Page 128 of Ethan

Sometimes Ethan just really hated his brother, and now hisotherbrother was going to show up here, probably beating asimilar kind of drum, and for once, he just wanted them toleave him fucking alone. He dealt with their bullshit, day in and day out, and they wouldn’t justlistento him.

“I don’t need you to go running to Silas and tell him where to use me,” Ethan said between clenched teeth.

Hank put a hand on his suddenly tense thigh.

“Okay, wrong way to say it,” Charlie said with an exaggerated sigh likethatwas the problem, not Charlie constantly trying to bend the whole world into a shape he liked.

“There’s no good way to say it,” Ethan said.

He wasn’t blind; he couldn’t exactly miss the glances Charlie and Max exchanged. Thewe’ll wait him outlooks. No doubt they were already planning on how to get Avery on their side. Hank, too, probably, but at least Hank would be straightforward about it. And at least Hank would go along with it because he was worried about Ethan’s safety on the ice. Not because he was used to getting his way about fucking everything—fuck you very much, Charlie.

“How about we table this for a little bit?” Max said gently, smoothing things over in a way that only he could do. It was a talent and a skill that Ethan didn’t even understand, but he was great at it. Perfect at playing peacemaker, at making guys who didn’t like each other at leasttolerateeach other, long enough that they could keep playing together.

That, among many other reasons, was why he was such a great captain.

“Sure,” Ethan muttered. He wasn’t going to assume he could get away with tabling itforever. Possibly Silas would move him to Max’s line, anyway, because now there was a spot and neither of the guys Ethan was playing with on his own line werethatgood.

But it would be one thing for their coach to talk to him and then move him, and another thing entirely for Charlie and Max to conspire to get their own fucking way about it.

Max pulled out a pan for the eggs and shoved a pan full of bacon into the oven. “You got fruit?” he asked Charlie, who just nodded towards the fridge.

Ethan decided to focus not on his annoyance with his overbearing brother but on the amusement that Max was nearly as comfortable in Charlie’s kitchen as he was in his own. Max emerged from the fridge again with a clamshell of strawberries.

“Tuck, come wash and cut these,” Max said to Hank, who wasn’t dumb enough to ignore an order from his captain.

He gave Ethan one last squeeze to the back of the neck and headed towards the sink.

A phone beeped and Max pulled his out of his pocket. “I think that’s me,” he said, sliding it across the counter towards Charlie. “You wanna check it?”

Ethan didn’t even know why he was surprised that Charlie had Max’s passcode. He should’ve just assumed he did.

“Sounds like Avery will be here around one p.m.,” Charlie announced. “They’re taking him to the practice facility first.”

“We’ll meet them there, then,” Max said confidently.

Ethan didn’t ask if they’d been invited; Silas and Inverness had to assume that if he told Max about it, hewouldbe there to greet a new member of the team, and that Ethan and Charlie would be, too, to welcome their brother.

Charlie made a sound in the back of his throat.

“It’s going to be good, you’ll see,” Max reassured Charlie. “I promise.”

And as good as he was at reassuring the rest of the team, Max was really fucking amazing at putting Charlie at ease. Nobody else could work the magic he did.

“Yeah,” Charlie agreed. “I texted him we’d see him there.”

“Good, enough time to eat breakfast and go back to bed,” Ethan said, and Hank laughed.

Hank was not surprised that the car ride into the practice facility in Jersey was tense-ish. He’d told Ethan he didn’t need to come—and there was no real reason to. He could easily meet Avery later tonight in Barney’s apartment or tomorrow morning at skate before the game. Besides, if they were coming back with Avery in the car, even Max’s luxury SUV wasn’t big enough for five hockey players. Even two that were sort of undersized.

But Ethan’s hand had gone around his arm and squeezed hard enough, nails nearly digging through the thick cotton of his sweatshirt, making it clear he wanted Hank there.

So after he and Ethan had moved a bunch of his stuff up five floors to Max’s guest room, they’d headed out, Max and Charlie in Max’s SUV and Ethan driving Charlie’s car.

Hank had wondered why Charlie hadn’t driven him and Ethan, but he hadn’t voiced that out loud, because of course, everyone on earth knew that Max and Charlie were weird about each other, and if Max’s presence relaxed Charlie enough that he wasn’t vibrating out of his skin, that wasn’t a bad thing.

When they’d gone to move Ethan’s stuff, Charlie had been scouring the sink, Max trying gently to convince him that the kitchen was plenty clean enough.

So, yeah, things were tense.