Page 124 of On Thin Ice

Bell raised his eyebrow in challenge. “Is that why he sleeps in the crook ofyourknees every night?”

“It’s cold, and I’m warmer. It’s a survival skill.”

He chuckled and poured the milk into his mug. “If you say so.”

“I do,” I told him, leaning against the opposite counter with my legs crossed at the ankles. “By the way, Will and his boyfriend are coming to the game tonight.”

Bell looked up, his expression softening. “Yeah?”

A couple of years ago, my brother had heard a loud noise coming from the basement late one night. Armed with a baseball bat, he went down to investigate, but instead of an intruder, he found Will and his best friend tangled up naked on the sofa.

Thankfully, Ryan handled finding out Will wasn’t as straight as he previously assumed much better than our own dad had with me.

After driving the other kid home, he sat Will down and explained he didn’t care who he got off with, he just couldn’t do it at three o’clock in the morning on a school night.

The next day, Will called me and asked to speak to Bell since, I quote, “I love you, Uncle Ethan, but my tastes are a little more varied than yours.”

My nephew and Bell had been thick as thieves ever since.

“Yeah.” I smiled into my mug. “Said he expects to see you light the lamp tonight. So do I.”

Bell chuckled and shook his head. “I’d better deliver, then.”

He nudged my hip as he passed me on his way out of the room. “He’s gonna be better than us someday, you know. He’s already got us both beat in the mustache department.”

“Don’t remind me,” I said, following behind him. “I’m still adjusting to the reality that I’m coaching my brother’s son. Back when I used to help out at his hockey camps, I said I’d never go into coaching. Now, every time he calls me Coach out on the ice, I expect Halstrom to come skating over.”

Bell grinned as he settled into the sofa. “He looks up to you, though. Always has.”

I nodded. “Yeah. I know.”

My coming out, Will said, was what had convinced him to come out, too. He was only nineteen, a sophomore at Thackeray, but he lived his life openly and authentically. Watching my father’s grandson take to the ice with rainbow laces on his skates, his boyfriend in the crowd cheering him on, felt like closure and a beginning all at once.

Like the trauma I’d endured had somehow been worth it, so that my nephew didn’t have to.

Bell’s voice pulled me gently from the thought. “Your mom coming, too?”

I shook my head. “Book club night. They’re doing some book about a hot fireman who is in love with the single mom who lives next door. Apparently, she’s leading the discussion. Rachel’s coming, though.”

He grinned. “A real family affair.”

These days, everything was.

My family had welcomed Bell like they’d been waiting for him all along. My mom adored him, claimed he was the son of her heart, which should have been insulting but somehow wasn’t. My sister Rachel texted him more than she texted me. Will thought he was a god, both on the ice and off. And Ryan? He’d once pulled me aside and said, “You’re happier now than I’ve ever seen you. Don’t screw it up.”

So I didn’t.

I loved Bell the way he deserved to be loved.

The way I used to think I wasn’t capable of.

I pulled on my coat, slid my keys into my pocket, and crossed through the living room toward the front door. Bell was curled up on the sofa with Puck tucked up against him,SportsCenterhockey highlights from the night before playing on the TV.

He tilted his head back when I passed behind him.

I bent and kissed him without a word, catching the soft smile that curved his mouth.

“Drive safe,” he murmured, his fingers brushing my wrist. “The roads might be slick.”

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