Chapter 13
Mikey
Pain was a familiar roommate. I knew its habits. I knew the sharp, stinging wake-up call of fresh stitches, the deep, throbbing ache of bone bruises, and the stiff, rusty grinding of joints that had been pushed past their limit.
I woke up on the rug in front of the cabin fireplace, and Pain was sitting on my chest, heavy and suffocating.
But for the first time in twenty-two years, Pain wasn't alone.
There was a weight across my stomach that wasn't anguish. It was an arm. A small, pale arm clad in a grey wool sleeve.
I turned my head carefully. My neck cracked, a sound like a gunshot in the silent room.
Lydia was asleep beside me. She had curled herself around my battered side, mindful of the ribs, mindful of the cuts, but refusing to give me an inch of space. Her hair was a dark halo on the dusty rug. Her breath hitched in her sleep, a remnant of the tears she’d shed last night.
I stared at her.
The morning light was filtering through the dirty windows, illuminating dust motes dancing in the cold air. The fire had burned down to embers, casting a dull, orange glow on her cheek.
She stayed.
The realization hit me harder than any punch Kincaid had thrown in the pit last night.
She had seen the blood. She had seen the cash—dirty, illegal money obtained through violence. She had seen me at my most primal, my most broken.
And she hadn't run. She hadn't called Mac. She hadn't looked at me with the mix of fear and pity that the rest of the world used when they looked at a Holt.
She had stitched me up. She had held me. She had slept on a hard floor in a freezing cabin just to be near me.
I reached out with my left hand—the one that wasn't swollen—and touched a curl of hair resting on her forehead.
Soulmate.
The word floated up from the depths of my mind. It was a word I had always hated. My dad used to use it about my mom. She’s my soulmate, Mikey. She keeps the darkness back.
And then he had nearly killed her.
I pulled my hand back, a spike of fear piercing through the calm.
I wasn't worthy of this. I was a genetic dead end. I was a man who had spent his Friday night in a cage fight to pay for his father's cage. I was bringing her into a world of violence and debt and madness.
"Don't you dare," a sleepy voice whispered.
I froze.
Lydia opened her eyes. They were puffy, but clear. Whiskey-colored and knowing.
"Don't what?" I rasped. My throat felt like I had swallowed broken glass.
"Don't do the math," she said, pushing herself up onto her elbow. She winced, rubbing her stiff neck. "I can hear the gears turning in your head, Michael. You're calculating the risk. You're listing the reasons why you're bad for me. You're preparing the 'I'm doing this for your own good' speech."
She leaned over and poked me in the chest, right on the sternum.
"Save it. I'm not listening."
I let out a breath that turned into a cough. It rattled my bruised ribs, making me grimace.
"You should leave, Lydia," I said, staring at the ceiling beams. "Mac is going to be hunting for us. If he finds you here... with the money... with me like this..."
"Let him hunt," she said dismissively. She sat up fully, shivering in the morning chill. She reached for the remaining logs and threw them onto the embers, stirring the fire back to life.
"How's the eye?" she asked, changing the subject.
"Swollen shut?" I guessed. I could only see out of the left one.
"Pretty much. You look like a pirate. A very sad, very large pirate."
She moved to her bag and pulled out a bottle of water and a protein bar. She cracked the seal on the water and held it to my lips.
"Drink."
I drank. The water was cold and clean. It washed away the taste of blood and shame.
"We have to go back," I said after I finished half the bottle. "I have to deposit the money. Wire it to the facility. The deadline is 5 PM today."
"We have time," she said. "It's barely dawn. The bank doesn't open until nine."
She sat cross-legged next to me, picking at the wrapper of the protein bar. She wasn't looking at me anymore. She was looking at the stack of cash on the floor.
"Mikey," she said softly.
"Yeah?"
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Tell you what? That I was going to get beaten to a pulp for cash?"
"No," she said, looking up. "Why didn't you tell me about the fear? Not the money part. The alone part. Why did you think you had to do this by yourself?"
I closed my good eye. "Because that's how it works, Lydia. Holts handle their own messes."
"That's bullshit," she said gently. "That's not strength. That's trauma."
She moved closer, shifting so she was sitting by my hip. She placed her hand on my forearm, right over the bandages she had applied last night.
"Tell me," she commanded. "Not the summary. Not the 'my dad is sick' line you give the scouts. Tell me the truth. What are you so afraid of?"
"I'm afraid of hurting you," I said instantly.
"Deeper," she pushed. "Where does that come from? You've never hurt me. You're the most disciplined person I know. So why are you convinced you're a monster?"
The question hung in the air.
