Chapter 4
Peter
Drop. Drop. Drop.
It was a precise sound. Measured. Controlled. I watched the dark liquid pool in the glass carafe, counting the seconds between drips. One-Mississippi. Two-Mississippi.
Control was a construct. I knew that. It was a lie we told ourselves to pretend that we weren’t just bags of meat and water hurtling through space on a dying rock. But it was a useful lie. It was the only lie that kept the puck out of the net.
I picked up my mug—black ceramic, no handle, ergonomic grip—and took a sip. The coffee was bitter. It burned my tongue.
Good. The burn meant I was awake. The burn meant I was here, in this kitchen, and not back in the hallway at the party last night, pressing Belinda O’Shea against the wall and offering to teach her how to have sex.
Learn from a professional.
I squeezed my eyes shut, the memory hitting me like a high stick to the face.
Why had I said that?
I ran the diagnostics in my head, trying to find the error in the code.
Variable 1: Alcohol? No. I had been drinking water.
Variable 2: Sleep deprivation? Possible. My sleep efficiency score had been down 12% this week.
Variable 3: The dress.
The image of her in that black slip of silk materialized behind my eyelids. The way it clung to her hips. The way her skin looked under the dim hallway lights—pale, soft, glowing. The way she had looked up at me, eyes wide with a mix of terror and hunger, admitting she was a virgin.
“I need a distraction. I need to get it over with.”
She treated intimacy like a hangnail she needed to clip off. It was clinical. It was desperate. And it was dangerous. If she went out into the wild with that mindset—searching for "data" in the beds of frat boys like Kevin—she was going to get hurt. She was going to get used.
And if she got hurt, she would be distracted. If she was distracted, her analytics would suffer. If her analytics suffered, the team suffered. If the team suffered, we lost the Championship.
There.
I opened my eyes, staring at the granite countertop.
That was the logic. It wasn’t that I wanted her. It wasn’t that the smell of vanilla and peppermint was currently haunting my olfactory memory. It was about the Championship. I was neutralizing a threat to the team’s performance. I was simply offering to... streamline the process.
"You look like you’re trying to murder that coffee cup," a voice croaked from the doorway.
I didn’t turn around. "You’re up early, Jax."
Jax shuffled into the kitchen, looking like a survivor of a natural disaster. His hair was a bird’s nest, he was wearing only one sock, and his skin had the distinct greyish pallor of a severe hangover.
"I’m not up," Jax groaned, collapsing onto a barstool. "I never went to sleep. The spinning wouldn’t stop. I think the punch was spiked. Or maybe I’m dying. Is this what dying feels like, Tsar?"
"That is what dehydration and poor decision-making feels like," I said, sliding a glass of water across the island toward him. "Drink."
Jax grabbed the glass like it was the Holy Grail and downed it in one gulp. He slammed it down, wiped his mouth, and squinted at me.
"So," he rasped. "You and the Analyst. In the hallway. What was that?"
My hand tightened on my mug. "Nothing."
"didn't look like nothing," Jax said, a smirk fighting through his misery. "Looked like you were about to bench press her. I saw Kevin running away like he’d seen a bear. Did you threaten him?"
"I saved him," I corrected. "He was boring her to death."
"Right. You saved him." Jax rested his head on his arms. "You know, she’s actually cool. Weird as hell, but cool. Sloane told me Bee organized her entire bookshelf by 'Spiciness Level.' Who does that?"
"Someone who values categorization," I murmured.
"Someone who needs to get laid," Jax corrected. "I heard she was on the prowl last night. It’s like watching a baby deer try to cross a highway. You just know it’s gonna end in a splat."
Splat.
The word settled in my gut, heavy and cold.
"She’s not going to splat," I said, my voice sharper than I intended.
Jax raised an eyebrow, sensing the shift in tone. "Protective much? Careful, Pete. She’s the GM’s kid. That’s a glowing red 'Do Not Touch' button."
"I am aware of the politics, Jax."
"Are you? Because you have that look."
"What look?"
"The look you get when someone enters the crease," Jax said. "The 'I will break your femur if you touch my puck' look."
I set my mug down with a deliberate clack.
"I’m going to the arena," I said. "Some of us have goals beyond avoiding liver failure."
"Run away, coward!" Jax called after me as I grabbed my keys. "But you can’t goalie your feelings forever!"
I slammed the front door, cutting off his voice.
Feelings.
I didn’t have feelings. I had objectives. And right now, my objective was to make sure Belinda O’Shea didn’t destroy herself—and my season—in a misguided quest for data.
The rain started halfway to the arena.
