Chapter 8
DECLAN
I woke irritated before the alarm.
Tiny was asleep on his back beside the bed, all four legs in the air, snoring like an engine that needed repair. Olivia’s side of the mattress was empty. Her suitcase sat open near the dresser, half-packed again even though she had only been home two nights.
My phone was on the nightstand.
I did not pick it up.
That lasted twelve seconds.
There were no new messages from Holloway. Of course there weren’t. The conversation had ended. I had made sure it ended.
I’m answering the hockey question. That’s all.
A clean boundary. Necessary. Professional.
And before that, I had typed, No. You wanted contact.
He had not denied it.
That was the problem.
Not the hockey question. Players texted about systems. Not often at eleven at night, and not usually after staring at a thread long enough that I could feel the hesitation through a screen, but it happened. The question had been legitimate. The answer had been simple.
The silence after my accusation was not simple.
It sat in my head while I showered. It followed me downstairs, where Olivia stood at the kitchen island in a blouse and bare feet, answering email with a coffee in one hand.
“You’re up early,” she said without looking away from her laptop.
“Couldn’t sleep.”
“Team stuff?”
“Yes.”
It was not a lie, but it wasn’t honest enough to feel good.
She glanced up then. “Big day?”
“Practice. Meetings. Media prep for tomorrow.”
“Sounds like every day.”
“Most days are the same on purpose.”
That got a small smile from her. “You and your routines.”
I poured coffee. Tiny lumbered in, pressed his head against Olivia’s hip, accepted two absent scratches, then abandoned her to sit on my foot.
“Traitor,” she told him.
“He respects structure.”
“He respects whoever has keys.”
She closed her laptop halfway and looked at me more closely. “You’re carrying something.”
I kept my expression neutral. “Roster decisions.”
“Mm.”
Olivia had always been smart enough not to push when pushing would only make me shut down. It was one of the things I loved about her. It was also one of the ways we had learned to stop asking each other for more.
She reached across the island and squeezed my hand once. “Try to eat lunch today.”
“I will.”
“You say that like a man who will forget.”
“I’m a man with staff.”
“Your staff shouldn’t have to feed you.”
“They’d agree.”
She smiled, then opened her laptop again.
I left ten minutes later with the aftertaste of coffee and guilt in my mouth.
At the arena, normal chaos was already in progress.
Milo had somehow convinced Lowell to film him juggling three rolls of tape in the players’ lounge.
He dropped one immediately, kicked it under the couch, and blamed the lighting.
Roman sat at the table eating eggs from a container and looking like he had been disappointed by civilization as a whole.
Tessa walked past me with two phones, a tablet, and a paper cup of coffee balanced against her chest.
“If anyone asks,” she said, “I have quit and moved to a cabin with no internet.”
“Noted.”
“Holloway is here,” she added, too casually.
I looked at her.
She gave me a flat look back. “He asked me what time media was without me prompting him. I assumed you’d want to know before the earth split open.”
“Thank you.”
“That is still not an invitation for feelings.”
I kept walking.
In the staff room, Benny was talking through skate issues with an assistant while our video coach had three clips queued up and a face that said he had been awake since the Carter administration.
I focused. I listened. I gave answers. I made corrections to the practice plan and adjusted the second drill to tighten the timing between low support and weak-side release.
Work helped.
Work always helped.
Until Jace stepped into the video room with Roman at his shoulder, hair damp from the shower he’d clearly taken at home, notebook in hand, pen already moving between his fingers.
He did not look at me first.
That annoyed me more than it should have.
The meeting started fine. I kept the pace clipped, the instructions specific. No extra attention. No unnecessary callouts. If I spoke to Holloway, it was because the clip required it.
He answered well twice, too fast the third time.
I paused the screen. “Wait.”
His mouth closed.
Immediate.
Again.
A hot, unwelcome awareness moved under my ribs, and I buried it under the next question. “Vega. What happens before that pass is available?”
Roman, who had missed nothing, gave me the correct answer without looking away from Jace.
On the ice, Holloway was not unfocused. That would have been easier.
He was too focused.
He anticipated every developing lane like he could force the drill to catch up with him if he moved hard enough.
He beat Lowell to space before Lowell had possession.
He drove through the middle when the read called for patience.
He turned one controlled regroup into a track meet because his body believed speed could solve timing.
It could not.
