booming voice said, “Make some noise for your Snow Bears!” as players in royal blue and white jerseys shot into the arena. And as always, we made plenty of noise—the arena shook with the deafening cacophony of music and a roaring crowd.
Like any team, the Snow Bears had a warm-up routine that was superstitiously written in blood. Collier always came out onto the ice without his gloves on, then tucked his stick under his arm and pulled on his gloves while he skated along the boards. Gagnon always did some stretches, and he always fired a puck at Jameson for reasons they’d never explained. Kuznetsov shot right-handed during warm-ups even though he was a left-handed player. Anyone who’d been to warm-ups more than once or twice could pretty easily find a particular player just by knowing their pre-game routine.
Which meant it only took me a second to track down Jase Kelly, though somehow I was sure I could’ve zeroed in on him even if I didn’t know his and every other player’s routine by heart. Somehow, in ways I hadn’t before, I just knew where he was.
And Lord, one glimpse of the number 22 on his back, and my heart went wild. There he was. I’d always gotten a little fluttery at the sight of him—what could I say, he was hot—but tonight it was even more intense. This wasn’t just that player I’d ogled and cheered for. This was Jase Kelly, the guy who’d been emailing me and texting me multiple times a day for the past couple of weeks. The guy who’d put together an event for my daughter.
That wasn’t just Jase Kelly. That was… Jase Kelly.
And my heart was going a million miles an hour.
Oblivious to me watching him, Kelly continued warming up with his team. As he always did, he fired a few shots at the goal, stretched a little, then skated a few relaxed circles around the Snow Bears’ half of the ice. At one point, he skated past us and skidded to a stop beside Maddox, one of the wingers, just in front of the glass and not five feet away from where I was standing. Next to me, some kids banged on the glass and called out “Kelly! Kelly!” That wasn’t unusual—everyone tried to get players’ attention, especially during warm-ups.
As he often did, Kelly casually turned toward the sound of his name and offered a smile and a wave at the kids. He started to turn around again, but then…
Holy shit, I felt it when he saw me.
His gaze landed on me, and adrenaline shot through me the way it did whenever the goal horn sounded.
His lips parted, and my knees wobbled. Then he quickly pulled his gaze away and focused on something in front of him, but my attention was locked on him. He recovered first, flashed a quick smile, and then skated away to join his teammates, leaving me completely out of breath.
“Uh.” My brother elbowed me. “You wanna tell me what that was all about?”
“Huh?” I looked at him. “What was what all about?”
Eric gave me one of those pointed, don’t insult my intelligence glares. “Bruh. I saw what I saw.”
“Oh my God, you sound just like Dallas.”
“Uh-huh. So she must’ve seen—”
“Hush.” I glanced at him, then quietly added, “It’s a long story.”
“Okay. And?”
I rolled my eyes. “I’ll tell you later, okay?”
“Dude,” he said in a harsh whisper, “I just saw Jase Kelly eye-fucking you from—”
“He was not!”
Eric huffed impatiently. “I want the story. The whole story.”
I cut my eyes toward him. “Including the gory details if he and I are really—”
He punched my shoulder. “Shut up.”
I just snickered, and we continued watching the Snow Bears warm up. Of course my gaze kept drifting to Kelly. He seemed to be pointedly not looking at me, but I wasn’t offended by it. He needed to be thinking about hockey right now, not whatever in the world had crossed his mind when our eyes had locked through the glass.
After warm-ups ended, the team retreated into the chute, and we took our seats in the fifth row while the Zambonis came out to resurface the ice. Not two minutes after I’d sat down, my phone buzzed in my pocket.
“Aw, shit,” I muttered as I dug into my pocket to get it. The only person who usually texted me in the evenings was Dallas’s mom, and I hoped to God she wasn’t messaging me to tell me Dallas was down with another migraine.