21.
Much to my appreciation, the next week had flown by.
Since the bonfire, since Aiden and I kissed, life at the rink was strained. Very strained. I remained committed to my skating, attended every practice with coach Tiffany, but I took extreme measures to avoid the hockey team at all costs. Every. Single. One. Of. Them.
By some stroke of luck, I had also managed to convince Mark and Lance to let me skip out of my punishment with Aiden. It took some heavy persuading, but luckily, they both agreed with minimal pushing as to why I was insistent on a break. Lance didn't say anything, but I got the impression he was aware that something had happened between the two of us.
With all of my effort to avoid the hockey team, I had gone from practically living at the rink, to hardly being there at all. It felt cowardly, but I was in no way ready to face Aiden. Or anyone on the hockey team.
Yes, I was a chicken.
At 9:00 AM on a Thursday in the middle of summer, I was home from the rink for the day after Mark had informed me that Tiffany was unable to come in. Although I wasn't going to the rink today, that didn't mean I wasn't going to work out. Dressed in a pair of grey running shorts, a black sports bra, and black sneakers, I was ready for a nice long run.
"Hey there kiddo."
I jumped at the sound of my dad's voice as I reached the bottom of the stairs. My gaze followed the direction of his voice, finding him sitting on the couch with an easy smile on his face.
"Come here a second, would you?"
I pulled the earbuds from my ears and offered him a smile as I made my way over. "What's up?"
A devious grin briefly swept his features as he watched me. I raised my eyebrows, suddenly feeling very skeptical. It was not a good sign to see him grin. Ever. "What?"
"I'd like to talk to you about Aiden Gray."
My eyes went wide. I didn't even try to mask my surprise that Dad would bring up Aiden. There was chance that he knew about he kiss... was there? I swallowed hard. "What about him?"
Either he didn't notice my concerned expression, or he didn't care. "How are things between the two of you?" He lifted his blue ball cap from his head, raked a hand through his hair, and replaced the hat.
Heat unwillingly flooded my face. "What?"
Dad clapped his hands together, eyebrows raised. "Why didn't you tell me that the two of you weren't getting along at the rink? I thought you told me everything, kiddo."
I sucked in a large breath. I was not expecting him to bring that up. It was a giant relief that he was about to ask me a million different questions regarding the kiss. It sucked to have to explain the punishment, but it was better than explaining a kiss.
"It's not that big of a deal," I lied.
"You two have to teach one other about your sports. How is that going?" He asked, "Are you picking up on hockey?"
"That?" It was a simple question with a simple answer. I still sucked at hockey. But that wasn't the simple one-worded answer I gave him. "Fine."
Dad's eyebrows raised. He clearly was not at all convinced that I was telling the truth. Still, he decided to accept the answer and change the subject. "I was talking with Mr. Gray today."
I froze. That couldn't be good.
With the poor relationship between Aiden and Lance, I was confident that Aiden wouldn't have discussed his personal life with his dad. I.e., he wouldn't have told him that we kissed. But Lance would know that I had ditched out on all of my practices with Aiden this week. A huge red flag.
"Why have you missed all your practices with him this week?"
There it was.
My mind went blank. I was unable to think of a liable excuse on the spot. If I were to have told him the truth, I had a sneaky suspicion that he would disapprove. Dad was not a fan of peer pressure.
"I just need a little break from him," I admitted, which wasn't a lie.
An eerie silence fell between us. Dad eyed me skeptically. I couldn't help but dropped my eyes to the floor to avoid his gaze. "Did something happen between the two of you?" Dad asked suddenly. Clearly, he was good at catching on to vibes. "Do I need to teach Aiden a lesson for you?"
That earned a smile from me as I lifted my head to see Dad now held a genuine look of concern on his face. If I needed him to, I could tell that he really would have gone and put Aiden in his place. Dad was always there, ready to fight my battles for me. It was one of the things that I found the most admirable about it. It was also the reason I knew I couldn't tell him the truth just yet.
"Thanks Dad, but everything is fine between us," I fibbed. "I just needed a break from hockey. That's all."
His lips curled into a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. He wasn't fully convinced. "If you say that you're fine."
