Pressure Play (Top Tier #1)

Chapter 1

Chapter one

Heath

One, two, three—breathe—one, two—

It wasn't working.

I sat on my kitchen floor with my back against the cabinet and my gear lined up on the counter above me like somebody else's life. Stick. Skates. Pads. All of it ready. None of it helping.

Nineteen thousand people were going to watch tomorrow to see if I belonged. I already knew how fast a mistake becomes a story.

I reached for my phone and called Thunder Bay.

Pickle answered mid-sentence.

"—because Juno threatened to edit me out of the podcast intro again, and I told her if she does, I'm filing a formal grievance with Hog, who believes in justice and also thinks Juno's voice sounds like a clarinet being murdered—"

The knot in my gut loosened half a turn.

"You didn't say hello."

"Hello's for people with time to waste. I've got intelligence.

" The sound of chewing. Definitely eating.

"Biscuit slept through yesterday's full team meeting.

Entire thing. Didn't move. Didn't twitch.

Then Desrosiers opened a protein bar, and Biscuit sat up like we shocked him with a cattle prod.

Hog claims it proves he has elite instincts. "

The corner of my mouth pulled upward. "That's not what elite instincts mean. Biscuit's a dog."

"That's exactly what I said! But Hog's knitting now—a scarf, apparently—and he refuses to be contradicted while holding pointy weapons.

" More chewing. "Oh, and Jake tried implementing a hydration accountability system.

Lasted nine minutes before I converted it into a drinking game.

Evan confiscated something I brought into the room.

I'm legally prohibited from specifying what. "

"Legally prohibited by who?"

"My conscience. Also Juno, who says I need to stop trying to sound like a true-crime narrator when I call people on the phone."

"You don't sound like that."

"See? Growth."

My shoulders relaxed.

"So," Pickle said, swallowing, "what's going on? You don't call this late unless you're dying or you can't sleep, and since you're breathing, I'm eliminating option one."

I leaned my head back against the cabinet. The counter edge pressed into my shoulder blade.

"Can't sleep."

"Opening night nerves?"

"Yeah. Something like that."

The tone of Pickle's voice changed. Focused, not frantic. "What kind of nervous?"

I hesitated.

"Not the playing-badly kind."

"Then what kind?"

I shifted the skates half an inch. "The kind where you screw up and everybody sees it."

Pickle was silent for three beats.

"Ah. That kind. You know what I did my first home opener here in Thunder Bay? Tripped over the bench door. Caught my skate on the lip and went down like a bag of cement in front of ten thousand people."

I groaned. "That's not the same."

"Not exactly. What can be is that I got back up. Played my next shift. Scored, actually." He paused. “Disappearing would’ve been worse.”

I leaned against the counter.

"Playing it safe isn’t what keeps you in Chicago, Heath. Showing up when things get messy is."

I didn't push back.

"You don't need to be perfect," Pickle added. "You just need to still be standing when the whistle blows."

I exhaled.

We talked for another few minutes. Pickle circled back to trademark Storm chaos. Hog's scarf caused a minor locker room battle, and Biscuit was campaigning to be named "Most Valuable Sleeper."

When we hung up, I wasn't as tense, but I was still awake.

I opened my laptop and streamed Dancing with the Stars, volume low, like it was something somebody might catch me doing. I told myself I'd watch one routine. I watched three. There was something about the contestants who weren't naturals and how they kept going back out there anyway.

Sitting in my apartment wasn't helping. It only gave my brain more thought space to spiral.

Jacket. Keys. Wallet.

I didn't decide to go out. I decided not to stay still.

Chicago at night was busier than Thunder Bay. Sound came from everywhere: bass thudding from a car two blocks over and the rattle and hum of the L.

I walked without a destination in mind. Hands in my jacket pockets and breath fogging in air that bit without freezing. The cold helped. Sharp and clarifying.

I passed a corner store still lit, amber light spilling onto the pavement. Next was a restaurant with chairs stacked on tables and kitchen lights bleeding through the front window.

Everything closed or closing. The city kept going anyway. Back in Rhinelander, you knew when a street was done for the night. In Chicago, I couldn't tell.

Three blocks later, I found the bar, the Northbound.

I'd been here twice since the move last spring: once alone and once with a couple of guys from the team who'd wanted somewhere low-key after practice. It wasn't a hockey bar or a tourist destination. It was a neighborhood spot with decent lighting.

I pushed through the door.

Warmth hit first. The air was thick with bodies and beer. Glasses clinked, and someone laughed near the dartboard. The bartender glanced up and nodded.

I nodded back and slid onto a stool at the bar's end.

"Usual?" I'd only been there twice, and he already knew.

"Yeah. Thanks."

He turned and reached for a beer bottle. I flattened a hand on the bar top—old wood, slightly tacky—and let the noise settle around me.

On the far wall, the bar had an oversized aquarium. When I came with the guys, one joked the resident Oscar was a piranha. I knew better.

The tank was four feet long with that one big fish. Iridescent orange gleamed when the light hit it right. When I'd sat down, the Oscar had drifted to my end of the tank and stayed there, hanging in the water, watching me with frank attention that would've made me nervous in a person.

