Chapter 28
Chase POV
The strobe of flashbulbs left blinding purple discs burned across my retinas every time I blinked.
I sat at the center of the press conference table in Briefing Room B, my forearms resting flat on the laminate surface, ten microphones bearing network logos clustered inches from my knuckles.
The air in the room was stale, thick with the heat of thirty television cameras, damp wool overcoats, and the low, irritating hum of an ungrounded public address speaker.
Beneath my black team polo, two layers of heavy elastic bandage were cinched tight around my ribs, biting into the bruised cartilage with every breath I drew from my diaphragm.
"Chase, rumors out of the Western Conference suggest you’ve pulled your name from consideration with Anaheim and Calgary," a reporter from the Minneapolis Star Tribune shouted, leaning forward from the second row of tiered seating.
"Are you actively attempting to force your draft position toward Colorado or Chicago? "
My jaw locked so hard the muscle beneath my ear spasmed.
"My focus is on Saturday's national championship game against Minnesota," I said.
My voice was a flat, gravelly scrape that gave the microphone nothing to work with.
"What about the shoulder?" another voice barked from the back aisle, a reporter holding a digital recorder above the crowd.
"There are reports from independent scouting services that your range of motion was degraded during the North Dakota series.
Are you skating through an unaddressed labral tear? "
A thick vein stood out along the left side of my neck, throbbing in time with the dull, concussive pound of blood behind my eyes.
I stared directly into the camera lens in the center aisle, my face a carved block of cold stone.
"The medical clearance was certified by the athletic department and submitted to the NCAA compliance registry," I rasped, holding the reporter's stare until the man looked down at his notebook. "I haven't missed a shift. Next question."
"Chase, regarding your father—"
Coach Hastings’s heavy hand clamped down on my right shoulder, cutting the reporter off mid-sentence.
"That's all for Captain Guzman," Hastings announced into the center microphone, his tone sharp and final. "We have an afternoon skate to run."
* * *
I followed Hastings down the private concrete corridor behind the media room, my boots striking the floorboards with heavy, concussive force.
We didn't turn toward the locker room.
Hastings steered me through a keycard-locked door into Athletic Director Miller’s executive suite.
The blinds were drawn against the gray winter dusk, casting the mahogany office into deep, shadowy gloom. Miller was standing behind his desk, not looking at the view of Lake Superior, but staring down at a single sheet of paper printed with a red NCAA compliance header.
He didn't offer a seat.
He slid the paper across the leather blotter as the heavy oak door clicked shut behind me.
"An anonymous filing was submitted to the regional compliance liaison at one-fifteen this afternoon," Miller said, his voice flat, exhausted, and pulled tight around the edges.
I looked down at the printout.
The words on the page were a surgical strike:
FORMAL INQUIRY OF UNDISCLOSED ATHLETIC CONFLICT: An anonymous report alleges improper fraternization and unauthorized collusion between Men’s Ice Hockey student-athlete Chase Guzman and lead biometric research fellow Nola Wagner.
The filing alleges that clinical fatigue indices and neurological baseline readouts were falsified to circumvent postseason medical suspension.
My blood turned to freezing slush in my veins.
The paper crinkled under my thumb as my hands clamped onto the edge of the mahogany desk. My fingernails bit into the polished wood until my knuckles turned bloodless white.
Marcus.
Marcus and Carter Ross. Their filthy, desperate hands leaving grease marks all over her name.
"The data is clean," I rasped, the words tearing out of my throat like shards of glass. "Every single telemetry packet has an electronic timestamp verified by the lab servers. I signed the compliance forms in front of the head athletic trainer."
"The integrity of the telemetry doesn't matter if the committee smells an irregular relationship, Chase," Miller snapped, leaning forward until his knuckles rested on the desk.
"If an official inquiry is opened by the NCAA board before Saturday morning, they enforce an automatic provisional administrative hold on your clearance. You sit out the national championship."
My molars clicked together with enough violence to send a blinding spike of pain straight through my temples.
"And Wagner?" I demanded, my voice dropping into a lethal, ruined growl that made Hastings shift his weight beside me. "Where does this leave her?"
