22. Revenge Is A Dish Best Served Cold #2
“With ten minutes and twenty seconds on the clock, scoring for the Minnesota Mustangs is number thirteen, Harlan Beaumont!”
“Atta boy, Har!” Knox shouts, amassing some hard-earned side eyes from our competition.
Harlan is sort of like our secret weapon. He’s quiet, he’s exceptionally fast, and he’s not as combative as some of the other players on the team. A lot of times, people conflate competitiveness with skill, but in some instances, it’s more strategic to downplay your capabilities.
Nobody seems to be watching when I blow Lake a kiss and she begrudgingly accepts it. For someone who basks in attention, she continues to contradict every assumption I’ve made about her. She’s…enigmatic.
I always thought humans were inherently messy, but Lake has taught me that there’s beauty in those with many facets—more sides to love.
Not saying that, uh, I’m in love with her or anything.
I don’t even know what love feels like. Yep, twenty-two and representing the rare percentage of young adults who haven’t felt a romantic soul tie with another person.
It’s as depressing as it is embarrassing.
Knox is substituted on the fly, replaced with none other than my newly sworn enemy, Buford Montgomery.
That smug piece of horse shit. Standing at three apples tall with enough testosterone to add an inch to his height, he saunters onto the ice as if he owns the place, which is ironic, seeing as I doubt anyone in the rink knows his name.
For fuck’s sake, his own teammates hate him. We all know what he did to Lake.
In that split second when he covers center, I freeze. I go catatonic.
With only nine minutes left on the clock, the whistle blows. Buford is manning the offense, but he only makes it a few feet before the puck is stolen from him surprisingly easily. I don’t have time to analyze his shitty blocking.
Unfortunately, my personal baggage is not left at the side entrance but is instead dragged onto the buffed surface of the ice and disemboweled.
My anger flares; I lose sight of the stakes. My vision goes emergency red, the tendons in my arms begin to writhe with the ache to draw blood, and I make a rash decision without consulting any of my teammates.
As the game is still in motion, I’m after Buford’s heels like a debt collector. My own teammates are yelling at me in absolute shock. I don’t hear anything over the tiny voice in my head that says, Make him hurt.
He doesn’t deserve praise. He doesn’t deserve playing time. He has no place on the Mustangs. But people like him—who cling to their wealth and weaponize it to make friends—need to get a taste of their own medicine.
In hindsight, I probably should’ve just slammed into him, but that’s not the high road I take.
Instead, I rear my arm all the way back and strike the bottom half of his face when he turns toward me.
Blood spurts against the inside of his visor, the crack of bone heard over the commotion that has the audience on their feet in a booing frenzy.
I won’t have long until my teammates pull me off him, so I make the most of it. The initial jab knocks him onto his ass, and then I’m scrambling on top of him, bookending his waist with my thighs as I swing punch after punch into that “moneymaker” of a face, as he calls it.
Red sprays onto the ice in alarming abundance. If the skin on my knuckles is tearing, I can’t feel it. The guy is too cowardly to hit back. I hope he has daddy on speed dial to pay for the nose job he’s going to need.
I know I’m going to sound psychotic, but I’ve never felt this free before. I’m a rule follower—a peacekeeper—but Lake is worth getting my ass benched. Nobody is ever going to hurt her again, and I’ll make sure of it.
“Consider this a fucking repercussion, Montgomery,” I growl, surrendering to the arms that yank me off him. The referee is even mixed into the mess, blowing his whistle as if a few measly guidelines would sate the monster inside me.
“You ever fuck with her again, and I’ll finish what I started.”
Buford coughs up a mouthful of ichor and a full tooth, root and crown still intact. I could’ve knocked out a second if I had more time.
“Major penalty for number thirty-six on the Minnesota Mustangs,” the announcer relays over the speakers, curtailed by an uproar of boos from our supporters.
Crew gives me a warranted what the fuck? look as I pass him. The paramedics race onto the scene like it’s a fatal injury rather than a free facial reconstruction.
I slowly skate over to the penalty box, spitting onto the ice, my gloves dripping a trail of gore. It concerns me that I don’t feel an ounce of remorse.
Lake, of course, is frozen in terror, her face bleached of any and all color.
I sit on the bench. The spectators around me are irate, screaming obscenities and throwing perfectly good concessions into the air.
Lake bangs on the fingerprint-smeared plexiglass. “Are you fucking crazy?!” she screeches.
I shrug, smiling like an idiot. “He deserved it.”
“That’s beside the point! You knocked his teeth out!”
Even when she’s berating me, I can’t help but fall into those mesmerizing eyes of hers—oceanic whirlpools that deepen into teal-gradated betrayal.
“You looked lonely. I wanted to sit next to you.”
Lake inhales shakily, pressing the heel of her palm into her forehead. “Sutton, you could’ve just cost the Mustangs the whole game.”
“Don’t worry, we’ve got this. Plus, you’re worth it.”