Heart of Thorns (Shadow Valley U Book 2)
Heart of Thorns: Chapter 30

I dump the fifth bag of ice into the tub and snicker to myself.

She’s so not going to enjoy this.

“Have you ever done an ice bath?” I call over to her.

She’s cooling down on the treadmill, taking it easy as I directed. Following orders for once.

“I’ve iced my knee before,” she replies.

That’s not the same thing.

The treadmill beeps, and I dip my hand into the water. She grabs a water bottle and comes my way, her eyebrow raised. The water has a nice bite to it, just a few seconds stinging my fingers.

This is going to be fun.

I motion to her body. “Might want to strip down.”

“Thorne!”

I snort. “I don’t mean completely. The sports bra and your panties can stay.”

Because I don’t want to know what I would do if someone walked in and got an eyeful of her tits. I’d probably lose my mind…

My chest tightens. I’ve been avoiding my own thoughts regarding our relationship. Mainly, that it’s all pretend. Except it’s starting to not feel quite so fake, and that terrifies me.

I wasn’t lying to her the other night. I haven’t done this before. Haven’t held on to a steady girlfriend, haven’t cared about anyone more than football to give them the time of day. No sleepovers, no public displays of affection, no repeated dates.

Anyway. Now is not the time to start thinking about such things.

“There’s something I didn’t tell you,” she says in a low voice.

“Tell me when you’re in the ice bath.” I point to the tub.

She frowns, but she does as she’s told. She steps up to the edge and lifts her good leg, gripping the edge to keep her balance. She slowly lowers it into the ice water and sucks in a sharp breath.

“Yep, I know how that feels,” I say. “Keep pushing.”

She says something under her breath and lifts her other leg in. The water barely touches her knees.

“Now sit.”

“Fucking hell.” She white-knuckles the lip of the tub and drops down inch by inch.

That just makes it worse, really.

Finally, the water rushes over her hips, then her abdomen, and she gets all the way into a seated position. She’s barely breathing, her chest not rising or falling as usual. And she’s so fucking tense…

I cock my head and count backward from ten, anticipating her cop-out.

And sure enough, she hauls herself up almost immediately.

“O-o-okay.” Her teeth chatter. “That was fun.”

I shake my head. “That was not good enough, grumpy cat.”

She scowls and doesn’t move.

“You really are like a cat. Afraid to get wet.” I shed my shirt and shove my sweatpants down, revealing my boxer briefs. I set a timer for three minutes on my phone and step in behind her.

“W-what are you doing?”

I ignore the feel of the water and focus on her, running my hands down her arms. “Helping. Obviously.”

She exhales.

“Now we sit.” I lower myself and spread my legs, leaving a space for her. The coldness leaves a familiar tightness in my lungs, a steal-your-breath iciness that I force myself to relax into.

She looks at me, then slowly comes back down. She settles between my legs and leans against my chest.

I immediately wrap my arms around her waist, holding her hostage. Her skin feels hot, even with ice cubes bumping into us.

“Breathe,” I say in her ear. “Focus on relaxing every individual muscle.”

“Y-you do this on the r-r-regular?”

“After practices a few times a week.” I nip her ear. “Relax.”

My hand slides lower, down her abdomen, and slips under the waistband of her panties. Her breathing comes faster when I stroke her clit.

I lean over and check the timer on my phone. “Two minutes left, kitten. Think you can slow your breathing a bit?”

“Not with you d-doing that.”

My finger rubs a lazy circle. “I was going to wait until after to reward you, but I think I’ll start now.”

She groans. Her head tips back and rests on my shoulder, and I watch her struggle to unclench her muscles. And take a deep breath. Then another.

When she does, I increase the pressure of my rubbing.

“Fuck,” she moans.

“I wonder if you’ll come like this,” I muse to myself.

“Y-yeah, just⁠—”

“You’re getting tense again.”

She blows out a frustrated breath and sags on me.

“There.” I push two fingers inside her.

She immediately arches up, but I don’t care. There’s thirty seconds left on the timer now, and I seem to be in competition with myself. A race against the clock.

I pump in and out. My other hand comes down and flicks her clit, all while she’s trapped between my arms. If I wasn’t in ice water, I’d have an erection the size of Texas. As it is, I can feel my heartbeat in my groin.

The timer goes off, the noise shrill, but she’s right there. She grabs my wrists, holding my hands hostage, and I continue until she tips over the edge. She rides it out, her hips moving, her mouth parted.

