Page 31 of Lawson

Ritchford nods, wrapping a towel around his hips. “Anything else happening there?” he asks, a giant suggestion of intention behind his eyes as he looks me up and down.

I study him. “Why, did your best friend say something?”

It’s no secret that Pax and our resident massage slash physical therapist, Monroe, are best friends. She also happens to be best friends with Blakely, so it’s likely that some of our more intimate moments got passed through the grapevine to him.

I’m not about to offer the information freely because I'm not a kiss-and-tell kind of guy, but it’ll be hard to deny it if he already knows.

“Why? Would there be something for her to tell me?” he fires back, nothing but mild curiosity on his face.

As far as the vets go, he’s certainly the easiest to get along with. He has this chill vibe about him that only dissipates when he steps onto the ice. Then all calm evaporates and he goes into pure beast mode.

I shrug, rummaging through my things for my shower stuff.

Stokehill whistles conspicuously to my left, and I glance at him curiously. He shakes his head. “Did you not hear Coach the first day? You're supposed to be treating that one like your grandmother.”

“That’s an impossible ask,” I respond. “And who's to say I'm treating her like anything? She's helping me with my skating techniques, same as anyone else would during camp or private lessons.”

Pax flashes me a knowing look, and I cringe internally. Apparently, he knows more than he's letting on. I give another shrug, trying to appear as chill as possible. “We're friends,” I say.

“She's funny. And smart. And we're keeping it casual?—”

“Oh, damn,” Stokehill says. “You mean there's somethingtokeep casual?” He sucks his teeth. “You're so fucked dude.”

“I am not,” I say. Then nod at Pax. “This one is BFFs with our physical therapist. You don't see anybody barking up his ass about it.”

“I've known her forever,” Pax fires back at the same time that Stokehill says, “He's not trying to fuck her.”

Pax clears his throat, digging through his locker while ignoring Stokehill. Wonder what that's about.

“Wait a minute,” I say furrowing my brow. “Who says I'm trying to fuck the skate coach?”

“You better fucking not be,” Kiplin's voice snaps behind us. “Because I promise you that way leads to a world of trouble.” He steps to the other side of the small bench separating us, looking at me with thatfuck the worldattitude he always wears on his face. “Are you?”

I square off with him, not showing an inch of the truth on my face.

Did I want to feel Blakely’s legs wrapped around my hips as I pound into her relentlessly? Hell fucking yes.

Have I acted on it? Hell fucking no.

Blakely and I are walking a thin line between friendship, colleagues, and lust-starved tension on a daily basis, butshe’sin control. Did that make me weak? Probably. But I wasn't pushing anything on her she didn't want.

“No,” I finally answer him.

Kiplin's brows draw together, his eyes scanning me like he's searching for deception. He's not going to find any, because I'm notactivelytrying to seduce her. We have a mutual agreement, one that proved pretty damn effective two weeks ago when I attended the figure skating event with her.

Her douchebag ex seemed to get the hint after I'd put him in his place. She hadn't brought up anything during our private lessons regarding texts from him or any other issues, so hopefully that was that.

Something like disappointment sinks in my gut, heavy and sticky. I don’t wantthat to be that.

I don’t want her to stop needing me, but at the same time, I want her to be free from the borderline abuse of the asshole.

“Good,” Kiplin finally says. “Now are you three going to keep standing here talking about girls you shouldn't be talking about, or are you going to hit the fucking showers?”

“Eager to compare lengths, Captain?” I fire at him.

He rolls his eyes. “Like a fucking hole in the head,” he grunts before heading to the showers.

I give his back a fake salute and shake my head. “I think he's going to win the award for biggest asshole captain in the NHL.”

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