Chapter 18 Grayson
GRAYSON
The first thing I notice is that my body reacts before my brain even catches up.
Before logic. Before rules. Before the mental spreadsheet I’ve been keeping since freshman year that tells me exactly what happens when you cross lines inside a room built on loyalty and blood and unspoken oaths.
My chest shifts when she walks into a room now. In a physical way—tight, then loose, then tight again, like my body can’t decide what to do with how she makes me feel either.
And that’s a problem.
Because Harlow Mercer is not supposed to be a problem.
She’s Kai’s sister. She’s off-limits. She’s the line Kai dug so deep into the ground you’d need to be blind not to see it.
She’s also…complicated.
Not because she’s dramatic or flirty or trying to be anything.
She exists like the world costs her something sometimes, and my brain won’t stop noticing.
And lately, quiet is the only thing I want.
Practice is supposed to put a stop to the relentless spin of my thoughts.
It always has. Since I was a kid. Since before I understood grief or pressure or the kind of fear that shows up in your chest at night and sits there until your ribs physically ache. Since before the two people in the world who were supposed to love me most just stopped caring or even trying.
On the ice, there’s no room to spiral. No room to replay conversations. No room to think about what someone’s eyes looked like when they realized you weren’t a joke, or a rumor, or a harmless interaction.
There’s only the next stride, the next pass, the next read.
Except today my brain is being an asshole.
It keeps flicking to the glass like my eyes have their own magnet in them. I tell myself not to look, then I look anyway, quick enough that no one can call me out for it.
She’s there.
Not front and center the way some girls sit—leaning forward, trying to be seen. Harlow is a few rows up, slightly off to the side, tucked into herself like a question mark. Oversized hoodie. Dark hair loose. Hands wrapped around a bottle like it’s a grounding object.
She isn’t watching the guys. She’s watching the ice.
Like she’s looking at the only thing in the building that doesn’t ask anything of her.
The sight hits harder than it should.
I take a pass on my forehand, and it jumps off my blade because my hands are half a second late.
Coach Graves’ whistle splits the air. “BENNETT.”
I pivot toward him, coasting in. “Yeah?”
He points his stick like a weapon. “You planning to be awake today, or is this a participation thing?”
Heat crawls up my neck. “I’m awake.”
“Then skate like it,” he barks. “Again. And this time, don’t handle the puck like it’s a live grenade.”
I nod once and push back into line, legs burning as I reset.
Weston glides by, shoulder bumping mine like he can’t help himself. “You good, buddy?”
“Fine,” I mutter.
Weston’s eyes flick toward the stands—toward Harlow—then back to me. His mouth curves like he’s about to say something that will ruin my life. I cut him off with a look that says, don’t you dare. Weston grins wider because he thrives on danger.
Kai skates past next, calm and contained, like he didn’t just read the entire rink in one glance. Captain Mercer doesn’t talk much in warm-up. He doesn’t have to. He just exists like structure.
He glances at me once with a quick inventory: eyes, posture, focus.
Then he says, quiet enough only I can hear it, “Skate.”
One word. Not encouragement.
A command.
It works.
Coach runs us through a flow warm-up that normally feels like muscle memory: swing low, hit the middle, quick touch to the far wing, regroup back through the neutral zone, controlled entry.
It should be simple.
It isn’t.
Not when my head keeps drifting upward.
Not when I can feel her there the way you feel a storm coming before you see clouds.
We get into a regroup sequence—center swings low, D hits him, quick bump to the wing, back to the middle, then we attack with speed.
Weston fires a pass to me at the blue line.
I catch it, take two strides, and my brain chooses that exact moment to remember the way Harlow holds her breath when something is too much.
My touch dies.
The puck slides off my stick like it’s embarrassed for me.
Coach’s whistle shrieks again. “BENNETT.”
I bite down on my jaw and circle back.
“Hands,” Coach snaps. “You’re late.”
“I’ve got it,” I say.
“You don’t,” he says flatly. “That’s why I’m talking.”
He blows the whistle. “Next rep.”
We go again.
This time, I make myself stay inside my body.
I take the pass. I settle it. I drive wide. I cut back toward the dots and fire a shot.
Asher—our goalie, annoyingly calm even when rubber is coming at his face—tracks it clean, swallows it without a rebound like it insulted him.
He pops up, resets, and gives me a look that says, are you done being weird?
I am not.
But I pretend.
