Chapter 12 Away Game
AWAY GAME
JACE
It had been five days since the showers, and it still sat in my head like a bruise I couldn’t stop pressing.
We’d spent the week pretending it hadn’t happened. Avoiding eye contact in practice. Him calling plays from behind the bench like I meant nothing, and me skating like I wasn’t starving to hear my name on his mouth again.
I adjusted my grip on my carry-on and tried to focus on literally anything else as I walked through the terminal. The flight to Seattle was already boarding, and the team was scattered across the gate area like someone had thrown a hand grenade into a pack of wolves.
Which, honestly, wasn't far off.
“Yo, Hart!” Finn's voice cut through the noise, too loud and too cheerful for six in the goddamn morning. He was bouncing on his toes near the Starbucks, waving a fistful of protein bars like they were concert tickets. “Got your breakfast, bro. You want the chocolate chip or the—”
“I don't want your gas station contraband, Callahan.”
“It's airport contraband, and you're gonna want in on this when we're three hours in and you're starving.” He grinned, all dimples and chaos. He had the energy of someone who'd been mainlining espresso since birth. “I'm running a full economy here. Snacks, gum, phone chargers—”
Rook appeared behind him like a tired ghost, coffee in one hand and his captain's duffel slung over his shoulder. He looked like he'd aged five years overnight. “Callahan, if you're scalping shit to your own teammates—”
“It's called entrepreneurship, Cap.”
“It's called a pain in my ass.” Rook's voice was flat, but I caught the twitch at the corner of his mouth. He turned to me, eyebrows raised. “Hartley. You good?”
“Yeah.” I shifted my bag higher on my shoulder. “Why wouldn't I be?”
His eyes narrowed slightly, the way they always did when he was reading someone. Rook didn't miss shit. It was part of what made him a good captain and part of what made him fucking terrifying. “You've been quiet.”
“I'm always quiet.”
“No, you're always an asshole. Quiet's different.” He took a sip of his coffee, still watching me. “You sleeping?”
Not since the showers. “Enough.”
“Uh-huh.” He didn't believe me. But he let it go, because that's what Rook did. He didn't push unless he had to. “Stay close on the flight. We're doing film review once we're airborne.”
“Yeah, cool.”
Rook nodded once and moved off toward the gate, already pulling out his phone to deal with whatever logistical nightmare was probably unfolding. Being captain looked exhausting. I didn't envy him.
Across the terminal, Mace was arguing with a TSA agent about something—probably his bag, which was almost certainly overweight because the guy packed like he was moving cross-country every time we traveled.
Tate was taking a selfie near the window.
Benny sat quietly in the corner with a book and noise-canceling headphones, the only person in the entire fucking gate who looked calm.
And then there was Coach.
He stood near the boarding counter with a clipboard doing a headcount. His hair was slightly messed up, probably from running his hands through it, and he had that look on his face. The one that said he was three seconds away from herding us all onto the plane with a cattle prod.
I shouldn't have been watching him. I definitely shouldn't have been cataloging the way his shoulders filled out his Wolves quarter-zip, or the way his jaw flexed when Finn tried to negotiate boarding group placement, or the way his eyes scanned the crowd with that focused intensity that made my stomach clench.
But I was watching. I couldn't fucking stop.
He must have felt it, because his gaze snapped to mine across the terminal. Our eyes locked for maybe two seconds. Two seconds where I forgot how to breathe, forgot we were in public, forgot that five days ago we'd crossed a line so far into the red zone there was no coming back from it.
His expression didn't change. Didn't flicker. But something in his eyes did and it sent heat straight down my spine.
I smirked. I couldn't help it. It was reflex, armor, the same shit I always did when someone got too close.
I lifted one shoulder in a lazy shrug, like what?
, like I hadn't been eye-fucking him from across the terminal, like I wasn't already half-hard just from the memory of him coming with my name in his mouth.
Coach's jaw tightened. Then the corner of his mouth twitched. Not quite a smile. More like acknowledgment. Like he knew exactly what I was doing and found it amusing instead of infuriating.
“Hartley.” His voice carried across the space between us, calm and controlled and absolutely fucking devastating. “Stop flirting with the departure board and get your ass in line.”
A few of the guys laughed. Finn made a choking sound. I felt my face heat, but I played it off with another grin and flipped him off as I headed toward the gate.
