Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Pittsburgh Penguins’ Arena, Pittsburgh
Eden
“Concentrate!” I yell at Shay.
Frustrated, I slam my hand against the rink’s glass, which shakes.
Shay glances over his shoulder at me. His brow furrows, before he gives a determined nod and skates harder after the puck.
Except, I’m the one who can’t concentrate. And when does that happen, apart from when Robyn messes up my filing system?
The score against the Penguins is 2 — 2.
Only minutes remain of the game.
If the Bay Rebels win, then they will only have to defeat the Penguins once more.
After that, Wilder’s team can fuck off out of our lives. Robyn and D’Angelo won’t be tormented by their pasts. I won’t need to battle with the urge to burn the bastard’s beard off his smug face.
We must win to save the team, staff, and Freedom.
The others care about that. I care about my family.
Should I feel more than I do? Have the sense of duty to an entire town that D’Angelo does?
Is that what being a good man means?
But then, I’m not good.
I’m Robyn’s phoenix.
I’m happy with that.
My expression is inscrutable, as I take a step back.
I glance at Robyn. She looks beautiful in a rose-tinted dress. She is standing next to me, rocking on her heels with her hands stuck deep in the pockets of her woolen, emerald coat.
She has barely looked away from Wilder in the same way that Shay wouldn’t take his gaze away from spiders as a kid like he was scared that they’d leap out and ambush him.
I became my brother’s official protector from spiders.
I never told him that in my head, I was in fact, their rescuer. I humanely caught them with a glass and dropped them back into the freedom of the street.
I guess that’s what Shay meant about the secrets we keep.
My hands ball into fists.
Would Robyn truly mind if I burned just Wilder’s beard?
Half of it?
I pull my long, black coat more firmly around my favorite suit that D’Angelo bought me.
D’Angelo has been leading the team brilliantly tonight. Shay scored both the goals.
Yet the Penguins have long crossed the line from playing a physical to a punishing game.
The Bay Rebels players are exhausted.
The ice is gouged with scars. The boards are wounded with the marks where the players, especially D’Angelo, have been smashed into them by repeated collisions.
These last minutes are about survival.
I catch my twin’s eye again.
Survive, I will him to understand.
It’s what we both know.
What we do best.
I ignore the cameras and the press. I’m becoming better at that.
I still vibrate with tension.
I wince at the roar of the crowd. The noise and chanting in the Penguins’ arena are louder than in the Bay Rebels’.
My temples are throbbing.
I squint against the bright lights and flashing replays across the vast, dominating video board.
I scrunch my nose up against the scent of cold ice, rubber, and sweat-soaked gear.
It’s the scent of my lost childhood dreams.
But I have a new dream now.
Should I wish that I was out there by my twin’s side? Skating with him to fight for a chance to raise the Stanley Cup?
Only months ago, I’d have given anything not to have been injured. But now, I have a new career, which I’m good at. I’m no longer the less talented hockey Prince twin.
I’m D’Angelo’s fucking PA.
I’m Robyn’s boyfriend.
I’m D’Angelo’s apprentice dom.
And I’m the most talented prince twin at those.
My eyes glint. My shoulders straighten.
I insisted that I travel to this game. I couldn’t miss another one.
My family need me to be here.
Cody and Noah are milling around close to coach, dressed in their staff uniforms. Cody keeps casting anxious glances over to me, as if he expects me to dramatically collapse, and he’s hyping himself up to dive over and catch me.
I would crush him.
I allow my best friend the delusion.
Shay once told me, when he was training to prepare me for college, that friends don’t hurt each other’s egos.
He said that it was called telling white lies.
I’d been confused.
“Isn’t lying bad?” I asked.
“We have secrets, right?” Shay replied. “Things that we don’t tell people about our past. Being truthful doesn’t mean confessing everything.
People can hurt you if they know the bad shit about you.
You must protect yourself. White lies are different though.
They’re not about lying to avoid hurting yourself.
They’re small lies to avoid hurting someone else. ”
“Does that mean you can lie to avoid hurting someone?”
Shay’s face lit up, and he nodded. “It’s how you please people. Then they want to be your friend. They don’t reject or throw you away like trash. It’s what I do. You can pretend to like what they do or what they’ve offered.”
It didn’t sound right.
I blinked. “If someone offers me…?”
“Coffee,” Shay explained, “and you wanted tea. You just say that you want the coffee to please them and make them feel good. You understand?”
I didn’t.
I still don’t.
A cold dread coils in my guts that Shay lived by that rule when he was with that bitch Blythe.
