Page 20 of Crossing Lines

“Yeah.” He leaned in. “What’s going on? Coach Hot Stuff got you all riled up?” He snickered.

“Stop it.” With a head shake, I scoffed, then came in close to him. “Yeah.” I spied said coach, dropping into a red vinyl chair at the end of a long table. “I’m going in.” I tagged Archer’s shoulder, strode to a seat next to Gibson’s, and plopped down in it. Was I obvious? Probably. But fuck if I cared. I had to be close to him.

“Hey, Boehm.” He offered me a warm smile and rubbed his hands over the table.

Archer slid in next to me and gave me a sly smile.

He knew what was up. I couldn’t hide anything from my best friend. “Hi, Coach Gibson. Good game, huh?” I set my forearms on the table.

Players and coaches took up the remaining seats around us, with Coach Finley at the other end. Most of the other forwards gathered around him.

My gaze flicked to my coach’s, and he sent me a glare. I was not moving. I could always say I wanted to sit with Archer.

“The game was okay. I would have liked to see you pull off the win without going into overtime. It was too close for my liking.” He leaned back as a waitress set filled water glasses onthe table. “That means it could have gone either way, and I expected this to be a relatively easy win, eh.”

“I agree.” Archer picked up a plastic menu centered in front of him.

“Guess so.” I pursed my lips. My shoddy playing with Dickerson hounding me all night hadn’t helped. “I’m sure tomorrow will be better.” I scrutinized my menu, then leaned into Archer’s side. “What are you getting?”

“Lasagna.” He pointed to it on the menu.

Nodding, I said, “Looks good. Maybe I’ll get the same.” My gaze swept to Coach Gibson’s light-blue eyes, his hair still slicked back on his head. My breath caught and my heart thumped. God, his good looks had a way of catching me off guard sometimes. I took a hard swallow, fixating on him.

His gaze dipped to my mouth, then he cleared his throat. “Lasagna does sound good. I think I’ll join you both.” He pushed his menu to the corner of the table.

Tyler, sitting across from me, narrowed his eyes. “I’m going with the ravioli.” He glanced at his coach, then set his elbows on the table and leaned forward. “Why aren’t you down there with your line?”

With a peek at Coach Gibson, I said, “I wanted to sit by Archer.” I wasn’t expecting that out of Tyler, the fucker. Was he trying to out me? I wound an arm around Archer’s shoulders. “We don’t get to hang out much anymore now that he’s always with Leo.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Archer’s cheeks flushed. “That’s not really true.” He unrolled his silverware from his paper napkin. “I see you guys all the time.”

“Besides, it’s nice to mix it up, don’t you think, Coach?” I hooked a brow at Tyler while swiping my gaze to Coach Gibson’s.

Giving me a warm grin, he said, “Do what you want, Boehm.”

The waitress stopped at the table, and we all ordered ourfood, then talk of the game wound through us all as we strategized what to change for tomorrow night.

After several servers showed up with our food and dropped it off, I cut into my lasagna. I was feeling pretty comfortable with Coach Gibson at this point, and I wanted more answers. “So, what kept you from starting the season with us?” I slid some cheese-filled pasta into my mouth.

“My mom was sick with cancer. Breast cancer.” He ate a bite of his food.

Everyone at our end of the table stopped talking and eating, focusing on him.

He scanned the table and swallowed his pasta, then set his silverware on his plate. “I stayed with her through chemo, and once she tested cancer-free, I made plans to join you all.”

An ache crept through my heart, and I parted my lips. Goddamn, he was a stand-up guy. I rubbed my chest. I was falling for him. No doubt about it now. My attention drew to his lips. I wanted to kiss him so fucking badly. He deserved so much, and I wanted to give it to him. He had to be hurting inside, between his injury, the loss of his boyfriend, and almost losing his mother to cancer? Fuck, I couldn’t imagine. “Um, so she’s cancer-free?”

“Yeah, for now.” He shrugged a shoulder and cut a bite of lasagna. “It could come back, but she’s taking medication that should hopefully stop that from happening.”

Coach Patterson turned toward us. “It was up to him to tell you all.” He looked at each of us around the table. “I think we can all say we’re glad he was able to join us. I think with Coach Gibson’s help, we’ll make it to the Frozen Four and maybe even win the championship this year.” He held up his glass filled with soda.

We all lifted our glasses and tapped them together, then sipped our drinks.

CHAPTER SIX

RYAN

After dinner, we rode our bus back to the hotel and piled inside. I spied a small bar at one end of the lobby and glanced at all the players filing toward the hallways to their rooms. Jonah was getting to me, and I needed to sit and chill out for an hour or so before heading off to my room.

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