Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
MIA
Idon’t go soft.
Not for anyone. Not even for Dylan Winters and his haunted eyes and broken-boy charm.
But that conversation yesterday, what he said, how he said it, it’s been rattling around in my head ever since.
Like an echo in a quiet room. I keep replaying it in bits, like I’m afraid I missed something important.
Or maybe I’m just trying to convince myself it didn’t get under my skin the way it did.
Because it did. And that pisses me off.
I’ve worked hard, bloody hard, to get to where I am.
This job, this space, this authority I’ve carved out in a world full of arrogant men and locker-room ego.
I don’t get flustered. I don’t get involved.
And I sure as hell don’t get affected by some sulky, self-sabotaging winger with a tattoo for every mistake he’s ever made.
Except he might be more than that. And that’s a problem.
I’m standing in the treatment room at 7:30am sharp, just like I always am. Gloves on, table prepped, rehab schedule pinned to the wall. Controlled. Organised. Professional. The way it’s supposed to be.
But my mind keeps drifting.
I picture him again, sitting on the edge of the table, arms loose, voice low. The way he said, “People think I’m cocky. They think I don’t care.”
He meant it. And the worst part is, he’s probably right.
I’d thought that too, at first. Assumed he was just another loudmouth with a god complex and a rotation of interchangeable blondes. Maybe he is, partly. But there’s more to it. There’s pain under there. Real pain. The kind that doesn’t shout. The kind that waits around in the background.
And now I’ve seen it, I can’t unsee it. I rub my temple, irritated. This is not what I’m here for.
“Morning, Clarke.” Murphy walks in, sweat already clinging to his hairline. He’s early, which means something hurts.
“Don’t tell me you pulled something tying your laces,” I mutter, grabbing an ice pack from the freezer.
“Worse. Slept funny. My neck’s proper done in.” Murphy reaches up and rubs his hand along the back of his neck, twisting his head from side to side, as though he’s trying to loosen the knot that’s sitting tight there.
“Jesus, you’re twenty-eight, not eighty.”
“Yeah, well. Got a body like a Greek God and a spine like a pensioner.” He winks, and I throw a towel at his face.
As I work on him, checking alignment, massaging tension out of muscles he didn’t know he had, my brain keeps dragging me back to yesterday. To Dylan. His story. His voice.
I push it down and try to focus on the job. Focus on the part I can control. That was my best friend’s advice when I called to talk it over with her last night. Well, that and to get under him so I could put it to rest and focus on the job in hand. But that’s a Sophie solution, not a Mia solution.
Later, once the morning sessions are done and most of the team are either lifting weights or stuffing their faces with protein bars, I head to my office to log my notes.
It’s not a glamorous space. Half the room stinks of stale tape and shoe spray, the chairs creak, and there’s a damp patch on the ceiling that’s been ignored by maintenance for months. But it’s mine. It’s quiet. And right now, I need quiet.
I’m halfway through inputting data when there’s a knock on the open door. I look up, and of course, it’s him.
Dylan leans on the door frame, not quite crossing the threshold. He’s in joggers and a black hoodie, hood down, face clean for once. No sunglasses. No swagger.
Just him.
“Didn’t think you’d be in this early,” he says.
“Where else would I be?”
He shrugs. “Thought maybe you needed a break. You were looking at me like you wanted to throw me into oncoming traffic yesterday.”
“I still might.”
He smiles at that. The real kind, not the one he wears for the cameras after a game. Dylan steps into the room and sits opposite me without asking. That irritates me on principle. But I don’t stop him. I don’t know why.
He watches me type for a moment. “What’s it like?” he asks.
“What’s what like?”
“Your job. Looking after broken things. Every day.”
I raise an eyebrow. “You’re not a vase, Winters. You don’t shatter and get glued back together.”
“Could’ve fooled me.” I glance at him, but his expression is neutral. Not joking. Just resigned. “You like it?” he asks after a moment.
“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”
“Yeah, but don’t you ever get tired of fixing people who don’t want to be fixed?”
That makes me pause. Because, if I’m honest, I do. All the time. But I don’t say that. I say, “I don’t fix people. I help them fix themselves. You lot either listen or you don’t. Not my responsibility if you don’t take care of your own bodies.”
“And what if it’s not their bodies that are broken?” Dylan studies me, it almost feels like he’s staring into my soul. And I don’t answer right away.
Because suddenly the air between us feels a little too tight, too quiet. Like he’s cracked something open without meaning to. Or maybe he meant to all along. “Then that’s not something I can tape back together,” I say carefully. “I’m not a miracle worker.”
He looks at me with tired eyes. I wouldn’t say defeated, more worn out. “I was never going to do anything else, you know. Hockey. That was it.”
I nod slowly. “I figured.”
“There wasn’t a plan B. No safety net. Just make it. Or don’t.” He doesn’t say what would’ve happened if he didn’t. But I see it. In the way he taps his fingers against his knee, restless. In the way he keeps glancing toward the window, like the walls are starting to press in.
“You did make it,” I say. “You’re one of the best wingers in the league.”
“Yeah. And I still feel like I’m one bad hit away from disappearing.”
There’s a long pause after that. And it’s heavier than I want it to be. “I get it,” I say finally. “The fear.”
He doesn’t respond. But he hears me. I can tell by the way his shoulders drop slightly.
“I didn’t grow up around this,” I say, surprising myself.
“Hockey. Sports. None of it. My family thought I should do nursing or teaching. Somethings softer and more suitable for a girl.” I meet his eyes.
“I’ve had to fight for every room I’ve walked into.
Earned every bit of respect. And yeah, it gets tiring.
But I show up every day. Because I know what I’m worth. Even if no one else does.”
He holds my gaze like he’s trying to memorise something. Like he’s not used to hearing the truth said that plainly. “I like that about you,” he says softly.
“Don’t flirt with me when I’m being sincere, Winters.”
“It’s not flirting.” I tilt my head in disbelief, but he continues. “It’s respect.”
That word lands somewhere I don’t expect. Somewhere deep. “Good,” I say, clearing my throat. “Because if you start calling me ‘Clarkey’ or ‘darling’ I’m going to dislocate your other shoulder.”
He grins. But there’s something different in it now. Less performance and more gratitude. He stands and stretches his good arm. “I’ll do the exercises properly today,” he says.
“I should bloody hope so.”
He turns to leave but pauses at the door. “Thanks. For listening.”
I nod once. “Don’t get used to it.” But he’s gone. And I’m left staring at my screen, completely incapable of focusing. Because whatever this is between us, it’s getting harder to pretend I don’t feel it too.
And I don’t know yet if that’s a crack in my armour or the start of something I can’t control.