Page 107 of Cold as Ice

Finally, he made his legs move and thankfully made it to the door.

Dr. Prosser still wasn’t looking at him. She had to know what this would mean. How this would kill his chances on the hockey team. In the NHL draft.

He wondered if she’d even considered that, or if she’d decided that he’d earned it, just being a stupid athlete who didn’t take her class seriously enough.

But you did.

He sure thought he had.

It was drizzling outside, cold and gray which seemed to fit his mood, as Elliott pushed the main door of the Hood classroom building open.

Then it got worse.

Mal was standing there, hood up in deference to the rain and hands shoved in his pockets, andgoddamn, he was smiling.

Like he was so proud of Elliott, even though there was nothing to be proud of.

Elliott’s stomach soured even further.

Nina had told him once that he’d lived a charmed life, easy and carefree. He’d been good at hockey and it had been easy enough to get better. He was good-looking. He was charming without really trying; people generally liked him—of course, not Mal at first, but he’d won him over in the end, hadn’t he?

She’d warned him that at some point, he’d struggle with something.

It wasn’t that he hadn’t believed her. She was smart and perceptive, but Elliott had never imagined that karma would come for him now, or in this particularly fucked up way.

“Hey,” Mal said, approaching him.

Elliott didn’t know what he looked like, but he must’ve somehow hidden the guilt and terror raging through him, because Mal didn’t seem worried.

He should be.

“Hey,” Elliott said.

Mal didn’t lean in and kiss him, but the hand on his arm, squeezing him gently, said it all. He wanted to.

And Elliott kind of wanted to let him, because he wasn’t going to get many more kisses from the guy he was crazy about. Not once he found out the truth.

“So?” Mal asked. “How did you do? A, right? B plus?”

Elliott felt his mask of numb indifference slip. “No,” he said.

“B, then? That should be enough—”

But Elliott couldn’t let him get the rest out. The truth had to be easier than this jovial sweetness that he’d believed for so long wasn’t in Mal’s wheelhouse, but now knew was how he was deep down, underneath. In a place he’d let nobody else see. Just Elliott. “No. I got a D.”

Mal’s jaw dropped. “No.No. You didn’t.” He snatched the paper out of Elliott’s hand. Stared at the scrawled letter for what felt like a hundred minutes, even though it was probably only a single moment.

Elliott turned. He didn’t want to see Mal’s face when he realized how epically he’d fucked this all up.

But Mal’s voice stopped him in his tracks. “There’s no fucking way you got a D,” Mal said, voice hard. “It’s just not possible. Youknewthe material. You did it right a hundred times.”

“Guess not on attempt hundred and one,” Elliott said, trying for a joke, but feeling it sink hard into the gray drizzle.

“Fuck,” Mal said. “No way.No fucking way.”He reached out and tugged Elliott along, and a minute later, they were ducking under Koffee Klatch’s awning.

Somehow they’d crossed the whole quad, and Elliott had barely realized it was happening.

“No, you didn’t do this, Ell.” Mal’s expression was almost unbearably earnest. “You aced the test. You told me you did.”

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