Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 83542 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 418(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 278(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83542 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 418(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 278(@300wpm)
He huffs a laugh that I’m not so sure isn’t holding back the type of emotion he never lets out. “Fuck. I thought I had you beat there, and you had to go and one-up me.”
“And I promise you I always will.”
He kisses me, and I hug him, but there’s one more thing I need to make sure he knows.
“What you said … about no one loving you who didn’t have to.”
“Yeah?”
“You’re wrong.”
He snorts. “I’m never wrong.”
“Oh, yeah? I bet you have a whole collective of friends who beg to differ.”
He thinks about it a moment but then nods. “Damn it, I think you’re right again.”
EPILOGUE
OSKAR
OFF-SEASON
“Are you ready?” I side-eye Aleks in the private elevator taking us to the Sky Room in the middle of New York City.
“I still can’t believe your PR department is letting you do this,” Lane says beside me.
“Technically, they don’t know, but I figure so long as it was on the down low …” Aleks runs a hand through his hair. “Shit, is this the wrong thing to do?”
“I’m keeping my mouth shut,” Lane says. “It’s not my job anymore.”
I backhand Aleks’s chest. “You should change agents. If you hire Damon for your next contract, you’ll get Lane thrown in, and then he could give his opinion on this.”
“Or he could offer it to me for free because he’s a nice and decent human being?”
I can’t deny he is that, but … “If you think he’s nice and decent, you should see what he does to me when I’ve been naughty.”
Lane tugs on my hand and talks over me. “Ignore him. If you want my professional opinion, coming to this event tonight is foolish, but not as foolish as, say—”
“Having a threesome with two guys in an alley,” I supply helpfully.
“Are you going to always bring that up?” Lane grumbles.
“I have fond memories of it.”
Lane glares at me, and I wrap my arms around him.
“Because it brought me you. Duh.”
He melts into my arms, but then I look over at Aleks with a subtle shake of my head and mouth, “So hot.”
“The elevator is reflective, asshole.” Lane looks up at me. “The love you have for me was so worth the cost of my career. Honestly. It hurts how much you love me.”
I lean in and say, “I can show you later how much I love you.”
“Eww, loved-up people,” Aleks says. “I’m finally free of monogamy. I’m going to spend the next few years spreading my seed far and wide. But, you know, metaphorically. I don’t actually want babies. Or STDs.”
I nod. “They’re not fun. Either of them.”
Aleks narrows his gaze at me. “It was chlamydia, wasn’t it?”
“The clap, actually. Hooray for azithromycin.”
“And this is why I checked his health records before ditching condoms,” Lane says.
“That sounds an awful lot like slut shaming, sir, and I will not stand for it.”
“Can I point out you were the one who brought up the threesome in the alley comment? I watched that CCTV footage about a billion times. No condoms anywhere.”
I pretend to be pissed, but he has a point. Before he came along, I did share the love and wasn’t always responsible. I was on PrEP, but that only goes so far. I was completely shameless and didn’t care about the consequences to my body or my life in general because I thought I was invincible.
While growing up sucks, I can say I have more self-worth than I ever have before, and it’s not because of falling in love with Lane. A man didn’t rescue me. He showed me what I could be. Who I could be.
But there will always be a bit of old me deep down. “I bet you jerked off to that footage a million times.”
Aleks steps forward and repeatedly hits the button for our floor. “This has got to be the slowest elevator in history.”
“Quick, he needs to make his escape from all this monogamy!” And fuck, those words are weird coming out of my mouth. Of all people.
Lane knocks his head against mine. “Ten bucks says Aleks falls for the first person he dates.”
“Not going to happen,” Aleks sings.
“It’s so going to happen,” I say.
The doors finally open, and we step out into a function room that has a terrace with an amazing view of the city skyline.
Hockey players are scattered throughout the entire venue. Everyone from the New York team is here, as well as some old dudes from Boston. Damon is with his partner at the bar, and there’s a group of giant Viking-looking Norse gods out on the terrace.
I spot the other guys from the Queer Collective in one corner, but before we can make a move over to them, Lennon, Ollie Stromberg’s partner, approaches and gives me a hug.
“Thanks for coming.”
“That’s what he—”
Lane pinches me. “Don’t.”
Yes, sir.
“We wouldn’t have missed Ollie’s retirement party for the world,” I say instead.