I turn and drop back onto my spot on the floor. “Does that mean … Can we ditch them altogether now?”
“Damn straight. I want to know what it feels like to be inside you with nothing between us.”
“Okay. Good to know.”
He points at my food. “Now we’ve gotten that out of the way, eat. Your food is getting cold.”
“Yes, Mom.”
As if perfectly timed, Anton’s phone lights up on the coffee table.
“Speaking of moms, yours is trying to call.”
He quickly reaches for it to answer. “Hey, Mom. Happy Thanksgiving to you too. And you, Dad.” He pauses for whatever they say and follows it up with “All good here. I have a teammate over, and we’re having a quiet one.” He continues to talk to her while I stare at the blank screen on my phone.
I don’t expect my dad to call, and my mom hasn’t invited me to her place for Thanksgiving in years. She has a new husband, new kids … Still, it would be nice if one of them picked up their phone to call me.
“Sorry,” Anton says when he finishes up.
“It’s fine. You have parents who obviously care.”
His lips flatten into a thin line. “You said your dad doesn’t do Thanksgiving.”
“Yeah. I’m not expecting anything from him. Or my mom. It’s fine. I’ve never been their priority.”
“It’s okay to still want them to make an effort though.”
“Nah, only a dumbass would still want it.”
“Well, you are you, so like you said, it checks out.” He leans back and sips his drink smugly.
“Stop showering me with all this affection and sweet words. You will spoil me for other men,” I deadpan.
“You’re welcome.”
“How do you think we’ll play tomorrow after eating all this food?” I point to my plate.
“Sluggish. But hey, the other team will be full of turkey too, so it’ll all even out. And if we get in another orgasm tonight, there’s no way we can lose. Our streak is still hot.”
“Better do it soon since apparently I can’t stay over.”
He clears his throat and leans forward to place his glass on the table. “About that.”
Ooh, I don’t like that tone. “What?”
“Maybe I do want you to stay over.”
“O … kay?”
“But I want you to do something with me first.”
He sounds uncharacteristically serious, and when he shifts, linking his fingers together and releasing them, I bite back my response of Sacrifice to the hockey gods? and wait.
“On the afternoons we’re home and I’m not with you, I spend a lot of time volunteering. No one knows. Not my agent, not our PR team, sometimes not even the charities I’m there for because I don’t give my real name. I do it for me because I think it’s important to give back.”
I narrow my eyes. “No one’s noticed you?”
“One of the soup kitchens I go to frequently knows who I am, but they respect my privacy. It’s not something I want the media getting wind of and making into a big deal.”
Wow. I know Anton is always going on about his privacy, but I know a lot of guys who volunteer or give money, and even when they do it privately or anonymously, it always gets out. Everyone loves recognition.
Then it hits me what’s happening here. “You’re telling me.”
“Yes.”
“When no one else knows?”
“Correct.”
Something warm creeps through my chest, making me smile.
“I want you to come with me today,” he says.
The smile drops right off my face. “If this is another animal shelter …”
Anton laughs loud and uninhibited. “I promise it’s not. I’ve actually filled my trunk with donations, and I was going to take it to a soup kitchen I help at and drop it all off. We’ll stay and help cook everything and get it set up, then the other volunteers will take over to do the actual serving.”
It’s not how I wanted to spend my afternoon, but I’m interested.
“You don’t have to,” he rushes to say. “No obligation, I just thought …”
“Yeah?”
He clears his throat. “I thought it might be nice for us to do together.”
“You’re on.”
And it’s hard to imagine that spending an afternoon with Anton where we play delivery driver and then cart boxes back and forth before joining a production line of people preparing food could be fun, but when we get back to his place and climb into bed, I’m hit with the strangest thought: there was nowhere else I’d rather be today.
Anton wraps his arms around me and yawns widely. “You did good today.”
“Thanks.”
“Now go to sleep. We have a game to win tomorrow.”
“There you go trying to jinx us again.”
“Please. It’s Buffalo. We have nothing to worry about.”
It’s true we’ve been kicking ass. We haven’t lost a game since Anton and I started sleeping together regularly. We’re high on the leaderboard and should easily skate into the playoffs at this rate.