Chapter 7 #2
That’s when I reached into my bag, grabbed my phone, and finally opened the message thread with her name on it.
Still blank.
Still silent.
Still hers.
You okay?
I typed it. Deleted it.
Tough day. Let me know if you need anything.
Deleted that, too.
Finally, I typed something else.
Keep your head down. We’ve got you.
I stared at it.
Simple. Unassuming. Safe. Yet still way too close to something that wasn’t supposed to exist.
I hit send anyway.
Ten minutes and one shower later, the message still sat on my screen.
Unseen. Unread.
The locker room had settled just enough to be dangerous again—quiet enough that anything could ignite it. Towels snapped. Gear hit the benches. Cold water hissed through pipes and cracked open soda cans. The tension hadn’t gone anywhere. It had just slipped beneath the surface like a shark.
Rhett stalked back in five minutes after I got back to my locker. Hoodie halfway off, face flushed, curls wild like he’d been running a loop of the arena—or pacing the fucking roof. His phone was in his hand, but he wasn’t looking at it.
Not yet.
He headed straight to his locker, stripping the hoodie the rest of the way off before he dropped it on the bench. Sat. Didn’t speak. Then he unlocked his screen. And it was like watching a bomb go live.
First, the silence. Then the inhale. Too slow. Too sharp.
Then the snap of his locker door slamming back against the hinge.
“She’s gone?” His voice cracked against the tile.
Jay, still pulling on socks a few feet away, didn’t look up. “I told you.”
“You said she left,” Rhett snarled, turning on him. “You didn’t say she left-left.”
“She didn’t tell me where she was going, Rhett. You think she’s sending postcards now?”
I rose. “Cool it.”
But it was too late.
“You don’t get it,” Rhett barked, stepping toward Jay.
Jay, credit to him, didn’t move. Just lifted his head and looked right through him.
“I get more than you think,” he said, voice cold as ice.
Rhett scoffed. “Yeah, sure. Coming from the guy who doesn’t even feel heat—”
That’s when Nate muttered something under his breath. Something low, bitter, and just loud enough.
“Maybe if you two weren’t so damn obsessed, she wouldn’t have run.”
Rhett froze.
Turned.
“Say that again.”
Nate stood, his own fists clenched, half dressed. “I said maybe she left because the rest of us are sick of being in the middle of your leash fight. You think she doesn’t know how you two look at her? You think it’s not obvious?”
The second he said it, I knew he regretted it.
But regret didn’t stop fists.
Rhett launched.
I moved.
But not fast enough.
He slammed Nate back into the row of lockers, one fist gripping the front of his jersey, the other cocked high and trembling.
“Say it again,” Rhett growled, teeth bared, scent flaring hard and hot. “Say it again.”
Nate didn’t.
Not because he backed down—because I was between them now, one arm shoved into Rhett’s chest, the other braced to hold them apart.
I met Rhett’s eyes. “Enough.”
His nostrils flared. Jaw tight. He didn’t move.
“Let go,” I said.
He didn’t listen.
Jay stood beside me suddenly, calm as always, but there was something sharp in his stance now. Coiled. Ready.
“This isn’t the way,” Jay said quietly.
That got through.
Barely.
Rhett let go. Not with grace. With a jerk, like his own body betrayed him by listening. He stepped back, hands still twitching, eyes still lit with the kind of fury that made alphas dangerous.
Nate adjusted his jersey. “He needs to get his head on straight before playoffs.”
“Shut up,” I warned, and he did. Fast.
Rhett’s chest heaved. His mouth opened—like he had more to say—but the words never came. Instead, he turned and walked out.
No bag. No hoodie. Just his keys in one hand and fury in the other.
Gone.
Jay looked at me.
I didn’t say anything. Because what the hell was there to say?
We were unraveling.
Not because of the press.
Not because of Beckett.
Because Wren wasn’t here—and none of us knew how to handle that without making it worse.
What I hated most was I couldn’t protect her if I didn’t know where she was. I couldn’t help with… whatever she needed assistance with and though I had no evidence, a part of me was dead certain that she needed something.
Fresh anger ripped through my veins and I glared at the lockers. It took me a minute to get that wave of aggression under control, but by the time I did, the locker room was empty except for Jay.
He watched me with eyes as calm as a midnight pond on a still day. “Better?”
“No.” That was the truth. “But I’ll deal with it. Let’s get out of here.”
I dragged on my clothes in a hurry, ready to be out of the locker room, the arena—fuck the goddamn city. Jay snagged Rhett’s hoodie and bag along with his own while I finished. Once I had my duffel and turned to face him, Jay lifted his chin.
“We could go look for her.”
It was absolutely the last thing I expected him to say.
“What?”
“We could go look for her,” he repeated, not an ounce of emotion bleeding into his voice or shifting his stance.
Hunting her down crossed a line. We weren’t invited and she hadn’t even left us an in case of emergency notification. I glanced down at the still unread message on my screen.
“She’s an adult,” I said, reminding him. Reminding me. “Not really—”
“She’s our friend,” Jay said cutting me off. “We’re worried about her. You’re worried. Rhett’s frantic. If we check on her and she’s fine, she can be pissed at us. But we’ll know.”
He had a point.
“And if she isn’t okay…” Jay didn’t even have to finish that thought.
“Where the fuck do we start?”