50. Ethan
ETHAN
The third period is almost over, and the tension is brutal.
We’re down one goal, and I can feel the weight of it in my chest like a puck caught under my ribs.
The Eastwick Knights are playing dirty—as always.
They don’t give a damn about finesse. Just brute strength and whatever they can get away with when the refs aren’t looking.
I clock Dylan weaving up the ice, slicing through defenders like she was born for this. She’s fast, humble, light on her skates, and for a second—just one—I think she’s got an opening. I think maybe, maybe she can tie the game.
It plays out in slow motion. One minute, she’s lining up for the shot on a goal, and the next, a defenseman barrels toward her. He’s not going for the puck. He’s going for her .
“Dylan—”
I don’t even hear the rest of what I scream. My blades dig into the ice as I pivot hard, but I’m too far away. He slams into her full force, shoulder to midsection, and she goes airborne before crashing down.
I don’t know if I imagine the noise or actually hear it over the crowd and blood rushing in my ears, but the sound of her hitting the ice—fuck, I’ll never forget it.
It’s the worst moment of my life, followed immediately by the next…when she doesn’t get up. Doesn’t move.
Panic floods me. The whistle shrieks. Coach is yelling from the bench, but it’s all white noise as I drop my stick and skate harder, faster than I ever have before.
“Dylan?” I drop to my knees beside her, yanking my gloves off. My hands tremble as I reach them out. “Dylan, talk to me.”
She’s curled onto her side, arms wrapped around her ribs. Despite the layers of protection she’s wearing, I’ve never seen her look so small. So fragile. Is this how Finn felt that night he found her beaten up outside the arena?
Her eyes are scrunched tight, but they flutter open when I touch her shoulder, slicing right through me as our gazes connect, and I glimpse the extent of pain she’s in. “I’m here.” My voice is hoarse, raw, but I’ll do anything to ease the pain she’s in. “You’re okay. You’re gonna be okay.”
“Menace.” Jax sounds just as broken as I am, and Finn skates over a second later, falling to his knees beside me. “Shit, Dyl. Where does it hurt?”
“Ribs.” She winces. “Back. Pretty much everywhere. Feels like I got taken out by a Mack truck.”
“Considering the size of that fucker, it would probably have hurt less if you had,” Jax grumbles, eyes blazing fury despite the gentle way he touches Dylan.
“Can you move?” I ask her.
“I think so.” She moves to sit up, but she winces, her breath catching.
“What?” The demand is a near-feral snarl as it rips from my lips.
“My shoulder.” She reaches up to tentatively touch it, grimacing at the light touch. “It hurts to move.” Her face falls, any color remaining draining away.
“It’s probably just bruised. You took a hard hit,” I assure her.
She nods, but I can tell she doesn’t fully believe me.
“Hurricane.” Griffin practically shoves me out of the way as he skids to a halt at her side, his goalie pads plush with the ice and his mask already discarded. He doesn’t hesitate as he hauls her into his arms.
“Careful,” Finn chides.
“Back up. Back up.” The medic cuts through the group gathered around us—mostly team members. “Give her some space.”
I nudge Jax, signaling for us to move aside, but careful to keep Dylan in my line of sight, easily within reaching distance should she need me.
We all hover while the medic does a quick assessment. She’s awake, talking, and that should settle me, but flashes of the hit she took, the sound she made when she hit the ground…they play on repeat in my head, freezing me in place, making it impossible to move forward. To breathe .
Her dad died in a freak accident in the middle of a game.
She could have died tonight. If she’d hit the ice differently. If she’d twisted when she’d fallen…
How the fuck does she find the strength to get on the ice knowing that?
A stretcher is brought out to get her safely off the ice.
Her helmet was removed at some point, and her gloves have been pulled off.
Coach is over now, his jaw tight and face pale beneath the bright lights of the arena.
He’s talking to her. She’s arguing. I hear the odd words.
