My chest goes tight, my own secret jammed behind my teeth every time he looks at me. Reid’s head lifts just enough to catch my eye from across the room.
He ties off his pads, voice a blade. “Better that way. Secrets have a way of blowing up in your face.”
The words wedge under my ribs. He’s not wrong. Every time I’m with Lulu, I feel the edge of it, the risk, the pressure. One day, this secret’s gonna crack wide open, and the sick part is, I don’t know if I care enough to stop it.
The room quiets for a beat, until Chase pipes up again. “So what you’re saying is, if you did date Taylor Swift, you’d tell us?”
Reid’s look could kill a man at twenty paces, and the chirping fizzles into a few nervous snorts.
Ryan shakes his head. “Leave Hutchy alone. Guy’s set in his ways. God help the woman who actually catches his eye.”
A round ofoooohsripples through the room, a couple of guys smirking. Reid grabs his helmet, voice flat. “She’ll be a stronger person than any of you snowflakes.”
When we hit the tunnel, it swallows us in echo—skates clacking, music thrumming through the walls, the low roar of the crowd swelling with every step. My chest tightens the second the ice comes into view, and we skate onto the ice one by one for warm-ups.
I spot her almost immediately.
Front row behind the glass with Zoe, Charlie, Tamara, and Claire. She’s wedged right in the middle of them all, a ridiculous foam finger clutched in her hand, laughing with Zoe as they try to make it do vulgar gestures. She waves when she sees me, and they both start making the gestures toward me and shoutingPookieat the top of their lungs. I shake my head, but the edge of my mouth lifts at how she’s grinning so wide and bright.
Eli’s right there too, winking at Tamara as he glides past in front of her, completely oblivious to how my eyes are locked solely on his sister.
The crowd is thunder, but all I hear is my pulse. And her laugh. And her moan.
My gut twists sharply. In hockey, nothing saysminelike putting your jersey on someone’s back. It’s claiming without words. And fuck, I want that more than I’ve ever wanted a goal. I want her in my number, my name stretched across her shoulders for everyone to see.
But I can’t. Not without blowing everything sky-high.
And yet, the thought won’t leave me, won’t stop circling. Because this isn’t just about respect or superstition, not just about us swearing we wouldn’t fuck around with anyone else. It’s different. It’s heavier.
I don’t just want Lulu in my bed, I want her in my jersey. I want her in my life.
Once the puck drops, the roar of the crowd is a living thing. My skates bite the ice, legs burning as I push harder, faster. Lulu’s somewhere in that wall of noise, and it’s like every stride is for her.
We cycle through quick shifts—Chase showboating down the wing, Jake barking at him to quit hot-dogging, Reid stonewalling the net with saves that shouldn’t even be possible.
I come off the ice sucking wind, and Chase elbows me as I drop onto the bench beside him. “Skating like you’re trying to win prom queen, Miller.”
“Fuck off,” I mutter, squirting water into my mouth.
Jake smirks. “Prom queen can’t even grow a beard.”
That cracks the bench. Helmets knock, gloves smack shoulders, the kind of easy laughter that keeps the blood pumping.
I grind my teeth, trying not to smile. Because the truth is, they’re not wrong—Iamskating harder tonight. And it’s got nothing to do with them.
Next shift, the puck’s on my stick and I’m gone. Cutting through the neutral zone, picking up speed until the wind burns my face. A defenseman tries to pin me against the boards, but I drop my shoulder and slide past, feeling the surge of the crowd rise with me. Another steps up, stick jabbing at me, but I toe-drag around him, the ice spitting beneath my blades.
For a second, it’s just me and the goalie.
I fake left, drag right, and snap it high. The puck smacks the back of the net with a clang, and the building detonates.
The horn blares. Chase is hammering his stick against the boards like a maniac, and Jake’s yelling something I can’t hear before the guys pile on me, celebrating the goal.
But I only look up once, past the glass. The whole crew’s on their feet. Zoe and Charlie clapping, Tamara whistling through her fingers, Claire bouncing on her seat. And right in the middleof them, Lulu’s losing her damn mind. Foam finger in the air, ponytail flying, grin so wide it could light the rink.
And fuck if it doesn’t feel like I just won the Cup.
We close it out with a win and a shutout for Reid. The final horn blares, and gloves go flying, sticks banging the ice. The boys swarm the crease, mobbing him in a pile that barely makes him blink. Stone-faced bastard just lets it happen, as if the whole arena didn’t just watch him bend physics in the crease.
