Chapter Thirty-Six
Connor
The thing nobody really warns you about packs is how quiet they make everything.
I notice it the third night in a row when I’m sprawled on Beau’s couch with a beer balanced on my stomach, Theo’s boot propped on the coffee table like it owns the place, and Emery curled into the corner with her feet tucked under her, half-watching whatever trash is on while she updates injury notes on her tablet.
There’s no tension or pacing, or even alpha posturing disguised as just hanging out.
It’s weird. Good-weird.
Beau’s in the kitchen, stirring something that smells like actual food instead of protein and desperation. I stretch, hands laced behind my head, and let my gaze drift around the room.
There’s evidence of all of us everywhere if you know how to look for it—extra boots by the door, Theo’s meticulous stacking of coasters, my hoodie slung over the arm of the chair like I never intend to leave.
Emery glances up at me, catching me staring. One eyebrow lifts.
“What?” she asks.
“Nothing,” I say easily. “Just thinking how domestic we look. Someone should warn the league.”
She snorts and goes back to her screen, and Theo hums under his breath, the corner of his mouth twitching. Beau doesn’t say a word, but I feel the flicker of his attention like a pulse.
We’ve been like this for weeks now.
Cozy nights in when the road schedule’s brutal.
Quick dinners after practice that turn into hours because no one’s in a hurry to leave.
Actual dates, too—Beau and Emery disappearing for an afternoon and coming back softer somehow, Theo joining her for quiet walks when his injury keeps him off the ice longer than he’d like, me tagging along to go grocery shopping and grab food at the diner and pretending I’m not enjoying the hell out of it.
I especially love the extra portions I get from Bev whenever I'm accompanied by Emery.
The team clocked it almost immediately, though I guess it would be hard not to. The three of us… we skate tighter now. Hit harder, too. We communicate without yelling, and even the locker room feels different, like the edge has been sanded down just enough to stop cutting each other by accident.
Coach hasn’t said much, but then again, he hasn’t needed to. I know he spoke to Beau about it, when he first claimed Emery, but now he just watches.
And whatever he sees… it’s working.
Which is good. Because what’s coming next is not a game you want to walk into half-formed.
“Big week this week,” I say aloud.
Beau sets a plate down harder than necessary. “Don’t remind me.”
Theo glances up at him. “You’ve been reminding us since yesterday.”
“Because it matters,” I shoot back, grinning. “Riverton doesn’t play nice, and you know it.”
Riverton Wolves are one of our team’s oldest rivalries. They’re located close enough to steal fans, and far enough to hate each other properly. Our games are always ones that turn ugly by the second period: filled with cheap shots and long memories.
My instincts stretch and flex, eager and sharp. I can already picture it: the noise, the hits, the way the ice feels faster when you want blood.
“You’re all buzzing,” Emery says mildly. “Try not to implode before puck drop.”
I laugh. “No promises.”
But beneath the humor, there’s something steady holding us together now. A shared center of gravity. A pack that knows where it starts and where it ends.
And when we take the ice against Riverton, we won’t just be playing for points.
We’ll be playing for each other.
*
By the time game day rolls around, Iron Lake has settled into that deep-winter mood where the cold stops being a novelty and starts being a fact of life.
The air hurts when you breathe it in too fast, the snowbanks along the roads are layered with months of plow scars, and the Icebox parking lot looks like a frozen graveyard of pickup trucks and beat-up sedans that refuse to die.
The sky hangs low and white, threatening more snow but never quite delivering it all at once—just enough to keep everyone irritated.
Perfect hockey weather.
We’re in the conference semifinals now; one step from the finals, and one step from making this season mean something permanent.
The locker room is loud, but not sloppy. (There’s a difference.) Music’s playing, but nobody’s dancing. Tape gets wrapped with intention and steel gets checked twice, and I lace my skates slower than usual, feeling the familiar tightness in my chest that always hits before big games.
Nerves, sure. But mostly hunger.
