Ares

The park is quiet.

Dry leaves dangle from gray branches.

Looks like it could snow.

Haven’t seen this part of Copper Valley. Eastern side. Downtown slopes along the skyline. The mountains are a fuzzy blue haze beyond the buildings. We find a bench, and she makes me put my leg up.

I pull her into my lap.

“Aren’t you cold?” she asks. Her nose is a cherry already.

I shake my head. This is nothing. Grew up in Minnesota. Born on a record cold night. Live on the ice as much as I can.

Her fingers trace my biceps. “Wanna talk?”

Funny woman.

I grab my phone, wrap my arms around her, and pull up a search bar. Find the video. It’s old, but not too old for the internet.

Sportscaster from Minneapolis starts talking.

Exciting day for hockey fans. The NHL draft is underway, and we’ve all got our eyes on the Berger twins from Wishberry Lake, a little town north of the Twin Cities. Big debate on who’s going first. I’ve got my money on Zeus—he’s the smarter of the two. How about you, John? Who’s your pick?

Well, Max, I’d say Ares, but how far can a guy without a vocabulary get in professional sports?

They both chuckle, and the camera pans to me.

Twelve years ago.

Fuck, I was young.

Sitting there. Behind eighteen cameras. The university logo behind us. Z’s to my left, talking, but he’s only half in the screen.

All eyes are on me.

And I’m wide-eyed and terrified.

Stats about my GPA scroll past the bottom. I almost flinch. Embarrassing numbers.

Ares. Ares, do you think the NHL will want you with your academic struggles?

I open my mouth.

Nothing comes out.

You’re damn right they will, Z answers for me. He’s a fucking good hockey player. The fucking best.

He gets bleeped, of course.

Even on YouTube.

They keep pressing. Asking questions.

And that’s when it happens.

I bend over. Behind the table.

Felicity stops the video before she watches me puke my guts out.

“People are assholes,” she says.

Not Lucy, not Tim, not Harold.

Felicity.

She shifts on my lap, wraps a hand behind my neck, and watches me, her fingers curling into my hair. “You can sing in front of a crowd.”

“Already know the words.”

Her soft brow furrows. “The reporters ask the same question every time.”

“All bullshit.”

She tilts her head.

I don’t like to waste words. Enough people waste words. But she’s biting her own tongue, waiting.

For me.

“Loki could do it,” I add.

She’s smiling. “Hey, Loki, man, you played a really tough game today. How’d it feel?”

I swallow.

Can I do this? Yeah, I can do it. I know the words. Heard them a million times. Same shit everyone says.

Suck in a big breath.

Hate talking this much.

Waste of air.

But I can do it. “Yeah, Max, it was tough,” I make myself say. “Boston/Phoenix/Colorado tried to eat our asses. But we played better. And I’m a fucking superstar, so I won.” I finish with a grunt.

“Does your brother know you can impersonate him so well?”

My phone dings with an incoming text.

From Z.

“Wow, that’s a little creepy!” Lucy says.

I reply to his WTF? They’re sending you to CHARM SCHOOL? with a gif somebody made of him twerking on the ice.

For fun, I copy it to Joey.

Have twenty other text messages waiting, but they’ll keep.

“Why don’t you text me like that?” Felicity asks.

I switch over to text her and shoot her a gif of butt drums.

She laughs, and that bubble in my chest that’s been tightening like a noose eases.

“You can write your own script,” she tells me.

I tilt a brow at her.

“Ares, what was it like out there on the ice today?” she says without moving her lips in a weird doofus voice.

“I played for Trevor,” she answers in a pretty fucking good impersonation of an ape.

But it’s not the ape part that makes me grip her tighter.

It’s the part where she gets me.

“Don’t answer for them.” Her hand smoothes my hair, her other hand strokes my chest. “Answer for you. Answer for anyone who’s ever been judged for not fitting into the society-approved box. Nick can’t do that. Manning can’t do that. Zeus can’t even do that. Only you can.”

I. Love. This. Woman.

Everything else stops.

Time. The weather. The earth spinning.

My breath.

My heart.

“You—” I stop. Have to swallow. Can’t talk. Can’t find the words.

Her bright green eyes don’t waver.

“You have special in spades,” she whispers. “Don’t let anyone ever take that from you.”

My phone dings again, but I ignore it.

Because I need to kiss Felicity.

I need to kiss her more than I need the ice. More than I need to breathe.

More than I need to exist.

I’m not special.

She’s special.

She’s also delicious. Sexy. Soft. Strong. Funny. Kind.

She’s a million-leaf clover.

I don’t believe in good luck charms.

But I believe in her.

Can’t kiss her enough. Hold her tight enough. Touch her enough.

Her lips meld with mine, her tongue slides so easy, so generous, her breath tickling my cheek, her soft whimpers fueling the hard, desperate ache in my cock.

She moves, and she’s straddling me, nestling me between her thighs, her hands roaming over my hair, down my neck, gripping my arms, kissing me back.

Too many clothes.

Too much coat.

Need to touch her. Feel her. Be inside her.

She breaks free. “Ares,” she whispers. “Let’s go home.”

The park swims back into focus. Brown grass. Cool air. Jogging path. Soccer fields.

We should go home.

But I don’t want to let go.

I. Love. Her.

Want her.

Here. Now. Everywhere.

I roll her hips over my cock.

Her eyes flutter shut, and she rocks against me while I grip her tight. “You turn me inside out,” she whispers.

She owns me.

She’s the piece I didn’t know I was missing. The words to my melody. The ice beneath my skates.

I kiss her jaw. Her cheek. The corner of her mouth.

Her hair tangles in my stubble. Sweet, like candy apples. I stroke the soft locks, she thrusts against my aching dick. I kiss her neck, she moans.

“Ares,” she gasps. “Someone could see.”

But she’s still riding me. Too much clothing between us. Too many layers.

Park’s empty.

Blocked from the road by the bushes and trees.

House on a hill, too far.

“Oh, god, I’m so close,” she whimpers.

I reach under her coat, under her shirt, to palm her breast and pinch her nipple, and she goes rigid against me. She buries her face in my shoulder, biting down, stifling her cries.

I want to feel her come.

Want to taste her. Want to take her.

I can’t stop myself.

Even if she doesn’t know.

She owns all of me.