Her eyes sweep the rink, like she’s auditing the chaos she helped choreograph. Then they skip right over me, not even a pause or flicker or recognition. Something in my chest tightens, an ache that hits between ribs and reason. I almost forget to move. My blade catches, jerking against the ice, and the sound drags me back to where I am.
The whistle blares, slicing through the static in my head. “Move it, Hendrix!”
The bark of Cooper’s voice hits like a shove between the shoulders. I blink hard, shake it off, and push forward, legs burning as I chase the next pass down the line. Each stride scrapes the tension off my nerves, the sting of cold air biting deep enough to remind me what’s real: the ice, the puck, the weight of what I can’t have.
When he finally calls it, my lungs are raw, my gear is soaked, and my head is no clearer. I glide toward the bench slowly, trying not to make it obvious I’m stalling. Cole glides up beside me, eyes cutting from me to the tunnel.
“Lots of cameras for a Thursday,” he says.
“Guess their weather guy called in sick.”
“Guess PR didn’t.”
I take a pull from my bottle, water cold enough to hurt in a way I can use. “Don’t.”
“Not doing anything.”
“You’re watching.”
“Someone should.” His tone is light, but the glance he gives me isn’t. “You good?”
No.
“Fine,” I lie.
He studies me, too perceptive for my liking. “She wrote a hell of a statement.”
It should make me feel better. It doesn’t. “Yeah. Great. Maybe it’ll keep you out of my hair.”
Cole’s mouth tilts, not quite a smile. “I’m not the one you want out of your hair.”
Before I can tell him to shove it, Cooper blows the final whistle. My lungs are fire, and my head’s no clearer than when I started. I peel my gloves off as the boys tap their sticks on the ice, the universalgood skatebefore everyone scatters toward the tunnel in twos and threes.
I should follow, but I catch sight of her again.
Alycia stands by the boards, headset slung around her neck, murmuring to one of the comms techs. The overhead lights catch the way one lock of hair slips loose, and she tucks it back like muscle memory. It’s ridiculous that something so small can undo me faster than a cross-check.
I should leave her alone. The cameras are still rolling somewhere, Cooper’s voice is echoing down the tunnel, and I can already feel his warning look on the back of my neck. But I’m already moving.
“Torres,” I call, my voice rough from shouting drills.
She looks up, and for one second, her eyes catch mine, and the whole building tilts. Then she looks elsewhere, somewhere safe.
“Hendrix,” she says, in the same professional tone she’d use for anyone, like I’m not the guy who once made her breath hitch for real.
“You here to critique my form?”
“Only if you start missing the net.” Her mouth twitches into almost a smile, but then it’s gone. She gestures to the comms tech. “We’re done here. Please send the footage to Janine for review so we can get it to the media by noon.”
Janine nods, gives me a quick grin, and disappears through the gate.
And then it’s just the two of us. The quiet between us is louder than the drills ever were. She’s close enough that I can see the faint tremor in her fingers and the small twitch in her jaw that says she’s holdingherself together by will alone. I should back off and let her breathe, but I can’t. She won’t look at me, and somehow that hurts worse than if she yelled. It’s like I’m being erased in real time.
“You didn’t sleep,” I say finally, the words scraping out of me more than spoken.
Her head barely lifts, but the movement punches straight through me. There’s a flicker of something in her eyes before she masks it again.
“You don’t know that,” she says, voice low and even.