When the climax subsides, she releases me and hauls herself out of the water. I follow more carefully, my gaze sharp on her red skin.

I climb out and offer my hand to her, then snag one of the two towels for her. I use the other one to dry off and smirk at her.

“That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

She shakes her head. “You’re impossible.”

“We’re going to add that into our routine,” I continue. “It’ll help.”

“If every ice bath goes like that, then… maybe.”

My smile widens.

“But…” She fiddles with the corner of the towel. “I didn’t say what I have to tell you.”

“Right.” I face her. “I’m listening.”

Fear flashes across her expression, and she glances around. As if someone snuck in while we were distracted?

“The arsonist,” she whispers.

“What about him?” I inch closer.

“He’s on the football team, Thorne.”

Fuck.

I sit in Rhys’s room, debating how much to tell him.

If anything.

This feels a little like bad luck, running to tell my best friend a secret of my fake girlfriend’s. But I can’t face this alone. How the fuck am I supposed to walk into the locker room, or onto the field, every day knowing that one of my teammates tried to kill Briar?

But unfortunately, Rhys knows me too well.

The second he walks in and finds me waiting at his desk, he drops his bag, closes his door, and says, “Spill.”

For the record, neither of us gossip. We just keep each other appraised of things going on in the school if it’s necessary. Or interesting.

Okay, so, maybe that’s a form of gossiping.

“If it’s about one of the hockey girls hooking up with Ben Patterson, it’s already gotten out.”

I freeze. “What?”

“Oh. Did you not hear? I think it’s a revenge plot against Briar, honestly. But he clearly has a type, and that type is scary. No offense, dude. I’ve seen Briar’s scowl, and it’s not something I want to cross. I can only imagine that her thighs are thick enough to crush my skull—well, your skull⁠—”

“Shut up,” I snap. “What the fuck is his problem?”

Rhys laughs. “You, obviously. And Briar… together. Do you see where I’m going with this?”

I wave him off. “That’s not what I wanted to talk to you about.”

“Something else happened?” He sits on his bed and grabs a notebook from his bag, flipping to a blank page. “I’m ready, Professor. Fill me in.”

“Put that shit away,” I groan. “You’re impossible. And this has to stay in the vault. It’s serious shit.”

To his credit, he gets serious. He tosses aside the notebook and focuses more fully on me.

“Remember the fire that nearly killed Briar?”

He rolls his eyes and nods.

“Well, it wasn’t an accident. Someone set the building on fire with her in it.” A lump forms in my throat just thinking about it.

“Holy shit.” Rhys’ eyes go wide. “How⁠—”

“She saw the guy. Kind of. Not enough to identify him completely, but she was able to ascertain that…” I press my lips together.

Do I tell him this?

It’s not a matter of trust—I trust Rhys with my life, no questions asked.

But do I trust him with Briar’s trust?

Something uncomfortable snakes through me.

“Please spit it out,” Rhys says, interrupting my internal debate. “What did she see?”

“It’s someone on the football team,” I blurt out.

“Fuck.” He echoes my earlier sentiments. He gets up and paces in front of me. His hand goes to his hair, and he pulls at it while he ponders everything I just said. Finally, he stops and looks at me. “Okay, so, what’s happening?”

“What do you mean?”

“Like, are the police on it, or…?”

“Yeah. There’s an open investigation, but Briar hasn’t heard anything. She thinks they’ve run out of leads, which would make sense. A fire tends to destroy all the evidence, and I’d guess whatever incendiary device was used was too common for them to narrow down.”

“If this guy has even done it before,” Rhys muses. “I mean, he went for what he thought was an abandoned old warehouse, right? Key word: abandoned. If I had a fixation on fire, I’d probably start somewhere that felt safe to practice on.”

I smack my palm to my forehead. “That makes sense.”

“This guy didn’t come ride to the rescue either, so he’s not one of those guys who creates an incident just so he can save the day.” He frowns. “I think I’ve been watching too much Criminal Minds.”

I chuckle. “Yeah, well, it’s probably going to come in handy while we figure this out.”

“Just call me Special Agent Derek Morgan.” He strikes a pose holding an imaginary firearm. “I am the handsome one out of the two of us.”

“Great.” I stand. “Hone those skills, Morgan, because we’re going to be profiling our teammates at practice until we figure out who our arsonist is.”

And we’re going to keep Briar as far away from this as possible. The arsonist already knows her face. He got into her room, left a threatening note. He warned her to leave it alone, to stop searching.

Well, as far as he’s concerned, she has stopped.

But me and Rhys have only just begun.