Wood panels beneath the tank were open. Equipment exposed. Tubing disconnected. Someone's hands moving inside.

I sipped my beer and watched.

The guy faced the tank and had his sleeves rolled past his elbows, forearms corded as he adjusted something near the filter intake. Brown hair. Broad shoulders.

When he shifted his angle slightly, his profile was sharp in the glow from the tank. Clean-shaven. Solid bone structure.

He straightened and wiped his hands on a bar rag. Turned enough that the light hit him full-on.

I inhaled sharply.

Mathers.

It was Kieran Mathers, my Ironhawks teammate.

He was the picture of composure in the locker room, shoulders back and every word measured. Never missed a play. He was a player coaches describe as mature beyond his years, which always sounded to me like a polite way of saying he'd never been young.

Here in the bar with sleeves rolled up while testing the pH balance, he didn't fit the picture I knew. This Kieran looked like an ordinary guy.

I stopped staring. Took a pull of my beer.

When I glanced back, Kieran was closing the panels. The bar owner clapped his shoulder and said something that made Kieran laugh.

He looked easy here, unguarded and relaxed. I'd never seen that in the locker room.

I watched him wash his hands at the bar sink. He checked the tank once more, a quick scan. He said something I couldn't hear. Was it to the fish?

Kieran turned and looked straight at me as I held my bottle in the air, caught out of position.

A slight smile. Recognition.

He said something to the bar owner and then moved toward me. Slowly walking across the room with no wasted steps.

He stopped two stools down.

"Donnelly."

"Mathers." My voice came out level. Small miracle.

"Didn't think I'd see anyone from the team tonight."

"Yeah. Same."

He glanced at my bottle, then back at my face. "Couldn't sleep?"

"Something like that."

"Opening night?"

"Is it that obvious?"

"Only because I've been awake since four." He admitted it as if he were talking about the weather. No shame.

I tipped my head. "Seriously?"

"Seriously." He flagged the bartender and gestured for water. When it came, he drank half in one pull. "Figured if I'm awake, I should at least accomplish something."

Looking past him at the tank, I asked, "You do this often? Fix aquariums at midnight?"

"When they need it." He moved to the next stool, closing the distance between us, one elbow on the bar. "Owner called yesterday. Filtration was cycling wrong. Didn't want to wait."

"And you just came?"

"Aquariums aren't complicated. I mean, they are, but the fundamentals hold."

A laugh slipped out. "That sounds like a voice of experience."

"I know a thing or two."

"It sounds like you do more than fixing bar tanks."

Kieran's jaw shifted into a slight smile. "I volunteer at Shedd. Have for a while. You pick things up."

I'd heard about his volunteer gig. High profile, but this wasn't that.

"So you're good at this?" I gestured at the tank.

"Enough not to kill anything." Another sip of water. "Filtration's about balance. Nitrogen cycle. Making sure nothing spikes too fast. You test, adjust, wait."

He rotated his water glass on the bar.

"There was a sea turtle at Shedd last year, hit by a boat propeller. Took five months before she'd eat on her own. You can't rush that. You just show up and keep the water clean."

I realized I'd turned on the stool to face him. Didn't remember doing it. "Lots of waiting."

"Yeah." His voice dropped. "That's the part that matters."

He stopped. Looked at his water glass.

"Anyway. Owner's happy. Fish lives another day."

I looked at him. Held it a beat too long.

He angled toward me, away from the bar.

"You played well in preseason," he said.

I tensed. "I stuck around. That's it."

"That's not it." His eyes stayed level. "Our spot isn't charity."

The certainty in his voice hit sideways. Like the math was obvious to everyone but me.

I wanted to argue. List every reason he was wrong, including every shift where I'd second-guessed myself, and every goal that felt more lucky than earned.

Like that one against Detroit where the puck had deflected off my skate, bounced off my ass, and somehow ended up in the net.

SportsCenter replayed it six times. The commentators laughed every time.

I didn't say any of that.

Standing here in a bar that wasn't pretending to be anything, talking about water chemistry, I felt more solid than I had all night. My body didn't brace.

Kieran asked nothing of me.

"Thanks," I said. An honest response.

He checked his phone. "I should head out. Early skate."

"Yeah. Me too."

He stood, paused, and looked at me once more. "See you tomorrow, Donnelly."

"See you tomorrow."

He left.

My beer was still half-full, and the bar was still warm. That Oscar swam in lazy circles. Steady. Unbothered.

I took my time finishing the bottle before pulling on my jacket and stepping back out into the cold.

The walk home was quieter than the walk there.

My phone buzzed in my pocket. Team group texts.

Varga: Who's ready to fucking GO tomorrow

Rook: This guy

Pratt: Early skate 8am sharp

I scrolled through the replies. Thumbed past the hype and the trash talk, looking for one name that wasn't there.

I pocketed my phone.

The cold had sharpened while I was inside. I walked faster, hands deep in my jacket pockets, and I kept thinking about the water beading on Kieran's forearms when he'd turned from the sink. He didn't notice, but I did.

Did I belong?

All I could think about was how Kieran had looked at me, like he already knew the answer.