Waivers

His ten years in America end this summer. The only way to keep playing is to marry an American.

Declan Revitt is a defenceman from Sheffield: third pair, penalty kill, nine goals in ten seasons, and the least trouble on any team he's ever played for. Nobody in hockey knows he's gay. He has made very sure of that.

Then a summary from the club's immigration lawyers tells him his status ends with his contract in June, and that after August no club in the country can ever file for him again.

Nick Botelho runs the equipment room: first in, last out, out since he was twenty, funny enough to fill any room, and the man who knows every glove size in the building. At one in the morning after a loss, Declan sits on the stool in Nick's back room with a beer and asks, to the pipes, whether Nick knows any American men who'd marry a stranger.

Nick says, "Me."

He says somebody in this league should get something out of it. He doesn't say he's been in love with Declan for more than a year.

A courthouse wedding in February. One bed. A lawyer who doesn't want to be told anything she'd have to un-know. A file that has to convince the government, and a dressing room that can never suspect a thing.

It only has to fool the government. So why can't either of them tell what's real any more?

Marriage of convenience · a closeted British defenceman · the equipment manager who's loved him for more than a year · one bed · a deadline · explicit (M/M) · one couple across three books · Book 1 ends on a cliffhanger