6. Rhys
Rhys
I yanked the lace tight on my left skate, jaw clenched hard enough to ache.
The locker room buzzed with the usual pre-practice chaos—equipment clattering against metal, laughter ricocheting off concrete walls, voices layered over voices until the noise became a physical thing pressing against my skull.
Normally, I tolerated it. Blocked it out.
Let the sound wash over me while I prepared mentally for ice time.
Today every decibel scraped raw.
I should've gotten coffee. Should've walked into that café, ordered my usual black, and walked out without incident. Simple. Routine. The kind of morning ritual that kept my head straight when everything else threatened to tilt sideways.
Instead, I'd avoided it entirely. Taken the long route to the rink, told myself I didn't need caffeine, that I could function without it.
Stupid.
Now I sat here caffeine-deprived and irritable, surrounded by twenty-something hockey players with too much energy and not enough sense, and my patience had worn through before practice even started.
"New girl in the café looks terrified of us." Greyson Williams dropped onto the bench across from me, all white teeth and sharp angles, his grin carrying that particular edge that meant he was about to say something calculated to get a reaction. "Cute, though."
My fingers stilled on the lace.
"Ben's already talking to her," Sam Harding added from two lockers down, shrugging into his practice jersey. His tone was easy, conversational. No malice. Just observation. "Guy moves fast."
"First-day nerves," someone else laughed. "Give her a week. She'll loosen up."
I resumed tying my skate, movements precise and controlled. Focused on the repetitive motion. The familiar texture of worn laces against calloused fingers. Anything except the spike of something dark and possessive that flared hot in my chest at the casual way they discussed her.
They didn't know. Couldn't know. And I needed to keep it that way.
"Probably scared because Ackerman spilled coffee on himself yesterday," Greyson continued, leaning back against the locker with that infuriating smirk firmly in place. "Heard she almost cried."
My jaw locked.
"She spilled it on him," someone corrected. "Jenna said the girl looked like she thought she'd get fired on the spot."
"Did she?"
"Nah. Ackerman let her off easy, apparently."
The conversation continued around me—light, meaningless banter that shouldn't have registered at all. Players talked. They always talked. About games, about stats, about women who worked at the rink or served them drinks or smiled at them in passing.
I never cared. Never reacted.
But listening to them discuss Olivia—her fear, her nervousness, Ben's interest—felt like sandpaper dragged across exposed nerve endings.
"Leave her alone."
The words cut through the noise, sharp and cold.
My words.
The locker room went silent.
Every head turned toward me. I felt the weight of their attention like a spotlight, sudden and unwelcome. My hands had gone still again, laces half-tied, tension coiled tight across my shoulders.
Nicholas Maddox arched one dark brow, the ghost of a smirk playing at the corner of his mouth. "Didn't know you cared, Ackerman."
I didn't answer. Couldn't answer without making this worse than it already was.
Greyson's grin sharpened into something knowing, blue eyes glinting with the kind of interest I absolutely didn't need directed my way. He leaned forward slightly, studying me with the focus of someone who'd just spotted weakness and intended to exploit it.
I bent over my skate and resumed lacing, movements deliberate. Measured. Gave them nothing else to work with.
The silence stretched—uncomfortable, loaded with questions no one quite dared ask out loud.
Then Sam cleared his throat, and the spell broke. Conversation resumed, quieter now, players exchanging glances I pretended not to see.
I finished with my skates and stood, grabbing my stick from the rack with more force than necessary.
Shouldn't have reacted.
Stupid.
The word echoed in my head, bitter and accusatory. I'd spent fifteen years building walls, maintaining distance, keeping my personal life separate from everything and everyone connected to this team.
One morning in her presence, and I'd cracked. Snapped at my own players over a girl they didn't even know I recognized.
I headed for the tunnel leading to the ice, shoulders rigid, aware of Maddox's knowing look burning into my back and Greyson's sharp attention following my exit.
I didn't understand why I'd reacted. Why hearing them discuss her—casually, harmlessly—had triggered something protective and possessive I had no right to feel.
She wasn't mine to protect. Wasn't anything to me except a ghost from a past I'd tried to bury.
