Page 23 of Fire on the Ice

“If I didn’t fuck quite so many people?”

Her hands are on her hips, but she doesn’t look as though she’s about to push me down the steps or anything, so I’ve got that going for me. She may be rough and tumble on the track, but I’ve never known her to be violent anywhere off it, except in bed and I’d describe that more as aggressive—deliciously so—than violent.

“Yes. And I’m sorry. That was shitty, and wrong, and it has way more to do with my own insecurities than it does with the choices you make. I’d like to think if I’d had more time to think about it and be rational that I might’ve still been worried about it, but not for as crappy reasons. It probably would’ve boiled down to me being concerned that I’m not enough for you.”

She opens her mouth, but she doesn’t owe me anything, and I want to make that clear. “That is in no way me fishing for compliments, I’m trying to explain how my brain got kinda stupid. Because feelings. You’re absolutely right that it’s nonsense, and I wouldn’t blame you if you still wanted me to leave. I didn’t want to leave with you hearing my voice on top of all those other ones you have to deal with. So again, I’m sorry and you deserve better than that. I’ll go.”

I thumb toward the door that’s down a few flights of stairs, even turn and start plodding down the steps, feeling shitty and guilty and queasy and regretting how much I must have hurt her. Which I’ll have to fucking live with, because it is so not her job to make me feel better about this. I was flat-out wrong. I can blame other people for my knee-jerk reaction—thanks, Mom and Dad for making sex something so frigging dirty and shameful and secret—but I have no one to blame but myself for holding onto that.

Grabbing the handrail at the next landing, I’m swinging around it to the next flight of stairs when there are quick, bounding footsteps behind me. I hold my breath and close my eyes in hopes it’s Blaze, but with no real expectation. You can’t really have one when you’ve screwed up as badly as I have.

Then there’s a hand on my arm, and someone’s tugging me around. I see a flash of red hair and that’s how I know it’s Blaze. That and the span of her hands as she grabs my upper arms and levels a glare at me.

“That is some Class-A bullshit right there, and I am not happy about it. Being bi and poly and liking sex—lots of it—doesn’t make me a cheater, and it doesn’t make me a liar. I don’t forgive you for that.”

My stomach bottoms out and I feel sick. I knew I’d messed up, and I didn’t expect forgiveness, to have my snap judgment absolved. But she could’ve let me walk out and been done. She wants to make me feel worse? That doesn’t jibe with the Blaze I know, who might have a temper like wildfire but is equally quick to get over stuff. Or, as I’m coming to think, bury it under things she wants, that she won’t let anyone take away from her.

Clearly we don’t know each other very well, though, otherwise I might have had a pang of shock and my mind might have darted to that stupid, unkind thought, but then I would’ve smacked my forehead and remembered she has a roommate, and it was probably her getting lucky. Not that the person who I’ve been having amazing sex with and enjoy even outside of the filthy banging would betray me.

Blaze shakes me, as if she can tell my mind’s wandered off, and it forces me to make eye contact. That intense kind where it feels as though you’re the only two people on earth, even if you’re in a roomful of people. Her gaze is so deep, it feels like she’s reaching inside of me and putting a stranglehold on my soul.

“I’m mad at you for something else, too, though.”

There’s more? I’m going to end up running out of here in tears, aren’t I? But no, I don’t cry. I’d walk out of here, straight-backed and stoic, and she’d think to herself that she was right about me, that I don’t have feelings and I’m a prude everywhere except in her bed.

“I’m mad at you for thinking you’re not enough for me. What the hell is that? You’re enough, Maisy. You’re precisely enough. You’re beautiful, and talented, and an amazing lay. Not to mention a creative one. I bet we could fuck for a month and not do it the same way twice. I know you weren’t looking for compliments, but I’m giving them to you anyway. And I’m sorry if I ever contributed to making you feel that way. You’re plenty.”

I may end up crying for a different reason. Never have I been told that. Ever. My parents thought I had too much personality, too much volume, not enough hard work and success. But for Blaze, a person I admire and in some ways envy to tell me I’m precisely enough? Fuck, this tight throat and the sniffle I let out is totally going to ruin my reputation as a heartless automaton. Would that really be the worst thing, though? I never wanted people to think of me that way, they just . . . do. Except for Blaze.

“I’m not going to say that I’ve never broken up with someone because I’m poly, and they weren’t, and they wanted me to be monogamous forever. I have. But it was always a conversation, not me getting bored one day and saying fuck it to my relationship. So if this were a long-term thing instead of being SIG spouses? Yeah, we’d have that talk. But that’s what it would be. You don’t need to worry.”

Blaze has a tendency to talk fast and sometimes mix up words, and generally be a little sloppy, reckless. But I’ve never known her to use the wrong tense when speaking.You don’t need to worry.That’s what she said, notYou didn’t need to worry,which is what she’d say if she were going to smack me on my butt and send me on my way and then go find someone to actually have sex with because she’s free of me and her obligation to me.

“So are you saying you’re not breaking up with me? You’re going to give me another chance?” I don’t like the pleading hope in my voice, but she deserves it, that kernel of insecurity.

“No, I’m not breaking up with you, and yes, I’m giving you another chance. But you pull that again and I’m going to shred your fancy-ass costumes with my skates. You have my word, and I need for that to be good enough for you.”

“It is.” I mean it this time. That dreamtime fear has melted away in the face of Blaze’s insistence, because I truly do believe in her integrity. She’s so honest and up-front about who she is and what she wants, why would she lie about this? “But can I ask you something? I will do my very best not to sound like an idiot, but I might mess it up.”

I love Blaze’s smile. She could light up the night sky with that thing. “I’ve got some experience with that. Shoot.”

“I didn’t know that you, um, did the whole relationship thing? I thought you just . . . fucked a lot of people? So is that what you mean when you say poly?”

“I have done relationships in the past, but I’m not in one right now. I would’ve told you. Some people aren’t cool with making out with someone else’s girlfriend even if that person is totally cool with it. I respect that. So for the last year or so until you asked me not to and in Sapporo? I was fucking a lot of people.”

It’s a good thing I know she was trying to make me lose it, otherwise I’d feel bad about busting out laughing over that. “But if it’s okay, then do you date someoneandfuck a lot of people?”

“Sometimes. Or sometimes I have one primary partner and a couple of other people I date more casually. Sometimes I see three or four people and none of them are more important than the others. Depends on what everyone is okay with and what my life looks like. Whatever is going on, everyone knows about it and everyone’s okay with it.”

She studies my face, and I hope I don’t look as though I’m thinking too hard. It’s just not something I come across every day. But why would I? I’m basically a hermit who sneaks the occasional lay during competitions. “Do you have any other questions? I’ll try to answer them as best I can. Communication is part of what makes the whole poly thing work.”

Right. Do I? “Not now. I think that was enough Poly 101 for one day.”

“Okay.” She uses the hands that have been gripping my biceps to chafe my arms instead, and it loosens something inside me, making me slump slightly in gratitude and exhaustion both. “Long practice?”

“Yeah.”

Blaze’s gaze darts up the stairwell in the direction of her suite. “I’d invite you in, but . . .”

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