Chapter 4
Luca
The arena roared like a living thing. Seventeen thousand voices compressed into a single wall of sound that hit me the second my skate blades touched the ice.
Opening night. The arena's lights blazed overhead, reflecting off the fresh sheet of ice. Every camera in Chicago was pointed at me.
I'd done this three hundred times. Maybe four.
It never got old.
I took my position for the opening faceoff. I bent low, stick ready. Across from me, Detroit’s captain—a brick wall of a man named Kozlov—grinned like he had a secret. The referee held the puck suspended between us.
"Heard you got a puppy to train, Moretti."
My jaw tightened. I didn't look toward the bench where Theo sat with the other bottom-six forwards. I didn't need to. I'd been hyperaware of exactly where Theo was since warmups, when he'd skated past and flashed that goddamn sunshine smile.
The puck dropped.
I won the draw. I snapped it back to our defenseman and drove forward into Detroit territory.
My line moved like a machine—years of chemistry meant I knew where Hayes would be before Hayes knew it himself.
A quick cycle behind the net, a pass to the point, and I crashed toward the crease looking for the rebound.
The shot went wide. Detroit’s goalie smothered it.
Whistle. Line change.
I skated toward the bench. I was already analyzing the play in my head. Should have driven harder to the net. Should have anticipated that Hayes would hold the puck an extra second. I grabbed my water bottle and squeezed a stream into my mouth without removing my helmet.
Detroit’s fourth line took the ice.
So did Theo.
My chest constricted—instant and unwelcome. I forced myself to look away. I focused on Coach Reeves’s rapid-fire instructions for the next shift. But my peripheral vision betrayed me. I tracked the flash of Theo’s number as the rookie lined up for the faceoff.
Professional. Keep it professional.
Theo lost the draw. Detroit surged into the Storm’s zone, and I watched the rookie backcheck.
His positioning was textbook. Good speed.
Good stick work. The defensive breakdown came from our center, not Theo, and when Theo intercepted the pass and chipped it out of the zone, the kid made it look easy.
Pride flared hot in my chest. That's my—
No. Not my anything. Just a rookie I was mentoring. That was all.
"Moretti, you're up!"
I vaulted over the boards mid-play. My skates hit the ice as Detroit dumped the puck deep. I raced back to retrieve it, absorbing the angles without thinking. A defenseman angled toward me—I feinted left, cut right, and sent a breakout pass up to Hayes that hit him in stride.
The next three minutes blurred into pure hockey.
Shift after shift, the game seesawed back and forth with neither team gaining an edge.
I played my usual game—controlled, calculated, every move precise.
I set up two scoring chances that didn't convert, blocked a shot that left my shin throbbing, and won three consecutive faceoffs in the defensive zone that killed Detroit’s momentum.
The score stayed 0-0 into the second period.
I stood at the bench during a TV timeout. My chest heaved, sweat dripping down my spine under my pads. Theo was on the ice again. I found myself watching the rookie’s positioning during the defensive zone draw.
Perfect. The kid was a fast learner. He was already implementing the adjustments we had worked on during those brutal morning sessions.
Stop watching him.
The timeout ended. Play resumed.
I had just swung my leg over the boards for my next shift when I saw it happen.
Detroit’s enforcer—a plug named Morrison who'd been headhunting all game—lined up across from Theo at the faceoff circle. But he wasn't watching the referee’s hand. He wasn't watching Theo.
He was staring dead at me.
My stomach dropped. Morrison’s stick wasn't even on the ice. He was coiled tight, back leg loaded, shoulder dipped low. The angle was all wrong for a faceoff. It was perfect for a charge.
"Callahan!"
My voice ripped across the ice, but the noise from the crowd swallowed it whole.
The puck dropped.
Morrison didn't even blink at it. He exploded forward, bypassing the faceoff dot entirely, ignoring the play to drive straight for where I was skating.
I braced for the impact.
Then a blur of blue jersey cut across my vision.
Theo didn't play the puck. He didn't try to check Morrison. He just stepped sideways—directly into the gap between the enforcer and me.
He didn't have time to brace. He just put his body in the way.
Morrison slammed into Theo with the full force of two hundred and twenty pounds.
Time fractured into crystalline shards.
I saw Theo’s eyes go wide. I saw Theo try to brace for impact as Morrison’s shoulder drove up toward his jaw in a hit that would have been a suspension if it connected clean.
Theo threw himself sideways.
