Weston gasps. “CAPTAIN. That’s cold.”
Kai’s gaze flicks up, deadpan. “You’ll live. Unfortunately.”
Asher is already half out of his gear, calm as ever, towel around his neck like he didn’t just spend an hour getting pucks fired at his face.
Coleson is loud—of course he is—telling a story too big with his hands, like he needs the room to orbit him.
I strip my shoulder pads off and keep my eyes down so my brain doesn’t go hunting for problems.
It finds one anyway.
Kai sits across from me, elbows on his knees, taping his stick like ritual, even though practice is over. “Film in an hour.”
I nod. “Yeah.”
Kai stands, grabs his bag, then pauses like he’s deciding whether to say something else.
He doesn’t.
He just adds, quieter, “Get your head right.”
Then he walks out.
And I’m left there with my pulse in my throat and the awful realization that Kai Mercer already feels the shift in me. He doesn’t know why. Not yet. But he knows something is off. And if Kai starts sniffing around the truth before I’m ready to tell it the right way, this turns into chaos.
Not the fun kind.
The kind that cages Harlow.
The kind that makes her disappear again.
I can’t let that happen.
Coach catches me in the hallway for two minutes of “stay present” and “stop drifting,” like he’s not wrong and I don’t hate him for it.
By the time I step back into the lobby, she’s still there. Notebook closed now. Hands folded in her lap. Hoodie sleeves pulled down over her knuckles like she’s trying to disappear into fabric. She isn’t looking at me. She’s looking at the ice.
Something in my chest tightens. I slow without meaning to. The air shifts when she senses me. Her head lifts. Her eyes meet mine.
Recognition.
Not surprise. Like she felt me coming before she saw me. It’s ridiculous. And it hits like a punch.
“Hey,” I say, keeping my voice low.
“Hey,” she replies, and her voice is steady—steady enough that it makes me want to believe she’s okay.
We stand there for a beat, neither of us moving, like we’re waiting for permission.
Kai is nowhere in sight. Which is both relief and danger.
“You stayed,” I say, because it’s the only safe thing I can say.
She shrugs slightly. “I like…watching the ice.”
I nod. “Yeah.”
Silence stretches.
