Chapter 47
FORTY-SEVEN
My legs stopped being legs somewhere around the third period. Every shift is shorter than the last. Every change comes faster. The ice is unforgiving, chewed up under my skates.
But we’re here. Still tied.
Still alive.
Kettler wins a battle along the boards and sends me up the left side with a quick pass. I drive hard, getting a clean entry into the zone, then send the puck to Logan with a no-look pass. He fires it as soon as it hits his tape, but it goes wide, and their defense takes away the rebound.
I skate back, lungs burning, and hop over the boards. I’m on the bench watching Fox set up in the offensive zone, working the puck along the half wall, looking for a lane. The crowd is loud, but it’s a held-breath kind of loud.
Kettler leans into me. “We’ve got them. They’re gassed.”
I nod. We’re all dead on our feet, but I know what he means. We’ve been the better team for the last ten minutes. It’s coming. I can feel it. We’re playing patient, smart, sticking to our systems. They’re getting antsy.
Logan gets a shot away from the point. Blocked.
Helm retrieves it, spins, and throws it back to the point.
Another shot. Tipped wide.
We’re buzzing. We’re right there.
They know it, too. Their defenseman panics, just enough. He throws the puck the length of the ice.
The whistle blows. Icing.
Face-off in their zone.
We lose it.
I hop over the boards, switching in. Their defenseman takes the puck at the right point, and I’m already moving, closing the angle, doing everything right.
Textbook. He pulls back, looks off, and I read the pass—I read it—and I’m moving to cut the lane when he threads it low to their winger at the left circle.
Everything slows.
The winger settles it in one touch. Weight transferring. Stick loaded. The kind of release that’s trained into muscle memory, so it happens without thought.
Kettler’s there though.
He’s moving, dropping, getting his body in the lane—
The puck catches the inside of his skate and pops up, perfectly, cruelly, right to their center at the top of the crease, screening the goalie. He doesn’t even have to adjust.
He just tips it in. Perfectly placed, over Volk’s right pad. The red light goes off.
The noise that comes is enormous and immediate.
And final.
But all I hear is the silence of our crowd.
My legs stop. Everything stops. The burning, the exhaustion, all of it just… gone.
Replaced by something worse.
Florida’s bench empties onto the ice. Their players pile on top of each other in our zone, and the noise rushes back in from everywhere. I’m standing in the middle of it, and I cannot move.
Volk is on his knees in the crease, gloves off, staring at the ice.
Kettler is still exactly where he was when he fell, sitting on the ice with his stick across his knees.
Fox has his helmet in his hands. He’s shaking his head slowly, over and over.
We came so far.
We came so goddamn far, but it wasn’t enough, and I don’t know what to do with that. Five years of wanting this—wanting it with these guys, these maniacs I love like family.
There will come a time when I think about next year. When I’ll give the pep talk. When I won’t be this angry, this gutted.
But that moment isn’t now.
There’s not even anyone to be angry at. And that’s the worst part. Sometimes, you play your best game and lose anyway, and all you can do is stand there and accept it.
I skate over to Kettler first.
I pull him up without a word, and he lets me, but he won’t meet my eyes.
“Not on you,” I tell him.
He shakes his head.
“Kett.” I wait until he looks up. “Not on you.”
Then, I go to Volk.
The handshake line is the hardest thing I’ve done all day. And that’s saying something after nearly a hundred minutes of hockey. I meet their eyes one by one, tell them good game. I hate that it’s true.
Somewhere in the line, I think about Summer. The way she’d know what to say. The way she’d just be there and let me fall apart as quietly or as loudly as I needed to.
I’ve never wanted anyone at the end of a game the way I want her here right now.
I get through the line. I don’t remember a single face.
The locker room empties around me. Coach tells me to get up and get out, but I stay folded over, my elbows on my knees, and my head down.
Fox’s hand lands on my shoulder. Then it’s gone.
Eventually, it’s just the ventilation system humming and the distant muffled noise of their celebration bleeding through the walls.
I press the heels of my hands against my eyes.
I stay there.
No idea how long.
“Miles.”
I open my eyes.
She’s right there, cheeks flushed and hair falling around her face.
I reach for her without thinking. Arms banded around her hips, face pressing into her stomach. Her hands move into my hair instantly, fingertips scratching my scalp, nails dragging gently down the back of my neck.
I don’t make a sound.
But my shoulders start to shake, and by the time I understand what’s happening, it’s too late. “Fuck,” I mutter into the fabric of her jersey.
She keeps her body pressed against mine, anchoring me without saying a word. Lets me have it. Doesn’t try to fix it or rush it or fill it with anything.
I don’t know how long we stay like that.
When I finally lift my head, she looks down at me, and a small smile lifts her lips. Christ, I even love this sad version of her smile. She frames my face in both hands, thumbs brushing under my eyes, but doesn’t acknowledge the tears. Just looks at me like I’m still worth something.
Like the guy she flirted with at Citgo. The one she gave hell to at Sully’s. The one she keeps finding, even when I’m trying to disappear.
Not the captain.
Not the loss.
Me.
I pull her down, and she settles into my lap, arms looped around my neck. I kiss her, still not over the fact that she’s here.
That she came.
That she chose me when it would’ve been easier not to.
When I ease back, she stays close, forehead tipping against mine. I catch a hint of that citrus scent I love so much.
“You’re here,” I rasp.
“I’m here.”
And for the first time since that puck crossed the line, all that hollow quiet is crowded out by Summer.
The Cup is gone.
But she’s here.
And I hope like hell she’s the one I never lose.