Chapter 16 Home Ice
HOME ICE
JACE
Aweek back in Canada and Coach had us skating like we were training for the fucking Olympics. It was brutal and relentless. Exactly what we needed.
We had a game to win. A season to salvage. And I couldn't afford to be distracted by the memory of his hands on my skin or the way he'd called me his good boy or the fact that I could still feel the phantom ache of him inside me when I moved wrong.
So I shoved it down. Locked it away. Focused on the only thing that mattered: hockey.
Game day arrived with the weight of expectation pressing down on all of us.
Boston was good. They'd beaten us twice last season, and the media had been running stories all week about whether we could finally get one back.
The pressure was on. Not just on the team. On me specifically.
“Hartley needs to show up tonight,” one of the talking heads had said on the morning sports show. “He's been inconsistent all season. If the Wolves want to make noise in the playoffs, they need their star winger to be a star.”
No pressure.
The guys were going through their routines—Volkov methodically retaping his stick for the third time, Mace bouncing on his skates with nervous energy, Finn chirping someone about their pre-game playlist. The energy was focused but electric, that familiar buzz of bodies ready to explode into motion.
I sat at the end of the bench and tried to breathe through the noise in my head.
Across the ice, Boston was doing their own warm-up routines. I watched their top line—fast, skilled, physical—and felt my chest tighten. They knew how to play against us. Had proven it twice last season.
“Hey.” Rook dropped onto the bench next to me. “You ready?”
“Yeah.”
“You sure? Because you look like you're about to puke.”
“I'm fine.”
“Hartley.” He waited until I looked at him. “You're one of the best players I've ever played with. You can do this. Just get out there and play your game.”
I nodded, throat tight. “Thanks, Cap.”
“And if you need someone to pass to when you panic, I'll be there.”
“I'm not going to panic.”
“I know. But if you do—I'm there.”
Coach moved down the bench toward us, and the scattered conversations died immediately. He didn't have his clipboard. Didn't have notes. Just stood there in front of the bench with his arms crossed, and the weight of what this game meant was written in every line of his face.
“Boston,” he said, voice low enough that we had to lean in to hear him over the arena noise. “They beat us twice last season, and they think they have our number.”
He paused, eyes moving down the line, landing on each of us in turn.
“This is a qualifier. You all know what that means. Win, and we earn our spot in the preliminaries. We're in the conversation. Lose, and our season gets a hell of a lot harder.” His jaw tightened. “I don't plan on making it harder.”
Rook sat forward slightly, elbows on his knees. The whole bench was locked in now, leaning toward him.
“They're going to come out hitting. They're going to try to intimidate us, make us play their game. Rough us up, get in our heads, make us react instead of execute.” Coach's voice dropped lower. “We don't take that bait. We play disciplined. We play smart. We play our system.”
He turned slightly, eyes finding Rook. “Their top line is going to challenge your line all night, Rook. They're fast on the forecheck. Volkov, Hallowell—you need to move the puck quick. Don't let them set up in our zone.”
Volkov nodded once, face impassive as always.
Coach's eyes shifted to me. “Hartley. They're going to key on you. Their D-men are big and mean, and they're going to make you earn every inch of ice. So you move your feet, you keep your head up, and you use your linemates. Don't try to be a hero. Be smart.”
“Yes, Coach.”
His gaze held mine for a beat longer than necessary, and I saw something flicker there—concern, maybe, or warning—but it was gone before I could be sure.
“Special teams will matter,” he continued, turning back to address the whole bench. “Their penalty kill is aggressive. If we get a power play, we crash the net. We make their goalie uncomfortable. We don't settle for perimeter shots.”
Mace cracked his knuckles. “And if they start running guys?”
“Then you do your job,” Coach said flatly. “But you do it smart. No stupid penalties. No retaliation that costs us momentum. You protect your teammates, but you don't give them power plays.”
“Got it, Coach.”
The arena announcer's voice boomed over the speakers, calling out the starting lineups. Boston's crowd roared when their names were announced, and I felt the pressure ratchet up another notch.
Coach leaned forward slightly, hands gripping the boards, and when he spoke again his voice was quieter but somehow more intense.
“This is what we've been working for all season.
Every sprint, every drill, every early morning skate—it's been building to this. To games like this. Games that matter.” He paused.
