Page 79 of Goalie Lessons

“Astrid?”

I freeze three feet inside the arena security checkpoint, turning to see Sloane standing in the middle of the busy concourse, her mouth hanging open as she stares at me, like she can’t quite believe it’s really me.

“Hey,” I say, biting my lip and turning to her, trying to figure out how I can save face. All the excuses from earlier rise to the surface, but it’s too late—the look on Sloane’s face says everything.

“I won’t say a thing,” Sloane says, throwing her hands in the air, grin splitting from ear to ear. “Except that I wasright.”

I bite my tongue and realize I’m holding back a smile. I’d thought that when Sloane found out, I’d feel…vulnerable. Or like I’d lost control. But it doesn’t. Instead, it’s like a tiny bit of weight has lifted from my chest.

Sloane takes my hand and tugs me through the arena, down secret hallways and tunnels, and into a little space just above the bench. When I’m seated, I can see Grayson out on the ice, closer than I’ve ever been. The game is already in swing, and I can’t take my eyes off him as he stands in front of the net, stick in hand, eyes tracking the play.

“Pretty cool, huh?” Sloane asks, bumping her shoulder against mine and glancing sideways at me. True to her word, she hasn’t asked about Grayson—actually, she hasn’t spoken at all. At least, not that I’ve noticed.

Sighing, I lean over and rest my head on her shoulder.

“Yeah,” I admit. “It’s pretty darn cool.”

***

“Astrid,” Grayson says, actually dropping his bag when he sees me, his eyes lighting up. He stalks toward me, a grin working over his lips. “You came to the game?”

There’s nobody around, so when he wraps his arms around me and lifts up, I let him, burying my face in his neck and breathing deeply—he’s freshly showered, his skin warm, hair smelling spicy.

“Yeah.” When he sets me down, I shrug. Sloane had acted surprisingly nonchalant about the whole thing, not asking me a million questions, not squealing or clapping once. Instead, we’d sat companionably through the game, and when it was over, she led me to a hallway, slipped me inside, and told me to wait.

Now, Grayson grabs his bag from the floor and straightens up.

“I think we can go out this way,” he says, his hands trailing from my shoulder to my elbow, then dropping as we step out onto the street. “And I thinkyouowe me some sightseeing.”

We walk together, and my heart is behaving strangely, beating too hard and too fast, giddy.

We drop his bag off at the hotel, and as we’re walking out, I nearly run right into a woman pulling her suitcase along behind her.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” I say, reaching out in the way you do when you nearly run someone over. But when her eyes land on me, I recognize her, see that she recognizes me, and wish I could be anywhere else.

“Astrid Foster,” she says, her voice taking on that telltale tone of pity. “Well, I haven’t seen you since the funeral. How are you doing, dear?”

“I’m fine, thank you,” I rush to say goodbye to her before she can say more about the funeral, my parents. She must have worked with one of them, but I don’t want to stick around and talk about it.

I can feel Grayson’s curious gaze on me, but I act like nothing has happened, instead changing the topic to my plan for our sightseeing. I convince him that with the things I want to see, we’ll have to take an Uber. Los Angeles is a city of cars—public transport isn’t that robust, and walking isn’t even an option. We sit quietly in the back seat, hands overlapped, until the Uber driver slows and pulls up outside the place, glancing back at us with a confused look on his face.

“This…right?” he asks, but I’m already unbuckling my seatbelt.

“Yep,” I reach forward, hand him a bill that might be a little too high as a tip, but I’m too excited to check. Grayson slides out after me, raising his eyebrow.

From his point of view, it probably looks like we’re in the middle of nowhere. That’s what I thought too the first time my dad brought me out here, unable to keep the grin off his face as he punched in the code for the door and led me through the dark warehouse.

“I’m just wondering, do you know whatsightseeingmeans?”

“Ha.” I glance over my shoulder at Grayson as I stride forward toward the warehouse. “You are about to eat your words, Grayson O’Connor.”

“You’d better stop saying my full name like that,” he teases, his voice close behind me, sending a shiver down my spine. “Or I’m going to think you’re obsessed with me.”

I swallow back my reply and jab in the code, which is ingrained into my mind. For a second, I think that it might have been changed, but the door just beeps, flashing a green light. As we dive into the dark, I reach back and take Grayson’s hand. It’s large and warm in mine, his skin a bit rough, and when he sweeps a thumb over my palm, I hide the breath I suck in, lucky it’s under the echoing of our footprints.

“I’ve never shown this to anyone before,” I warn, as I tug him along, weaving us between various objects in the dark warehouse. “So I hope you can keep a secret.”

“Would it be cliché to make a joke about you murdering me here and hiding my body?”

---