“Deacon. Holy hell. Did you see this?” Callahan barks out a laugh.
“Buddy. My man. You brought it to the web.” Foster cracks up.
“Oh, he did. He definitely did.” Sterling smiles, “Broke the fucking internet.”
Deacon looks up from lacing his shoes with the face of a man who already regrets existing. “What now?”
Hank turns his phone around so everyone can see the headline. “Former Playboy and Hottest Man of the Year, Goes Down.”
Koa chuckles, “The proposal heard around the league."
The video is looping. Deacon dropping to one knee, the crowd roaring, his girl crying, his teammates losing their minds in the background. Already seven million views.
He scrubs a hand over his face and asks with zero inflection, “It was private. How did it get out?”
Faulker smirks. “You proposed at Icehouse. How did it not?”
I clap him on the shoulder, playing along because a few of us knew it was going to go down like that. “Relax. You look good on camera.”
Deacon lifts his chin, “I look good, she looks fucking beautiful.”
We roar at that. The good kind of ribbing follows. The kind that comes from men who would bleed for each other without hesitation. Every jab is affection. Every laugh is a new layer to their coat of armor.
He scowls, “And she’s highly intelligent. A professional. You disrespect her, I will cut you.”
“Period.” I chuckle.
“Mic dropped,” Faulker adds.
“End of.” Sterling laughs.
“Fuck off,” Moretti grumbles.
Stretch time follows. Bands pulled. Hips opened. Shoulders loosened. The locker room fills with the soundtrack of grunts, thuds, and Faulker lecturing Hank about the benefits of yoga for a goalie, specifically.
Someone throws a towel. Someone else throws it back. The speakers blast warm-up music. Energy builds in the room, the door swings open, and Coach D walks in.
Silence lasts exactly one breath.
Coach D is not loud. She doesn’t have to be. She stands in front of the whiteboard, eyes scanning the room, taking all of us in like she is cataloging strengths and sins.
“New York,” she says. Simple. Heavy. “They play fast. They talk shit. They think they’re the only New York team and will try to run you out of your own building. Prove them wrong.”
Everyone shouts out or cheers in response.
She taps the board with his marker. “First shift sets the tone. I want hits. I want speed. I want them gasping before the five-minute mark. If they want to play physical, remind them whose ice this is.”
Heads nod. Muscles tense. Heart rates rise. Coach looks directly at me. “You start us off. Make them feel you.”
A rush hits me all at once. Clean. Hungry. Electric.
Coach D steps back, voice dropping low. “You know who you are. Play like it.”
Her stare sweeps over us, sharp enough to cut tape with. She is the first female head coach in the league and the only one who could have pulled this team out of the gutter and into somethinglethal. Not because Costello was trying to make history, but because she was the best. Number one in the country at Lincoln University and Olympic-bound until that fight on the ice knocked her off the roster. She still carries that fire in her, the kind that crackles in the air when she speaks.
And just like that, we are seconds away from the tunnel. Seconds away from the roar. Seconds away from war.
We file out behind her. The floor vibrates with the crowd above us. The lights are low; the kind of dim that makes you feel like you are waiting in the throat of something with a pulse.
