Chapter Eleven

“Right,” Nick was saying when Trevor came down the stairs. “Daddy has a game this afternoon, so what do we have to make sure we do?”

Trevor paused in the doorway to the kitchen. Gabrielle sat at the table, on a booster seat because she was shorter than most, a side effect of being Trevor’s daughter. She had a bowl of cereal, a little milk spilled onto the table around her, but otherwise, her clothes were dry and clean. Trevor felt a burst of pride in his chest.

“I gotta do my words and draws, and then we can play with the squishy stuff and watch Daddy on the TV.”

“Excellent,” Nick said, replacing Gabrielle’s juice box with another. There was a mug of coffee on the counter, and another in Nick’s hand, so Trevor figured the other mug was for him. “We can call your Nana on the pad if you like.”

Gabrielle’s toothy grin was wide, and Trevor chose that moment to come into the room, afraid that if he stayed in the doorway much longer, his heart would grow seventeen sizes. It was Nick’s job to do this stuff, and it definitely shouldn’t affect Trevor like this.

“Morning, sweetheart,” Trevor said.

Gabrielle reached up to hug him, pressing a sloppy kiss to his cheek and he reciprocated in kind, accepting the mug of coffee Nick pressed into his hands.

“Thanks.”

“No worries,” Nick said, waving him off. “Figured you might want to wake up before driving to the rink.

Trevor made a face. “Why we have to have morning skate the same day as an afternoon game, I don’t know.”

“Need to make sure you’re actually ready to win a game,” Nick told him with a grin.

Gabrielle dropped her spoon into her bowl with a clang and reached for her new juice box. “Mr. Nick said we could watch, Daddy.”

Trevor gasped, leaning in close to her. “Daddy better make sure he scores well, hadn’t he?”

“It’s all right if you don’t,” Gabrielle said, looking serious. Trevor’s chest tightened painfully, and he smiled, running a hand over her hair. “Losing is okay as long as you’re happy.”

“If you’re watching,” Trevor said, his breath hitching as he spoke, “Then I can’t possibly be sad.”

Gabrielle giggled, sucking from her juice box and resting her head against Trevor’s side. Trevor looked up to see Nick watching them, smiling around the curve of his coffee mug. He didn’t look away when he caught Trevor staring, smile widening instead.

Trevor didn’t know what to do, uncertainty and want warring in his chest. It would be so easy to say something, to ask if this thing between them was one-sided, Trevor may be losing his grip on the reality of the situation, or if Nick was being friendly because Trevor was his employer.

Trevor knew he didn’t date for a reason.

“All right,” Trevor said, stepping away from Gabrielle and reaching for one of the smoothies in the fridge. There had only been two in there the night before, so Trevor raised his eyebrows. “When did you make more smoothies?”

There was a flush over Nick’s cheeks, but he shrugged one shoulder, busying himself with boxing up Trevor’s salad for lunch. Trevor didn’t know when he had started doing that either, the two of them falling into something like this. Nick was supposed to be his nanny, not his mother, but Nick never seemed to mind.

“You didn’t have to do that. Or make my lunch.”

“I know,” Nick said, and Trevor couldn’t place the emotion in his tone. “I like it.”

“You like it,” Trevor repeated, raising his eyebrows.

“Daddy,” Gabrielle whined. “Mr. Nick makes my lunch every day.”

Trevor gave her a bright smile. “I know, baby. But he doesn’t have to take care of Daddy like he does you.”

Nick’s face was doing something complicated, expressions Trevor didn’t have time to place before they were gone. “I can stop–?”

“No,” Trevor said quickly, probably too loud for his close proximity to Nick. Nick was startled, looking at Trevor with surprise, but with a small smile starting to creep onto his face. “No, I just didn’t wanna put you out.”

“You’re not,” Nick assured him, handing over the box of salad. “It makes me feel better to know you’re not sneaking pizza.”

“As if.” Trevor rolled his eyes. Placing his mug into the dishwasher, he leaned against the counter. “The team would kill me if I tried to play on a stomach of pizza.”

“Right,” Nick said, a quirk of his lips almost mocking.

“Guys with a ton of ice cream in the freezer shouldn’t throw stones,” Trevor pointed out.

Nick snorted, picking up Gabrielle’s bowl and spoon from the table and placing them into the dishwasher alongside Trevor’s – and what Trevor assumed was Nick’s. It was so very domestic, standing side by side while Nick made the lunch and filled the dishwasher. Trevor’s skin felt too tight for his body and he swallowed thickly, having to get out of the kitchen before he did something stupid like try to kiss Nick.

