The Bell Centre is freezing.I stand at the edge of the bench, breath fogging the glass, trying to focus on the drills.
The Defenders spill across the ice in navy practice jerseys, sticks cracking against pucks, blades hissing over fresh ice. It’s not a real practice, more of a glorified warm-up. Passing drills, breakouts, goalies taking a hundred shots just to find their rhythm.
Finn razors past the crease, calling out to Adam and slapping the puck into the corner. “Wake up, man, that’s your lane!” he crows. Adam scrapes a little snow at Finn’s skates as he blows by.
Liam barks instructions at a cluster of younger guys while Dmitri silently turns the drill into open-ice murder, checking Wesley hard enough to make the rookie wobble.
Nate’s in the net at my end, dropping into a split. He tracks the puck clean, glove flashing, pads snapping shut. He looks huge in gear—impenetrable, commanding—but my eyes keep straying to the smallest things: the sharp push-off from his right leg, the fractional wince when he resets. No one else would catch it. I do.
Coach paces behind me, satisfied, while I scribble notes on my iPad I’ll use later.Groin stable under low load, but external rotation still tight. Careful on pushes. Mobility work before game.
The horn blows, and the players coast into lazy circles before streaming off the ice, joking, clattering sticks against the boards. I trail behind them, already planning the treatment queue.
The Bell Centre’s visiting medical room smells of industrial disinfectant. Every arena’s training facility carries the same scent of bodies pushed beyond their limits and patched back together with tape and hope.
I carefully arrange my equipment. Control the environment, control the narrative. Professional competence as armor against the chaos of want.
Wesley arrives first, as rookies always do, overconfident in his youth. His complaints about back pain are more performance than genuine distress. It’s a way to show he belongs, that he’s tough enough to need treatment.
I work with clinical efficiency, hands impersonal as I assess and adjust. Dmitri follows, grim and economical with words, pointing to his knee with the expectation of understanding. We communicate in the language of injury andadaptation, no wasted syllables, no personal investment beyond the mechanics of healing.
And then Nate fills the doorway.
The air changes temperature, becomes charged with the memory of his hands on my skin, his voice in my ear, the taste of surrender on my tongue. He moves into the room, and everything I’ve rebuilt in the past hour threatens to crumble again.
“Morning, Trouble,” he murmurs, settling onto the table.
His proximity is a match on gasoline. Heat blooms up my neck despite every professional instinct screaming resistance. I force my hands to steadiness, my voice to cool professionalism as I begin the assessment I could perform in my sleep.
“Range of motion looks good,” I announce, testing the flex and extension of his hip with the detached interest of a mechanic examining an engine.
“Feels even better when you touch it,” he replies, voice pitched low enough that only I can hear the innuendo threading through what could pass for innocent gratitude.
My fingers falter for a moment. It’s barely a hesitation, but it’s enough for him to notice. Enough for that knowing smile to curve his mouth.
“Stay still,” I command, putting every ounce of authority I possess into the words.
He obeys with mock solemnity, but his eyes never leave mine. “Yes, ma’am. Anything you say.”
The submissive words carry the weight of last night’s dynamic, the memory of how he’d held my wrists and fed me ice cream while I melted into compliance. My professional mask feels tissue-thin under the intensity of his gaze.
By the time I finish and step back, my hands are steady but my insides are in revolt. He slides off the table withathletic grace, pausing just close enough that I catch the scent of his skin.
“See you at the game.” He winks as he leaves the room, and I remain standing alone in the sterile space, surrounded by the tools of my trade and the wreckage of my composure. In the space of twelve hours, I’ve discovered desires I didn’t know I possessed and risked everything I’ve worked to build.
The question isn’t whether I can go back to the way things were. The question is whether I have the courage to go forward into whatever this is becoming.
24
UNDER PRESSURE (NATE)
The locker room hums with the usual pregame noise. The music is too loud, sticks are tapping, the staccato rhythm of guys gearing up for battle is overwhelming. Montreal’s barn is already shaking, and we haven’t even hit the ice yet.
I drop onto the bench, strapping my pads methodically. The ritual keeps me calm.
Finn plops down beside me, laces loose, wearing that expression that says he knows every secret I’ve ever had. Which, unfortunately, he mostly does.
“You’re wound tighter than your blocker straps, big man,” he says, elbowing me. “That got anything to do with our sugar PT lookin’ like she just got caught skippin’ church?”
