CHAPTER 1
Paxon
“Dammit!”
“Whoa there, bud. Where’s the fire?”
I look up at my teammate Hen from my cubicle, still clutching my phone in a death grip with my text messages open. “Nothing. Sorry.”
“Boone?” he guesses accurately.
With a curt nod, I lock the screen and put my phone in the stall. I can’t afford to let my brother get in my head tonight. This game is too important.
“Is he gonna make it?”
“Not tonight,” I grumble, shifting my focus to getting my gear on.
I’m fucking worried. Boone always makes it to my home games, so when he can’t that means something is very wrong. Hen and a few of the other guys know he’s a challenge, but I still don’t like talking about it.
“He’ll be okay, man,” Hen says. “He always is.”
“Yeah.” I shake out my shoulders. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine on the ice.”
“I’ve worried about a lot of things in my day, but never you.”
The slightest of smiles tugs at my lips. Hen’s a good guy.Jimmy Henson is his full name, but he’s been known as Hen in the league since his rookie year. We were traded to the team at the same time, finding an unexpected home and chosen family with the Mistone Magnets. I wasn’t thrilled about being traded away from Philly, but I gotta admit, the move was a good one. And it kept me closer to my mom and Boone.
I twist my neck from side to side, pushing out all thoughts that aren’t about shutting down Detroit tonight. We lost our last two games against them, but that losing streak ends tonight. On home ice. Our fans deserve it.
Whatever is going on with Boone can wait until the game’s over.
The locker room door opens and Coach Willis enters, his normally cheerful face marred with a frown. My shoulders tense. Is there bad news? No. Can’t be. Boone just texted me an hour ago.
“Landham,” Coach calls out to the team captain.
Landham crosses the locker room and he and Coach huddle for a second. The captain glances over his shoulder, but not at me. He’s looking at our injured goalie, who’s been playing in spite of the bruised ribs he got from a crazy mash-up last week.
Landham nods and turns to face all of us. “Listen up, guys.”
Coach clears his throat, his expression smoothing slightly. “Just got word from Detroit that Krikowsky is back in tonight.”
Our goalie, Palachuk, glares at nothing, his jaw clenching.
“I thought that asshole was suspended for three games,” our rookie forward, Greene, yells out.
“He should be kicked out of the game,” Hen mumbles.
“Too many injuries. They made a call to let him back in,” Coach explains. “But with some pretty strict rules. If he’s out of line at all, they’ll notice. You got this, Palachuk?”
Before the goalie can speak, Landham is crossing the room and clapping him on the shoulder. “Course he does, Coach. And his team has his back.”
But the coach obviously wants to hear directly fromPalachuk. Krikowsky and he go way back to their college days, and the Detroit center seems to have some kind of personal vendetta against our goalie. If Palachuk knows what it’s about, he hasn’t told us.
“Don’t worry, Coach. I can handle him.”
“He won’t even get close to you,” Hen says, bumping my arm. “Right, Bouche?”
“Damn right. We got you.”
