The Magic Broom by Teegan Loy Read Free Book Online Page B

Cody silently thanked the newspaper for not having the budget. Stefan just happened to be in town visiting his cousins before heading to Olympic qualifying.
Poor Derek was visibly disappointed he didn’t get any pictures of Cody lying facedown in a snowbank. The morning was actually okay. He managed to make it to the bottom of the hill several times. Stefan did some incredible tricks and talked about all the bones he’d broken learning them. Cody told him he was perfectly fine keeping the snowboard on the snow. He didn’t need to learn how to fly. He’d done that when he tried luge.
In between interviews, Cody and Kira raced over to the curling club. The boys were working on throwing take-outs, which meant exactly what it sounded like. If there was a rock in play, they wanted to take it out of play. Sometimes, they took out more than one rock at a time. Shane did something called a triple take-out and all the boys whooped and hollered for several minutes. They soon called it an afternoon and Pete rushed off the ice, sweeping Kira off her feet and spinning her around until she screamed that she was going to hurl on his chest. Pete immediately set her down.
“So,” Shane said. “You look like you’re still in one piece. How was snowboarding?”
“The trick is to keep the board on the snow,” Cody said. “Derek was not pleased that I didn’t face-plant into a snowbank, but he is looking forward to this evening when I try my hand at short track speed skating. Any sort of sport that involves skates usually means my ass ends up on the ice.”
“Don’t be hurting that cute little ass of yours,” Shane said, swatting him on the butt.
“I wish we could hang around,” Kira said. “But Cody has a date with a speed skater.”
They all wished him luck before Kira whisked him off to another ice rink where he was stuffed into another skintight suit and made to wear the worst skates ever invented. The blades were long, and every time Cody tried to move, they got tangled and sent him sprawling to the ice. Derek was grinning like it was Christmas. Cody flipped him off and promptly fell down again.
Svetlana did everything in her power to keep him on his feet, but she finally dragged him over to the boards and let him watch her skate. It was amazing. He couldn’t believe she could get so close to the ice without wiping out.
She explained skating singles and the team stuff. When he asked her about medals, she said she was in the running for the bronze, but anything could happen.
“How do you deal with the nerves?” Cody asked. “All I would be thinking about was wiping out.”
“I do get nervous, but it’s a nervous excitement. I love to compete.”
They talked until Cody’s feet felt like blocks of ice and his balls were starting to itch in the confines of his suit. Svetlana giggled when Cody complained about the tightness of his suit. She gave him a hug, patted him on the ass, and helped him down the tunnel to the locker room where Kira was waiting for him.
“Get me out of this shit. I’m exhausted,” Cody complained.
When Cody finally got back to his apartment, there was a note tacked on his door from Shane telling him to text the moment he found the note. Cody followed the directions, and in a few seconds, Shane poked his head out of his apartment and smiled sleepily at him.
“Sleep with me,” Shane said.
“Be right there,” Cody said as he dragged his tired and bruised body into his apartment and got ready for bed. He staggered down the hall and followed Shane to his bed. They barely had enough energy to kiss. Cody fell asleep with his lips pressed against Shane’s neck and woke up with Robbie holding his ringing phone next to his ear.
His evil editor had found a ski jumper for him to interview. Cody shouted into the phone and said under no circumstance was he going anywhere near ski jumping. His editor actually agreed with him, but said he had one hour to get his scrawny ass out to some restaurant by the