Chapter 6
DECLAN
By seven the next morning, I had already watched the doors to the players’ entrance three times.
That was the kind of thing I noticed about myself because discipline was mostly repetition and honest accounting. If I drifted, I corrected. If I overfocused, I redirected. If I developed a habit that served no purpose, I killed it before it became part of me.
Watching for Jace Holloway did not serve a purpose.
I had staff for attendance. I had a schedule. I had enough actual work on my desk to bury a less stubborn man. Whether one player came through the doors at 7:12 or 7:28 was not something I needed to personally track from my office window like a security guard with control issues.
Still, at 7:16, I looked again.
The parking lot was gray under a low ceiling of clouds.
A few players moved toward the entrance in hoodies and beanies, shoulders hunched against the wind.
Lowell arrived with a protein shake in one hand and his phone balanced against his ear.
Milo followed two minutes later, wearing sunglasses despite the lack of sun and talking at Benny, who looked like he was reconsidering every career choice that had led him to that moment.
No Holloway.
I turned away from the window, irritated.
This was coaching, I told myself. He had been steadier yesterday. There had been a response to clear structure. If I wanted consistency from him, I needed to monitor whether the systems held.
That explanation was reasonable.
It was also incomplete.
I opened the practice plan and forced my attention onto the forecheck adjustments for the morning skate. Two minutes later, my phone buzzed with a message from Tessa.
Holloway is in the building. On time. He also said “good morning” to me like a hostage reading from a card.
I stared at the message longer than it deserved.
Then I replied, Thank you.
Her answer came fast.
That was not an invitation for feelings, Coach.
I put the phone face down.
Tiny snored from the dog bed in the corner of my office, one giant paw hanging off the edge.
Olivia had come home late the night before, and Tiny had reacted like a soldier reunited after war, whining, spinning, pressing his whole body against her legs until she laughed and almost dropped her carry-on.
He had slept at the foot of our bed for exactly twenty-two minutes before deciding he preferred my office floor this morning.
Loyalty, apparently, was conditional.
I got to the video room five minutes before the team.
The assistants were already there, coffee in hand, arguing quietly about whether the second power-play unit needed a personnel change or a better reason to stop looking like five men waiting for a bus.
I let them go for a minute, then cut in with the plan.
When the players filed in, I did not look for Holloway first.
I looked at the screen. I adjusted the remote. I checked the first clip.
Then I looked.
He was third row, aisle seat, notebook open, pen tapping against his thigh at an irregular rhythm. His hair was a mess in a way that suggested he had tried and lost patience halfway through. Roman sat beside him with the dead-eyed expression of a man who considered mornings a personal insult.
Jace had the right sheet.
I noticed that too.
The session started clean. We reviewed entries, spacing, support options.
Jace watched the first two clips with sharp attention, eyes tracking movement before I asked the question.
He saw the ice quickly. Too quickly sometimes.
His mind wanted the next step before everyone else had finished the first.
That was useful when it was controlled.
Dangerous when it wasn’t.
On the fourth clip, Milo leaned over and whispered something. Jace’s mouth twitched. His pen stopped tapping, then started again faster. On screen, Lowell carried the puck under pressure, and before I paused it, Jace spoke.
“If he reverses there, we’ve got weak side speed and their D is cooked.”
He was right.
He was also early.
I stopped the clip and looked at him. Not hard. Not for the room.
“Finish this part first.”
The pen stilled.
Jace shut his mouth, looked back at the screen, and nodded once.
Immediate.
No joke. No defensive flash. No “I was just saying.” No performance for Milo, who was already grinning like he had been handed a loaded weapon.
The response was so clean it unsettled me.
I continued. “Before the reverse is available, what has to happen?”
Jace answered after a beat. “Lowell has to pull F1 below the dot.”
“Good. Next?”
“F3 has to hold middle instead of drifting.”
“Right.”
He did not seem to realize what he had done. That bothered me more than if he had done it deliberately. If he were trying to please me, I could categorize that. Players wanted approval. Players adjusted to new coaches. Stars liked being taken seriously.
This looked less conscious.
The rest of video passed without incident.
Jace fidgeted. He lost the thread once when someone’s phone buzzed too loudly and he glanced back toward the sound like his attention had been physically yanked.