But what if he still does?
What if he accepted that collar for the same reason? Because he wanted to please D’Angelo and Robyn?
To make them feel good?
Cody shoots me a thumbs-up in question.
I pull my cold hands out of my pockets. My hands are numb, despite my gloves. Then I force myself to return the gesture, no matter how unnatural or untrue it is.
Probably, Cody would count it as a breach of physiotherapy code of trust. Is that a real thing? Are there consequences like the removal of cake treats after treatment?
Cruel.
Cody’s expression relaxes. He grins at me.
Then he turns back to Noah, and they both intently watch the game together.
Would Cody accept that this was a white lie too?
“Assholes,” Robyn hisses. “Come on, come on…”
Hurriedly, I step to her side.
I clasp Robyn’s gloved hand in mine.
She sighs, allowing herself to sink against my side. “The dicks are playing dirty again. Can you see how Lucas is limping? Noah wanted to take him off earlier, but Dad insisted that he keep playing. Wilder has had a full-body-collision with D’Angelo four times—”
“Six.” But who’s counting? “He’s also been crashed into the boards thirteen times.”
“Fourteen.” Robyn winces, as the glass rattles. “I want to kill that bastard.” Then her gaze snaps to mine and widens. “Figuratively.”
Shame.
I stiffen, when D’Angelo stumbles on the ice like his knees are about to buckle. Atlas attempts to hide the slip by skating at his captain’s shoulder.
The whole team has been trying to shield the way that D’Angelo has been slipping and almost falling throughout the game.
They have created a protective bubble without drawing attention to his weakness.
Grayson has covered gaps that he’s left, subtly shadowing opposing rival players for him.
Shay has been taking more risks to intercept pucks, while Lucas has delayed opponents to give D’Angelo the time that he’s needed to recover.
My lips thin.
D’Angelo shouldn’t be playing tonight. If he’d told coach about his collapse, then he’d have been benched.
Cody and Noah are both on the alert, in case D’Angelo collapses again midgame. Michael has given them the contact of a private doctor that he knows in Pittsburgh.
Cody spent most of the journey to Pittsburgh talking down Michael from driving to join us, despite his important hospital shift.
If he’s worried about D’Angelo, then I am as well.
The crowd hopefully can’t tell that something is off about D’Angelo’s play, however, with how the rest of the team are covering for him.
But I can.
D’Angelo should have taken the time to be checked out at hospital like Michael wanted, rather than traveled all the way to Pittsburgh to play this game.
D’Angelo is dangerously committed to his team. Coach shouldn’t kick his arse. He should see how much his captain sacrifices for the sake of the team.
“Three minutes left.” I scan the rink.
This will be close.
Too close.
The energy in the arena is high. I am wound tight.
Coach launches up from the bench, waving his arms and screaming at the players.
Helpful.
I glance over the directors who are seated on the benches besides coach. Then I give a curt nod to the muscled men in sleek black suits, who are standing discretely at intervals behind us and the benches with their hands clasped in front of them.
They are the private security team that D’Angelo hired.
After what happened in the locker room with Wilder, when D’Angelo was attacked, none of us were prepared to travel here with the Bay Rebels security alone.
Someone in Bay Rebels wants to hurt D’Angelo — hurt the team.
But who?
Tonight, I am Robyn’s bodyguard.
I don’t give a shit about how much my head hurts. I swore to Shay that he could focus on scoring tonight because I wouldn’t leave Robyn’s side.
He has his job, and I have mine.
I scan the crowds.
Yet my gaze is caught on coach and directors again.
What happened to D’Angelo in the showers was personal. I should know. When I come for my enemies, it’s fucking personal.
Who would want to hurt D’Angelo like that and why?
Wilder hadn’t been acting alone.
D’Angelo spent the trip on the bus, sending messages across to Robyn and me who were traveling on the staff bus with Noah and Cody.
Cody calls it the Fun Bus.
Robyn showed me his text.
“D’Angelo has hired Garcia,” she whispered. “He’s investigating everyone.”
My gaze darts across the men on the bench, directors, coaches, and staff.
Is Garcia also looking into the players?
It would break D’Angelo if the person behind the attack was one of the team.
Robyn reaches up to smooth her finger over my brow. “Why are you frowning? There’s still…”
“Two minutes left,” I automatically reply.
I glance down at her, before back at my brother.
Shay is skating hard, trying to shake a rival defenseman who is targeting him.
I can’t hold it in any longer.
My neck prickles with the awareness of the cameras.