The Maulers.
They’re not just here to play hockey. They’re here to claw their way into our bones, snap us in half, and bleed us dry if we so much as blink wrong. Red and gold bastards with fists faster than their skates and a reputation for hits that land harder than their goals. They talk shit like it’s their native language, and they know we’re the ones to beat this year.
Good.
I’m in the mood to ruin something.
The rink is vibrating before the puck even drops. Packed barn, rafters shaking, every fan in black and red howling for blood. The Reapers are loose in the tunnel, blades scraping concrete, shoulders tense, every man a fuse waiting to blow.
Elias is pacing like a caged animal, all lean muscle and jittery adrenaline, licking his mouthguard between his teeth, flipping his stick from hand to hand. His curls are still damp from warmup, cheeks flushed, eyes fixed on the Maulers through thecrack in the tunnel curtain. The bruise on his knee hasn’t faded yet—yellow at the edges now, but I see how he shifts his weight, how he favors it slightly. He’s still hurting.
I told him to sit. He looked me dead in the eye and said, “Then bench your best chance at winning. I dare you.”
Goddamn brat.
I didn’t bench him. I’m not stupid. He’s the best center in the league right now. Numbers don’t lie. He’s got the best faceoff stats, fastest pivot, tightest plus-minus in the playoffs. Even Coach can’t argue anymore. Just muttered something about cursed knees and legacy runs and walked away to stress-smoke somewhere.
So Elias is where he belongs. Center line. Me on his left. Cole on his right. And the entire arena waiting for us to break something.
The Maulers skate out cocky, all swagger and sneers. Their captain—big, ugly and stupid enough to think he’s funny—glides past Elias with a smug grin and chirps, “Careful, rookie. That pretty little knee still holding up? Or you gonna cry for your boyfriend to kiss it better?”
Elias flashes a grin that makes my cock twitch and my fists curl. “Try me,” he taunts back, voice bright with murder. “I’ll bury you so deep in this ice your kids’ll be born shivering.”
Cole wheezes. The Mauler sneers.
The puck drops and we explode. Elias snatches it with no hesitation, no fumble, just pure reflex, stick slicing sideways. He doesn’t just win the faceoff, he steals it, tears up the ice, spinning on that bad knee like it doesn’t exist, dragging two Maulers behind him. I’m right behind him, teeth bared, left wing and locked in, skating like I want someone’s blood on my blade. Cole flies up the right side screaming, “Suck my dick, Maulers!”
Jesus Christ.
Elias draws both defensemen straight to him—bait so perfect it belongs in a textbook—but he doesn’t slow, doesn’t even glance. He flips a no-look pass across the crease like heknowsit’ll land. And it does. Cole slams it home, back of the net, horn screaming as he rams the boards with arms wide and chest heaving. “That’s right, bitches!” he roars. “Tell your mom I said hi!”
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
He skates over to the Maulers bench, points at the goalie, and screams, “You look like my ex. Ugly, useless, and getting fucked in front of a crowd!” He’s always the loudest when he’s hurting. Cole chirps to cover the bruises. Performs like laughter can keep the fists from landing. But I see the wince when he skates off. The way his left glove trembles before he yanks it tighter.
I’m already moving to drag his ass back to the huddle, but I’m too late—one of the Maulers launches over the boards and tackles him, gloves dropping as hell detonates around us. Viktor goes airborne, Mats screams something vicious in Spanish, and Shane’s cackling like a demon from the crease, mask tilted like he summoned this shit himself.
I grab the closest Mauler by the collar and slam him into the glass hard enough to shake his ancestors. The ref’s whistle might as well be a mosquito. It’s useless. Everyone’s swinging. Cole’s laughing through a face full of fists. Elias is yanking at jerseys, trying to drag him out.
One of the Maulers lands a clean fist to Cole’s jaw.
Viktor doesn’t even hesitate. He moves like death in skates, no windup, no warning, just six-foot-six of Russian obliteration charging across the ice and colliding with the guy mid-swing. The Mauler hits the ground like a sack of bricks. Viktor looms, dead-eyed, helmeted, a statue of consequences.
“PETROV! BOX!” the ref screams.
Viktor shrugs, turns and glides toward the penalty bench with eerie calm, like he didn’t just commit second-degree assaultin front of a sold-out crowd. The Mauler’s dragged off the ice behind him, blinking.
Cole’s still wheezing on the ice, clutching his jaw and grinning. “THANK YOU, DADDY!” he yells after Viktor.
Viktor doesn’t even turn. Just raises one gloved hand and flips him off without breaking stride.
The bench chokes on laughter. Coach mutters something about needing a daycare and goes back to chain-smoking in the corner.
We reset back to center. Elias is already waiting at the circle, crouched low like a predator who’s learned to grin before he bites. He stares the Mauler across from him down, all teeth and mischief, a smirk playing on his lips. “Hey,” He chirps, light and sweet as poison, right as the ref bends to drop the puck. “Tell your backup goalie I’ll need dinner first if he wants to go down on me too.”
But the Mauler across from Elias leans in close, venom curling under his breath just below the ref’s range. “Got first line ‘cause you suck dick that well, rookie?”
Elias gives him a wicked smile and purrs. “Oh, you have no idea how well.”
