Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 85616 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 428(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 85616 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 428(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
He bounces from hook-up to hook-up and tries not to overthink what comes next. But when he meets Miles Reed, the Burlington Bobcats’ new athletic trainer, there’s nothing to overthink.
Miles is his fated mate. Dyl is sure of it.
Except Miles is a shifter too, and he doesn’t feel the same pull. Something’s wrong.
Still, the attraction between them keeps growing, along with Dylan’s hope that maybe fate matters less than the fact that Miles keeps choosing him.
But getting closer to Miles also means getting pulled into the danger he came to Burlington trying to escape: a stalker who has spent years watching and threatening him.
And now they’ve noticed Dylan too.
With the season heating up and the threat escalating, Dylan and Miles will have to figure out what’s real between them before someone else decides their fate for them.
ICED OUT MATE is a spicy MM hockey shifter romance featuring a one-sided fated mate bond, forbidden attraction, teammates and found family, and two men determined to find out whether love really needs fate’s permission
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
Chapter One
Started At Hello
DYLAN
Anxiety sucked major donkey balls.
I paced around my living room, looking around for something to do to keep my mind busy. To stop it from racing in a hundred different directions, none of them leading me anywhere I actually wanted to go. It felt like a pile of ants had been dropped in my chest and were crawling outwards.
I already vacuumed. I cleaned the kitchen this morning. I cuddled with Nike on the couch and I played a video game that I could hardly focus on, causing me to lose more times than I could count and get yelled at by some fourteen-year-old with early onset anger issues. I’d already gotten a warning for talking back to the little snot heads so I decided to keep my smart mouth shut and just turn it off. I went into my bedroom and stared at the pile of laundry that needed to be folded. I put away three shirts and a couple pairs of socks but still couldn’t stop the anxiety from smacking me repeatedly across the face and punching me directly in the chest.
None of it worked. My skin still crawled. Brain still buzzed. Heart raced for no apparent reason, since my fight-or-flight instincts must have been fried at birth.
I dragged myself over to my kitchen, the tiles cool against my bare feet. I checked the sink, finding nothing to clean. Looked in the fridge for some beer—it was already five o’clock which gave me the societal green light to start drinking, even if it was a random Sunday at home.
Nothing.
In fact, my fridge was pretty empty. I had my meal prep containers full and ready to go (chicken, brown rice, and veggies—yum… for a hamster shifter), but maybe I could busy myself with some grocery shopping?
Which would then require me going to the grocery store, something I wasn’t particularly fond of.
I shut the fridge door. A tiny and hungry meow followed the sound of it closing. Nike looked up at me with half-closed eyes. He likely woke up from a nap and launched himself off the couch the second he heard me opening the fridge. He could have been in a coma and that cat would have risen like the second coming for a nibble of fresh ham.
I smiled before crouching down and giving him a couple chin scratches. He looked at me like, Thanks, bud, but we both know that’s not what I came here for.
“Sorry, sir, your order is coming right up.” I opened the fridge door to another—much louder—meow. Cool. I didn’t want to get him upset and lower my star rating.
The crinkling of the bag made Nike even more awake. He nudged his body against my leg, looking up at me, tail shivering in anticipation. “Here you go, sir. I hope it pleases you.” I balled up a tiny piece of deli meat and tossed it down on the floor. Nike pounced on it like a lion. He swallowed it down, gave a meow of thanks, then bumped into my leg asking for more. “Coming right up.” I tossed down another piece. I’d give it to him by hand, but I learned my lesson from the first couple days I’d brought him home. I’d never had a cat—hell, I never even had a goldfish—so I wasn’t really aware of just how sharp their teeth and claws were.
I quickly learned after I tried to be nice and hand-feed him some kibble. Maybe it was because he was extra hungry after I rescued him, but the little bastard nearly took off a finger. Thankfully my shifter healing closed the two deep bleeding wounds on my hand fairly quickly.
I still wasn’t sure if that moment gave my sidekick a taste for fresh blood, though.
After nearly an entire slice of ham, I figured it was time to close the kitchen and hand out the bill. Nike quickly entered dine-and-dash mode once he realized the ham was being put away. I closed the fridge door to see his black tail curling around a corner and disappearing back into the living room.
“I’ll just comp this one,” I called out to him.
The sound of kitty litter being moved around answered me. Great. He wasn’t paying his bill and he was blowing up the bathroom.
I leaned against the kitchen counter and rested my head against the plain wood cabinet.
That was a nice five-minute reprieve, but unfortunately feeding my cat wasn’t the cure I was searching for.
What about a hookup? That could possibly help solve this random oil slick of anxiety I’d woken up covered in. I could keep my mind and body focused entirely on someone else’s. Get myself out of my head. Give—and get—some head in the process. Win-win.
Except I knew that’d only be a temporary fix. Especially lately.
I wasn’t always this anxious. I lived a fairly carefree life and liked to have that reflected in how I acted and felt. Except life has a way of chipping away at the effortless smiles and hearty laughs. My first real anxiety attack happened sophomore year when I was failing in my science classes. Academics—or anything requiring major brain power—was never my strength and having that made obvious with the grades I was bringing home made me feel crushed, over and over again. It didn’t matter how good I was doing in gym class or in hockey. My father was one of those men who could cut you down with a look—and considering he was a fucking rocket scientist there were some big shoes to fill and a lot of nasty looks and comments when those shoes weren’t the right fit for me.