Page 66 of Unrivaled

He must’ve been paying attention after all. “Erika thinks Anaheim.”

Suddenly saying it out loud exhausted him. He sat down on the opposite end of the couch from Max, and they finished watching the movie together.

Grady expected to get scratched for the next game as a preventive measure, since an injury could kill a trade. But Coach put him in the lineup at the last minute. “Don’t look at me,” he said. “I do what they tell me. Suit up.”

So he did. He got a few shifty looks in the locker room, but at least soon it wouldn’t be Grady’s problem.

He went out and put up three points against Pittsburgh, which was good enough to earn him first star of the game but not good enough to get the Firebirds a win against their second-most-hated rival team.

Grady did his standard postgame media bullshit, spent long enough on the bike to keep from cramping, hit the shower, then hit the road.

He hoped Max wasn’t expecting much from him tonight. Between the exhaustion and the frustration, he didn’t feel particularly social.

As had become routine, Max had the TV on when Grady got home. TSN was playing highlights from the Nordiques game—no, not just one game. The video flashed to a shot of Dante Baltierra in an away jersey. He’d been playing at home in the first one.

Had Baller hit a milestone tonight?

Grady looked away from the screen and met Max’s eyes.

Max said, “I’m really sorry.”

With a sinking sensation, Grady turned back to the television. This time he read the ticker along the bottom.Nordiques trade Dante Baltierra to Anaheim in three-way deal.

If they’d taken Baller, they weren’t taking Grady. Not without significant other moves, or an injury, or a roster overhaul that made no sense at this point in the season.

Which meant Grady wasn’t going anywhere for now.

“Fuck.”

“Yeah.” Max regarded him for another moment and then turned off the TV. “You want to get high about it?”

MAX DIDN’Tmake a habit of smoking. He needed his lungs in top condition. But sometimes he needed to unwind more.

He’d been pretty sure Grady would turn him down—Grady was uptight by default, and weed wasn’t legal in Pennsylvania.

So when Grady blinked at him and then laughed and said, “Fuck it, YOLO,” Max kind of thought he was hallucinating.

It turned out weed made Grady tactile. They sat shoulder to shoulder on his back porch, passing the joint between them.

Grady was warm and solid against him, leaning with a good amount of weight, and he smelled good. Max suspected he’d made a terrible mistake, so he reached for the conversational equivalent of a bucket of cold water. “So. How’s the dating going?”

“Fucking terrible.” Grady turned his face until his forehead was pressed to Max’s shoulder. He snickered. “I quit.”

Well, that backfired. “What?”

“It was a dumb idea.” He slumped and rotated again as he held out his hand for the cigarette. Automatically, Max handed it to him. “I could’ve been traded anyway. And, like, it’s already November. I don’t wanna spend the holidays with some guy after dating him for a month. That would be weird and clingy.”

“True.”

Without dislodging himself from Max’s shoulder, Grady held the joint up to Max’s lips. Max took a drag. The paper was slightly damp in his mouth.

Grady sighed theatrically and flopped backward onto the deck. “I don’t know what I’m gonna tell Jess, though.”

The high was hitting now—it always took a little longer than Max expected—and his head got that detached floating feeling. “Hmm?” What did Jess have to do with it? Max didn’t remember.

“’Cause, like, she’s gotta go. If she doesn’t see Amanda again and get closure, she’s gonna pine forever, you know?”

Max nodded. He might not remember what Grady was referencing, but he understood thepine foreverbit and why it was bad.

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