“I know.”
“If the team finds out, not guesses, but knows, it changes every room we walk into.”
“Yes.”
“Every compliment looks like favoritism. Every correction looks personal. If I play well, people question why. If I screw up, it becomes proof. If you sit me, they’ll say you’re overcorrecting. If you don’t, they’ll say I’m getting special treatment.”
“I’ve thought about it.”
“Management?”
“They would have to address it.”
“That’s the nice version.”
“It’s the accurate version.”
“Would you get fired?”
He didn’t answer quickly enough.
My stomach dropped.
“Declan.”
“Maybe,” he said. “I can’t predict it. There are conduct policies, morality clauses, optics, power dynamics. Even if we’re bothadults and the relationship is consensual, I’m your head coach. That matters.”
Hearing him put it that plainly hurt, but it also steadied something in me. He wasn’t pretending that wanting each other made the rest of the world stupid.
“What happens to me?” I asked.
“They won’t fire you.”
“Don’t give me the padded answer.”
His attention sharpened.
“I’m not asking if they terminate my contract tomorrow,” I said. “I’m asking what happens to my life.”
Declan exhaled slowly. “Your reputation takes a hit. Media turns it into a spectacle. Some people decide you were manipulated. Some decide you manipulated me. Some say you slept your way into ice time, which is absurd and exactly the kind of absurd people love. Some make it about you being with a man. Others pretend they’re not making it about that while doing it anyway.”
My skin felt too tight.
“And the room?”
“The room changes. Maybe not with everyone. Maybe not forever. But yes, it changes.”
I looked toward the dark window. “Benny would panic and then ask a question so invasive he’d need a lawyer.”
“Likely.”
“Milo would try so hard to prove he was normal about it that he’d become deeply abnormal.”
“Yes.”
“Roman would quietly threaten people with his goalie stick.”
“He may already have a list.”
