Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Thorne
This morning was a lot for anybody to handle. But especially my girlfriend, the sunny redhead with the gorgeous smile that I’m pretty certain I’m falling in love with. She’s handling it like a champ.
And I haven’t done what I wanted to do, which is break everything in sight and probably terrify Mollie and Indie. So really, we’re all doing better than expected.
Now it's the afternoon, and we're at the practice rink because Mollie needs to move. She needs the ice. Her phone is back at the houseboat, deliberately left behind. What she doesn't need is to read the comments section of people reacting to her story.
Right now, she's running through an old routine near center ice while I half-ass some stick drills near the boards. The rink is empty, and the lights in the stands are off. It feels like we have the whole world to ourselves. She catches me watching and sticks her tongue out at me.
"Eyes on your own work, Thorne."
"Mine is boring. You're not."
She blushes and turns back to her routine. I slam a puck into the net without looking, just to show off. It misses by two feet. Very cool. She doesn't notice, which is the only reason my dignity survives.
It’s nice having this incredibly attractive redhead doing her own thing on one end of the ice while I fuck around on the other. It feels balanced.
The doors open at the far end of the rink.
Voices burst into the calm oasis; young women, as far as I can tell.
A man in a dark tracksuit walks in with four girls trailing behind him.
He's calling instructions in a voice that carries.
His French-Canadian accent smooths the consonants.
The girls fan out along the boards, lacing up skates and chattering.
I don't think much of it at first. Juliet mentioned, months ago, that the rink is available for auxiliary coaching during off-hours. Youth programs, private sessions, that sort of thing. As long as they don’t show any interest in me personally, I can just go back to my drills.
But I see Mollie stop skating, suddenly, like someone yanked the plug out of her. Her arms drop to her sides and every ounce of color drains from her face. I've seen Mollie scared. I've seen her angry, sad, frustrated, drunk, and delirious with laughter. I've never seen her look like this.
I skate over to her, fast. "What's wrong?"
Her lips barely move. "That's him."
"Who?"
She points. "Coach Savard."
My whole body recalibrates in an instant. I look at the man again, this time really seeing him. Golden hair, just slightly silvering at the temples. Athletic build, easy posture, practiced confidence. He's leaning on the boards, smiling at one of his students, his hand resting on her shoulder.
The girl can't be older than twelve.
Oh fuck no. He’s doing the same shit right here in front of me? Every cell in my body ignites. My hands are already fists and my jaw locks so tight that my teeth ache. I start to move toward him and Mollie grabs my arm.
"Alex. Don't."
I can barely hear her over the roar in my skull. My eyes won’t leave him.
This is the man who destroyed her. Who isolated her from everyone, who put his hands on a teenager, who let her shatter on the ice at Nationals twenty minutes after she tried to tell him no. He's standing in my fucking rink.
He seems unaware that his name is trending on TikTok right now because my girl just burned his career to the ground. My eyes dart to the girls. Where are their parents? Do they not have phones?
Mollie looks at me. Her eyes are both damp and fierce. "Not in front of them. Please."
I stay because she's asking me to. My fist throbs with the need to connect with Savard's face, but I stay.
Savard hasn't noticed us yet. He steps off the mats and walks along the boards, correcting one girl’s arm position, murmuring something close to her ear. The familiarity of the gesture makes my stomach lurch. His hand lingers on her back. She beams up at him.
Then he turns and sees Mollie.
His expression cycles through surprise, recognition, and then something that makes my blood pressure spike to dangerous levels.
He smiles. He actually fucking smiles at her, warm and easy, like they're old friends at a reunion. He has no idea what she did this morning. He has no idea that his world is already over. He’s playing it cool.
I’m going to kill the motherfucker.
"Mollie." He skates over, carefree. "Chérie. What are you doing here?"
His arms open, suggesting that he expects a hug. But Mollie doesn't move. She doesn't smile. She stares at him with a forbidding expression.
"I see you've made a new friend." Savard turns back to Mollie, his tone shifting to something oilier. "The captain of the Seattle Havoc? Figures you’ve been hanging around, trying to win his attention. Your brother always was the magnetic one of the two of you."
"You shouldn’t even be here." Mollie's voice is low and steady. "Don't you have the internet?"
A look of confusion crosses Savard’s face. No, I guess he doesn't have any friends or business associates that would warn him if his name was being smeared. That makes me happy.
"I'm simply happy to see my former student." He spreads his hands, all innocence. "You look well. Skating again, I see. Though I have to say, your form has suffered. You always needed someone to keep you sharp."
"I told the world what you did to me." Mollie’s voice is eerily flat and quiet. "I’m surprised you haven’t already heard the news."
Savard's jaw tightens for a fraction of a second before his composure slides back into place.
"I don't know what you mean, chérie. I didn't do anything to you.
And you telling anyone that I did would be a lawsuit waiting to happen.
" He tilts his head and his voice drops.
"You were always so dramatic. Everything I did was to help your career.