Coach switches us into small-area work—3-on-3 below the tops of the circles, low-to-high, quick decisions, constant pressure. It’s chaos with rules. The kind of drill that forces you to think fast or get embarrassed.
Weston chirps the entire time like his vocal cords are being held hostage.
“Bennett, pass the puck like you like us!”
“Shut up,” I snap, stealing the puck off his stick and bumping it behind the net.
Kai is in the middle like he belongs there—centers always do. He’s the hinge. The connect point. The guy who makes everyone else look like they have more time than they do.
He takes a hit, spins off it, and dishes a no-look pass into space.
I’m there because that’s my job.
I one-time it.
Asher snaps his glove up and snags it like it’s personal.
Weston throws his hands up. “RUDE.”
Asher doesn’t blink. “Shoot better.”
Weston points at him. “I hate when you talk.”
Asher’s mask hides most of his face, but you can still feel he’s unimpressed.
Coach loves it. He loves competition. He loves watching us get mean and then seeing who breaks first.
He blows the whistle and changes it up again.
“Special teams,” he barks. “Power play. Kill. Move the puck, or I’ll make you regret being born.”
Weston mutters, “That escalated quickly.”
Kai lines up at center ice for the faceoff rep because, of course, he does. Captain. Center. He’s the one Coach trusts to set the tone.
He looks at our unit, eyes sharp.
“Quick,” he says. “One touch. Don’t overhandle.”
His gaze lands on me for half a beat too long.
Like he knows my hands aren’t the only thing that’s been late.
We run the look.
I work the half wall like I’ve done a thousand times—shoulder checking, reading pressure, switching my feet to keep my hips open, feeling the penalty killer close in.
I bump it down low.
Kai takes it, draws a man, pops it back to me.
I send it across the seam.
It’s clean.
It’s fast.
It’s hockey the way it’s supposed to be—simple and sharp.
Shot from the other side.
Asher kicks out the rebound in the next rep and resets without any drama, like he’s built out of the same material as the crease.
Coach nods once. Baseline achieved.
Then he turns the screw.
Conditioning.
He blows the whistle and points. “Line it up.”
We skate. Hard.
It’s the kind of work that strips everything down until all you can feel is lungs and legs and the burn in your throat.
It should clear my head.
It almost does.
But even as my vision goes edge-blurry and sweat drips into my eyes, I still feel her presence like a pressure point.
Like a question I keep refusing to answer.
The locker room hits like a wave—music, laughter, chirps, gear clattering like it’s the soundtrack of our lives.
Weston drops onto the bench dramatically. “I have passed away.”
Kai doesn’t even look up while he unties his skates. “Do it quietly.”
Weston gasps. “CAPTAIN. That’s cold.”
Kai’s gaze flicks up, deadpan. “You’ll live. Unfortunately.”
Asher is already half out of his gear, calm as ever, towel around his neck like he didn’t just spend an hour getting pucks fired at his face.
Coleson is loud—of course he is—telling a story too big with his hands, like he needs the room to orbit him.
I strip my shoulder pads off and keep my eyes down so my brain doesn’t go hunting for problems.
It finds one anyway.
Kai sits across from me, elbows on his knees, taping his stick like ritual, even though practice is over. “Film in an hour.”
I nod. “Yeah.”
Kai stands, grabs his bag, then pauses like he’s deciding whether to say something else.
He doesn’t.
He just adds, quieter, “Get your head right.”
Then he walks out.
And I’m left there with my pulse in my throat and the awful realization that Kai Mercer already feels the shift in me. He doesn’t know why. Not yet. But he knows something is off. And if Kai starts sniffing around the truth before I’m ready to tell it the right way, this turns into chaos.
Not the fun kind.
The kind that cages Harlow.
The kind that makes her disappear again.
I can’t let that happen.
Coach catches me in the hallway for two minutes of “stay present” and “stop drifting,” like he’s not wrong and I don’t hate him for it.
By the time I step back into the lobby, she’s still there. Notebook closed now. Hands folded in her lap. Hoodie sleeves pulled down over her knuckles like she’s trying to disappear into fabric. She isn’t looking at me. She’s looking at the ice.
Something in my chest tightens. I slow without meaning to. The air shifts when she senses me. Her head lifts. Her eyes meet mine.
Recognition.
Not surprise. Like she felt me coming before she saw me. It’s ridiculous. And it hits like a punch.
“Hey,” I say, keeping my voice low.
