My jaw tightened. “How about you try to win without the penalties? Bringing a gun to a knife fight isn’t as impressive as you think.”
Whitfield chuckled and shook his head as he continued forward.
It’d been this tense all morning. Our next game was against one of the best teams in the league, the Westbrooke Angels. I was nowhere near impressing Coach enough to expect playing time. When I wasn’t doing schoolwork or hanging out with Naomi, I was on the ice with Sam. He’d dedicated copious amounts of time trying to help me get back to the level I was before. Now, it looked like those hours were a monumental waste. I wanted to drive my fist into a wall at the realization.
“Where’s your head?” Sam stopped in front of me, looking just as frustrated. “In bed, with Naomi?”
“Shut up,” I warned. Sure, these last few days I’ve been distracted. But Naomi wasn’t my problem. In many cases, she was my solution. I hadn’t felt a moment of peace until we started opening up to each other. Every second with her reminded me of how good life could get.
“Am I wrong?” Sam continued. “Because your dribbling’s worsened. You can’t initiate a breakout to save your life. And you’re letting Whitfield—a scrawny son of a bitch compared to you—shove you like a rag doll.”
“He plays dirty,” I reminded him.
Sam shoved my shoulder. “So did you once.”
I pushed him back. “Back off.”
“Or what?” he taunted, getting close enough so our visors clashed. “What are you going to do, huh?”
My blood boiled. I could tell from the look in Sam’s eyes he wasn’t going to let this go without a fight. This wasn’t about my fumble. He’d gotten my phone back to me and found nothing useful on it. After that, he seemed to have it out for me. Thought I was hiding something. I couldn’t even get him to tell me what he was looking for. Our agreement was null when his search turned up empty.
“Get out of my face, Sam,” I said through gritted teeth. “I might not be as quick to throw a punch as I was before, but I can still teach you a lesson.”
“Boys!” Coach Haynes finally intervened. Most of the time, he let us figure out our own issues. When it seemed like there was no resolution in sight, he’d step forward. “Off the ice,now!”
Stoll was at his side again today. The closer it got to game time, the more he hung around. Even though I didn’t have much of a reference, the time he dedicated to our team felt unusual. He watched with a hard look when Sam and I went to the sidelines. Neither of us said a word to Coach as we started toward the locker room. Haynes’s pensive glare was enough to let us know we were done for the day.
The second the locker room door closed behind us, Sam threw his helmet across the room. It banged across one of the metal benches before tumbling to the floor. I watched, calm as he snatched his gloves off and tossed them toward his helmet. He started ranting about Coach and the new players. As he paced, I lowered myself onto a bench to watch and listen.
Sam looked unhinged. He scratched at his neck as he spoke. The mood rubbed off on me, transferring like an airborne virus. I tried to use a breathing technique Aden recommended, but it didn’t work.
“This isn’t about what happened out there,” I said in a stiff voice, still pissed at how he’d gotten up close and personal. “So, calm the hell down and tell me what’s bothering you so we can fix it.”
“Fix it.” Sam laughed humorlessly. “God, fix it? What if it isn’t broken, Finn? I mean, look at you.”
I frowned when he stopped pacing to gesture in my direction.
“You’re fine. Better than fine, you’re in a dream state. Wrapped around a woman’s finger. Fucking like mindless—”
“Don’t bring Naomi into this.” My order was laced with a dark warning.
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Fine. My point is—”
“What?” I pressed.
Sam paused and went over to lock the door. When he turned back, his eyes were wide as his secret spilled out. “We’re poker chips to them, Finn. I came down here because Mendell was the only school that seemed willing to do what it takes to win. Come to find out, we get benched when we cross a certain threshold. Be good, but not too good.”
I shook my head. “I’m not following. Slow down or maybe speed up. Just get to the point, please.”
The air felt thick with Sam’s anxiety. I think I knew what he was getting at, and my stomach twisted when I got confirmation.
“Stoll, the greatest AD.” Sam scoffed. “Savior of dying programs. Champion of the poor and weary. He’s got a whole betting system that works like a well-oiled machine. Probably makes thousands, moving his chess pieces, pretending he’s God. And he’s such an idiot, but no one can see it. Or maybe they do. I know Haynes does, he just doesn’t say anything. Stoll must have something on him.”
“Slow down, slow down,” I urged, struggling to keep up. Sam seemed to have reached a breaking point. “Just…the betting thing. Tell me about the betting thing.”
This was what he’d been looking for on my phone? I had known something about this before the fight. Had evidence apparently. But, of course, I couldn’t recall a goddamn thing. How in the world did I get evidence on a guy I barely spoke to?
“He benches players strategically.” Sam took a seat across from me, moving his hands as he spoke. “Rich donors probably place their bets alongside unknowing gamblers. We lose, they win.”
