Zack was frozen, mouth open, with a wooden spoon in his hand. It was probably not a good look. But all the hair on the back of his neck was standing on end. Six weeks he’d been here, talking to Aaron and learning about his life. Six weeks and he hadn’t known Aaron’s family was all but alone on their own island or that he had a twin. Zack’s journalistic instincts were good, but Aaron had somehow managed to do a complete end run around them.
“Did you wait to tell me this until I’d finished your part of the article?” he asked.
Aaron shook his head. “It never came up.”
But it was an evasion, Zack knew, and he was pretty sure that Aaron knew he knew it.
“Okay.” Zack put the spoon down, wiped his hands on a towel, and turned around to lean back against the counter. “What do I have to do to see the island?” he asked.
Aaron shrugged. “Fly to Ohio and book a ferry ticket like everyone else.”
“No. Not that one. Yours.”
Aaron laughed and tipped his head to the side as if Zack was the biggest fool in the world. And, truth be told, he probably was. “Why, be very, very good, of course.”
WHILE THEY ATE, AARON chatted happily about his day and updated Zack on little happenings at the rink. It was a disgusting portrait of domesticity, and Zack wasn’t quite convinced that he wasn’t dreaming. Life with his ex had never exactly been about domestic bliss. Zack hadn’t known he wanted someone to do the pleasant little niceties of home life with and yet, here he was, listening to Aaron with rapt attention.
Aaron nudged his socked toes against Zack’s ankle in the middle of a story about a lesson he’d taught the other day when his student had landed their first single jump. It was a little thing in itself, next door to innocent, but the touch sent a bolt of heat through him.
“You’re used to getting what you want when you want it, aren’t you?” Zack asked, in lieu of focusing on the story.
Aaron scoffed. “If I was used to getting what I wanted when I wanted it, I wouldn’t be trying to get on my first Olympic team; I’d be expecting to get on my second.”
“I wasn’t talking about your career.” Zack wasn’t offended that that was where Aaron’s mind had gone first. He adored Aaron’s drive. Also, Aaron’s foot was still pressed against his, and there was a knowing gleam in his eyes.
Aaron tilted his head from side to side as he thought about it. “Maybe. I don’t feel like I’m particularly demanding or persuasive. It’s all performance. So what that gets me is what other people want to give me. Or what I earn.”
Zack had a lot of questions, but as much as he was fairly sure he’d have Aaron in his bed by the end of the evening, he knew it was too forward to ask any of them directly.
“You mean on the ice?” he asked instead.
Aaron shrugged. “Sure. Or with my family. Or Katie and Brendan. I had to earn my place here as surely as I’ve had to earn my life off the island.”
“Does that feel fucked up?” Zack didn’t want to lean in to Aaron’s self-confessed desire for winning other people’s approval if he had issues about it.
“Nope. I know where I stand with people and I know what is and isn’t under my control. It makes things clear. And...” he added, with a look from under his eyelashes at Zack, “most importantly, I enjoy it.”
SOMEHOW THEY MANAGED to finish eating. As soon as they had, Aaron stood and started collecting plates. Zack took the plates out of his hands, set them on the counter, and looped his fingers loosely around Aaron’s wrists.
“Dishes later,” he said against Aaron’s ear. “This, now.”
“Oh, good.” Aaron all but melted against him. “I thought you’d never ask.”
Zack chuckled. “Does that mean you want to skip the awkward makeouts on Marie’s couch and just get right to the main show?”
“If I say yes, does that mean you’ll throw me over your shoulder and drag me off to bed?”
“Yes.” Zack tightened his grip on Aaron’s wrists and watched as his eyes fluttered closed. He took a deep breath, tried to school his features into some sort of calm, then snapped them open.
“Then yes, please,” Aaron said.
Zack obliged. He’d never be strong in the ways Aaron was, but he had height and breadth on Aaron and enough athleticism that it was an easy enough thing to hoist him up in a fireman’s carry.
Aaron yelped briefly.
“You all good?” Zack asked.
“Fantastic,” Aaron said.
Zack grabbed Aaron’s ass—which skating had made perfect —with one palm, and walked him into the bedroom to dump him across his bed. Zack looked at him, sprawled there, breathless and flushed.
“Take your shirt off,” he said quietly.
As Aaron did as he was told, Zack swooped in to grab the shirt once it was over Aaron’s head but before his arms could get free of it.
“I’m tangled,” Aaron said, laughing awkwardly.
“Do you mind?” Zack asked. He didn’t like to think there were tests in sex, but this trick served as one. It had always reliably told him where he could or could not go, although he was pretty sure he’d already clocked Aaron on this.
Aaron, as he expected, shook his head.
Zack let himself take Aaron in for a moment. His body was almost that of a dancer’s, but not quite as lithe or corded. But even just sitting there on Zack’s bed, he had definition and grace and a defiant sort of fearlessness. Zack leaned in to kiss him. Aaron’s lips parted instantly and it was desperately clear how eager he was to go
