He grabs at my collar to yank me down, but I plant my skates and shove him hard enough that he stumbles, blades scraping uselessly against the ice.
This is weeks of me swallowing it. The funeral. The waiting. The quiet dread that something else will go wrong before she makes it to full term. The knowledge that she’s at home and carrying our child, and I’m stuck in an arena pretending I’m fine.
He swings again, but I beat him to it. One last punch lands clean and decisive, and he drops to a knee before he can catch himself.
The linesmen are immediately there, wedging themselves between us, arms locking around my shoulders and hauling me back. I don’t fight them.
I can hear the boys pounding the boards, their sticks tapping against the ice. The crowd is a living thing, screaming and hungry and electric.
Chase is half-laughing, half-yelling as he skates backward and points his stick.
“That’s Reid Hutchison, you asshole! You don’t get to hack him and skate away!”
Logan is cackling like a lunatic. “Should’ve stayed in your crease, buddy!”
Viktor just nods at me with a sharp, satisfied look, while Jake leans halfway over the boards, his grin proud.
“Atta boy, Hutchy!” he shouts. “Build the statue, baby!”
The refs herd me toward the box long enough to bark out the calls—fighting majors and matching misconducts.
Chase skids to a stop near the box, already peeling his gloves back.
“I’ve got it,” he says, tapping the glass. “I’ll sit.”
“Of course you will,” Logan laughs. “You’d marry him if he could stand you for more than five minutes.”
Chase flips him off and hops into the penalty box to serve my five.
I bend, pick up my mask from where it slid near the crease, and roll my shoulders once before settling it back into place. The world narrows behind the cage.
Across the rink, their backup is scrambling over the boards.
The puck drops again, and the Lightning press, angry now, but I see everything. I track the shot through traffic and swallow it clean.
This line is mine, and we win 2–1.
But it doesn’t matter what barn we’re in, what city, what noise follows us down the tunnel.
The only thing I’m thinking now as I tug off my mask is: I want to go home.
When I get back to my hotel room, it smells like starch and too much carpet cleaner, instead of her shampoo. Instead of her cheeseburgers and my honey, and Harry’s lemons and soil.
Once I’m out of the shower with a towel slung low on my hips, my phone buzzes once. An incoming video call from Carina.
I don’t even dry off properly, just swipe it open, and drop onto the edge of the bed.
She’s curled on our couch, a throw blanket around her legs, one hand resting on the rise of her bump. Her hair’s a little wild, and her eyes narrow like she’s scanning for damage.
“You good?” she asks softly.
I nod. “Yeah. We won.”
She squints. “That’s not what I asked.”
I sigh. “Took a few shots. Ribs held up. I’m fine.”
“You’re lying about one of those things.”
