Chapter 25 - Karter #2
The chill of the arena bled through the concrete corridor.
As the rest of the team funneled out of the locker room, their skates clacking against the rubber mats toward the tunnel, I spotted Coach Corby waiting near his office door.
I watched him scan the guys filing past until his gaze locked on Aleksey.
Reaching out, Corby tapped Aleksey’s shoulder pad and pulled him out of the line.
I didn’t keep walking to the ice rink. Instead, I broke off from the pack and trailed right after Aleksey, stopping a foot short of the head coach.
Corby pulled off his cap, rubbed hard at the back of his neck, and let the brim slap against his thigh. “I heard that crash all the way from my desk. Jesus, Zotov. You know better than to start throwing punches this close to game time.”
“I didn’t start shit,” Aleksey said, voice harsh. “Clay came at me with a stick. You want me to just stand there and take a blade to the head?”
Corby closed his eyes for a second, letting out a long, exhausted sigh. “No,” Coach admitted, his gruff tone dropping its edge for a fraction of a second. “And I will deal with Clay myself. But you cannot rise to the bait.”
Corby opened his eyes, his pale gaze flicking to me for half a second before settling solidly back on Aleksey. “I’ve got scouts up in the stands right now watching you. If you go out there and lose your head again, they’re walking. Both of you need to keep it together.”
I stepped in closer, close enough that my arm brushed Aleksey’s. “Don’t worry, we handled it,” I said, keeping my voice level. “It’s done.”
For a second, Aleksey looked like he was going to argue anyway, eyes still burning with anger, but then he exhaled through his nose and eased back half a step. The tension in his shoulders didn’t disappear, but it shifted.
Corby watched the exchange, something unreadable crossing his face. He shoved his cap back on. “Keep it handled. And keep it off the ice.” He jerked his chin toward the tunnel. “Now go.”
He turned and walked away without waiting for an answer.
Reaching out, I caught the front of Aleksey’s practice jersey and gave it a firm tug, pulling him a step farther down the corridor where the others couldn’t hear.
“What?” he snapped, chin dropping as he met my eyes.
“Let it all slide,” I said, low.
He scoffed. “Didn’t you hear Clay in there? They’re gonna keep pushing until someone swings.”
“Then don’t give them what they want.” I kept my grip on his jersey. “You getting kicked out for good is exactly what they’re going for.”
Aleksey’s eyes narrowed, but some of the fire in them dimmed as he studied my face. His whole body seemed to be strung tight, but he didn’t look like he was squaring up for a fight anymore. “I’m not gonna stand there like an idiot while they run their mouths and come at me.”
“Just focus on hockey,” I said. “Prove them wrong by winning. That’s it.”
He let out a rough breath through his nose, the fight draining out of him in small pieces. After a long second, he gave a short nod. “Fine.”
“Promise me.”
“I promise,” he said, quieter. “No fighting on the ice.”
I let go of his jersey, and we didn’t say anything else as we both made our way onto the rink.
Practice was a grind: drill after drill, no talking between us. We kept the distance we’d agreed on, letting everything we needed to say come through passes and positioning instead.
Running the offensive drills tested our rhythm. Aleksey played defense, anchoring the blue line while I dug the puck out of the corner. Drawing two opposing players with me, I sent a blind backhand pass out toward the open ice.
Aleksey was exactly where he needed to be. He caught the pass flat on his stick, shifted his weight, and ripped a slap shot through the traffic. The hard rubber blasted past the goalie and smacked into the back netting.
We did not need to say a word. He cleared the bodies out of our defensive zone, and I found the empty ice to set up the next rush. Anticipating his movements felt completely automatic.
Practice ran for another two hours before the whistle cut through the noise.
Showers afterwards passed without much talk between us and the rest of the team. And on our walk back to The Ice House, Aleksey and I stayed quiet, careful to keep a gap between us the whole way.
Unlocking the attic door to my room just before eleven in the morning gave us our first real private moment of the day. Still feeling the dull ache of the early morning practice skate in my bones, I tossed my keys onto the desk, my phone onto my bed, and let out a long breath.
As Aleksey followed me inside, my phone vibrated against the edge of the bed.
Glaring at it, I could see my father’s name flash across the glass in bright white letters.
I picked the phone up and met Aleksey’s gaze, bracing myself. “It’s my dad.”
Aleksey stopped near the opposite wall. He didn’t offer to leave; he just gave me a single, steady nod.
I tapped the green button, hit the speaker icon so Aleksey could hear, and dropped the phone onto the mattress. “Hi, Dad.”
“What exactly were you thinking?” My father’s voice clipped through the small speaker, and he sounded like he was struggling to keep his volume level.
He sounded like someone who’d been up for hours; rage simmered down into something cold and deliberate.
“You cornered a university official with a secret recording and threatened to leak it to the press. You’ve even dragged your brother into this mess. ”