“Right,” Trevor said, grabbing his keys from the counter. He paused next to Gabrielle, who reached up for another hug and a kiss. “See you later, sweetheart.”

“Play good, Daddy.” Gabrielle looked less stressed about him leaving this time, and Trevor didn’t know whether it was because he would be home before she went to bed, or because Nick was around now more permanently. He wasn’t sure which one he wanted it to be.

“I will.” Trevor met Nick’s eyes, grinning. “Close your eyes if we go to overtime, yeah?”

Nick rolled his eyes. “You lost one time I was watching. You don’t even know if it’s a superstition you should have.”

The derision in Nick’s tone about Trevor having superstitions wasn’t new, and it amused Trevor no end. Nick would have made a terrible hockey player.

The game itself wasn’t a loss, but it was terrible.

Trevor tried to remember that Nick and Gabrielle were watching at home and though it helped to keep him driving the net and tossing pucks at the goalie, very few slipped through the net. Though he was put on the power play, Trevor was rarely put on a line with people who could keep up with him or anticipate his play. It was an old gripe, and one he had gone over with the coaches’ time and again.

They would draft in new players and very few were able to skate as Trevor’s center. This time, Q thought putting Trevor in center would help, but he was sadly mistaken.

Though they managed to squeeze in a last-minute goal during the third period, it wasn’t Trevor’s, and Trevor was tired of trying to play a position for which he wasn’t suited. He knew better than to say anything right then, biting his tongue during the media and trying to keep his answers minimal, in case they used something he’d said against him, and hit the showers, trying to wash away the disaster of the game. The terrible wins were the hardest to take, and Trevor was bone-deep tired by the time he walked through the door at home, the sounds of the TV still playing in the living room. The hall was big enough for him to dump his bag and not worry that someone was going to trip over it. His hair was still damp – a testament to how quickly he’d left the rink, and how cold it was in the city.

Gabrielle was perched next to Nick on the couch, scribbling on a pad of paper when Trevor walked in. She looked up, eyes wide. “Daddy!”

Trevor caught her as she leaped off the couch, drawing her into a tight hug.

“Well done, Daddy. Sorry, you didn’t get a goal.”

“It’s all right.” Trevor buried his nose in her temple. “We still managed to win.”

“It was a good game,” Nick said, smiling softly when Trevor looked up. “You did your best.”

“Uh-huh,” Trevor said, making a face. Nick knew a lot about hockey, but he doubted he would want to sit there and listen to Trevor bitch about the positions he was having to play and how he wasn’t exactly suited for them.

He took his time reading a story to Gabrielle, savoring the chance to tuck her in and stay with her until she fell asleep. Her head was pillowed on his arm and he gently rolled her over, making sure her octopus was next to her, and that he left the nightlight on by her bed. She was still afraid of the dark and though they’d managed to downgrade from having the actual light on in the bedroom, she still demanded to have something.

The fish lamp had been a gift from one of his sisters, Erica demanded that Gabrielle would love it. She had – fishes dancing across the ceiling and walls as she slept, making it seem like she was underwater.

Nick was still on the couch, relaxed and playing on his phone, some game Gabrielle had downloaded that he couldn’t stop playing himself. Trevor would have mocked him if he didn’t have a hundred games of his own that Gabrielle had managed to wrangle him into downloading.

“Haven’t completed that yet, huh?”

“It’s awful,” Nick said, scowling at his phone. “I can’t stop playing it.”

Trevor outright laughed at him, sinking onto the other end of the couch, tipping his head back against the cushions and closing his eyes. Now that Gabrielle was in bed and he had the time to relax, his exhaustion once again washed over him. His body always ached after a game and his after-game shower usually helped to pound some of the aches away, but he wanted to climb into bed and sleep until morning.

“You can go to bed,” Nick said softly, and Trevor met his eyes over the top of Nick’s phone.

“I know,” Trevor said. Part of him was reluctant to leave the room. The couch wasn’t particularly comfortable for sleeping on, though napping wasn’t out of the question, part of Trevor’s comfort didn’t come from the bed at all. It came from the fact that the silence between him and Nick wasn’t uncomfortable.

Nick’s lips quirked up. “When Gabrielle doesn’t go to bed, I just carry her up.”

Trevor snorted. “That brings up the question of whether or not you’re capable of moving me. I might be shorter, but I’m a hockey player.”

