Page 46 of Offensive Edge
“You got so furry,” Rowan said. His thumb swept across Theo’s bearded cheek. Rowan was not wrong. Theo had a thick dusting of hair across his chest, down his abdomen, all the way to his dick.
“Gotta keep warm out there on the ice.”
“Oh yeah. So cold when you’re skating around an NHL arena for three hours.”
“It would be cold if I shaved, so I can’t do that.”
“God no,” Rowan said, his hand running over the portion of Theo’s chest he had access to. It made Theo shiver. Rowan’s fingers ghosted over Theo’s nipple, and suddenly Theo was having a difficult time not getting hard. Rowan bit his lip when he felt the beginning of Theo’s erection against his leg.
“Do you want—”
“Yeah.”
“What do you want?”
“Whatever you’re comfortable with,” Theo said. He was rocking his hips against Rowan’s thigh, and he could probably come just like this, worked up from Rowan and the high of finishing the season strong enough to get first seed in the West. The hand Rowan had on his cheek slid down to his ass. Rowan still looked nervous.
“Good,” Theo breathed, looking at Rowan to assure him he wasn’t doing anything embarrassing.
“Okay,” Rowan said. Theo pulled his hips away enough for Rowan to slide a hand down the front of his boxers. Theo tipped his forehead onto Rowan’s chest and sighed, being careful to be quiet too. If Rowan was nervous about being heard, he could control himself.
On the ice, Rowan was the most confident player Theo had ever seen. He was a presence, a force. He was respected, and he carried himself like he knew every inch of his talent.
Right now, that Rowan was nowhere to be found.
“Can we get these off?” he asked, slipping his hand out from the constrictive elastic of his boxers.
“Yeah, baby,” Theo said, pushing himself back up to his knees. Theo wasn’t shy in bed. He also wasn’t the most modest guy in the world, and the way Rowan was looking at him, his eyes trailing down the length of Theo’s body, sucking in his bottom lip to hold it between his teeth was only feeding his ego.
Theo teased him, hooking his thumbs under his boxers and pulling them down centimeter by centimeter, the vee cut of his hips leading Rowan’s eyes right where he wanted them. Finally, he had pulled his boxers low enough to let his erection spring free, and Rowan’s mouth dropped open, his eyes glassy with lust.
There had always been a power imbalance in their relationship. When you were the “some guy” standing next to a superstar, there was no way to ignore that. When they were alone or outside hockey contexts, it was a little easier. But that imbalance had once pulled them apart.
Now, Theo felt like the one who had the upper hand. He had the confidence; he had the experience, and as the (as Rowan had assessed) injured party in their situation, he felt like Rowan was looking to him for guidance.
It kind of felt awesome, which was a scary thought. He wondered if they would ever feel truly equal to him.
“I think I need to work up to getting my mouth on you,” Rowan said, pushing himself up on his elbows. His mouth was dick-height, and his lips were wet and inviting, and all Theo wanted was to push his cock between them. Instead, he shimmied out of his underwear and flopped back onto the bed next to Rowan, pulling Rowan halfway on top of him. It was Theo’s turn to get his hands on Rowan’s body, sliding down to palm Rowan’s smooth, firm ass before tickling his sides enough to hear him laugh.
“You have the best laugh,” Theo said, looking at Rowan with what he knew was bare adoration. He felt out of his skin with excitement and emotion, but Rowan was his person, and his heart was stitching together the cracks. It felt bigger in his chest than it had in years.
“No one has ever told me I have the best laugh.”
“Of course it’s the best. It’s yours. It sounds like Ro.”
“That is...very gay,” Rowan said, finally wrapping his hand around Theo’s dick.
“So gay,” Theo agreed, pressing his hips into Rowan’s grip. He got another little laugh and nudged Rowan’s lips up to kiss his, and it felt just as magical as NHL-playing adults in a hotel room as it did when they were doing this exact thing in the basement bedroom of Rowan’s billet family’s house on a Saturday night after a home game.
Rowan had hockey-glove calloused hands that felt so good on the soft skin of Theo’s dick, and Theo let himself turn his brain off finally and sink into the feeling of being here and doing this with Rowan.HisRowan.
He kept his moans as small and quiet as he could, just loud enough for Rowan to hear, and when he came, Rowan looked a little less shy than he had when Theo had initially slipped a hand down his boxers.
CHAPTER24
ROWAN
When Rowan setfoot in Vic’s house for the first time, he knew, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he wouldn’t be continuing his housing search. Not only because it was a pain in the ass, but also because as “resilient” as people have called Rowan in the past, he truly hated change and wanted to minimize it as much as possible his first year on the team. Also, he just kind of loved this house.