I let the first one go with a correction.
“Holloway, underneath until the touch is earned.”
He nodded, breathing hard. “Got it.”
The next rep, he did it correctly.
The one after that, he left early again.
I skated along the boards, hands in my pockets, keeping my voice even. “Again.”
His head snapped toward me. “The lane was open.”
“Again.”
“If he moves it when he’s supposed to, I’m gone.”
“He didn’t have it.”
“He would have if he looked.”
Lowell, pale and unfortunate in the middle of this, said, “I did look.”
Milo muttered, “Oh, this is premium.”
Roman’s mask turned slowly toward him. Milo shut up.
I held Jace’s gaze. “Run it as drawn.”
His face flashed with frustration. Not for show. Not arrogance. The real thing, bright and difficult, because in his head the play had already worked and reality was the insulting part.
He went back.
He ran it right.
Then he ran it wrong.
Not accidentally. I saw the decision happen. He saw pressure cheat high, read the weak side, and chose his version over the structure. For half a second, he looked brilliant.
Then the pass died in traffic, Lowell got caught flat, and the whole drill collapsed into three players circling uselessly while the puck slid to the corner.
I blew the whistle.
The rink quieted by degrees.
Jace coasted back, jaw set, already prepared to argue the merits of the read. I could see the words lining up behind his teeth.
I did not give him space for them.
“Off.”
He blinked. “What?”
“Off the ice.”
No one moved.
His blue eyes cut to the bench, then back to me. “For making a read?”
“For ignoring an instruction.”
“It was the better play.”
“It failed.”
“Because Lowell was late.”
“Because you left the structure.”
His shoulders lifted with a breath he did not release. For a second I thought he might keep going in front of everyone.
I almost wanted him to.
That was the first warning I ignored.
Instead, he turned hard, skated to the gate, and stepped off. His movements were controlled enough that most people would have missed the damage. I didn’t. He sat at the far end of the bench, helmet still on, gloves planted on his knees, staring at the ice like I had taken more than a rep from him.
I waited ten seconds.
“Next group.”
Practice resumed.
It was the right call. It had been measured, proportionate, temporary. A consequence, not a spectacle. I brought him back after two rotations and said only, “Do it correctly.”
He did.
The rest of practice ran clean because everyone in the building understood the line now, including me.
Afterward, I told Benny to send Holloway to my office when he was done.
Roman heard. He looked from me to Jace, then back. There was no accusation in his face, which made it worse. Only calculation.
Fifteen minutes later, Jace knocked once and came in without waiting for my answer.
He had showered. His hair was wet, curling at the longer pieces on top, and he wore a team hoodie with the sleeves shoved to his elbows. His hands were empty. No notebook. No pen. That was deliberate.
I closed the office door.
He tracked the movement, then looked back at me. “If this is about the drill, I know what you’re going to say.”
“Sit down.”
“I’d rather stand.”
“I didn’t ask what you’d rather do.”
His eyes sharpened. “Coach.”
“Sit.”
He sat.
No delay. No muttered comment. No performance.
The room changed so fast I felt it in my teeth.
Jace felt it too. His fingers curled against his thighs, then flattened. He looked at me like he wanted to blame me for the fact that he had obeyed.
I stayed standing behind my desk because sitting felt like giving ground I was not ready to give. “You’re not here because you made a read.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
“You’re here because I gave you an instruction and you decided your instinct mattered more.”
“It does matter.”
“Yes. It does. That’s why you’re in the league and not watching it from your couch.”
That hit him sideways. He had expected a fight. Praise, even controlled, made his posture shift before he caught it.
I continued. “Your read was good. Your timing was bad. When you leave early, you don’t create offense. You create a problem everyone else has to solve behind you.”
His mouth tightened. “So I’m supposed to wait until the play is dead?”
“You’re supposed to know the difference between patience and hesitation.”
“I do.”
“Not today.”
His gaze dropped to the floor.
“Look at me.”
He did.
Immediate again.
There it was. That clean transfer of attention. No debate. No delay. His whole focus moved to my face, and the air between us became too narrow for the office around it.
My voice came out lower. “Why is it harder for you to listen when you’re trying to prove you’re right?”
He didn’t answer.
For once, there was no quick deflection. No joke thrown like a smoke bomb. His throat moved. His knee started bouncing, stopped when he noticed, started again.