Across the room, Beau is quiet in that way he gets when he’s locked in: shoulder taped and jaw set, his eyes sharp. Theo sits beside him, methodical as ever, rewrapping the brace on his wrist from an old injury, movements calm and precise.
The three of us barely talk, but we don’t need to. There’s a current running between us now, something that didn’t exist earlier in the season.
Pack awareness.
Coach finishes his speech without theatrics. After all, we all know what this game is. We all know who Riverton is.
“Discipline,” he says, voice steady. “They’ll try to drag you down to their level. Don’t let them. We skate our game, we finish our checks, and we make them chase us.”
He looks right at Beau when he adds, “And we don’t retaliate stupidly.”
Beau gives a single nod.
We file out into the tunnel, the noise of the crowd swelling as the doors crack open. The Icebox is packed, and when the puck drops, Riverton comes out fast and mean.
They forecheck hard, two men deep, trying to force turnovers along the boards. We answer with clean breakouts, D-to-D passes snapping tape to tape, wingers flying the zone the second we gain possession.
The ice feels fast tonight—fresh cut, edges sharp—and my legs hum with it.
First period stays scoreless, but it’s not quiet. Hits rattle the glass as sticks slash at ankles just a fraction late. Their goalie plays aggressive, cutting angles early, while ours stays deep and patient, trusting the defense to clear rebounds.
Second period is where it turns.
We score first, and the Icebox erupts. The Wolves answer back five minutes later on a power play, one-timer from the left circle after a clean seam pass that we should’ve closed.
1–1.
Tension coils tight, and I’m changing on the fly when I hear it—clear as day, shouted from the Riverton bench as Emery passes behind them with the trainers.
Something crude. Personal.
About what she does on her knees instead of with her hands.
I don’t even remember deciding to move.
One second I’m stepping onto the ice, the next I’m driving straight at their winger, gloves already coming off. Beau is there at the same time, slamming into their captain with enough force to knock the breath out of him. Theo drops his stick and goes for the defenseman who laughed.
The Icebox explodes as fists remind faces what consequences feel like.
Helmets scatter and linesmen pile in, trying to separate bodies that don’t want to be separated. I take a punch to the jaw and give one back twice as hard, adrenaline roaring so loud I barely feel the sting.
I hear the whistle, but I don’t care. They dragged her into it.
We all end up in the box—offsetting majors, ten-minute misconducts handed out like candy—but the message is sent.
Riverton doesn’t chirp about her after that.
The third period is war, though. Skating lanes close as shots get blocked, and everyone finishes every check.
Beau plays like a man possessed, his shoulder holding together through sheer will, throwing his body into corners and coming out with the puck anyway.
Theo shuts down their top line with quiet efficiency, stick always in the right place, angles perfect.
With four minutes left, tied 2–2, I break down the right wing on a partial. Their defenseman overcommits, and I slip the puck back to Beau trailing high. He snaps it on net—not pretty, not perfect—but it squeaks through traffic and trickles past the goalie’s pad.
The roar is physical.
It hits you in the chest.
We spend the final minutes defending like our lives depend on it—because, in a way, they do. The Wolves throw everything they have at us; goalie pulled, extra attacker on, bodies stacked in front of our net like wreckage, and the Icebox is deafening.
It means that I don’t hear the final buzzer so much as feel it—vibration through the ice, through my skates, through my chest. For half a second, nobody moves.
And then it hits.
We’ve done it. We’re through.
Beau slams into me, helmet to helmet, laughing like he can’t quite believe it himself, and Theo’s there too, solid and grinning, wrapping us both up as one word echoes in my head.
Finals.
As we skate off, legs rubbery and hearts still racing, my eyes find Emery without thinking. She’s already moving with the trainers, professional to the core, but when she looks up and meets my gaze, there’s no mistaking what I see there.
Pure, unfiltered pride.
For us. For this team.
For what we’ve built.
And whatever it took to get here—however ugly, however close—it doesn’t matter. We’re in the finals.
And we are riding the highest kind of high.