Chapter 2
Sebastian
I’d been expecting several scoldings upon my return to school, but I hadn’t been prepared for the second to follow the first in such quick succession.
Perhaps that’s why I’d been so prickly with the mysterious hockey player—I'd still been recovering from my first beatdown when I'd discovered her inside DuLane Arena.
Now, as I stared into the eyes of another beautiful brunet, one who just so happened to be my girlfriend, I braced myself for a third tongue-lashing.
“Practice doesn’t start for another week, Sebastian. You might live and breathe hockey, but food and water are also necessary for survival.” Kate’s voice reverberated through the empty arena. “Come get lunch with me.”
Was it already afternoon? The massive clock at the opposite end of the rink confirmed in large red numbers that it was fifteen minutes past twelve.
“You said this would be a quick session,” she added. “That was almost three hours ago.”
It was easy for me to lose track of time when I was training, which caused quite a bit of contention in our relationship. To be the best, I had to work the hardest, which meant prioritizing hockey over everything and anyone else. Given my current situation, that was more important than ever.
“I didn’t notice the time,” I admitted.
Kate was always cranky at the start of a new season, when our time together became increasingly sparse.
It didn’t help that she was used to the injured version of me, which, at this time last year, had been in no shape to practice or train.
Now that I was healed and the summer was over, the next few weeks were bound to be a difficult transition for her.
Kate didn’t like to share me with hockey.
But when the injury happened, she stuck by my side throughout my entire recovery.
She drove me to rehab, listened to me bitch about my life, and rarely got mad when I snapped at her in moments of pain or frustration.
That unwavering loyalty was the only reason I was relatively patient with her outward dislike of my passion.
“Is it too much to ask for a few hockey-free days together before the season completely consumes you?”
Hockey-free days were a rare occurrence in my life, and practically nonexistent in the weeks leading up to a new season. She knew that by now, which made her question even more frustrating to hear.
“How about this—I can give you lunch and a pre-lunch snack if you join me in the locker room for a shower. We won’t have the place to ourselves once practice starts up.”
Rather than give her time to consider my offer, I leaned forward and pressed a deep kiss against her mouth. She tasted like her vanilla and brown sugar lip gloss. It was a new development. Last month had been strawberries.
“I promise to make it worth your while,” I whispered. Exhaustion and limited time aside, I would never turn down the opportunity to have sex with my girlfriend. It was the only other release that came close to the high I got while playing hockey.
“You can’t distract me with sex,” she said.
“We would be saving water. The planet is very important to you.” Kate was pursuing a degree in environmental science, and I took more showers than the average person, which meant my proposition was bound to be successful at some point.
“Please tell me you two haven’t done that before. The locker room is a sacred space.”
I glanced up to find Dallard University’s best defenseman standing at the entrance to the players’ bench, muscled arms closed over a broad expanse of chest. Colossal would be the first word I’d use to describe Bryce Hillford; intimidating would be the second.
At six feet six inches tall, the guy resembled a humanoid bear.
And despite being one large motherfucker, his size didn’t detract from his speed on the ice.
If anything, it made him a lethal weapon, one that I’d had the pleasure of playing alongside for my entire NCAA career.
My best friend stalked forward, his tree-trunk legs eating up the stretch of space between us in three steps.
I hadn’t seen Bryce in over three months.
He usually spent the summers at home in Miami, soaking up the sun at his family’s beach house.
Despite his love for hockey, Bryce detested the cold.
“I’m glad to see you’re alive, Evans,” he said.
“I could have sworn you were dead, given I haven’t heard a peep from you since summer started.
” For the usually cool-headed hockey player, that was as good as a fist to the face.
But beneath the surface-level anger, there was something much worse: disappointment.
“Hey, man,” I said, bringing a hand to the back of my neck, fingers massaging the skin at the base of my head. “Sorry I’ve been a little MIA.”
His mouth smoothed into a firm line, and his eyebrows rose in an expression that seemed to say, That’s it?
“I should’ve let you know that I was going dark for a little bit, but it was easier to turn everything off and hide from the world.
I’ve been trying my best to get my shit together since .
. . ” Since I made an absolute fool of myself returning for a game I wasn’t remotely ready to play . . . “It hasn’t been easy.”
Was it shitty to pull a disappearing act on my best friend? Absolutely. But the past eighteen months had really messed me up, and I was still working through a lot of stuff. Bryce knew that better than most.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
Truthfully, I was several hundred miles north of okay, but it would take severe inebriation for me to admit that out loud. “Never better.”
I knew that both of them could see through my lie, but rather than call me out, Bryce offered a genuine smile and said, “Good. We need you if we’re going to win another national title.”
Hearing those words from someone I could trust eased a bit of my apprehension, though it was only a drop in a bucket.
We both knew I had an uphill battle on my hands.
At this point in my hockey career, I was unlikely to be offered a contract.
Most players skilled enough for the pros did one or two years in college before moving up to the NHL.
If not for my injury, I would have been one of them.
But I refused to let one accident take away from the fact that I was a first-round draft pick at eighteen.
The Detroit Red Wings had my rights until my NCAA career was over, which meant I had eight months to prove that I was the same player who had led the Dallard University Ravens to a national title at age twenty.
Some days, I couldn’t help but wonder if scoring that game winning-goal was worth the pain I’d endured over the last year, or the uncertainty it had cast over my future.
“Lunch?” Kate asked.
“I’ll join,” Bryce said. “I have to ensure our locker room isn’t defiled by the likes of you two.”
A chuckle escaped my lips as we headed out.
I paused at the exit and peered over my shoulder, allowing myself one last appreciative glance of the arena.
Despite my less than pleasant talk with Dean Adler and my run-in with little Miss Attitude hockey girl, I was finally starting to think that things were looking up.
>> <<
After seven long days of boring lectures, whispered stares from my fellow students, and building anticipation, stepping onto the rink for the first practice of the season felt like coming up for air after being trapped underwater.
Before my injury, I hadn’t realized that being on the ice was just as vital to my survival as breathing.
Now that I had one final chance to secure my future in this world, I wasn’t going to waste it.
“If my mom looked at me the same way Evans looks at a hockey rink, I wouldn't be in therapy twice a month.” Kent’s drawling comment was met with a chorus of laughter from our teammates. The right winger was only teasing, but I was still tempted to whack him over the head with my stick.
“It’s the same way Bryce looks at Boss Subs from the grocery store,” said Landon, our first-line goalie.
It came as no surprise that he felt the need to chime in. Landon and Kent’s relationship was built on the need to one-up each other. Bickering was their favorite pastime, just like any old married couple.
“And the same way I look at your mother when she crawls into my bed at night,” Bryce quipped.
Thankfully, Coach Dawson called for our attention before anyone else could join in on the gag. “All right, boys, enough of that. Time to warm up.”
Bryce held out an arm to stop me from entering the rink, and when I met his eyes, I already knew what he was going to say.
“Quiet mind, steady heart.”
He spoke those same words before every game. They were a promise to himself as much as they were to his teammates. Today was no game, but hew knew I needed the reminder.
“Quiet mind, steady heart,” I repeated, and then I was off, my skates tearing across the ice as I led the pack around the perimeter for a few warm-up laps.
Each loop around the rink felt like another gasped breath of air, as if I’d broken through the surface after nearly losing myself to the icy depths of a bottomless ocean.
When we split into smaller groups for circle passing, I found myself with the usual suspects, most of whom doubled as my roommates as well as our first line.
In addition to Bryce, Landon, and Kent, that included Bishop at left wing and Richie Torres, otherwise known as RT, on defense.
Together, the six of us were typically an unstoppable force.