Page 85 of Melting the Ice

“Jesus,” Brody said, his throat suddenly tight and dry. Okay, he wasdefinitelyfalling on the appreciative side of this, tonight.

“Just something I thought about,” Dean said modestly.

“That sounds like a pretty advanced maneuver,” Brody said, but his cock was already stirring against his thigh.

Dean just shrugged. “Might not be any good at it. Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try it.”

“Alright, twist my arm,” Brody said.

“Next time,” Dean said.

“Actually—” Brody paused and then straightened up, hand straying downward andyep,Dean was getting hard again too. He wrapped his hand around his cock, giving it an experimental stroke as Dean hissed. “Actually, I think it’s gonna be thenextnext time.”

“I think you’re right, pretty boy,” Dean groaned.

Chapter Twelve

It wasn’t like everygame wasn’t important.

They were.

Coach B and Zach—plus all the many, many coaches Brody had had over the years—had always impressed on him that every single minute on the ice mattered.

But this one loomed even larger. The Evergreens’ main conference rival, the Sabretooths, were in town, and this was the second game they’d played against them in as many days.

In preparation for this weekend’s games, Coach and Zach had them working really hard all week, especially the defense, because the Olympia Sabretooths were considered to have one of the best offensive lines in all of NCAA hockey. Practices had been so long and grueling this week, he’d barely had time to see Dean.

Definitely they hadn’t had time to fool around. Disappointingly.

Brody shoved those thoughts away. Trying to focus on today’s challenge.

Yesterday, they’d narrowly lost, with the Sabretooths scoring a goal in the last five minutes of the third period. Finn had been despondent after, not letting anyone talk to him, and then disappearing.

But today, Brody knew, was a new day. A new game. A new opportunity to make his mark and be part of the team that stopped Olympia.

Right now? They were doing it. They were up 2 to 1, and Brody felt like he was playing his best hockey of the season. Frankly, the Sabretooths had required it. He’d had no choice but to give this challenge everything he had.

“Ten minutes left. Let’s not let them tie it up,” Coach said, during one of the last TV timeouts of the game. He met each player’s eyes, but Brody didn’t miss how his gaze settled on Brody and Ramsey. They’d be spending a lot of this last ten minutes on the ice, hoping to prevent Olympia from tying it up.

“No mistakes,” Ramsey echoed.

“Don’t let them bait you into anything,” Coach added.

They’d only let the Sabers have the power play once this game. And during that one power play, despite his and Ramsey’s best efforts, they’d set up and scored a fairly easy goal twenty seconds in.

Coach turned to say something to Finn, who had a particularly determined tilt to his jaw.

If Brody knew him at all, he’d bet that Finn was already beating himself up for missing that goal.

“Hey,” Ramsey said, nudging Brody. “They’re gonna get aggressive out there, with you. With all of us.”

“Oh, they’re gonnagetaggressive?” Brody questioned. They’d already been pushing him hard, into the boards and getting into his face what felt like every moment of the game so far.

Olympia’s game plan tonight seemed to be to put their most physical line onto the ice, and then wait to send their ace scoring power play team.

It hadn’t worked so far, and Brody—and clearly Ramsey—expected them to push harder.

They’d want to take both of these games and go home to Olympia as the sole leader of the conference. But Brody was determined, in a fierce way that he hadn’t been since the season started, to not let that happen.

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