Ryan Talonovich is the star of his college hockey team, until an accident during practice leaves him confined to a wheelchair. The doctors say he'll walk again but a new season is already underway and he's been replaced on the team, which leaves him feeling alone and betrayed. What's the use of fighting to get back on the ice now?<br><br>Then he meets Dante Espinosa, a short track skater on the city's speed skating club. Though he has to work overtime to afford his sport, Dante is hell on ice, and dreams of making the cut on the U.S. Olympic Speedskating Team.<br><br>Their love of the ice brings them together, but too many obstacles stand in their way: Ryan's struggle with therapy. The memory of Dante's first boyfriend. Lack of funding to the event, Dante's harassing boss, a skating friend in love with him, and Wil Dietrich, who will do anything to win.

Power Play

At the door, he shifts both bags to one side and is digging into the pocket of his windbreaker for his keys when the phone rings again. “Bobby,” he mutters—it has to be him, hasto be. “You hung up on me,”he’ll moan, and Dante doesn’t need to hear that right now. Let the damn thing ring off the hook for all he cares.


But each ring jars his nerves and he can’t get his keys out, they catch on his pocket and threaten to tear the fabric, the bags start to slip down his arm, he can’t even thinkwith the phone going on and on like that. So he drops the bags to the floor and tugs at the keys, hard enough to send them flying out of his hand and skittering across the hall. And the phone continues to ring, over and over again. Dante storms into the kitchen, snatches up the receiver, dammit the hell. “Bobby,” he cries, “I told you no.”


Chapter 112