What Goes Around...

Part Eighteen

Chapter Eighteen

Freya looked up at him with a smile and it made him feel warm inside. She was a great ally, and he wasn't sure he could have made this trip without her.

               "You ok?" He lowered himself to the seat beside her.

"Yup. Good. You?" She gave him a strange look as she shrugged.

                "What is it?" She blushed and it made him smile, "what have you done?" He was rapidly coming to associate her with chaos and trouble. That look told her that this evening was apparently no different.

                "Before we came away I talked to Krystal about my...inexperience..."

That made him groan it was the last thing he wanted to talk about but he knew that ignoring things didn't work with her. "What did she recommend?"

Freya didn't speak, merely turned the book over in her hands, Fifty Shades of Grey.

                "Is it always like this?" She asked earnestly.

The fear and anxiety on her face, the innocence and insecurity...he shouldn't laugh, but he did, heartily.

                "You are the craziest woman I have ever met. If you are inexperienced read Harlequin romance not a book on BDSM." When her eyebrows raised in question he laughed, "the tying up, the pain...it's a niche Freya, not what most people do."

She collapsed back in her seat gratefully, "thank God. I thought I'd have to let you slap my bare arse and that was not a pleasant thought."

Coop managed to hide the gasp of surprise that her words caused in him, THAT was a dangerous analogy, somewhere he couldn't take his head, because the images her words created sparkled in his mind, and that was wrong.

Instead he plastered on a smile, "as I keep reminding you, nothing is happening between us, spanking or otherwise."

Her eyes were wide at that for a moment, then she shook her head, "so you enjoyed the hockey?"

Coop laughed, "god woman, you are a menace! Yes I enjoyed being here, but that does not mean I'm about to open my life back to hockey." He'd sworn he'd never wear his boots again and he meant it.

                "So you'll teach me to skate now?"

He shook his head, "not happening!"

                "But you're good at it."

                "No way Freya, I haven't skated for years, and I'm not about to change that just for you."

She placed her hand on his arm and he wanted to groan in frustration, she was playing him and he was powerless, "please? I'm so clumsy that I wouldn't trust anyone else to teach me, but it's kind of on my bucket list."

He groaned, "why can't you take no for an answer?"

Despite the nature of his words there was no malice in his voice.

                "Because you always look out for me, and I trust you."

 

How the hell has this happened? Coop looked at the ceiling for a moment in disbelief. He was on the ice, in Mathew's conveniently right sized blades, with Freya grasping his hands for grim death, wearing her own standard rink issue skates. Her knuckles were white, her shoulders tense, but the look of pure exhilaration on her face as he skated backwards leading her across the rink made it all right. She was in rapture.