Page 37 of The Price of Ice

And it was true, but maybe it was also too late to worry about it.

THEY DIDN’T TALK ABOUThis heat any more after that. That was fine by Kallen; it’d gone well for once and he was neither too sore nor too jumpy. It was true he’d felt a little weird about enjoying it, like he’d broken some unspoken promise to Levy. But they’d got past that, and now it was almost like he’d never gone away.

Levy was cleared for non-contact and then for light contact and finally, ten days later, to play. He was clearly perfectly capable of cooking his own breakfast and folding his own laundry now. But after practice, Levy mentioned they needed to go grocery shopping and Kallen went along with him.

He’d gone to have dinner with the Johnsons the previous night, feeling guilty to have ditched them after they’d been so kind as to take him in.

Merle had made a joke about him having grown a couple of inches since she’d last seen him, and Kallen had rolled his eyes at her, a little embarrassed. But other than that, he’d enjoyed a simple plate of pasta because that’s what he got for dropping into a family home in the middle of a busy week. And then he’d stayed for a chat and second dessert—the first one being fruit for the sake of the kids—which was a frozen bourbon ice-cream cake that had Merle and Johnson going starry-eyed. It was a little too sweet for Kallen after years of avoiding sugar, but he ate it anyway to be polite.

“You having fun in the singles’ flat?” Johnson asked him idly.

“Sure, it’s good. Levy’s teaching me to cook.” Given that Johnson’s attention was at least half on his empty plate, Kallen felt he could get away with not elaborating beyond that.

Recipes got them through another ten minutes, and then he could get up and insist on putting the plates in the dishwasher for them, clearly announcing he was leaving without saying so.

HE HONESTLY FORGOTall about them. Most of his clothes had migrated to Levy’s guest bedroom, even if he never used the bed there for anything except leaving clothes out for the next morning. And his life was simply too intertwined with Levy’s for there to be too many gaps for anyone else.

Every other weekend, he called home. He texted with his brothers semi-regularly, and of course he went out with the team when they won, or when it was someone’s birthday and their schedule didn’t make it impossible.

“Wait, what?”

“My mum and my sister are coming over,” Levy repeated. They were having leftover stir-fry for dinner after a game day. “For my birthday. Next weekend?”

“It’s your birthday?”

“Um, yeah, December 11.”

Kallen shoved another forkful into his mouth. He hadn’t known that, which felt a little messed up. It wasn’t like... It didn’t matter what they called it or didn’t. Levy was a good friend and they were definitely close enough for presents. And then he caught on why Levy might be mentioning it to him.

“Oh, you want me to...?” He tilted his chin down to indicate the Johnson’s.

His friend sighed. “Not really, but... It could be a little weird?” he admitted, licking his lips. “I haven’t told them... I mean, I told them you are living with me, and, like, I talk about you to them, but I haven’t mentioned that we are sleeping together.”

If Kallen had been an alpha, they could have easily bunked together for the night and no one would have thought anything of it except that they were accommodating Levy’s family. Thenagain, it wasn’t like they would be wrong to guess they were lovers, would they?

Maybe Levy didn’t want them to guess. Not that Kallen did, he certainly hadn’t said a word about it to his own family, letting them believe he still lived with the Johnsons and simply spent a lot of time with Levy.

He wasn’t sure why he hadn’t, it wasn’t like he had a reputation to protect, was it? And there were no rules about who he had sex with when hewasn’tin heat.

But he didn’t want to share it. Everyone already got to know who he fucked when it was contracted. Levy wasn’t like that, in fact Levy hadn’t even fucked him yet. He didn’t know why, and it wasn’t like he felt like he was missing out, everything they did was amazing.

“I get it,” he said. “It’s our business.”

Levy stopped chewing, then glanced away and swallowed. “Sure, we can just—” He stopped himself, then met Kallen’s eyes with a smile that was a little stiff. “I mean, the Johnsons must be missing you, right?”

And that’s how he’d ended up at Merle Johnson’s dinner table the day he found out her husband was on his next heat rota.

THE NEXT DAY WAS SUNDAYso the gym downstairs was the only place he could think to hide. He’d pretended to get a headache the previous night just to get away from Merle and Johnson. Thankfully little Tilly had been acting up, so they’d probably forgotten all about him the moment he’d gone to his room.

He still had to survive today, though, and there was no way he was showing up for Sunday roast and looking either of themin the face. Did Johnson already know? Or did Management tell the alphas closer to the date of his actual heat?

[What you up to?]

Texting Benny was a move of pure desperation. Kallen had had lunch at a local sushi restaurant after he’d been done with his workout, using the shower next to the sauna in the back of their gym to avoid going upstairs. But he couldn’t work out anymore without injuring himself and they had a game that Tuesday where he was hoping to keep up his scoring streak of nine games.

Benny didn’t live in their building, instead he shared a flat with two of his brothers near the White Cats’ Den. The team’s previous omegas and their children lived there, as did a considerable number of grown kittens who’d stayed on as support staff. Technically, anyone in the current team was allowed and encouraged to stop over at their ‘home’, but after his initial visit, Kallen hadn’t returned.

He liked kids just fine, or at least he liked playing with them, but the Den wasn’t about other people’s kids. It was about his own. And that was well away into the future and therefore he didn’t need to think about it.

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