"I am," I lied again. "Promise."
It was a small white lie at the moment, but ultimately, it would be the truth. The kiss was not going to affect me forever.
Dad nodded, accepting that I was telling the truth as he stood very the couch. "Very well. That's all that I wanted to talk to you about." He turned his head, nodded in the direction of the front door. "Lucy is waiting for you."
"Lucy?" I echoed; my eyes darted to the door. "That's weird. She didn't tell me that she was coming over."
I turned to look at Dad, to which he shrugged. "She said she wanted to check in on you. I told her that I wanted to talk to you alone first."
As I started to ask him another question, Dad fled the room before I had the chance. My eyes narrowed in the direction he fled to. His quick escape put me on edge as to why my best friend was waiting outside.
"Didn't anyone tell you that it's not polite to blow off practice?" An all too familiar voice sent a shiver up my spine the second I stepped out the front door. This was a set up. My dad set me up.
Please no, I thought, I am not ready to talk.
Just the sound of his voice sent an unwanted rush of heat surging throughout every ounce of my body like someone just lit off a match. The summer air felt like it was engulfing me in a tight embrace taking away my ability to breath.
Dad knew that I was lying when I said everything between Aiden and I was fine. That was why he chose to tell me that Lucy was the one waiting outside.
I frantically turned back towards the door, keeping my back firmly in the direction of Aiden's voice. My heart jumped in my chest at the sound of his approaching footsteps. Please no, please no, please no.
"You aren't ignoring me, are you Lodge?" he asked, drawing out a long, exaggerated breath. "Because you know that you can't hide from me forever."
I my bottom lip between my teeth. Forever might not have been plausible, but that didn't mean I couldn't try.
"Come on," Aiden groaned, frustration laced his tone. "We need to talk eventually."
Against the sudden strong urge I felt to turn around, to talk to him, I ignored him and instead placed my hand on the door handle.
Aiden's arm was suddenly over my shoulder, his hand pressed firmly against the door to prevent me from opening it. "Please Zoe. Five minutes."
"Why are you even here?" I snapped, whipped myself around to come face to face with a pair of chocolate eyes that put my senses into sensory overload. Every memory of our kisses flooded my head in an instant. Crap.
I swallowed the lump that just formed in my throat, forced myself to resist every urge that I felt to look down at Aiden's lips. With his right hand pressed firmly against the door behind me and the side of the house to my right, I had nowhere to run. I was cornered: forced to face him with his face only inches from my own. Just great.
"I wanted to check in on you. You've been MIA at the rink since the bonfire." Aiden's voice was soft, genuine. He let out a small exhale, "I wanted to make sure that you were okay."
Had I somehow stepped outside into a parrel universe? One where Aiden Gray actually cared to check in on me and see how I was doing. Aiden was stirring up something in the pit of my stomach.
My mind felt fuzzy. Half of my brain had betrayed the other half – I couldn't help the strange feeling of excitement I felt being in his presence. He looked really good dressed in a loose-fitted navy t-shirt that did little to hide the muscle on his arms.
"I have been MIA," I grumbled, forced my eyes off of him to look anywhere else.
Aiden sighed; his hand dropped from the door as he took a step backward to give me some much-needed space. "Let's pretend that that isn't a lie. Why tell Hansen and my dad you needed a break?"
My eyes fell back to his, blinked slowly. He couldn't have been serious. Aiden had to have known that I was avoiding him.
"Do we have to talk about this?" I mumbled; my eyes once again dropped from his.
Aiden let out a soft chuckle, shoved his hands into the pockets of his black athletic shorts. I inhaled slowly, steadying my breath. It was taking every ounce of my being to resist the overwhelmingly strong urge I felt to feel his lips against my own once again.
"Fine." A condescending smirk fell onto his lips as Aiden crossed his arms over his chest. "At least tell me why you bolted from the bonfire."
I bit down on my tongue so hard that I almost tasted blood.
"Either you just want to hear me say it out loud, or you are the dumbest guy that I have ever met," I managed to grumble lowly, my voice as dull as possible. The last thing I wanted was for my emotions to come out like word vomit.