Fine and still play . She’s doing what any one of us would do—fighting to stay in the game—but the thought of her out there, at risk of another hit, one that could have more lasting repercussions, makes me want to keel over and vomit.
“You need to get checked out,” I tell her firmly. “Your shoulder needs looking at. If you continue to play with it as is, you could do more damage. Tear your rotator cuff or something, and instead of missing the last twenty minutes of a game, you could be out for the next several weeks.”
I need her off the ice. Not just for her sake, but for my sanity.
Her lips part in an argument, but I lean in, cupping the back of her neck and bringing my forehead to hers.
“Please.” It’s a plea. A prayer. A…I don’t even know what.
I have never been this concerned about a player.
This unfocused on a game. For the first time in my life, I don’t give a shit about the scoreboard.
About the fact that we’re losing this game.
She is all I can think about. All I see.
All I care for. “Let them check you out,” I beg of her.
Whether it’s the catch in my voice, the fear in my eyes, or the tight grip I have on her neck, she agrees, and the medics begin to move her off the ice.
“She’s in good hands,” Coach says, voice tighter than normal as he puts a hand on my shoulder.
“I should go with her?—”
“You’ve got a job to do.” His voice is firm, much like the tone I used on Dylan earlier.
“But—”
How can I possibly finish out the rest of the game?
How can he expect me to run through a play, and have my head in the game when the woman I’ve fallen in love with is injured?
I said she was fine, but I have no fucking clue.
What if she tore a muscle or ripped a ligament?
What if she needs surgery? Rehab? What if this affects her whole damn future? Hockey is it for her .
I can feel myself spiraling until a hard squeeze of my shoulder draws me back.
I meet Coach’s hard gaze. I can see the worry in his brown depths, but unlike me, it’s not getting the better of him.
“I know you’re worried. I am too, but she’s in good hands.
She’d want you focused on the game. Living up to your role as captain.
” He jabs me in the chest. “So get the team focused and prove to her that you’re the captain—the player— she believes you to be.
’Cause you know damn well as soon as you go back there, she’ll be wanting to know we did everything we could to win. ”
Fuck. He’s right.
I fucking hate that he’s right.
I nod, not daring to take my eyes off Dylan until she disappears from view down the tunnel.
I can feel the others at my side, all of us watching our girl be taken off the ice.
My chest tightens, pulse thrumming with fear and fury.
When I finally manage to tear my gaze away, it collides with another—across the ice, right at the glass.
Lucas.
He’s standing there in the stands like he owns the place. Smirking.
That same smug, calculating look I’ve seen too many times before.
A flare of something sharp twists in my gut. I nudge Jax beside me and lift my chin toward the stands.
He follows my gaze. So do Finn and Griffin.
All three of them go still. Jax’s jaw clenches. Griffin’s hands curl into fists. Finn mutters a quiet, “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
No one says it aloud, but we’re all thinking the same thing.
What the hell is he doing here?
And did he have something to do with what just happened to Dylan ?
The whistle blares, ripping through the moment like a blade.
Jax claps a hand on my shoulder. “We need to focus.”
I force myself to turn away from Lucas, my spine rigid. Facing the rest of the team, I shove the fury down deep and push all questions regarding what he might be doing here to the back of my mind as I bark, “Huddle. Now.”
The team closes in, expectant eyes on me. I meet them all, one by one, my gaze hard, determined. “You saw what they did to one of ours,” I start. Murmurs go up, tones of disgust and anger. “I don’t know if we can win this, but we can at least give them hell.”
My words are followed by a chorus of “Hell yeah!”
“Let’s show them that if you mess with one Steelhawk…”
“You mess with us all,” Griffin finishes, a lethal glint in his eyes and a cruel curl to his lips.
I hold out my hand in the center of the huddle. “For Dylan.”
Jax’s palm slaps against mine. Then Finn. Griffin. The rest of the team.
“For Dylan.”