Description
Fifteen years of professional hockey has taught veteran player Julian one vital rule: keep your head in the game and your true self buried at all costs. With retirement on the horizon, he just needs to survive one last season without his long-guarded secret surfacing. That is, until the arrival of Stryker Bell, a cocky young rookie whose presence on the ice is as magnetic as his personality is infuriating.
Stryker is everything Julian knows he should avoid—he’s young, reckless, and alarmingly attentive. Their proximity in the locker room quickly turns the air between them electric, transforming simple practice sessions into unspoken dares. When the pressure of a losing streak finally snaps Julian’s restraint, a single, desperate moment of physical vulnerability irrevocably changes their relationship.
What begins as a blur of stolen moments quickly deepens into a terrifyingly real connection. Julian finds himself caught between the safety of his silent, hollow closet and the vibrant life Stryker represents. As he navigates old, buried trauma that threatens to dismantle his career, Julian must decide if he is willing to risk everything he has built to finally embrace the man who makes him want to stop hiding.