I looked at the fire. The flames licked at the wood, consuming it.
I had never told anyone. Not Jagger. Not Mac. Not even the therapists the state mandated after the incident. I had given them the sterilized version. My dad had a break. I called the cops. It was scary.
But the truth was a rot that lived in my marrow.
"I was fourteen," I began. My voice was low, barely audible over the crackle of the fire.
Lydia didn't speak. She just squeezed my arm.
"It was a Tuesday. Taco night. Stupid detail, right? But I remember the smell of cumin and ground beef."
I stared into the flames, but I was seeing a suburban kitchen in Chicago.
"Dad had been... off... for weeks. Pacing. Growling at the mailman. Mom said it was stress from the season ending. She told me to stay in my room."
I swallowed hard.
"But I was hungry. I came down to the kitchen. Mom was at the stove. Dad was sitting at the table. He was staring at a fork. Just... staring at it. Like he didn't know what it was."
Lydia’s thumb stroked my skin. Back and forth. A pendulum keeping time.
"I said, 'Hey Dad.' And he looked up."
I shuddered. Even now, eight years later, the memory made my blood run cold.
"It wasn't him," I whispered. "The eyes... they were yellow. Not gold. Yellow. Like sulfur. There was nothing behind them. No recognition. No love. Just hunger."
"He growled. A sound I'd never heard a human make. And then he launched himself at Mom."
Lydia gasped softly.
"He didn't shift," I continued, forcing the words out. "That was the worst part. He was in human form, but he was moving like a wolf. He tackled her into the stove. The pot of boiling water... it went everywhere."
I closed my eye again.
"She screamed. She screamed my name. 'Mikey, run! Run!'"
"Did you run?" Lydia whispered.
"No," I said. "I froze. For ten seconds. Ten seconds while he... while he hurt her."
The shame washed over me. Hot and acidic.
"And then," I said, my voice breaking. "Then I felt it."
"Felt what?"
"The snap," I whispered. "Inside me. It was like a switch flipped. I stopped being Mikey. I stopped being a boy. I just saw a threat. And I attacked."
I opened my eye and looked at her. I needed her to see this. I needed her to see the darkness.
"I picked up a cast-iron skillet from the counter. And I hit him. I hit my own father. I hit him until he stopped moving. I hit him until his skull cracked. I hit him until there was so much blood I couldn't tell whose it was—his, Mom's, or mine."
Tears were streaming down Lydia’s face. Silent, hot tears.
"I almost killed him, Lydia," I confessed. "I wanted to. In that moment, I wanted to end him. Not to save her. But because it felt... good. It felt right. The violence felt like a release."
I pulled my arm away from her, tucking it against my chest.
"That's why I'm afraid," I rasped. "Not because I might get sick one day.
But because I already have it. The instinct.
The violence. It's right there, under the surface.
I keep it locked down with rules and routines and hockey.
But if I slip... if I lose control... I'm him.
I'm the thing that hurts the people it loves. "
I waited.
I waited for her to recoil. I waited for her to realize that Mac was right, that Reynolds was right, that I was a ticking time bomb that needed to be dismantled.
But she didn't move away.
She moved closer.
She crawled over my legs, careful of the injuries, until she was kneeling directly over me, straddling my hips. She put her hands on my face, forcing me to look at her.
"Listen to me," she said fiercely. Her voice was shaking, but her eyes were steel.
"You were a child, Michael. You were fourteen years old, watching a monster attack your mother. You didn't attack because you liked it. You attacked because you were protecting her."
"I enjoyed it," I argued weakly.
"No," she corrected. "You felt power. Power is seductive. Power is adrenaline. That doesn't make you a monster. It makes you a protector who was forced into a war zone in his own kitchen."
She leaned down, pressing her forehead against mine.
"You didn't keep hitting him," she whispered. "You stopped. You called 911. You saved them both. Your dad is alive because you stopped. Your mom... she lived for another two years because you stopped."
"I still feel it," I admitted. "The urge."
"Everyone feels the urge, Mikey. Darkness isn't unique to Holts. It's human. It's shifter. It's universal. The difference between a monster and a man isn't the urge. It's the choice."
She kissed my swollen eye. Light as a feather.
"You choose every day," she said. "You choose discipline. You choose to carry the weight of the team. You chose not to fight Erickson. You chose to bleed in a pit to save the man who hurt you."
She pulled back, looking deep into my soul.
"That's not madness," she said. "That's love. It's messy, and it's violent, and it's terrifying. But it's love."
She traced the scar on my jaw—the one my dad gave me that night.
