“You called Kowalski.”
“Yes.”
“And told him to look out for me.”
Evan’s throat moved. “I couldn’t be the one to do it. But I needed someone to. So I called him.”
“You told him Michigan players are good people.”
“They are. You are.”
Finn looked at him for a long moment. This man sitting shirtless in a hotel bed with pasta sauce on his thumb and the gray at his temples catching the lamplight and every piece of armor gone. Then Finn leaned over and kissed him, tasting garlic and warmth. When he pulled back Evan’s mouth was soft and he was looking at Finn the way he would look at him in any hallway, in front of anyone, without checking first.
“We’re having dinner with Kowalski tomorrow,” Finn said.
“Apparently.”
“You’re buying.”
“That seems fair.”
Finn settled back onto Evan’s chest. Evan’s arms came around him, one palm warm against his ribs, the other resting on the duvet.
But Michigan’s ice was still his.
And so was this.
14
Epilogue
The jersey was heavier than Finn expected.
Not the fabric. The weight of twenty thousand people watching him pull it over his head, the Fury crest settling across his chest, the hat someone pressed onto his skull before he’d finished blinking. The flashbulbs went off in a wall of white that turned the audience into silhouettes, and the man at the podium said his name and the number and the city, and the sound of it went through the building like a held breath releasing.
Chicago. The Fury. Seventh overall.
He did not remember the walk back to his seat. Only the handshakes, the cameras, the jersey heavy on his shoulders, and Hayes standing in the aisle with his phone in one hand and the other hand on top of his head like he was trying to keep his skull attached.
“Dude.” Hayes grabbed him by the shoulders. “Dude.”
“I know.”
“Seventh. Seventh overall. I’m going to throw up.”
“Please don’t.”
“I’m so proud of you I might actually cry, and if that happens we never speak of it.”
“Deal.”
His phone was vibrating nonstop in his pocket. His mother. His agent. Petrov. People he hadn’t talked to since freshman year. He pulled it out and the notifications stacked so fast the screen was just a blur of names.
One text sat at the top.
Evan:Chicago.
Finn looked up. Across the arena, past the crowd and the cameras and the scouts in their suits, Evan was in the upper section. Not hiding in a back row. Sitting with Claire on one side, who was on her feet, a Fury pennant in one hand, her other hand pressed over her mouth. On Evan’s other side sat a guy Finn didn’t recognize. Tall, lean, dark curly hair. He was clapping and grinning like he’d been personally invested in the outcome.
