Chapter 18 #2
He studies me, too perceptive for my liking. “She wrote a hell of a statement.”
It should make me feel better. It doesn’t. “Yeah. Great. Maybe it’ll keep you out of my hair.”
Cole’s mouth tilts, not quite a smile. “I’m not the one you want out of your hair.”
Before I can tell him to shove it, Cooper blows the final whistle. My lungs are fire, and my head’s no clearer than when I started. I peel my gloves off as the boys tap their sticks on the ice, the universal good skate before everyone scatters toward the tunnel in twos and threes.
I should follow, but I catch sight of her again.
Alycia stands by the boards, headset slung around her neck, murmuring to one of the comms techs. The overhead lights catch the way one lock of hair slips loose, and she tucks it back like muscle memory. It’s ridiculous that something so small can undo me faster than a cross-check.
I should leave her alone. The cameras are still rolling somewhere, Cooper’s voice is echoing down the tunnel, and I can already feel his warning look on the back of my neck. But I’m already moving.
“Torres,” I call, my voice rough from shouting drills.
She looks up, and for one second, her eyes catch mine, and the whole building tilts. Then she looks elsewhere, somewhere safe.
“Hendrix,” she says, in the same professional tone she’d use for anyone, like I’m not the guy who once made her breath hitch for real.
“You here to critique my form?”
“Only if you start missing the net.” Her mouth twitches into almost a smile, but then it’s gone. She gestures to the comms tech. “We’re done here. Please send the footage to Janine for review so we can get it to the media by noon.”
Janine nods, gives me a quick grin, and disappears through the gate.
And then it’s just the two of us. The quiet between us is louder than the drills ever were.
She’s close enough that I can see the faint tremor in her fingers and the small twitch in her jaw that says she’s holding herself together by will alone.
I should back off and let her breathe, but I can’t.
She won’t look at me, and somehow that hurts worse than if she yelled.
It’s like I’m being erased in real time.
“You didn’t sleep,” I say finally, the words scraping out of me more than spoken.
Her head barely lifts, but the movement punches straight through me. There’s a flicker of something in her eyes before she masks it again.
“You don’t know that,” she says, voice low and even.
“I know your face,” I tell her, and I hate how soft it sounds. How close it comes to confessing everything I’m not supposed to want.
Her mouth parts like she’s about to say something, but she stops herself. Her shoulders square, chin lifting, and when she finally speaks again, her tone is all business.
“Don’t,” she murmurs, quiet enough that I almost miss it. “I’ll email you the finalized details for our coffee date on Saturday tonight. I think we should bump our arrival up to 9:30 to avoid the potential lunch crowd.”
I swallow down the thousand things I want to say that aren’t about timing. “I can’t do anything without my wardrobe guidelines.”
“Considering your… whole thing right now?” Her eyes flick over my sweaty gear. “Doubtful.”
“I’ll have you know I put this outfit together all by myself.” I gesture down at my sweat-soaked practice gear. “Pretty sure I’m redefining casual.”
She huffs out a breath. “Smart casual, Kyle. Not a locker room disaster.”
“I can be both,” I say, grinning. “Multi-talented.”
“You really don’t know when to stop, do you?” Her gaze flicks up, but she doesn’t hide the twitch of her mouth this time.
“Not when it comes to you.”
The rink noises fade into background static, but none of it matters. What matters is that she’s close enough that I can feel the edge of her control, and I’m the reason it’s slipping.
“I wasn’t joking.”
She freezes. “You said you’d make it easy.”
“I did, and I am.”
“Then stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like this isn’t pretend.” Her voice trembles once, quick and contained, before she smooths it out again. “Please.”
The word please is probably the first honest thing either of us has said today. For a heartbeat, neither of us moves. Then I take one small step close enough to feel her inhale, and to see the flutter in her throat she tries to hide.
“I’ll keep it professional, Torres,” I whisper. “But if you think I can un-feel this, you’re out of your mind.”
Her eyes flicker up, causing something in my chest to pull tight. I don’t know what I’m seeing exactly, only that it isn’t just annoyance or frustration. There’s something guarded there, something that tells me this isn’t just about PR guidelines or a bad headline.
“This can’t be anything but fake. I’m the one who loses everything if we get caught playing a different story than the one I wrote.”
I want to understand, but all I can do is piece together what little I know—how hard she works, how tightly she holds the line between her job and everything else, how fast she shuts down when things get personal.
Maybe she’s just protecting her job. Maybe she’s protecting herself.
Maybe it’s both. Either way, I can’t tell, but I feel the weight of it anyway.
I want to tell her she’s wrong. The story she wrote doesn’t have to end the way she thinks it does. But she’s already stepping back, pulling her armor tight again, and I know that if I push right now, I’ll lose her completely.
“Then we won’t get caught.”
She laughs, but it’s hollow. “You can’t promise that.”
“I can promise I won’t let you get hurt.”
“That’s not how this works, Kyle. You don’t get to protect me from something you caused.”