Nick at least had the decency to think about the answer before giving it. “What are you, 5’5”?”

Trevor flipped him the bird, thankful that Gabrielle was in bed. “Fuck you. 5’11” and you know it.”

Though he still looked skeptical – and Trevor would admit to being 5’10” when he was bald, thank you – Nick acquiesced with a tip of his head. He was still smirking, the asshole.

Trevor blurted out, “If I was only 5’5” it’d make for pretty awkward kissing,” before he could stop himself.

Nick stared at him, open-mouthed like he wasn’t quite sure what to say to that. Trevor could feel his face flush, heat rising in his cheeks, and he fiddled with his phone, pretending that he wasn’t on edge, waiting for what Nick would make of that.

“Spend a lot of time kissing tall girls, do you?” Nick asked. Trevor thought his tone was supposed to be light, but there was an edge to it that he couldn’t ignore.

“No,” Trevor said honestly. There had been a couple, but he had good reasons for both, and though he wasn’t picky about gender, he definitely had a leaning – and it wasn’t toward the female persuasion. Deciding to answer honestly, he dropped his phone onto his lap and sighed. “I haven’t kissed a hell of a lot of people, don’t really care who they are. As you can imagine,” he added, needing to stress the next part for obvious reasons. “I don’t spread that around given my job.”

Nick’s face morphed from surprise into sympathy. “Yeah, I can imagine that wouldn’t be something you’d wanna scream about.”

“It would be fine,” Trevor shrugged, “If I liked women the best.”

There was a long, drawn-out silence, and though Trevor spent his life darting between people taller and thicker than he was, he was more terrified of this moment than he was of being on the ice and getting checked into the boards.

“It can’t be easy,” Nick said slowly, and there was a tone in his voice that Trevor couldn’t figure out. “I wouldn’t wanna hide who I am.”

Trevor made a face, scrubbing a hand through his hair. His heart was pounding double-time in his chest and he forced it to stop. Now wasn’t the time to get hysterical. Panicking was a sure-fire way to say something that could irreparably damage the relationship they had been forging. “For the right person, it would be worth it.”

Nick was staring at him again, this time with careful consideration. “No matter who they were?”

“Sure,” Trevor said, trying to sound certain. He knew it was the truth. As long as they loved him, and he loved them, he would brave the media storm for them. It would be difficult, Trevor didn’t want it to interfere with hockey and it inevitably would, but the only thing worse than dealing with the fallout from his sexual preferences would be putting Gabrielle through something like that for someone who wasn’t worth it. “They’d have to love Gabrielle.”

“Anyone who’s with you that doesn’t love Gabrielle isn’t worth it,” Nick said, without preamble. He was dead serious, and Trevor’s heart did the dangerous lurching thing it did every time Nick said something in defense of Gabrielle.

Silence fell over the two, but it wasn’t awkward, and Trevor could meet Nick’s eyes without flinching and without blushing. It would have been the perfect time to bring up how he felt, the fact that he wanted to kiss Nick, that he thought Nick might be that person. Courage failed him, and he clamped his mouth shut on the urge.

Eventually, sleep crept up on him and he shuffled to the edge of the couch. “Thanks.”

“For what?” Nick asked, propping his head up on one arm.

Trevor shrugged. “Not freaking out. For knowing Gabrielle is important.”

Nick frowned. “Those aren’t things you have to thank someone for, Trevor. That’s common decency.”

Sometimes Trevor forgot Nick was Canadian. Then there were moments when he was reminded, starkly, that American prejudices didn’t always extend to the Canadians in his life. Maybe that was why Pears and Jetty had both taken his sexual preference in stride and promised to deck anyone who didn’t accept it should Trevor choose to share it with the team.

“Thanks anyway,” Trevor stressed. He didn’t know why he was pressing it.

Nick was silent for a moment, mouth pressed into a thin line. “I could hardly be a dick about things we share, could I?”

It was a throwaway line, said so carelessly, but there was a weight to the words that brought Trevor up short. The meaning behind them hit a moment later and he blinked. “Nick, you–”

Tilting his jaw, Nick stared him down. As if Trevor would ever throw him out for that.

“Same,” Trevor said, for lack of anything else to say.

Inside, his mind was on overdrive. The problem with knowing that Nick was into guys was that it gave his traitorous mind the knowledge that all those plans Trevor was making, all the feelings he was having about Nick, could become a reality.

It would help if Gabrielle didn’t love Nick as much as she did.