Page 88 of Second Shot

“No, I’d never give you that look.”

He laughs. “Well, dream you sure did.”

“I’ll have a talk with dream Ryan and tell him to knock it off.”

He smiles and rolls onto his back. “I think I’ve had that kind of dream every night this week.”

“That’s no surprise. The finals are fucking stressful.” I move to grab some tissues so I canclean off my stomach, and his. I didn’t want to disturb Gabe before, but now that he’s moved, it’s my chance.

“They are. Getting in is also a dream come true.”

“Yep.” I gently wipe his belly clean and toss the dirty tissues onto the nightstand. “We live for this shit. But that doesn’t mean it’s not stressful.”

He lifts his head. “After the finals, let’s take a trip together. Niko is trying to get a group of us to go.”

“I’m in.” I smile. “Where we going?”

“Niko suggested Mykonos, Greece. He said he’s been before and it has an epic party scene. He said we could rent a villa and you and I could have our own private suite.”

“I’m down.” I turn toward him, running my gaze down his naked, muscular body. “Maybe we can fuck in the Aegean Sea.”

He smirks. “Sure. So long as a jelly fish doesn’t sting my dick.”

I wince at the image his words put in my head. “You should have been a poet.”

He chuckles. “So, should I tell Niko we’re good to go?”

“Absolutely,” I say, slipping my arm around his waist, and dragging him against me. “And speaking of good to go…”

He sniggers and leans in for a kiss.

Chapter Twenty-One

Gabe

The playoffs are a different animal entirely. Everything moves faster, hits harder, matters more. Six weeks of hockey that can define a career, validate a season, or haunt you for the rest of your life.

We draw the Brooklyn Blizzards in the first round. They clawed their way in as the eighth seed, and they play like it, loose, aggressive, with nothing to lose. Their goalie steals the spotlight early. He’s locked in, tracking everything, stoning us in Game 1 with a ridiculous glove save in overtime that quiets our home crowd. He nearly repeats the feat in Game 2, but we manage to scrape out a win.

It finally clicks in Game 3. Ryan and I find our gear with a 5 to 1 statement win on the road. We combine for three goals and two assists, and suddenly the ice feels like it belongs to us again. The connection we rebuilt late in the regular season holds up under playoff fire.

“This is what we’ve been working toward,” Ryan says after we close it out in six, both of us running on fumes and adrenaline.

He’s right. Every brutal practice, every blown play we had to fix, every hard conversation, it all fed into this. We’re still standing. And we’re dangerous.

Montreal’s a different challenge. They’re fast, disciplined, and built for this time of year. They dismantle us 4–1 in Game 1 on home ice, and for a moment, it feels like we’re in over our heads. But then Game 2 goes to overtime, and Ryan buries the winner off a pass I thread through a triangle of defenders. That goal shifts something. We remember we belong here.

The series turns into a grind. Every shift’s a battle. Niko is unreal in net, pulling off stops that defy angles and physics. Marlowe anchors the blue line with veteran calm, leveling guys twice his size and never losing position. Foster is chaos in motion, his speed tearing holes in their structure.

But it’s the rhythm Ryan and I fall into that tilts the ice. The connection we’ve rebuilt, quiet looks, half-second reads, tape-to-tape touches, it all starts clicking in real time. We’re finding lanes that shouldn’t be there, beating coverage before it even sets.

“You two are terrifying right now,” Petrov says after we take Game 6 at home, edging them 3–2. “I’ve centered a lot of lines, but I’ve never seen two wingers sync like this.”

The Conference Finals bring us face to face with Chicago, Ryan’s old team. The franchise that cut him loose. Now they’re the final wall between us and the Cup.

“How are you feeling?” I ask as we’re lacing up before Game 1.

He doesn’t look up. “Like I want to make them regret ever trading me.”

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