The words hit harder than they should, mostly because she’s right. I’m the reason this entire mess exists. I’m the one who kissed her when I shouldn’t have, who looked at her like she was the only thing worth breaking a rule for.
“I’m sorry,” I respond. Two words that feel too small for what they’re supposed to fix.
“Don’t apologize for something we both wanted.” She shakes her head, voice quiet but sharp enough to cut.
It’s brutal hearing it that way. It’s not a denial or admission, just the truth sitting between us, heavy and unfixable. Before I can find words that make sense, Cooper’s voice carries down the tunnel.
“Hendrix!”
Alycia straightens instantly, the shift in her posture so practiced it hurts to watch. I take a half step back, the distance between us suddenly feeling like punishment.
“Guess that’s my cue.”
“Guess so,” she says, not looking at me.
“Saturday, then?” I grab my gloves, forcing a smile I don’t feel.
“Nine-thirty. Try not to be late.” She stares down at the ice. Her tone is light and professional, but the tremor hiding in it ruins me.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I murmur.
She finally looks up, and for a second, I see the real her again that’s been living rent-free in my head ever since we met in the elevator, but then it’s gone. Replaced by the polished version of her that the world is allowed to see.
I nod once, more to myself than her, and skate off the ice toward my brother’s voice. Each stride feels like every inch of space I put between us is another line I’m not supposed to cross.
And the worst part is, I already know I’ll cross it anyway.
As I head toward the tunnel, I drag a hand through my hair, trying to shake her loose. But she’s still there, right under my skin, where she always ends up.
I don’t hear him at first, just the echo of my own footsteps and the hum in my chest that sounds too much like her name.
“Want to tell me what that was?” Cooper’s voice slices through the quiet, carrying more warning than question.
I stop short, spine locking before I turn. He’s standing just past the threshold, arms folded, still in that coach posture that makes everyone else straighten up on instinct. His expression isn’t angry, but controlled, which is so much worse.
“What what was?” I ask, even though I know damn well what he means.
“The part where you almost made out with PR intern on the ice,” he says, leaning against the wall like he’s trying not to throttle me.
“Wasn’t on the ice.”
“Not the point. I thought we covered this.”
“Covered it, yeah. Didn’t say I agreed with it.”
He folds his arms, every inch of him screaming Coach, but the look in his eyes is a lot like my big brother, who’d do anything to protect me from the world. “You want to protect her? Don’t give them a story to chase.”
The words hit harder than I expected. “I didn’t—”
“You didn’t stop it either.” His tone softens just enough to cut deeper. “You’re better than that, Kyle.”
“You think I wanted that to happen? He came for her.” I drag a hand down my face, trying to hold the line between guilt and defensiveness.
“And you took the bait.”
“Wouldn’t you have done the same if someone talked about Ramona like that?”
“You’re not me. And she’s not Ramona.”
I look away, the air between us heavy with everything I can’t argue. He’s right, as usual. Cooper exhales, the sound rougher than his words.
“You need to figure out whatever this is between you two. Either get a handle on it or get it out of the spotlight before it blows up bigger than you can control.”
“Right. Control. Got it.”
“Don’t make me pick between the two of you.”
A bitter laugh hits my throat. “You ever think that’s the whole problem? There’s no version of this where we don’t set fire to at least one career. Probably both.”
“You sound like Cole.” His mouth twitches.
“God forbid.”
“You’ve got heart, kid. Always have. Just don’t let it get you benched.”
He walks off before I can think of anything to say.
I stand there a second too long, then head for the locker room.
I drop onto the bench, elbows on my knees.
Every part of me wants to go back out there and tell her she’s wrong—that it doesn’t have to be fake, that I’d risk everything to be real with her just once.
But Cooper’s right. If this thing with Alycia Torres is supposed to be fake, then I’m in real trouble.
Cole materializes at my shoulder like a devil with impeccable timing. “A birdy told me Saturday is going to be babies’ first fake date,” he says lightly. “Are you going to keep your hands to yourself, or should I ask your girl to start drafting apologies?”
“Draft your own,” I say, but it comes out flat. I lean both hands on the back of the bench until the wood prints into my palms. “She’s gonna hate this.”
“She already does.”
“Not the work. Pretending to be with me.”
“You know what Michele told me when I was making everything harder than it needed to be?”
“Don’t do drugs?”
“That, too.” He smirks, the edge softening into something earned. “She said, ‘Don’t make me carry the part that belongs to you.’”
I squeeze the bench until my knuckles pop. “What part belongs to me?”
“The risk. The mess. The way it looks. If you want her, you make the parts you can control so clean that she can breathe.” He taps my chest once, a quiet gesture that still hits like an impact. “That starts here, not out there.”
It’s offensively reasonable, and I kind of hate him for it. “What if she never breathes around me again?”
“Then you still made it easier for her to try.”
He walks off, leaving me in the quiet hum of the locker room. I sit there, staring at the space he left behind, the echo of his words sitting heavy in my chest. Because he’s right about all of it. I just don’t know if trying will be enough this time.
Saturday can’t come fast enough.
And for the first time in my life, I’m terrified of getting exactly what I want.