Because there's no second chance if this goes sideways.
Just me and an impossible task and a ticking clock.
I go upstairs to my bedroom after dinner, letting the quiet of the condo settle around me. I kick off my shoes, change into an old T-shirt, and sit on the edge of the bed with my phone in my hand.
The file is still open:Luka Popovich - Client Briefing.
I scroll through social media on my phone. Looking for anything that might be helpful. There’s a photo near the bottom from game day a few days ago, caught mid-play, all focus and controlled violence. He's not looking at the camera. In fact, I notice that he never looks at the camera. Odd for a guy who did a mostly nude centerfold shoot.
I zoom in slightly, studying his face like I can decode him through pixels and distance. Two agents couldn't crack him. Carey is betting I'll be the third failure.
I lock my phone and set it on the nightstand, then lie back against the pillows, staring at the ceiling. The busy city buzzes faintly beyond the window. It’s a different rhythm than Arizona. Maybe it’s the weather, or maybe it’s the difference in being on the West Coast, or maybe the only difference is that it has me in it now.
I close my eyes, feeling the cold settle into the quiet spaces around me.
Seattle is already doing what Carey wanted. Stripping away everything comfortable, everything safe, putting me outside my usual zone.
What she doesn’t understand is that I don’t need what’s familiar, and I don’t need comfort
I just need a win.
And I'm going to get one.
Chapter Four
LUKA
The arena is loud in a way that vibrates through your bones.
The kind of loud that hits when the puck drops and thirty thousand people decide, collectively, that they want blood and miracles in the same sixty minutes.
This is the last home game before the bye-week break. I can feel it in the air. The extra edge. The way the hits land a fraction harder, the way bodies lean into contact instead of away from it. Nobody wants to limp into two weeks off.
The puck snaps across the ice, and I intercept it without thinking, stick blade absorbing the impact like it’s part of me. I pivot, shoulder down, and drive through the neutral zone as a defender closes in. He goes for my hip. I adjust, take the contact high instead, and keep moving.
The crowd roared when I fired the puck toward the net. It deflects wide, but the pressure sticks. I circle back, resetting, scanning. The game slows the way it always does when I’m locked in, like someone turned the volume down on everything except the ice.
"Boards!" Slade shouts.
Aleksi takes a hit from an opposing player and loses the puck, and then I ram the guy clean into the Plexi, popping the puck free. Aleksi recovers from the hit and scoops it up and then sends it down the ice. The bench exploded with cheers.
That’s the thing about hockey. You don’t get to fake effort. You either show up or you show that you’re better suited to warm the bench.
We’re midway through the second period when Olsen, our goalie, makes a glove save on a breakaway that would’ve tied the game, and the building loses its mind. I tap my stick against the boards in appreciation, chest tight with the familiar surge of pride to be on this rink, playing with this team, and these fans. This team knows how to fight for each other, and it’s just another reminder that I’m right where I’m meant to be—playing hockey, not doing my father’s bidding.
The third period is a grind. My lungs are burning, my legs are cramping, and the sweat dripping down my forehead is stinging my eyes, but I welcome all of it. Fatigue strips everything down to instinct. There’s no room for doubt when your body’s screaming at you to quit. There’s no room to waste time or energy. Every move has to mean something, every push off the ice has to earn its keep. There’s no room to waste whatever fuel is left in the tank.
And we don’t.
With five minutes left, I win a faceoff cleanly and crash the net. The puck finds its mark, skidding past the goalie’s pad. The red light flashes, and the sound is deafening.
Goal.
I don’t celebrate much… I never have, but I let myself feel it. The weight of the moment. The momentum that this game brings to our season. Slade slaps my helmet as we skate past the bench.
"That’s how you start a vacation," he grins.
We hold the lead. The final horn sounds, and the game ends the way it should. With us on top and the other team skating off in silence.