"If the board investigates a conflict of interest," Miller said, his eyes cutting up to mine with cold institutional pragmatism, "her departmental research grant is frozen pending an ethics review.
Her post-graduate fellowship recommendation stays locked in my drawer until the committee clears the program. Which could take six months."
The room seemed to lose all atmospheric pressure.
Six months. Her mother’s medical bills. The fellowship in Colorado Springs that she had worked eighty hours a week to earn.
They were going to crush her future just to get leverage on my draft stock.
I leaned over the desk until my face was twelve inches from Miller’s, my shadow swallowing the papers on his blotter.
"You listen to me very carefully," I whispered, the syllables scraped raw with pure, unadulterated venom.
"You know exactly where this tip came from. Carter Ross has been trying to extort representation out of me since November. You let this inquiry leave this office, you let anyone question Wagner’s academic integrity, and I walk out of this barn right now. "
Miller’s jaw tightened. "Chase, you wouldn't—"
"I will pull my name from the roster," I rasped, my breath searing the air between us.
"I will call the Boston media desk and give them every line-item budget discrepancy your department ran to pay for our travel upgrades.
You bury this filing, Miller. You tell the compliance liaison the data was independently audited by the biomechanics department chair, or you find yourself a new captain for Saturday night. "
The office went dead silent save for the hum of the heating vent.
Miller stared at me for five long seconds, his face draining of color as he took in the unblinking, feral resolve in my eyes. He reached out, his hand trembling slightly, and dragged the paper back across the blotter, dropping it into the shredder bin beside his desk.
"Get out of my office, Chase," Miller whispered. "And stay away from her until that final whistle blows on Saturday."
* * *
I didn't take the main concourse.
I shoved through the heavy iron fire exit, stepping straight into the freezing twilight of the arena's private loading lot. The wind coming off the lake was brutal, twenty below zero, whipping dry ice pellets across the cracked asphalt.
My black team parka hung open, my chest burning with a suffocating, violent fury that made my hands shake against my keys.
Then I stopped.
Standing in the sheltered alcove beside the players' private exit door, shivering beneath her dark wool coat, was Nola.
She was holding her heavy leather bag against her hip, her woolen scarf pulled high around her throat to block the biting wind. Her face was chalk-white, her hazel eyes clouded with a deep, dragging exhaustion that made my sternum ache with an immediate, physical pain.
Her right hand was tucked beneath the front flap of her coat, resting flat, motionless, and protective over the lower curve of her stomach.
The rage in my blood evaporated instantly.
The press conference, the compliance filing, Marcus’s poison—it all turned to dust, drowned out by the fierce, primal urge to shelter the girl standing in the freezing dark.
I crossed the slush in four long strides, my boots crunching through the crust.
I didn't say a word. I hit the remote unlock on the Silverado, hauled the passenger door open, and gathered her up by her waist before her boots could slip on the ice.
I lifted her straight into the elevated cab, climbed in after her, and slammed the heavy door shut against the howling gale.
The cab was dead quiet, sealed off from the storm.
I didn't start the engine. I unclipped my seatbelt, reached across the center console, and hauled her small frame straight across the leather into my lap.
Nola gasped, her arms instantly wrapping around my neck, her face burying into the warm hollow beneath my jaw as I locked my heavy arms around her waist, squeezing her until her ribs were pressed flush against mine.
I buried my face in the curve of her neck, dragging in the scent of her vanilla lotion, clean skin, and cold hair like a drowning man pulling air into burned lungs.
My body shook with one long, ragged exhalation against her skin.
"Chase?" she whispered, her fingers knotting into the fabric of my parka, her small body trembling faintly against mine. "What happened in there? You're shaking."
"Stay right here," I rasped, my voice thick with gravel, my lips pressing a desperate, burning kiss to the pulse point jumping beneath her ear. "Good girl. Just let me hold you. I've got you, Nola."
She leaned into my chest, her breath warm against my neck, her hand drifting down to rest flat over her own stomach as she held me in the dark.
I tightened my grip, my chin resting against the crown of her head, staring out through the frosted windshield into the black Minnesota dusk.
I would burn the entire arena to the ground before I let anyone touch her.