Page 35 of Your Sharpest Edge
“I’m not racing you,” she shouted as I skated back to the boards where she was sitting and leaned over the railing.
“Oh really?” I teased.
“Alex, I literally cannot fall,” she said as she got onto the ice and held onto the edges of the rink.
She was wearing black leggings today and an oversized sweatshirt with what I presumed was her skating coach’s company on it, and her hair was styled in her typical sleek ponytail.
“I’ve got you, Anastasia.” The words came out raspier than I’d intended.
Lately, it had become more of a struggle to remind myself that Anastasia was my teammate’s wife, especially after last night.
“Don’t you have other friends you could’ve invited?” she asked, holding onto the boards.
“Nah. I told you. I’ve never really had a friend until you.” I gestured out to the ice. “Plus, I wanna see the illustrious Anastasia Sokolov before her competition.”
She laughed. “Yeah. Yeah.”
This was the best friendship. There was such comfort in feeling like a piece of home lived a few floors away from me.
“I don’t know how many times I’ve got to tell you to stop calling me by my full name,” she huffed as she stepped onto the ice.
“Okay . . .Anastasia.”
I was never going to call her by her nickname becausehedid.
She nodded and then grabbed onto my forearms as she eased her skates over the ice. “Ugh, you’ll never learn.”
“Come on,” I whispered.
For the last six months, I viewed the woman in front of me as a friend, but every primal instinct I had was suddenly taking over. Watching her fingers wrap around mine was something new, and every fiber in my body was on fire.
I shook my head, chalking it up to the fact that I was touch deprived. The entire season left me exhausted, and admittedly, I hadn’t hooked up with anyone since... well, since those dinners at the start of the season with Anastasia.
It wasn’t that I didn’t get invited out, but a part of me was always waiting to see what she was going to do. I’d say she came to my apartment five nights of the week when we were home, and over the past few months, I much preferred her company over some chick I was going to fuck for the night.
“Why am I guiding you?” I asked as she wrapped her fingers around my forearms.
“I want to see how a big hockey player skates,” she murmured.
“Because it’s so much different from you?”
She didn’t let go of my hands as I skated backward with her. “So much different,” she said, but still didn’t let go.
Her grip was firm, her touch sending a reassuring warmth through me, grounding me in the moment.
Her steps synchronized effortlessly with mine as we traced the perimeter of the rink together. She held onto my arms,both of us skating backward, and I realized halfway through our second lap that she was guiding me more than I realized.
“Is this what it’s like to skate with a partner?” She moved me gently around the rink, my feet naturally falling in the same movement as hers.
“Yes,” she whispered breathlessly.
We skated together a few more feet before she stopped us. “Tell me about your partner in Russia?” I asked since we very rarely spoke about him.
“Ivan?”
I nodded.
Her lips curled into a smile. “He was wonderful. The perfect dancer and the way our bodies connected on the ice...” She spun away from me before circling back. “It was as if we could speak to each other without exchanging words.”
