Page 196 of Puck Me Back to Life

“I love you, Kai.”

The room stays quiet. He sleeps through the confession. Maybe that's for the best.

For tonight, it's enough that he's here.

Someone pounds on my front door hard enough to pull me out of sleep. For one disoriented second, I don't know where I am.

Then I remember.

The couch.

Kai asleep in my bed.

The game.

Everything that happened afterward.

Another series of knocks rattles the door. I rub a hand over my face and check the clock. Six thirty-eight.

“Jesus.” The knocking comes again.

I glance toward my bedroom before crossing the apartment barefoot. Whoever is outside isn't getting anywhere near Kai until I know why they're here.

I unlock the deadbolt and crack the door. My body immediately tenses.

Noah Grove.

His nose is wrapped in a white bandage, purple bruising already blooming beneath both eyes. He looks like he slept even less than I did.

“What do you want?”

Noah shifts awkwardly. “Is Hayes here?”

Every protective instinct in my body wakes up at once. Without thinking, I step into the hallway, pulling the door shut behind me. The click of the lock echoes between us.

My finger lands squarely against the center of his chest. “What the hell do you think you're doing here?”

Noah doesn't move. “I just⁠—”

“No.” I jab his chest again. “You don't get to show up at my apartment after yesterday. You don't get to say another goddamn word to him.”

He finally looks me in the eye. “I came to apologize.”

I blink. “What?”

He exhales shakily. “I need to apologize.”

The hallway falls silent.

Noah looks exhausted.

His shoulders are slumped, and his eyes are bloodshot in a way that has nothing to do with hockey.

“Please.” His voice cracks slightly. “I just… let me talk to him.”

I study him for a long moment. Every instinct tells me to tell him to get lost. Every instinct also tells me Kai deserves the chance to hear whatever Noah came here to say.

“If I think you're upsetting him,” I say quietly, “you're gone.”