Aiden smiled; the corners of his eyes crinkled. It was an attractive smile that drew my gaze down to those very soft, very kissable looking lips. They were distracting. So distracting that I didn't hear him talking until I realized that his lips were in fact moving.
"What?" I croaked as I forced my eyes back to his. Way to be so obvious. Heat flooded through me. I wanted nothing more than to flee to the safety of inside my house.
"Distracted?" His chocolate eyes remained locked to mine, boring into my soul as if he was daring me to confess everything to him.
Violently, I shook my head. "No."
I was clearly not ready to talk to Aiden about anything. My mind was still contaminated with thoughts of his soft lips and what it would feel like to have them pressed up against mine once more.
To my surprise, Aiden didn't press the topic. He instead just shrugged it off before he turned his back to me. Instantly, some of the sexual tension I felt dissipated. "You know we need to talk about the kiss sooner or later, so you might as well just say what you are feeling and get it over with." Tilting his head to look at me over his shoulder, he smirked. "Once again, you can't hide forever."
I sucked in a large breath of air, holding it on as I turned and darted around Aiden towards my car. "I'm not hiding."
"Yeah right, "Aiden snickered. He was quick to fall into line with me. "Try again, princess."
I came to a stop in front of my car and turned to face Aiden. Keep direct eye contact, I thought to myself, it will make you look more confident. "Okay fine. You're right. I have been MIA at the rink because I've been avoiding the whole hockey team. Not just you."
"Not surprised."
Albeit that Aiden was the one hockey player that I wanted to avoid the most, I really wasn't ready to talk to anyone on the team after the bonfire. They all played a part in setting up that stupid dare that started this whole mess.
Every one of the guys had thought that Aiden and I were already hooking up. After that stupid kiss between him and I, they probably were thinking that I was lying when I said nothing had ever happened between us.
A took a step toward me, once again invading my personal bubble. I stumbled backward until my back was pressed up against the door of my car. Aiden's right hand flew to the roof of my car as he leaned toward me, his chocolate eyes locked onto mine. "It's been a full week Zoe. You have to be ready to talk."
I bit my lip. "I am talking."
A soft chuckle left his mouth as he shook his head. "Only because I came over and didn't give you a choice to ignore me." He licked his lips, grinned softly down at me. My attention fell down to his lips as my heart leaped in my chest.
Heat rushed throughout every limb in my body. My sanity felt like it had all melted away and the logical side of my brain had been tied up and gagged. Without thinking, my hand rose to his face, my fingers traced gently along his jawline to his lip.
Then it happened. Word vomit. "I can't get our stupid kiss off my mind, okay?!"
My hand fell back to my side as I winced, clamping my eyes shut.
A silence filled the air. Aiden didn't say anything, but I felt him lean backward out of my space. Probably because I had just freaked him out. I was such a fool.
"Now why didn't you just lead with that?" He wondered, sounding not the least bit surprised by my confession.
I opened my eyes to see Aiden held a small, satisfied smirk on his face. If anything, he looked like he had been expecting that. My lips curved to a pout. "I'm not supposed to like you Aiden. I don't like you. I shouldn't have enjoyed kissing you and I sure as hell shouldn't be wondering what it would feel like to kiss you again."
Before I could process everything that I just confessed, Aiden was grinning at me from ear to ear like someone who had just won the lottery. His eyes twinkled with mirth. "You ran from the bonfire like someone that didn't enjoy the kiss."
"No," I corrected, "I ran because I was embarrassed."
Aiden threw his head back in a laugh before he leaned his weight onto his right hand that was still pressed against my car. His face once again was only a few mere inches from my own. I gulped. "Why were you embarrassed?"
"You were appalled."
Zoe! My brain was internally screaming at me to shut up, to stop talking immediately. The more I talked, the more I admitted out loud to Aiden and made the situation worse. Aiden now knew how much he had affected me. I was giving him all the ammunition he was going to need to have the upper hand on me forever.
"I wasn't appalled."
My eyebrows raised. More word vomit. "But you pulled away."
Aiden chuckled at that, nodding his head in agreement. "I did. I mean I had to breath at some point, Zoe."