"You are not him," she vowed. "You are Mikey. And you are mine."
Something inside me broke.
Not a bone. Not a muscle. But the hard, calcified shell I had built around my heart. It shattered.
A sob ripped from my throat. A harsh, ugly sound.
"Lydia," I choked out.
She pulled me up, wrapping her arms around me, pulling my head into her chest.
I cried.
I cried for the fourteen-year-old boy in the kitchen. I cried for my mom. I cried for my dad, who was rotting in a facility, lost in his own mind. I cried for the fear that had dictated every step of my life.
Lydia held me. She rocked me back and forth. She murmured soft, nonsensical things into my hair.
She didn't try to fix it. She just sat in the dark with me.
And slowly, the crushing weight on my chest began to lift.
An hour later, the fire was roaring, and the world felt different. quieter. safer.
I was lying back against the sofa cushions we had pulled onto the floor. Lydia was nestled between my legs, her back to my chest, my arms wrapped around her.
We watched the flames.
"What happens next?" she asked softly. "After we pay the facility?"
"I go back," I said, resting my chin on her shoulder. "I face Mac. I take whatever punishment he gives me. I play the playoffs. I get drafted."
"And then?"
"And then I sign a contract," I said. "Detroit. Chicago. Boston. Whoever takes the risk."
"And then?"
I closed my eyes, letting myself drift into the fantasy I usually denied myself.
"And then I buy a house," I murmured. "Not a condo in the city. A house. Somewhere with trees. Somewhere quiet."
"Like this?" she asked, gesturing to the cabin.
"Better plumbing," I joked weakly. "But yeah. Like this. No neighbors. No noise. Just... peace."
"I like trees," she mused. "And I'll need space for a garden. Medicinal herbs. Since I'm going to be a holistic PT apparently."
I tightened my arms around her. "You're in this fantasy?"
"Obviously," she scoffed. "Who else is going to organize your protein intake? Plus, you need someone to manage the dog."
"We have a dog?"
"A big one," she decided. "A Newfoundland. Something that drools as much as you do."
I laughed. It hurt my ribs, but it felt good.
"A dog," I agreed. "And a garden. And a soundproof room for when the noise gets too loud."
"And a really big bed," she added, turning her head to look at me. "Because I plan on keeping you very busy."
I looked at her. Her lips were swollen from the dryness of the cabin. Her hair was a mess. She was wearing my bloodstained hoodie.
She was perfect.
"Lydia," I whispered.
"Yeah?"
"I want that," I said. The yearning was a physical ache. "I want that so bad it scares me."
"We'll get it," she promised. "We just have to survive the next two months."
"Two months," I echoed.
It felt like a lifetime.
I shifted, wincing as my hip protested.
"Are you okay?" she asked immediately.
"I'm fine," I said. "Just... I need to feel you. Not like last night. Just... skin."
"Okay," she whispered.
She turned in my arms, careful of my bruises. She straddled my lap again.
We didn't undress fully. It was too cold. But she pulled her shirt up, and I pulled my sweatpants down enough.
When we joined, it wasn't frantic. It wasn't about release.
It was an anchor drop.
I moved slowly inside her, watching her face. Every breath she took was a breath I borrowed. Every time her eyes fluttered shut, I felt peace settle over me.
"I love you," I whispered, the words coming easier this time. "I love you, Lydia."
"I love you, Mikey," she breathed, kissing my bruised mouth gently.
We moved together in the firelight, building a fragile, beautiful future out of whispers and touch.
But even as I held her, even as I felt the Soulmate bond snapping into place like a steel trap, I knew the truth.
We were hiding in the woods. But the wolves were waiting.
And Mac Cross wasn't just a coach. He was a guardian. And guardians didn't like it when monsters stole their treasures.
"We should go," I said later, when the fire had burned low again and the sun was fully up.
"Yeah," she sighed, resting her head on my shoulder. "Back to reality."
"Hey," I said, lifting her chin. "This is reality. Us. This is the real part. The rest is just noise."
She smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes.
"I hope so, Mikey," she whispered. "I really hope so."
We packed up the cabin. I took the bloodstained money. We got into the truck.
As we drove down the logging road, leaving the sanctuary behind, I felt the heavy cloak of the world settling back onto my shoulders.
I gripped Lydia’s hand across the console.
I was ready to fight for her. I was ready to bleed for her.
But I wasn't ready for what was waiting for us in Mac’s office.
Because the hardest battles weren't fought in cages. They were fought in the quiet rooms where people decided your fate. And I had a terrible feeling that my fate was about to be decided by a man who loved Lydia just as much as I did, but in a very different way.