The captain of the hockey team has a lot of responsibilities but when it’s just us, all he wants is to be my good boy.

Senior year should have been the same as the previous years: football, hook ups, and homework.

But after the season ended, somehow, Joey Carpenter happened.

He’s weaseled his way under my skin. Into my heart.

The strong, intimidating, hockey player melts so beautifully for me and I’m addicted.

He pretends like he doesn’t need anyone, but I see him.

See what he really needs.

The longing to be cared for is there in his eyes.

I desperately want to give it to him.

If I’m being honest with myself, I need to matter.

I need to save him.

Save him from himself.

Save him from his family.

Will I be able to convince him that he deserves to be loved without conditions or will they leave him ragged and broken?

I'll do anything not to marry the girl my parents want me to.

Including marrying her brother in a drunken panic.

I'm not gay, but I can fake it long enough to get our parents off my back, right?

Cue hiding out for the next two years, but nothing is that simple, because I'm offered a spot on the US National team.

Now we have to fake it for the entire world as the poster boys of gay fencers while Colin makes me doubt everything I think I am.

I'm not prepared for all the ways I depend on Colin. Or the place he's filling in my life.

But I can't keep this up.

I'm slipping on a national stage.

And he's going to press every button until I snap, ruining this for us both.