“You're good enough to win this. You're better than them. But you need to believe it. You need to go out there and prove it.”
The bench was dead silent. Even the arena noise seemed to fade into background static.
“Sixty minutes,” Coach said. “Three periods. You leave everything on that ice. No regrets. No what-ifs. Just hockey.” His eyes swept down the line one more time. “Play disciplined. Play smart. Play like Wolves.”
“Yes, Coach!” The response was immediate, unified, charged.
The ref's whistle blew—the signal. Time to take the ice.
“Rook, bring them in,” Coach said.
We gathered tight at the bench—gloves stacked in the center, bodies pressed close, the energy building like a spark about to ignite. The Boston fans were screaming, trying to drown us out, but we were louder.
“Brothers on three,” Rook said, voice steady and strong. “One. Two. Three—”
“brOTHERS!”
The word exploded out of us, and then we were moving—over the boards, onto the ice, the roar of the crowd hitting us like a physical force.
I took one stride onto the ice and felt it hit me.
My heart was pounding too hard. My chest felt tight, like someone had wrapped bands around my ribs and was pulling them tighter with every breath. My hands were shaking where they gripped my stick, and I couldn't make them stop.
Not now. Not fucking now.
I tried to breathe through it, tried to use the techniques my therapist had taught me.
The ice felt too big. The crowd noise too loud. Everything was too much and I couldn't—
I skated toward the bench instead of joining the warm-up circle, and I saw Coach's head turn immediately. Tracking me. Reading me.
His eyes narrowed, and he moved down the bench toward where I'd stopped, one hand raised slightly — a signal to the assistant coaches that he had this.
“Hartley.”
I looked up and found him watching me with that intense focus that missed nothing. The rest of the team was still out there, skating patterns, taking shots, going through the comfortable noise of warm-up. Nobody was paying attention to us.
“With me.” Not a request. “Now.”
He jerked his head toward the tunnel entrance and I followed him off the ice, legs still unsteady under me, jaw tight.
We stopped just past the entrance in the short stretch of tunnel where the bench cameras couldn't reach — far enough from eyes, close enough that nobody would think twice about a coach pulling a player aside before puck drop.
He turned, and his gaze dropped immediately to my hands. Still gripping my stick too hard. Still trembling.
“Hey.” His voice came down to something low and private. “Look at me.”
I forced my eyes up to meet his.
“You're ready,” he said, and there was no softness in it — just certainty, like he'd already run the numbers and this was the answer. “You've put in the work. You know it, I know it. Whatever's going on in your head right now—” he paused, letting it land — “leave it here.”
“Grant—”
“Leave it here,” he said again, quieter this time. Final.
Then he stepped in and kissed me — quick and firm, one hand coming up to the side of my jaw like he was steadying something.
Not long enough to be reckless. Long enough to matter.
His thumb pressed against my cheek for half a second before he pulled back, and I felt the loss of it immediately, that specific warmth he always left behind.
“For luck,” he said, dry, like he didn't believe in luck and wanted me to know it.
The shaking in my hands wasn't gone. But it had moved somewhere I could ignore it, pushed back behind the steadier thing he'd put in its place.
“Yeah,” I said. “Okay.”
He stepped back, and the mask settled into place — arms crossed, expression neutral, coach again. “Now get out there and show them.”
I took a breath and went.
I touched the ice with my glove—routine, ritual—and joined the warm-up circle. My heart was still pounding, but it was game-day adrenaline now, not panic. The shaking had faded to background noise. I could do this. Coach had asked if I could, and I'd said yes, so I had to make it true.
Let's fucking go.
Boston came out hitting everything that moved, trying to establish dominance early.
Their first line was relentless—fast, skilled, mean—and they were targeting me specifically.
Every time I touched the puck, someone was on me.
Every time I tried to make space, I got a stick in my ribs or an elbow to the side.
“They're keying on you,” Rook said during a whistle. “Use it. Draw them in, move the puck quick.”
I nodded, sucking wind, and lined up for the faceoff.
First period was a grind. No goals for either team. Just hitting and battling and fighting for every inch. I had a few chances—one shot that hit the crossbar, another that the goalie got a piece of—but nothing found the net.
“Keep shooting,” Coach said when I came to the bench. “It'll come.”
No emotion. No reassurance. Just instruction.