“Hey,” she replies, and her voice is steady—steady enough that it makes me want to believe she’s okay.
We stand there for a beat, neither of us moving, like we’re waiting for permission.
Kai is nowhere in sight. Which is both relief and danger.
“You stayed,” I say, because it’s the only safe thing I can say.
She shrugs slightly. “I like…watching the ice.”
I nod. “Yeah.”
Silence stretches.
Not uncomfortable.
Full.
I gesture toward the exit. “You want to walk?”
Her gaze flicks to the doors. Hesitation. Calculation. Then back to me.
“Where?” she asks.
“Anywhere that’s not here,” I say lightly. “Too many people.”
Her shoulders drop a fraction.
“Okay,” she says.
And suddenly we’re walking side by side out into the afternoon, campus washed in soft gold.
I’m hyperaware of the space between us—six inches of charged air.
Every so often, our sleeves brush. Each time it sends a jolt through me sharp enough that I have to force my hands to stay loose at my sides instead of reaching.
We don’t talk right away. The quiet feels intentional, like we’re both protecting it.
Finally, she speaks. “Kai’s not happy.”
I huff softly. “That’s his baseline setting.”
Her eyes flick to mine, and I catch the smallest lift at the corner of her mouth—almost a smile, then gone. Her fingers twist together in front of her. “We had a pretty rough conversation earlier. It was needed, but that doesn’t make it any easier.”
I stop near a low stone wall bordering a patch of grass. She leans against it, posture guarded but not closed—balanced between staying and bolting. The wind lifts a strand of hair across her cheek. She tucks it back like she’s annoyed that her body can’t cooperate.
“Is that why you were at practice today?” I ask, softer.
“Yeah. It’s just been a rough couple of days.” Her eyes shine with unshed tears, and she sniffles, looking away quickly, blinking hard like she hates that her body betrays her.
“I should go,” she whispers.
I nod, even though everything in me wants to ask her to stay.
“I’ll walk you—”
She shakes her head. “Kai’s waiting.”
Of course he is. I step back, hands sliding into my pockets like I can hide how badly I want to reach out and touch her. To hold her. To make her see that she’s okay, and that she will be okay.
“Get home safe,” I say.
Harlow nods once. “You too.”
Then she’s gone, moving away with shoulders squared but steps lighter than when she arrived. I stand there too long, staring at the place where she was like my body expects her to come back.
Then I force myself to turn toward home.
Kai is in the kitchen when I walk into our apartment later, arms crossed, expression carved from stone, tension radiating off of him in waves.
Shit.
“Where were you?” he asks.
I keep my voice even. “Just walking around. Needed to clear my head.”
“Have a lot on your mind?”
Running a hand over the back of my neck, I meet his gaze head-on. “You could say that.”
His eyes sharpen, and I already know where this conversation is headed. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on between you and my sister, or are we just going to pretend I’m blind?”
There are only so many options in front of me right now.
One, I lie. Tell him there’s absolutely nothing going on, but that’s anything but the truth. Nothing has technically happened, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want it to.
Two, I tell him that I think I might, no, that I know I have feelings for his sister but that it’s…complicated.
Neither of those options sounds like a great idea at the moment.
“Honestly, I don’t know. I feel like it’s up to her. I care about her, but I’m not pushing anything on her. She’s doing her best, and I don’t want to add stress to that.”
Kai’s laugh is humorless. “You don’t get to decide that.”
I hold his gaze. “Neither do you.”
Silence.
Loaded with years of brotherhood and lines and loyalty.
Kai stares like he wants to argue, then something in his face shifts—exhaustion, fear, control slipping around the edges.
“She’s not a game,” he says roughly.
“I know,” I answer immediately. Because that is the one thing I know for sure.
Kai holds my gaze another beat, then looks away like it costs him.
“Just…don’t be stupid,” he mutters.
I swallow. “I’m trying.”
Kai nods once, stiff, like that’s all he can give. He disappears into his room. I stand there for a second, staring at the kitchen counter like it has the answers I want so badly to know.
My phone buzzes, and looking down, I see that it’s a forum notification.
Fuck.
I’m at a crossroads. I don’t want to disappear on her, but at the same time, I can’t help but want to explore what is standing right in front of me. Another part of me is starting to notice the similarities between them, but I couldn’t be that lucky.
Out of so many students at PCU, how could it possibly be her?
I’m not sure, but I’m also terrified to find out.