Chapter Eighteen
LUKA
I'm not looking for the café. I tell myself after getting her text.
The village is small enough that walking in circles becomes obvious after the third pass, but the night air bites clean and sharp, and moving keeps the thoughts from settling too deep.
My jacket's zipped to my throat, hands shoved in my pockets because they need something to focus on that isn't the way I’ve been avoiding her.
Snow muffles the sound of my boots. Each step a reminder that I shouldn't be here. That instinct is a dangerous thing when you've spent your whole life learning not to trust it.
I turn the corner near the clock tower and then stop.
The café sits halfway down the street, windows glowing amber against the dark. Warm light spills across wooden tables inside. I can almost hear the hiss of the espresso machine inside. I don't need to get closer.
Through the window, at a table near the front, I see movement. A flash of cream-colored fabric. Dark hair catching the light.
Natalia.
I take three steps forward before I realize I'm moving.
She shifts in her chair, and something in the angle changes. The light hits her differently. Her hair falls around her shoulders in dark waves, like it did that night she walked into the bar in that burgundy sweater and told the skier that she was with someone.
She has one leg tucked under her, the other stretched out—protecting her injured ankle, probably. This cream sweater looks soft, the kind of soft that makes you think about textures. About what it would feel like under your palm.
I don’t let myself think about that.
Then Zack leans across the table, elbows planted, mug cradled in both hands. He says something I can’t make out.
She smiles back and nods, leaning in against the coffee table too, like they’re trading private stories—small secrets that only exist between two people who aren’t bracing for impact.
My hands tighten in my pockets.
This is good, I tell myself. This is how it’s supposed to be. She’s safe, and she’s not with someone who would drag her into the kind of mess she doesn’t deserve.
Not with someone whose life is always one headline away from detonating. Not with someone who learned early that love is leverage, that softness gets used against you, that people don’t stay unless they want something.
My father never loved anyone in a way that didn’t come with strings. He only knew how to own, how to control, how to punish.
If I let her stay close, I’ll ruin her, eventually. That’s what men like my father do. And I’m his son.
No matter how far I’ve run from him, no matter how many times I’ve sworn I’m nothing like him, there are moments I feel the same damage sitting in my blood.
Because he didn’t raise me, he built me.
Watching her laugh at something Zack says, watching the way she tucks her hair behind her ear, watching the ease in her shoulders that I’ve only ever seen in glimpses—it hurts in a way I don’t have words for.
In a way that makes me understand why people use violence to solve things.
Because at least violence is concrete. You can measure the damage, count the stitches, and calculate the recovery time.
This just bleeds.
I force myself to look away. To turn and to walk.
But then Natalia looks over, and our eyes meet. I take a step closer, ready to step into the café with no idea what I would say, but then my attention shifts to Zack, remembering that he’s there too.
I turn and leave, feeling Natalia’s eyes on me.
I've spent my entire life learning to control force. On the ice, in my hands, in my temper. Channeling it into something useful, something that earns a paycheck and keeps me just on the right side of suspension.
This should be easy, but it's not.
And the worst part—the part that sits ugly in my chest—is that I haven't touched anyone since she arrived.
Not once. Not because I'm noble or virtuous or any of the things people might assume, but because I can't. Because since the moment Natalia Kovac walked into the media room in Seattle, something shifted, and I have no idea how to shift it back.
I used to be good at compartmentalizing. At keeping things simple, transactional, and meaningless. Physical release with no strings, no complications, and no risk of permanent damage like broken hearts or misplaced trust.
Now I can't even fake interest with these women who find me in the bar or on the slopes.
The thought sits bitter on my tongue as I walk, hands still shoved deep in my pockets.
The rental shop is still open—barely. The lights dim, and a bored attendant scrolls through his phone behind the counter.
Outside, near the equipment racks, a cluster of teenagers jostled each other, laughing loudly.
That particular brand of teenage invincibility that hasn't learned consequences yet.
Then I see him… a bright orange beanie. Blue-and-white zebra jacket.
Too memorable to miss the description of the asshole kids who made Natalia fall. My vision narrows, and I move without hesitation towards them.
One of them looks up. His face went still, eyes widening.