And you repaid me by falling apart on the biggest stage of your life. "
My vision narrows. Mollie's hand is still on my arm and I can feel her fingers digging in, holding me in place.
"I already filed a complaint with the Federation," Mollie says. Her voice is steady in a way that I recognize from this morning, the same steel she found when speaking on camera. "If you were wise, you’d leave before word travels to those girls’ parents."
That lands. His composure cracks for a real second, long enough that I see what's underneath the oily charm.
He looks at me again. Then back at Mollie. Then at the space between us, the proximity, the way her body angles toward mine. He reads it correctly and his lip curls.
"Oh, I see how it is." He laughs and it's an ugly sound. "You two aren’t just hanging out. You're fucking a hockey player now. That's cute." He takes a step closer and looks me in the eye. "Surely you can do better, hmm?”
The first punch breaks his nose.
I don't think about it. My fist connects with his face and I feel cartilage crunch under my knuckles.
Savard's head snaps back and he staggers, blood already pouring from his nostrils, but he doesn't go down.
He grabs the boards with one hand and blinks at me like he can't process what just happened.
I grab the front of his jacket and hit him again. This one catches his cheekbone. I feel the bone give, a sickening shift under my knuckles that sends a jolt up my entire arm. Savard drops to one knee on the rubber mats, his free hand flying to his face.
Mollie screams my name. One of the girls on the ice starts crying.
I hit him a third time.
The third punch is the one I'll remember. Not because it does the most damage, but because I had time to stop before I threw it. It was a choice.
Savard goes down flat. Blood sheets from his nose and a dent is already forming under his left eye where the cheekbone is damaged. He makes a horrible, choking gurgle, curled on his side, both hands coming up to cover his face.
My right hand is already swelling. Two of my knuckles are split open and there's a sharp ache in my ring finger that I recognize from experience as a probable fracture. But I barely feel any of it. The adrenaline is a wall between me and the consequences.
Right now, vengeance is singing in my blood. If Savard didn’t look so pathetic, I might hit him again.
Mollie pulls at my arm, her voice rising. "Alex, stop. Stop."
I step back from Savard's body. My chest heaves and blood drips from my knuckles onto the black rubber mats. Somewhere behind me, a girl is sobbing. She doesn't know why the giant hockey player just destroyed her coach's face.
Nobody is going to explain it to her today, I bet.
"What the fuck is going on?"
Beck's voice hits me like a bucket of ice water. I turn and there he is, standing at the rink entrance with his gym bag over his shoulder, staring at the scene in front of him.
Savard’s bleeding on the floor. I’m standing over him with split knuckles. Mollie’s pressed against my side, her hand on my arm, her eyes damp. Beck is smart, and the scene leads to some obvious conclusions.
Fuck it. There could not be a worse time for him to find out about us, but I’m done lying, even for my girlfriend.
Beck looks at me. He looks at Mollie. His eyes drop to her hand on my arm and stay there for a long second. Then he looks at my face and I watch him put every single piece together.
Savard chooses this moment to be vindictive. From the floor, through the blood and the shattered bones of his face, he manages to spit the words. "Get your brat of a sister and her psycho boyfriend away from me!"
I take a step toward Savard, raising my fist. Savard hisses and covers himself. But Mollie steps in, stopping me with both hands flat on my chest. "He's done. He's done, Alex."
Beck hasn't moved. He stands at the entrance with his bag over his shoulder and his expression going through stages.
Confusion. Processing. And then something that settles into his face like concrete hardening.
He doesn't yell. He doesn't charge at me or throw a punch.
He just looks at his best friend and co-captain with an expression that is worse than any violence he could manage.
Betrayal. The kind that doesn't come with anger attached, not yet. Just the hollow, gut-sick realization that the person you trusted most has been lying to your face.
"Beck." My voice sounds wrong, raspy and desperate. "Let me explain."
He shakes his head once. It's a small movement that carries the weight of our entire friendship.
Savard is trying to get up and failing. One of the assistant coaches has appeared from somewhere and is kneeling beside him, calling for help. The girls are clustered at the far end of the ice, the one with the pink bow clutching the boards, her ribbon askew.
Someone is going to call an ambulance. Juliet, the front office, my agent, and probably the fucking police. I did just break a civilian's face in a Seattle Havoc facility.
None of that registers, because Beck is still staring at me. I stare back, trying to find the words to make this right. I know there aren’t any.
Beck turns and walks out of the rink without saying a single word. The door swings shut behind him and the sound echoes.
Mollie grabs my face, making me pay attention to her. “We should go. Let’s head into the locker room and wait.”
I wrap my arms around her and she burrows against my chest. My busted hand throbs and Savard groans on the floor. “Yep. Come on.”
I start toward the tunnel. Everything I built just broke apart in thirty seconds. My friendship, my captaincy, my right hand, and probably my career. I hold Mollie tighter, because she's here, she's real, and right now she needs me more than my pride does.
I'd do it again. Every single punch.
This is either the most romantic thing I've ever done or the dumbest. I genuinely can't tell the difference.