The hit caught him across the chest and ribs instead of the head, but the force of it lifted Theo off his skates. He slammed into the boards with a sound that punched through the arena noise like a gunshot.
Theo crumpled.
Everything in my world reduced to a single point—my rookie’s body limp on the ice.
I didn't remember crossing the distance. I didn't remember dropping my gloves. One second I was jumping the boards, the next my fists were tangled in Morrison’s jersey and I was slamming the enforcer into the glass hard enough to rattle the stanchions.
"You fucking—"
Morrison tried to swing. I ducked under it. I drove my fist into his ribs. Then his jaw. Once. Twice. The referees were shouting, hands grabbing at both of us, but I couldn't stop. I wouldn't stop. Morrison had hit Theo.
Someone yanked me backward. Hayes.
"Cap, he's down! Moretti, look!"
The red haze cleared enough for me to see the Storm’s trainer kneeling beside Theo on the ice, checking his eyes with a penlight. Theo was conscious—thank God, he was conscious—but his face was pale and his expression was glazed with shock.
I stopped fighting. I let the referees haul me toward the penalty box while Morrison skated to his own bench, spitting blood on the ice. The arena was screaming, half the crowd on their feet, but all I could hear was my own pulse thundering in my ears.
What the hell did I just do?
I never fought. Not in ten years. I never lost control. I never let emotion override discipline. Captains didn't fight. Captains kept their heads and led by example. They sure as hell didn't drop the gloves and whale on an opposing player like a goon.
The trainer was helping Theo to his feet. Slowly. Theo’s legs looked unsteady, but he was standing. He was moving toward the bench under his own power.
The tight band around my chest loosened fractionally.
I sat in the penalty box and watched the game resume without me. Five minutes for fighting. Morrison got five plus a game misconduct for the charge.
I sat there with my gloves off and my knuckles aching and tried to understand what the hell had just happened.
I had lost it. Completely lost it. The mask I had worn for ten years had shattered the second I saw Theo hit the ice.
The assistant coach caught my eye through the penalty box glass and tapped his temple twice. Get your head right.
I nodded mechanically.
The five minutes crawled past. When the penalty expired, I stepped back onto the ice for my shift. I hyper-focused on playing my game. I backchecked hard. I won my faceoffs. I made the safe play every time.
By the time the second period ended, the Storm were up 1-0 on a power play goal I had nothing to do with.
I headed to the locker room and carefully didn't look at the spot where Theo sat. The rookie was still in full gear. Still dressed. That meant the trainer hadn't pulled him from the game entirely, just held him out as a precaution.
He's fine. He's fine. Stop checking on him.
The second intermission passed in a blur of adjustments and hydration. Coach Reeves said something about staying disciplined, about not retaliating. His eyes lingered on me for a beat too long. I nodded and drank my water and ignored the curious looks from my teammates.
In the third period, Theo returned to the ice.
I saw him vault over the boards for his shift and felt something in my chest unlock. The rookie’s skating looked normal. His positioning was sharp. Whatever damage the hit had done, it hadn't been enough to keep Callahan down.
The game ended 2-1, Storm victory.
The arena erupted. I went through the motions of the post-game ritual—handshake line, stick salute to the crowd, skating off the ice. I should have felt good. Opening night win, solid two-way performance, team clicking.
Instead, all I could think about was the sound of Theo hitting the boards.
In the locker room, the energy was high. Music blasted. Guys chirped each other. Hayes did an exaggerated reenactment of my fight that made half the team crack up. I stripped off my gear mechanically, answering questions with grunts and half-sentences.
"Hell of a fight, Cap," Hayes said, dropping into the stall next to mine. "Haven't seen you drop the mitts since... ever, actually."
"He was targeting a rookie." I unlaced my skates without looking up. "Someone had to send a message."
Hayes’s tone suggested he didn't buy that explanation for a second. "Nothing to do with the fact that you've been watching Callahan like a hawk all game?"
My hands stilled. My pulse kicked up, flooding my veins with adrenaline.
Careful. Very careful.
"I'm his mentor. It's my job to watch him."
"Right. Your job." Hayes stood, grabbing his towel. "For what it's worth? Morrison had it coming. The kid took that hit to protect you—I saw the whole thing. Threw himself in the way when Morrison was lining you up."
My vision tunneled. I replayed the hit in my head—Morrison’s angle, Theo’s position, the way the rookie had thrown himself sideways.
Not to avoid the hit. To intercept it.
My hands started shaking.
"Where is he?" My voice came out rough.