Chapter 66
Nikolai
Isabelle is waiting, just like she said she would, when I arrive at the dorm.
I’m exhausted, completely and utterly. The guys jumped on me as soon as I entered the locker room, and protested when I said
I didn’t feel up to drinks, but a look from Cooper silenced them. He cornered me before I left, made sure I was going to be
with Isabelle.
I don’t deserve his friendship, and I definitely don’t deserve Isabelle’s love. Tonight finally made that impossible to ignore.
I might’ve told Dad to get out of my life—for real this time—but he still won, in a way.
Blood is blood. The moment I looked into my father’s eyes and realized how deeply I wanted to take a swing, it all clicked
into place. I’m no different from him. I might give up hockey, I might try to keep a tight lid on my emotions, but that doesn’t
change a damn thing about who I am at my core.
Isabelle rises from the bed. Without a word, she wraps me into a hug. I don’t lift my arms; they feel like bricks. She sniffles
as she steps back, blinking her red-rimmed eyes.
“Are you okay?”
“Fine.”
“That was a lot.”
I rip off my jacket and toss it on the desk chair. Push up the sleeves of my sweater. Isabelle fusses with my hair. I gently
pull her hands away, stepping around her to sit on the bed. I groan, pressing the heels of my hands into my eyes.
In the locker room, and in the car, I kept the panic at bay. I breathed through my nose. I counted to ten. All that bullshit. Now, though, alone with Isabelle, the too-tight, panicky sensations rush to the surface. It’s as if someone welded iron around my torso. I rub my sternum as she curls next to me.
Normally, her presence helps calm me. Right now, I feel like one wrong move—from either of us—could set me ablaze.
“Breathe,” she murmurs as her hand squeezes my knee.
I’m sure she means it to be reassuring, but I flinch away from her. I have no idea where my father slunk off to, but his words
won’t stop echoing in my mind.
You can’t change blood, Kolya.
I stand, pacing the small room. Isabelle says my name. My fingers tingle. I curl and uncurl them, but they’re on the verge
of going numb.
You will always be my son.
My stomach lurches.
Panic and rage, entwined in a violent embrace. I pushed, and he showed his true colors. Whatever hope I had that he was different
now, that he had really changed, faded the moment I smelled the vodka on his breath. Saying goodbye was the hardest thing
I’ve ever done. Even harder than protecting my mother, finally, after years of being silent. And why couldn’t I have said
it? Why couldn’t I have told him that I hate him, to complete the break between us that started the moment he lifted his hand
in a fist?
“It’s going to be okay,” Isabelle says. She doesn’t leave the bed, but she watches as I pace like a caged animal. “But Nik—you
have to know that you don’t have to quit hockey. No one believes you’re anything like him.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I think I do.” She catches me as I pass the bed. She must have washed her face, because there’s no glitter on her petal-soft cheeks. “Look, if you’re not going to listen to me, at least listen to your mom.”
I laugh shortly. “What?”
“I called her. Told her about the offer to join the Sharks. And... and your panic attacks.”
I wrench myself away. “You did what?”
“You never really talked to her about your dad. I think if you did, it would help you. Really help you.”
“You went behind my back to talk to my mother.”
“Don’t say it like that.” She twists her hands in her sweater. My hockey jersey, the gift I gave her. I’m suddenly aware of
the leather bracelet on my wrist. It feels tighter than usual. Constrictive. “I’m just—I’m trying to help you not ruin your
life.”
“I’m not ruining my life.”
“You are .” Her eyes look as fierce as they did on New Year’s, when I couldn’t keep the panic at bay and she saw my breakdown from
start to finish. “And I don’t care if you’re mad at me for saying that, because it’s the truth. You don’t have to prove to
anyone that you’re not like your dad. We already know. All of us, your mom included.”
“You have no idea what my mother thinks. There’s a reason we haven’t— I can’t believe you would...” I trail off, shaking
my head. I rub my chest again; it’s getting harder and harder to breathe. If I’m not careful, I’m going to puke.
Isabelle reaches for my arm, but I shake her off. I can’t. I can’t do this.
“Nik,” she pleads. “I’m trying to help. You encourage me, you remind me my passions are important—why won’t you do that for
yourself?”
I struggle to keep down the rush of emotion, but it’s building. It’s building, and I can’t fucking stop it. I’m spinning out, and like hell am I going to let Isabelle be collateral. Goodbye to my father, goodbye to hockey—she doesn’t understand that I have to do this, I have to —
“You need to go.” I get as far away as I can in the small room, clenching my trembling fists and pressing them against my
stomach. My shoulder aches, my chest aches, my goddamn soul aches. Isabelle blinks, her expression shuttering.
I never should have dragged her into this.
She pulls herself together. “What are you talking about?”
“Go.” My voice breaks on the word. It’s a struggle to force anything out, much less speak in English. “I don’t—I can’t—”
She takes a couple steps in my direction. “I don’t want to leave you alone right now.”
“And I don’t want to hurt you!”
She freezes. “What? You’d never do that.”
My heart lurches as I imagine it. I feel like a monster, hell-bent on destruction. This close to cracking open. I shake my
head shortly, turning away from her.
She rests her hand against my back, in between my shoulder blades. “Nik—”
“I mean it.” My voice comes out as a snarl as I twist around. I can’t control anything right now. Not my voice, not my breathing,
not my body. I’m burning from the inside out, and if Isabelle gets caught in the inferno... “Just go. Now.”
“You’d never hurt me,” she says stubbornly.
“I don’t trust—”
“I trust you,” she interrupts, her voice gaining steam. “What about in bed? You make it hurt, but you’re not hurting me.”
“It’s not the same as this.” Never the same, because I’m not panicking when we’re in bed. This is the furthest thing from
that. It’s skirting right on the edge of the rage I can’t shake. The inheritance from my father that I’ll never be able to
distance myself from, no matter what I tell myself.
“Why not? You trust yourself then, trust yourself now. You’re not a violent person. You’re not your father. I promise.”
“Isabelle.”
“I know the man I fell in love with,” she whispers. A tear slips down her cheek.
“Please, solnishko. If I did something I couldn’t take back, I’d never forgive myself. Never.”
She flinches at my harsh tone. I nearly heave. I turn to the wall again.
Such a coward. A selfish fucking coward.
But if she goes, I’m protecting her.
“Fine,” she says, her breath catching on the word. “But talk to your goddamn mother.”
Finally, finally, I hear her leave.
I grab the nearest object—a paperweight with a hockey puck in the middle—and hurl it across the room.