But my body hadn't gotten that message. And that terrified me more than I wanted to admit.
Practice was brutal.
Not because of the drills—Barrett ran the same conditioning sequences he'd been running for weeks, nothing I couldn't execute in my sleep.
Not because of the players either. They skated hard, listened when I corrected their positioning, responded to coaching with the kind of focus that came from wanting to win.
Brutal because I couldn't concentrate worth a damn.
My mind fractured in ways it never had before.
I'd stand at center ice calling plays, watching the forwards execute breakout patterns, and suddenly I'd be thinking about the tremor in her hands when she'd apologized.
The way her voice had caught on the words "please don't fire me" like she'd been swallowing broken glass.
I missed a whistle cue.
Barrett shot me a look—brief, questioning—but didn't call me out in front of the team.
Small mercies.
I forced myself back into the drill. Watched Maddox drive hard toward the net, all explosive power and barely controlled aggression.
Watched Crown thread a pass through traffic with that lazy precision that made it look effortless.
Watched the defensive pairings I'd spent months training execute zone coverage that should've had my full attention.
Instead, I kept circling back to the café.
To the moment her eyes had gone wide with recognition.
To the coffee spreading across my hoodie while she'd stood there frozen, terrified I'd destroy her for an accident.
To the realization that she thought I was the kind of man who'd fire someone over spilled coffee.
That gutted me worse than anything else.
My skate caught an edge during a transition drill. Not enough to fall—I recovered instantly, muscle memory compensating before conscious thought could interfere—but enough that several players noticed.
I never stumbled. Never lost focus on the ice.
This was my domain. The one place everything made sense.
Except today it didn't. Today I was distracted by a girl half my age, whom I had no business thinking about at all.
Practice ended twenty minutes later than scheduled.
Barrett kept us running power-play sequences until even Maddox looked winded, until the ice had more grooves than a vinyl record, and my legs burned with the kind of exhaustion that should've cleared my head.
It didn't.
I stripped off my gear in silence while the locker room emptied around me. Players filtered out in clusters—some heading to physical therapy, others to the weight room, a few straight home. The usual post-practice exodus.
I took my time. Let the space clear. Gave myself the illusion of control by waiting until the noise faded and I could think without twenty voices layering over each other.
Then I shouldered my bag and headed for the exit.
The hallway stretched long and fluorescent-bright, concrete walls lined with championship banners and framed photographs of players I'd either coached or competed against. My footsteps echoed in the emptiness.
The café sat halfway between the locker room and the parking lot.
I could take the side exit. Avoid it entirely. Add thirty seconds to my walk and eliminate any chance of seeing her.
Smart move. Professional.
I kept walking straight.
Just passing through. Not stopping. Not looking.
The café came into view through the wide glass front—afternoon light slanting across clean counters, chairs stacked on tables, the espresso machine silent for once.
I told myself I wouldn't look.
My gaze cut sideways before I could stop it.
She stood behind the counter wiping down surfaces with methodical precision, hair pulled back, apron slightly crooked.
The late afternoon light caught the strands that had escaped her ponytail, turning them copper-gold.
She moved with focus now. No tremor in her hands.
No fear in her posture. Just quiet concentration on a simple task.
Something in my chest tightened—sharp and uncomfortable and entirely unwelcome.
She looked... settled. Calm. Like maybe the morning's disaster had faded into just another first-day mistake she'd survived.
I shouldn't be watching this. Shouldn't be cataloging the way she bit her lower lip while she worked or how her shoulders had finally dropped from the tense line they'd held earlier.
I forced my gaze forward. Turned my head with deliberate, stiff precision and kept walking.
Each step felt heavier than it should.
This is a problem.
The parking lot doors loomed ahead. I pushed through into cold air and gray sky, letting the chill bite against overheated skin.
Behind me, the café's warmth and her presence lingered like a brand I couldn't shake.
Movement snagged my peripheral vision.
I stopped mid-step, hand still on the parking lot door, and turned my head just enough to catch the figure standing at the hallway corner.
Not a player—wrong build, wrong posture, no equipment bag.
Not a coach—I knew every coach on staff and this guy wasn't one of them.