’t happened at all.
Some of the conversations he’d had last night had made him wonder about the team’s finances, too. He had no idea what it cost to run a hockey team, but it was hard to imagine that with all the people throwing money at it they couldn’t keep their head above water. People had paid a thousand dollars a ticket to talk to Danny and his teammates for a few minutes each last night.
Maybe he was being stupid about it—maybe even that kind of money didn’t go very far in professional sport—but something about the whole situation was setting off Eliot’s instincts. The instincts that told him when something was off, the same ones that made him the exact kind of curious, suspicious person who was perfect for journalism.
At least, that was what he believed. He’d never really had the chance to prove himself.
This could be that chance. If there was something going on, and he figured it out and took the story to Ben… it could be his ticket to bigger and better things.
Not that writing about men’s grooming wasn’t a perfectly reasonable, noble pursuit, but Eliot had always wanted more. Danny had made vague promises of giving him the opportunity to make connections, and he had—though possibly not in the way he’d intended.
It couldn’t hurt to do a little digging. No one would ever have to know if he didn’t find anything.
If he did, though, it might make his career.
Chapter Eighteen
As he skated out into the rink, Danny felt a sense of peace he’d never experienced before while he was playing. He’d woken up this morning next to Eliot, who’d stayed over after dinner the night before and been around to keep his pre-game anxiety at manageable levels the whole day, and he felt way better than he ever had.
Even with an uncomfortable twinge in his knee, this was much better than normal. He understood now why so many of his teammates were married or had long-term girlfriends. Having someone around when you needed them was amazing.
He was glad this game hadn't been too far from home, so Eliot could come.
He still wasn’t entirely sure where he stood with Eliot. They seemed to be having fun, and Eliot had volunteered to come watch him play today, but they hadn’t discussed what was really going on between them.
Well, other than really great sex. He knew that was going on.
It was hard to stop thinking about the sex.
Danny turned to where he knew Eliot would be sitting, and spotted his purple scarf straight away. He might not have understood hockey, or even cared about it, but he was there anyway.
While that might have been for the sake of appearances, Danny didn’t think that was all there was to it. The part of him that believed no one would ever love him liked to remind him that he was paying Eliot, and tell him that the sex was just a perk, but it didn’t feel like that.
Being around Eliot felt good. It always felt as though he wanted to be there. Danny knew what it was like to hang out with someone who was bored of him as a person and just wanted something from him.
Eliot had never been like that, from the moment they’d met onward. That was why Danny had jumped at the chance to hang out with him more.
Eliot waved eagerly at him, a huge smile on his face. Blushing, Danny waved back. He hoped Eliot would understand why he wasn’t being quite as enthusiastic.
Coming out had been a snap decision, and while he didn’t regret it, he was happy for anyone who didn’t already know to keep not knowing. He was glad not to have to hide anymore, but he felt as though people were constantly staring at him now.
It was nice to have someone here for him, though. His parents had come to a few games before, but not since his dad had died. After that, he’d been alone.
Danny skated into position, taking a deep breath and then looking up at the opposing center. He was a big guy, even by Danny’s standards. At around six-foot-two, Danny was by no means a small man, but this guy had two or three inches in height and another two or three in shoulder width on him.
An easy match so he could impress his boyfriend would have been too much to ask for. Not that Eliot was likely to be able to tell the difference.
Had he just thought of Eliot as his boyfriend? That was new.
That was… nice.
Danny took another deep breath and focused, waiting for the puck to drop. They needed an early advantage, because there was always the risk that his knee would crap out on him for good mid-game and he’d have to be replaced.
It might have been arrogant to think that there wasn’t really anyone on the team who could replace him, but it was also true. He’d been reliable for so long, gotten back up so often, that he’d been assumed bulletproof.
Danny was as surprised as anyone to learn that he wasn’t.
The moment the puck hit the ice, he swung for it. Harder t
han he should have, probably, but he managed to pass it off to Reynolds, who had as good a shot as anyone of taking it to the goal.
Danny’s knee twinged as he spun around, too sharply as always, and headed in the direction of play. Reynolds’ shot bounced off the goal post, maybe a half-inch off target. Danny lunged for it, ready to take advantage of the goalie looking the other way.
He was so busy watching the puck that he missed one of the other guys heading for him until it was too late, taking the full impact of a guy his own size hitting him top speed.
Danny stumbled back, his knee giving out momentarily and landing him on the ice, a surge of pain shooting up his thigh. Tears sprung up in his eyes, but he wasn’t about to shed them. Not over this.
The fall didn’t clue anyone in that he was hurt, so he got up and skated back to play a few moments of defense. He’d wanted to push for an advantage, but with an opposing team smart enough to keep on top of him, it was hard to get a play in edgeways.
A second attempt at pushing the attack found him slammed face-first into the barrier, his helmet bouncing off the plexiglass. He groaned at the impact and pushed the guy behind him off, glad he hadn’t hit his knee this time.
Winded, he spun around to knock the puck out of the other guy’s reach with his skate. His head spun for a moment, pain making him nauseous.
Eliot was in the crowd. He couldn’t give up in front of him.
Tempted as he was to take a break at the first possible opportunity, Danny stuck with it, keeping his plays aggressive, keeping on top of the puck and avoiding the other team, who seemed more interested in him than in it.
Did they know he was hurt? Had someone found out?
The third time he was slammed up against the barrier by the same guy, it took all his willpower not to elbow him in the ribs.
“What the fuck, man?” he growled.
The other guy laughed. “Thought you were into that kinda thing.”
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