Page 72 of Common Goal
“I’ll be the one in theI kissed Eric BennettT-shirt.” Kyle winked at him, and then he was gone.
Chapter Fourteen
“Do you ever get used to that?” Kyle asked over the roar of twenty thousand people cheering as Scott’s goal was announced.
Kip grinned, his eyes fixed on Scott’s face on the enormous scoreboard screen. “Nope.”
“Like, that’s your boyfriend. Yourfiancé.” It was suddenly a lot easier to tease Kip about Scott. He no longer felt a stab of jealousy or longing when reminded that Kip was spoken for, and Kyle didn’t want to think too hard about why that was.
“I know,” Kip said. “We argued about coffeemaker settings this morning.”
Kyle laughed, imagining it. He’d felt a surprising lurch in his own chest when Eric was announced at the beginning of the game as the starting goaltender. Eric wasn’t his boyfriend, but their night together had been incredible, and Kyle had been obsessing over it ever since. And it wasn’t just the sex that he couldn’t stop thinking about. It was all of it: the dinner, the conversation, the way Eric hadn’t dismissed him when Kyle had confessed that he was more passionate about bartending than academia. In fact, every moment they had spent together had been wonderful, starting with their brief conversations at Scott and Kip’s engagement party. Eric had Kyle thoroughly smitten.
And now he was on the ice in full hockey gear, looking like a gladiator as an arena full of fans cheered him on. It was hard to believe he was the same man who’d shyly asked Kyle to boss him around a bit in the bedroom.
It was an afternoon game against New Jersey, so the building was rowdy. The score was now 2–0 for New York in the third period, thanks to some amazing saves by Eric.
“I want him to get a shutout,” Kyle said.
Kip nudged him hard. “Don’t say it out loud! You’ll jinx him!”
“Wow, Scott has really rubbed off on you.” Kyle regretted saying it immediately because he knew what was coming.
“All the fucking time,” Kip drawled.
Kyle looked at the clock. Six and a half minutes left.
Come on, Eric. You’ve got this.
He hadn’t gone to a game with Kip in a while, and he’d never been this on edge watching one. His stomach twisted with nerves, not just because he wanted the Admirals to win, but because he didn’t want Eric to get hurt. How did Kip deal with all this stress?
“We picked a venue,” Kip said, casually stealing a handful of Kyle’s popcorn. “For the wedding.”
“Really? Where?”
“We found an inn near Bay Shore—more of a resort, with a main building and cottages around it. We booked the whole thing.”
“That sounds...”Expensivewas the first word to pop into Kyle’s head, but he finished with, “awesome.”
Kip smiled. “I know. It’s a total dream wedding. We wanted to do it out of the city, but not too far. And we wanted somewhere private. We’re hoping we can do the ceremony outdoors, near the water.”
“So no center-ice wedding?”
“Fuck no. Scott loves the fans, but this is for us.”
Kip gazed dreamily at the circle where Scott was now bending to take a face-off. Kyle’s eyes locked on Eric, crouching at the top of his crease. Kyle indulged in a brief fantasy of dancing with Eric at the wedding. It could happen, even as friends.
The crowd started yelling angrily, and his attention turned back to the game. One of the Admirals players had gotten a penalty.
“Total bullshit,” Kip grumbled. “That wasn’t even close to slashing.”
Kyle hadn’t seen it, but he agreed. “Fucking ridiculous.”
Now the Admirals would be short one player, and the face-off was happening in their zone, close to Eric. Kyle wondered if Eric was stressed about that. Or maybe this was fun for him. Maybe this was the hockey goalie equivalent of a skier standing on the rim of a headwall. Kyle had lived for that feeling once, and still loved it whenever he got the chance.
New Jersey won the face off and, for the next fifty seconds or so, unleashed a barrage of hard shots at the Admirals’ net. Eric was unbelievable, shutting down a scoring chance at one side of the net, then quickly sliding to the opposite side to stop the rebound shot. A slap shot came from the blue line that hit Eric so hard in the chest thatKylecould feel it. The crowd roared their approval. When the play finally stopped, they chantedBen-ny, Ben-nyand the DJ started playing Elton John’s “Benny and the Jets.”
“He’s so fucking good!” Kyle said, beaming with pride like he was somehow responsible for Eric’s talent.
