He dressed in black sweatpants, a Bellford Ravens sweatshirt, and a knee-length puffer coat, the kind that all the athletes got. His hockey bag slung over his shoulder, he left the Rink and stepped into the bitterly cold Massachusetts night.
Rather than walking back to his apartment, he turned left and took the path that ran adjacent to the Rink. He’d do a lap, he decided, while he called Lotte.
She picked up on the fourth ring, after he thought she was going to send him to voicemail.
“Update me,” he said instead of hello.
Lotte sounded tired. It was late in Groningen, but she rarely slept the requisite eight hours. Bash gave her as much shit for that as she gave him for overworking himself on the ice.
“Okay,” Lotte said. “He got sick last week. He thought it was a cold, and then we thought maybe the flu. It got bad enough that Mom convinced him to see Dr. VanHoeken. You should’ve seen the way she had to argue with him. Shit, I felt bad for her. Well, Dr. VanHoeken doesn’t have good news. All this stress Dad’s been putting himself through? It hasn’t caused a heart attack yet, but it caused that thing I texted you. You could think of it as heart attack-adjacent. Or maybe a mini heart attack. An appetizer for a heart attack. An amuse bouche for cardiac arrest.”
“Lotte.”
“Right. Sorry. VanHoeken said that Dad needed to basically cut his activity in half, stop working so much, eat better, cut out alcohol—not to mention drugs—and start thinking about his health seriously if he didn’t want another heart attack.”
Bash sighed. It was very cold. He wished he were still inside. “What did Dad say?”
“What do you expect? He told VanHoeken that the last heart attacks didn’t get him, so why would another one?”
“Jesus Christ.”
“Yep. Mom was furious, and Dad was mad that she was mad.”
“How areyou?”
“Just glad I’m in Groningen. Are you sure you can’t visit?”
“I’ll be home in December.”
“Ugh. Fine. Well, I have to go. I’m meeting Gustav for a drink.”
Bash almost dropped his phone. “The fucking prince?”
“Yes, him.”
Bash was grateful for the chance to chuckle. “I knew if anyone could do it, it’d be you. Love you.”
“I love you, too.”
He’d almost completed his lap around the Rink and was about back to where he started when he saw movement in the shadows of the building.
Bash stopped in his tracks. He could see the figures, but from where he was positioned, they couldn’t see him.
There were two.
One was obviously Cort. Moonlight fell on his blonde hair and caught on his cheekbones. A smug, bruised face Bash would always recognize.
The other boy was hidden in the shadows, but he wore a Bellford Hockey sweatshirt. Based on his shape and build, Bash could safely guess it was either Conrad or Thaddeus. Conrad was a freshman and a good pal of Cort’s. Thaddeus was a sophomore who’d fallen into the flock of Cort disciples.
Whatever was going on seemed, for lack of a better term, utterly suspicious.
Bash inched forward, careful not to make a sound, and careful to stick to the shadows.
The boys were talking. Or rather, Cort was talking. The other boy was nodding.
“Don’t tell anyone,” Cort was saying. “If they found out about—” The other boy cut him off with something too low for Bash to hear. He didn’t dare get any closer, or they’d see him.
“Yeah, I know,” Cort said, sounding frustrated. “Just be smart, okay? I know that’s hard for you, but try.”
