Chapter Four
LUKE
Iwas built for this. The pre-game silence. The slight weight of protective gear strapped tight to my shoulders. The hum of fluorescent lights buzzing overhead, a countdown to war. In here, before the blood and ice and violence, I was steel. Calm. Locked in. Nothing else existed.
Not my family. Not the dynasty pressuring me to carry their legacy on my back. Not the whispers about who I used to be before I was crowned captain. Not the girl who vanished in the dead of night and left a crater in her wake.
Not today. Today was Crestview. Our oldest rival. The kind of game that set the tone for the entire season. And I was ready to detonate.
The guys gave me space. They always did when I got this way. They thought I was just in the zone—clinical, methodical, ruthless. Focused.
Theo cracked jokes in the corner, tearing an energy bar open with his teeth. Chase was pacing, hyped and twitchy. Jax sat near me, lacing his skates with that quiet, dangerous intensity that matched mine more than anyone else’s. He didn’t speak. He didn’t have to.
I didn’t look up. Just tightened my grip on the hockey stick between my knees, rolling my shoulders to shake off the last of whatever wasn’t game-related.
But it was still there. In the back of my head—Mila. The earthquake beneath the surface I hadn’t prepared for. The fault line I’d forgotten could still split me wide open.
She shook my world. But that didn’t matter now. Because when everything else failed, I came back to the one thing I could count on. The ice. The game. The violence that asked for nothing but instinct and grit.
Not love. Not loyalty. Just blood, breath, and blades. And tonight? I was ready to burn.
My brother had texted me an hour before warm-ups. You’ve got this. Followed by a picture of him and his fiancée Claire at some business dinner, perfectly polished.
I didn’t respond.
Drew was back in the fold now. Wearing ties. Playing house with the girl who’d saved his reputation. Pretending like he’d never fallen. But I remembered the nights he hadn’t come home. The headlines our father had to bury. The glassy eyes and empty bottles.
The way he looked at me now—as if he wanted to believe I had it all under control, but he wasn’t sure.
He, most of all, knew the pressure our father put on us, and when he was counted out, the mantle had settled on my shoulders.
It still rested there despite how he’d returned and stepped up.
Our father didn’t like unknowns, chances that weren’t a sure thing—and Drew had, for a while, looked like one.
Dad still treated him that way, and it pissed me off.
I didn’t understand how he could partially dismiss his oldest son.
Drew had cornered me in the kitchen before I left. Tie loosened, phone in one hand, the other braced on the counter. “You good?” His eyes searched too long. “Because if something’s off—I can help. I’ve got your back.”
I lied the way we all did. A short shrug, eyes steady. “I’m good.”
His mouth had pressed flat, as if he’d wanted to say more but swallowed it.
I was the last one out of the locker room. The sound of my skate guards on concrete echoed down the tunnel, counting down each step toward the rink.
The air hit colder when I stepped onto the ice. The arena was packed—Blackwood Academy black and silver everywhere, chants vibrating against the plexiglass.
And then there she was. Not Mila. Avery. Dead center behind the bench, palms flat on the plexiglass, mouth already moving. Probably yelling at Chase. Probably loving every second of it. The seat beside her was empty. It used to be Mila’s.
She’d sit with her legs folded, hoodie pulled halfway up over her hair, clutching a coffee, as if it could shield her from the cold she hated. I’d look over during breaks and found her watching me—not the game, me—as though she were memorizing every second.
And now she was gone. Still not here. But I felt her, a phantom limb. A song that used to play on repeat in the back of my head until I forgot how to stop humming it.
Coach called the first line. I didn’t hesitate. Didn’t think. I hit the ice and chased the puck as if it owed me something.
Crestview’s forward made a lazy attempt at a cross-check near the blue line. I answered with a hit that rattled his bones. He dropped like a stone, stick sliding across the ice.
The crowd exploded. The ref’s whistle came late—an afterthought. I didn’t stop. Didn’t blink. Just skated away while the trainers rushed the ice.
Back on the bench, Jax muttered, “Jesus.”
Theo elbowed him. “He’s in a mood.”
I glanced down the bench and locked eyes with Logan—his gaze laced with silent, bone-deep loathing. What the fuck was that about? For the moment, I dismissed it.
Chase just watched me, brow low.
I sat down and breathed deeply.
Avery slapped her palms against the glass again, grinning wide. But her eyes flicked to the empty seat beside her. Just for a second.
And that was when I knew. Mila would come. Maybe not tonight. Maybe not the next game. But she would show. She always had. And when she did, I would be ready. Because this wasn’t over. Not even close.
My father didn’t call. He summoned.
One text from his assistant, and I was leaving the rink immediately after the game, still smelling like ice and sweat, to stand in the corner office of King Enterprises. Floor-to-ceiling glass framed the Blackwood skyline like a trophy case. Most of those buildings? Ours.
Grant King didn’t look up from the folder in front of him. “You’re late.”
I dropped into the chair across from his desk. “I was at my game.”
His gaze finally lifted—cold, assessing. “Sports are fine, but don’t mistake it for a future. Hockey is a window, Luke. You need to start thinking about what happens when it closes.”
This was nothing new. He’d been grooming me for the summer internship since I could drive.
Made it sound as though it were an honor.
A rite of passage. The truth? It was just another leash.
I’d never quite forgiven him for how easily he’d written Drew off when he fell—alcohol, drugs, the spiral everyone witnessed but no one stopped.
Dad had been pissed about the stain on the family name, not the fact his oldest son was drowning.
That had been left to Claire and me to fix.
“Dunn Industries made an offer on the Bayview property this morning,” he went on. “We can’t let them get their hands on it.”
I frowned. “It’s just a hotel.” He’d been looping me into deals like this for years, shaping me into whatever version of me he wanted sitting in this office one day.
“It’s leverage,” he corrected, leaning back in his chair. “If Dunn controls that block, it pushes us out of the harbor district. And if we lose that, we lose control of a lot more than you understand right now.”
I didn’t miss the way he glanced at the closed side door—Lorne’s. The partner who handled the “messy” parts of the business. I’d learned early that whatever went on in those meetings wasn’t for me to hear.
And that was the thing about my father—business talk was never just business. So when he shifted gears, I knew it was a setup.
“You’ll be polite to Elise Dunn,” he added smoothly, as if it were just another line item on a spreadsheet.
“Keep her close. If Charles Dunn wants a working relationship, we give him the illusion of one. And another thing—you’ll stay away from distractions,” he said, tone sharp enough to cut. “I hear Mila Callahan is back.”
My pulse jumped, but I kept my voice flat. “And?”
“And you would be smart to remember why she left. Your mother and I warned you about her. That family is trouble. Always has been.”
The flash of the necklace burned in my mind—finding it in my hockey bag like the ultimate fuck you parting gift. I stood, adjusting the strap of my duffel. “Anything else?”
“Yes. Family is what matters. Protecting it comes before everything.”
I met his stare. “Sure. Family first.” What I didn’t say was that family was the only thing that could cut you the deepest. And some wounds never stopped bleeding.