He recovered when I called on Roman instead of him, giving him ten seconds to find the room again.
By the time we hit the ice, the air between my shoulder blades had gone tight.
Not from nerves. From attention.
Practice opened with pace drills. Holloway was good.
Annoyingly good. He made difficult reads look casual, not because they were easy, but because his brain chewed through options faster than the drill could present them.
That was part of what made him special. It was also what made him a nightmare.
Halfway through a regroup sequence, he anticipated the release again. Not lazy. Not disrespectful. Excited. He saw the seam develop and went before the defenseman had earned the touch.
The pass missed. The line broke down.
A week ago, I would have explained the mistake. Two days ago, I might have given him the specific cue.
Today, I wanted to know what happened if I gave him less.
I blew the whistle.
Everyone looked over. Holloway circled back, already talking.
“I saw the weak side open. If he moves it right away, that’s a clean entry.”
I said, “Again.”
He blinked. “But if we’re trying to build speed through the middle, then I can pull their guy up and create space underneath.”
“Again.”
No explanation. No argument offered back. No room to wrestle.
Jace stared at me for half a second, frustration bright in his face. Then he turned and skated back into position.
He did the rep again.
Correctly.
Roman’s mask tilted in the crease. Milo looked disappointed there would be no show. Lowell looked relieved.
I kept my voice level. “Again.”
They ran it. Jace stayed in support until the touch came clean, then released. The timing opened, and the puck moved through the neutral zone the way it was supposed to.
I blew the whistle. “That’s it. Next group.”
Jace coasted past the boards, breathing hard. His gaze flicked to mine and away again, fast enough that someone else might have missed it.
I didn’t.
At the water break, Roman drifted beside him. I was close enough to hear without trying.
“Since when do you listen the first time?” Roman asked.
Jace pulled the top off his bottle with too much force. “Since always.”
Roman gave him a long look.
“What?” Jace snapped.
“Nothing.”
“That wasn’t nothing.”
“It was observation.”
“Observe someone else.”
Roman took a slow drink, eyes still on him. “Sure.”
He skated away, but not far. Roman Vega didn’t hover. He stationed himself where he could see the exits.
I respected him for that.
The rest of practice went well. Not perfect.
Perfect was useless as a standard. But Jace kept returning to the instruction faster than before.
He still tested edges because that was how he navigated the world.
He still forgot to rotate out once because he got caught talking through a read with Lowell and missed the next whistle.
He still shoved Milo in the shoulder when Milo called him “teacher’s pet,” and I had to tell both of them to move before they wasted everyone’s time.
But when I said stop, he stopped.
When I said again, he went.
That should not have felt as significant as it did.
After practice, I found Tiny in the hallway outside the locker room, sitting like a mountain in the middle of traffic.
Olivia had sent me three pictures from home that morning of him pressed against her legs while she drank coffee, declaring him “emotionally healed.” Apparently healing had lasted until the moment I brought him to the rink because the dog walker’s kid had a fever.
Tiny ignored Lowell’s attempt at affection. He tolerated Benny scratching his ears. He turned his head away from Milo with majestic disrespect.
Then Jace came out.
Tiny rose so fast Benny had to dodge the leash.
“You are embarrassing,” I told him.
Jace’s tired face broke into a smile. “Tiny. My man.”
The dog shoved directly into him, nearly pushing him into the wall.
“Careful,” I said.
“I’m good.” Jace braced a hand on Tiny’s shoulder and scratched the heavy folds of his neck. “He’s just built like furniture.”
“He adored my wife for twelve hours and abandoned her as soon as we got here.”
Jace glanced up. “Your wife’s home?”
The question was normal. Casual.
“Yes,” I said. “Got in last night.”
“Cool.” He looked back at Tiny. “Sorry, buddy. Guess you’ve got options now.”
Tiny licked his wrist.
There was no reason for the small silence that followed.
No reason for the way my attention snagged on Jace’s hand buried in my dog’s fur, on the easy patience he had for an animal taking up his path and covering his clothes in hair.
No reason to compare it to the quiet house, to Olivia standing in our kitchen that morning scrolling emails while I packed my bag, both of us moving around each other with practiced care.
I tugged Tiny’s leash. “Let him go.”
Tiny did not.