Page 20 of Ethan

Ethan turned to Hank with a grin. “That was cute, how worried you sounded.”

“You weren’t paying attention,” Hank grumbled, even though Ethan had been.

“Paying enough attention,” Ethan argued, but his dimple was still showing and Hank needed to look anywhere but at it. “Come on, let’s go kill Charlie.”

Danny laughed. “Want your bro, huh?”

Ethan’s face morphed from amused to serious in a second. “Can’t let his ego get any bigger.”

Hank did not say that Charlie’s last two back-to-back one-hundred-point seasons kind of justified any ego he wanted to have. He had a feeling Ethan wouldn’t have wanted to hear it.

He didn’t have an older brother—or two older brothers and an older half sister, like Ethan—but hedidhave an older sister, Annie, who’d played hockey in college. So while Hank couldn’t entirely understand, he hadsomeidea of what drove Ethan.

“We got this,” Hank said to Ethan and supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised when Ethan slung an arm around his waist, giving him a brief squeeze.

“Yeah, we do,” Ethan said, nodding. “Fucking dream team here.”

Danny raised an eyebrow but didn’t say anything.

Hank tried to battle back the flush that wanted to rise in his cheeks, but that was like asking the sky not to be blue. He had reddish-leaning hair and pale skin. The flush was a fact of life, no matter how much he hated that it gave everything away.

Ethan tapped him gently on the ribs. “Right?” he asked again.

“Yeah, yeah, teamwork makes the dream work.”

Danny chuckled under his breath. “Adorable,” he said.

Hank wanted to argue, but what was he going to say? He couldn’t say anything without probably hurting Ethan’s feelings—and it wasn’t like anything Ethan had said waswrong, even.

“Come on,” Hank said. “Let’s go find Danny’s teammates and your brother. Kick their asses.”

“I wanna know if anyone actually thought that plan was going to work,” Max said, a couple of hours later, gathered around a big table at a local bar, sharing fries and beers, as they celebrated the blue team’s defeat of the orange team.

The orange team was there, too, and they weren’t exactly drowning their sorrows, but Hank had seen Charlie and Danny share more than one commiserating glance.

“I totally thought it was going to work,” Ethan retorted hotly.

“Of course you did,” Hank said, nudging him with an elbow. He didn’t know when it had begun to feel right and normal to be touching Ethan like this. Hockey players were a touchy-feely breed, generally, and Ethan,alsothe youngest kid in a big family, was clearly okay with it, but Hank had never been that guy. He’d always kept his distance. All the guys he’d played with in juniors, in Erie, and in the AHL, in Syracuse, and even on the Bandits, seemed to get that.

But either Ethan didn’t care, or he didn’t want any space, because he kept sliding right up to Hank, taking the seat next tohim like they were already best friends. Like he didn’t want there to be any room between them whatsoever. That was strange enough, but it was even stranger that Hank keptlettinghim.

That he found himself meeting Ethan halfway there, even.

“I can’t believe you went out of your way to come after me specifically,” Charlie complained to Ethan. Glanced over at Max. “And that youlethim.”

“I’m not gonna control him,” Max said, blushing a little.

“It worked, didn’t it?” Hank pointed out.

After they’d “killed” Danny, they’d systematically tracked down where Charlie was holed up with Brock and Willy, and by the time they’d taken them out, the game was over, because the remainder of Max’s team had taken out Pavel and Sasha, already.

“Sure did, ’cause we’re fucking brilliant,” Ethan said, smiling up at him, still as delighted as he’d been over an hour ago, when the lights had all flashed, signaling the end of the game. “Teamwork makes the dream work, right?”

Even though this was all temporary—Ethan was going back to Portland U, and while Hank was probably headed to Syracuse at the end of the preseason, hopefully he’d be back here sooner rather than later—Hank found himself unexpectedly enjoying the way Ethan leaned in. But still, there’d be no reason to be close, soon. This was just fleeting. A few days of insanity.

And itfelta little insane. He’d known the guy for a day. Maybe it was good that he’d get some distance soon. Clear his fucking head.

“And here I thought that splitting up Barney and Baby Barney was going to mean we lost,” Dom said dryly.