The problem was, he wasn't wrong.
The flight was chaos in a metal tube.
Finn had somehow convinced half the team to buy into his snack black market, which meant there was a full-scale bartering economy happening in the back rows.
Mace was asleep before we even reached cruising altitude, snoring loud enough that Victor threw a bag of pretzels at his head.
Tate had commandeered the armrest and was editing his latest post with the focus of a surgeon.
I sat in a middle row, headphones in but no music playing, staring at the seat back in front of me and trying not to think about the fact that Coach was three rows up on the aisle.
Trying. Failing.
“Hey.” Benny slid into the seat next to me, book in hand. He was one of the quieter guys on the team, which I appreciated. He didn't need to fill every silence with noise. “You gonna actually watch the film review or just brood?”
“I don't brood.”
“You've been staring at that seat like it insulted your mom for ten minutes.”
“Fuck off, Cho.”
He grinned and cracked open his book. “Just checking.”
Rook's voice came over the intercom—well, not the intercom, but he might as well have had one with the way his captain voice carried. “Alright, boys. Film time. Devices out. We're running through Seattle's defensive structure. Pay attention or I'm making you skate sprints in the hotel parking lot.”
Groans echoed through the cabin. Finn muttered something about labor laws. Mace cracked one eye open, grunted, and went back to sleep.
I pulled up the film on my tablet, but my focus was shit. I watched the footage play—Seattle's defensive zone coverage, their breakout patterns, the way their penalty kill set up—but none of it was sticking.
“Hartley.”
My head snapped up. Coach was standing in the aisle next to my seat, leaning slightly against the headrest in front of me. His presence filled the space, made the air feel thinner. He had his own tablet in hand, and his expression was completely neutral.
“You catching any of this,” he said, voice low enough that only I could hear, “or are you too busy thinking about other things?”
My pulse kicked. “I'm paying attention.”
“Really.” He didn't sound convinced. He glanced at my screen, then back at me. “What's their weak side on the breakout?”
I blinked. Scrambled for an answer that wasn't I have no fucking idea because I've been thinking about your hands. “Left side. Their D-man's slow on the pivot.”
His eyebrows lifted slightly. “Not bad.”
“I'm full of surprises, Coach.”
“Yeah.” His gaze held mine for a beat too long. “You are.”
Then he moved on, continuing down the aisle to check on the other guys, and I was left sitting there with my heart trying to punch its way out of my chest.
The game was a disaster waiting to happen from the moment we stepped on the ice.
Seattle's arena was loud. Their fans hated us and it made every hit feel personal, every whistle feel like a goddamn riot waiting to break out. The air was thick with noise, and the ice felt too fast, too slick, like it was trying to throw me off balance.
First period went sideways almost immediately.
Their top line came at us hard, pressing high, forechecking like they had something to prove.
Which they did—Seattle was fighting for a playoff spot, and we were in their way.
Every shift felt like a war. Every touch of the puck came with a body on you, a stick in your ribs, a shove after the whistle.
I tried to stay focused. Tried to play my game, find my spots, wait for the right moment to strike. But their crowd was in my head, screaming every time I touched the puck, and their D-men were collapsing on me like I was the only fucking player on the ice.
Midway through the first, I made a mistake.
It wasn't huge. Just a pass that didn't connect, a turnover at the blue line that gave them an odd-man rush. Volkov shut it down before it became a real problem, but I still felt it like a knife between my ribs.
Idiot. Fucking idiot.
The crowd roared. My breath came a little shorter. And for one terrible second, I felt the panic flare—the same old wound, the same fucking fear that I wasn't good enough, that I was going to choke, that everyone was watching me fail.
Then Coach's voice cut through the noise from the bench, clear and steady.
“Next shift, Hartley.”
That was it. Two words. But they hit me like a reset button.
I sucked in a breath. Shook it off. Skated back to the bench and took my spot, and when I glanced down the line, Coach was watching me. Not with disappointment. Not with frustration. Just… steady. Like he knew exactly what had just happened in my head and wasn't worried about it.
The trust in that look did something to me. Something I didn't have time to unpack right now.
I went back out for my next shift and made a clean, smart play. Didn't force it. Didn't try to be a hero. Just took what the ice gave me, made the pass, supported the cycle. We didn't score, but we controlled the play, and that was enough.
The second period was a fucking grind.