It wasn’t a gentle shower; it was a Vermont deluge. Cold, driving sheets of water that turned the grey morning into a twilight gloom. The windshield wipers slashed back and forth—thwack-hiss, thwack-hiss—a metronome for my escalating headache.
I parked the SUV in the players' lot. It was empty. It was Saturday. Practice wasn’t until Monday. Most of the team would be sleeping until noon.
I pulled my hood up and sprinted for the side entrance, swiping my keycard with wet fingers. The lock beeped green, and I stepped into the cool, dry silence of the facility.
I breathed in. The air here was filtered, smelling of rubber flooring and Zamboni exhaust. Home.
I walked down the long concrete corridor toward the locker room, intending to review tape. But as I passed the General Manager’s office suite—the glass-walled administrative wing near the front—I saw a light.
Saturday. 7:30 AM.
She was here.
Of course she was here. Because she had no life. Because she was hiding from the shame of the "Porn Incident." Because she was just as obsessive as I was.
I stopped. I shouldn't go in. I should keep walking.
But my feet turned. I walked toward the glass door. It was unlocked.
The outer office was empty, but the door to the inner office—her temporary workspace—was ajar.
I was about to knock when I heard the voice.
It wasn’t hers. It was coming from my pocket.
My phone started vibrating against my thigh. I pulled it out, annoyed at the interruption.
Caller ID: Nikolai Volkov.
My stomach dropped. The sensation was physical—a sudden hollowness, like missing a step on a staircase.
I stared at the screen. He never called this early. He usually slept until noon, nursing the hangover from whatever bender he’d been on the night before.
I hesitated. I could ignore it.
But if I ignored it, the variable remained unknown. Was he in the hospital? Was he in jail? Was he dead?
I answered.
"Peter," the voice on the other end was rough. Slurred. Wet.
He was drunk. At 7:30 AM.
"Dad," I said. My voice was devoid of emotion. A flat line. "It’s early."
"Time is a construct, boy," my father laughed. It was a jagged, ugly sound that ended in a coughing fit. "Listen. I need... I need a favor. The text. Did you get the text?"
"I got it."
"Good. Good. I need it, Pyotr. The guys... they’re not patient. It’s just a bridge loan. I have a sponsorship thing coming up next week. Big money. I just need to cover the spread until then."
He was lying. There was no sponsorship. There hadn't been a sponsorship since he punched a referee in 2018.
"Who are 'the guys', Dad?" I asked, leaning my forehead against the cool drywall of the hallway. "Is it the bookies again?"
"Don't take that tone with me," his voice snapped, swinging from pathetic to aggressive in a microsecond. "I made you. I put the pads on you. I taught you everything you know. You’re sitting in that college tower because of my name."
"I’m sitting here because I save the pucks you couldn't," I said. The words were cruel. I knew they were. But the anger was a living thing in my chest, clawing to get out.
"You ungrateful little shit," he hissed. "Five thousand. That's all. You have it in your trust. Your mother's blood money. Just transfer it."
"No," I said.
"What?"
"No. I’m not sending it. I paid the rent last month. I paid the car insurance. I’m done."
"You think you’re better than me?" He was shouting now. I could hear glass clinking in the background. "You think because you have a chart and a diet plan that you’re safe? You’re a Volkov, Peter. The ice is in your blood. And the ice cracks. You hear me? It always cracks."
"Goodbye, Dad."
"Don't you hang up on me! I will fly out there! I will come to that school and—"
I ended the call.
I stood there in the silent hallway, the phone gripped so tightly in my hand that the metal casing bit into my palm.
My breathing was ragged. I felt sick. Physically nauseous. The shame was a hot, oily slick coating my skin. The ice always cracks.
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to force the breathing exercises. Box breathing. In for four. Hold for four. Out for four.
It wasn't working. The rage was too loud.
I raised my hand, the urge to throw the phone through the drywall overwhelming. I wanted to break something. I wanted to shatter the silence.
"Peter?"
The voice was soft. Tentative.
I froze. My arm was still raised, muscles trembling with the effort of holding back the violence.
I opened my eyes.
Belinda was standing in the doorway of her office.
She was holding a stack of papers. She wore thick wool socks, leggings, and an oversized Blackwood sweatshirt that hung off one shoulder. Her hair was piled in a messy bun, secured with what looked like a pencil.
She was staring at me.
She had heard. She had to have heard. I hadn’t been shouting, but the hallway was an echo chamber.
She saw the raised arm. She saw the phone. She saw the wild look in my eyes that I worked so hard to hide from the world.
Slowly, agonizingly slowly, I lowered my arm.
"What do you want, O’Shea?"
My voice was a ruin. It rasped, sounding like I’d swallowed gravel.