I blinked slowly. Wait, did that mean that Aiden also enjoyed the kiss?
Zoe, stop overthinking!
Finally, the logical side of my brain was freed from its ties. I slid sideway from the close proximity of Aiden, titled my head sideways to give him the smallest of smiles. "I'm sorry. I don't know why I just bombarded you with all of that. It was a stupid kiss.'
"Right..." Aiden's voice trailed as he turned his back to me. "I should get to the airport."
I raised my eyebrows. With no reason to care, my curiosity got the best of me and I had to ask, "Why are going to the airport?"
"My cousins are flying in today," he answered smoothly, kept his back turned to me. He sounded less than thrilled.
It was weird. I'd just admitted everything to Aiden about how I had enjoyed kissing him, and how I couldn't get the stupid thing off my mind. I even told him that I wanted to do it again. And yet, for some odd reason, I felt less awkward around him than I had before.
"You don't sound very thrilled about that. Do you not like your cousins or something?"
Aiden turned back around to face me, offering a shrug of his shoulders. His dark eyes appeared distant. Something was now bothering him. "It's not that. I get along fine with them. It's my uncle that is the issue."
"Oh," I sucked my lips in. "You don't get along with your uncle?"
Aiden rolled his eyes. "More like my dad doesn't."
"Oh."
Regardless of the reasoning behind his dad and uncle not getting along, I didn't need to know anything more than that. I could see how that alone would make an extended family visit uncomfortable. Lance was very intimidating when he was upset over something.
"They have a weird rivalry," he explained, feeling the need to fill me in. He rubbed the back of his neck, eyes trained on something behind me. I recognized this behavior of Aiden's to be a nervous one. He didn't do it often, so when he did, I was fairly certain it was due to nerves. What was he nervous about now?
I shouldn't have cared, but he had piqued my curiosity. "What kind of rivalry do they have?"
Aiden forced out a small, humorless laugh. "They are both extremely competitive. They find every little thing between them to be a competition. Especially me and my cousin." He let out another dry laugh. "Which is rather ironic considering how my dad feels about me."
Reflexively, I took a step closer to him feeling the need to comfort him. A small, sympathetic smile pulled my lips. "Why?"
"I'll let you know that when I figure it out myself."
"You really don't get along well with your dad, do you?"
Aiden's eyes suddenly flickered to mine. A mix of annoyance and confusion filled them. His jaw clenched. "It's complicated."
"Do you want to talk about it?" I wasn't sure why I asked, why I cared.
His chocolate eyes remained on me for several seconds. His muscles slowly relaxed as he let out a sigh. "My dad doesn't want me to pursue hockey as a career. He wants me to go to college, follow in his footsteps."
A warm feeling erupted inside of me feeling oddly happy that Aiden felt comfortable enough to confide in me. Maybe the two of us were closer to becoming friends than I thought.
It didn't make sense what Aiden said that his dad didn't support his NHL dream. Lance was funding the rink; he was funding the hockey team. It was because of Lance that hockey team got my morning ice time. It was because of Lance that the team got a whole new coaching staff. Nothing about Lance's actions screamed unsupportive to me.
"But your dad is sponsoring everything?" I asked, eyebrows furrowed.
Aiden snickered. "Yeah. He loves sports and he loves flaunting his money. Of course he sponsored the rink."
"If he loves sports so much than why not support you being an athlete?"
"If only I had that answer."
My heartstrings tugged. I couldn't help but feel bad for Aiden. I had never once had to worry about not having the support of my parents or Scott. We rarely fought. My family seemed to be so vastly different from the Gray's.
"I should go," he huffed after several moments passed with silence. Aiden turned toward his car, pulled the keys out of the pocket of his shorts. "I'll see you tomorrow." He opened the driver side door, paused to look back at me. A sly grin had found its way onto his previously distant features. "We have practice tomorrow, Zoe. Do not be late."
Heat radiated off my face as I watched him get into his car and drive off down the road. Something had shifted inside of me. Instead of feeling a sense of dread of having to face Aiden I felt almost excited to see him again. That made me feel worse.
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