"Oh, shit," he mutters.
The others follow his gaze. Recognition rippling through the group.
"No way… that's him." The kid in the orange beanie blurts it out. "You're Popovich. Holy shit—dude, you're a monster on the ice."
I stop an arm's length away. Close enough, that they can see my face clearly in the dim light. Close enough, that they can feel the shift in my demeanor, the way their laughter dies and their shoulders tense.
They start talking over each other, words tumbling out in a nervous rush.
"I saw your hit on Johansson last season—"
"My dad says you fight like you're trying to kill someone—"
"They say you're secretly Russian mafia or something. Is that true—"
I lift one hand.
Instant silence.
I reach out slowly, deliberately, and rest my palm on the zebra-jacket kid's shoulder. Not hard, but not gentle. Just enough pressure that he understands—viscerally, instinctively—that he's not moving unless I allow it.
His eyes go wide.
"You were here two days ago," I say, my voice calm. The same tone I use right before a fight, when the ref is still between us and I'm deciding exactly how this is going to go. "On the upper runs."
The kid nods, "Yeah."
"You came down fast and out of control. There was a woman near the trees."
A flash of knowledge glazing over their faces.
One of the other boys exhales sharply. "We didn't hit her."
"No," I agree. My hand stays where it is… steady. "You scared her. She fell and got hurt."
The kid under my palm goes pale.
"I—I didn't mean—" His voice cracks. He's maybe sixteen, seventeen. Old enough to know better. Not old enough to have learned it yet.
I lean in just enough that he has to hear me over the wind. "You don't get to decide what you meant. You only get to live with what you did."
His breath comes shallow and rapid.
I glance at the other two. They're frozen, watching. "If I see any of you anywhere near her again," I say, letting each word land separately, distinctly, "I will make sure the next time someone goes looking for you, they won't find anything until the snow melts."
Then I straighten, lifting my hand from the kid's shoulder as if nothing happened. "Understand?"
All three nod. Fast and frantic. Then I turn away and don't look back, because I don't need to.
My hands are still balled into tight fists.
Not from adrenaline. From the effort of keeping my anger contained… keeping my voice level and my grip relaxed when every instinct screamed to do more. To make them feel a fraction of what Natalia felt, alone on that mountain, hurting.
I strip off my jacket and boots in the dark vacant chalet. No Natalia already in bed asleep like she usually is when I return this late. I move through it without turning on the lights, my eyes already adjusting.
I head to the bedroom and change into swim shorts before heading to the patio and slide the door open.
I step out and toss the hot tub’s cover off. Steam curls from the hot tub, rising into the cold night air like ghosts. I sink into the water slowly. Heat crawls into my muscles, degree by degree, easing the tension that's been coiled in my shoulders since I saw her through that café window.
I lean my head back against the edge of the tub, close my eyes.
Her laugh echoes in my skull. The way she looks at Zack—open and easy. She’s only ever looked at me like that once. The day we shared lunch together in the bar.
I've spent years perfecting the skill of separating what my body wants from what my head knows is safe. Keeping things transactional, and most importantly… meaningless.
Now I can't even touch that part of myself. It's like she rewired something fundamental, and I don't know how to rewire it back.
The water laps against my skin, hot enough to sting.
I am my father's son.
I've spent my entire life trying to outrun that truth. Years learning to channel his violence into something controlled, something acceptable. I fight on the ice and collect a paycheck. I protect my teammates and get called a hero. I break people's faces and sign autographs afterward.
But it's still violence. Still the same capacity for damage. Just dressed up in a jersey and played to a crowd.
My father never walked away from anything. Never chose distance when he could choose confrontation. Never measured his words, or his hands, or the damage he left in his wake.
I won't do that.
I won't.
Maybe walking away, staying silent, choosing absence, is the only way I know how not to become him. Not because I'm better. But because I'm self-aware enough to know I'm not.
Steam rises around me. I exhale slowly, watching my breath mist in the air above the water.
Another night survived. Another line not crossed.
Tomorrow, I'll do it all again. Keep my distance. Choose absence over action, silence over words, safety over everything else that claws at my chest.
I close my eyes.
And wait for the morning.