Chapter 24
Lisa
I don’t tell Blake where I’m going.
Not because I want to hide anything from him, and not because I think he wouldn’t understand why I need to do this, but because if he knew I was planning to walk straight into a conversation with James Perth less than forty-eight hours after surgery to put his shoulder back together, he would try to stop me. I can’t have anybody stop me anymore.
For too long, my life has bent itself around James in quiet ways that were hard to explain even to myself while they were happening, small compromises that didn’t feel like compromises at the time, small silences that didn’t feel like silence until I looked back and realized how much of myself I had been shrinking just to make room for him.
And I am done shrinking. Completely done. Which is why I’m standing outside the entrance of the Hawks’ training facility on a grey Chicago afternoon that smells faintly like rain. I’m staring at the glass doors like they might open on their own if I wait long enough.
“They won’t open themselves,” Leo says calmly beside me.
I didn’t even hear him approach.
“I wasn’t waiting for them to,” I reply automatically.
“You were,” he says.
He’s not wrong. Leo doesn’t ask me if I’m sure about this.
He doesn’t tell me I shouldn’t be here. He doesn’t suggest Blake should be the one having this conversation instead.
He just stands beside me with his hands in his coat pockets like this is another meeting he already scheduled three steps ahead of everyone else.
“Ready?” he asks.
“No,” I admit.
“Good,” he replies. “That usually means it matters.”
“What are you even doing here?” I ask, and Leo smiles.
“Helping a friend,” he shrugs before he keeps walking.
Inside the building, everything smells like polished floors, cold air conditioning, and expensive equipment that has never belonged to people like me.
For one second, I am back in another hallway, years ago, waiting outside another locker room while James told me he would only be five minutes and somehow made me wait thirty instead.
I stop walking. Leo notices immediately.
“You don’t have to go in if you change your mind,” he says quietly.
“I didn’t,” I answer.
I just needed a second.
James is exactly where Leo said he would be.
He is near the back hallway leading toward the practice rink, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed like he’s waiting for someone else. He looks like he hasn’t realized yet that he was the one waiting.
He sees me before I say anything. And he smiles. That same smile. The one that used to make me nervous in ways I didn’t understand yet.
“Lisa,” he says, as if this is a coincidence rather than something inevitable.
“James.”
His eyes flick briefly toward Leo. Then back to me again.
“Didn’t expect to see you here,” he continues casually.
“I did,” I answer.
For a moment, neither of us speaks. And in that silence, I realize something surprising. I’m not scared of him anymore. Not even a little.
“You shouldn’t have gone after Blake,” I say finally.
His expression doesn’t change.
“I didn’t go after anyone.”
“You did.”
“It’s hockey,” he shrugs. “People get hit.”
“That wasn’t a hit,” I reply.
“It looked like one to the referees.”
“It didn’t look like one to the league,” Leo says calmly beside me.
James’s attention shifts again. Slower this time. More careful.
“And you are?” James asks.
“Someone with access to video review committees, sponsorship boards, and three different legal departments that are currently very interested in what happened on that ice,” Leo replies evenly.
James’s smile tightens slightly.
“There’s nothing illegal about a hit during a game.”
“There is when four players collapse on one target simultaneously after a prior altercation off the ice,” Leo says. “Especially when there is footage of you initiating physical confrontation with the same individual in a public setting two nights earlier.”
James looks at me again. Something colder replaces the confidence in his expression.
“You brought a lawyer?”
“I brought a witness,” I correct.
“You think this changes anything?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say simply.
“No one is suspending me over a shoulder injury.”
“No,” Leo agrees calmly. “But sponsors do reconsider contracts when violence becomes a narrative problem.”
Silence stretches between them.
“And league discipline committees do reconsider aggressive play patterns when there is a documented escalation history attached to them,” Leo continues.
James’s jaw tightens.
“You’re bluffing.”
“I don’t bluff,” Leo says.
For the first time since I arrived, James looks uncertain. Not afraid. But uncertain. And somehow that feels bigger.
“I didn’t come here to threaten you,” I say quietly.
“Then why are you here?”
“I came to end this.”
“There’s nothing to end,” he replies.
“Yes,” I say. “There is.”
I step closer before I lose my nerve.
“You don’t get to be part of my life anymore,” I continue, my voice steadier than I expected it to be. “Not through hockey. Not through threats. Not through Blake. Not through my brother. Not through anything.”
He watches me carefully.
“You think this is about Blake?”
“I know it is,” I answer.
“You always made everything personal.”
“You always made everything controlled,” I correct.
His expression shifts slightly. Just slightly. Enough that I know I hit something real.
“You don’t get to punish people because I left,” I continue.
“I didn’t punish anyone.”
“You tried to.”
“That’s not how the game works.”
“That’s exactly how you work,” I say.
The hallway feels quieter than before. Or maybe I just stopped hearing everything else.
“You don’t get to scare me anymore,” I say finally.“And you definitely don’t get to scare him.”
James studies me for a long moment.
“You think he’s going to stay?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“He won’t.”
“He already did.”
Leo steps slightly forward beside me.
“The league review board meets next week,” he says calmly. “You’ll be receiving notice.”
James doesn’t answer, which tells me everything I need to know.
“I’m not here because I’m afraid of you,” I say one last time. “I’m here because I’m done with you.”
And for the first time since I met him, he doesn’t smile back.
Outside the building, the air feels lighter than it did when we arrived. It feels like something invisible finally shifted out of the way. Something I didn’t realize I had been carrying with me all this time.
“You did well,” Leo says as we walk toward the car.
“I thought I was going to be more nervous,” I admit.
“You were,” he replies.
“I mean, while I was talking.”
“That’s because you were telling the truth,” he says simply.
I stop walking.
“Thank you,” I say.
“For what?”
“For making sure he can’t do that again.”
Leo smiles slightly.
“He won’t,” he says. “And you should thank your boyfriend.”
“Blake doesn’t know I’m here,” I tell Leo as we walk away from the training facility.
“You think it’s a coincidence I showed up here?” Leo asks, and all I can do is smile.