Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
HALEY
The bus smelled like coffee and the staleness of a vehicle that had been sitting for weeks, waiting for the first expedition game to arrive.
I boarded early, which meant I could claim the seat I wanted, set up my workspace, and be fully operational before anyone else had arrived. Mid-bus, aisle seat, laptop open to the scouting package I’d been refining since yesterday. The screen cast light across my hands.
This was my armor. Not the hoodie I wore in my office, though that helped. This was the real thing. A clear reason to be here that had nothing to do with who my father was or what anyone thought about me being on this bus in the first place.
Players filed on a bit later. Loud voices, personal bags slung over shoulders, the shuffle of bodies trying to fit themselves into spaces designed for people smaller than orc hockey players.
Someone laughed too loud. Someone else told them to shut up.
Standard team travel chaos that I’d learned to tune out years ago.
Brashe strode down the aisle and chose the empty space across from me.
“Morning.” He dropped into the seat and placed his bag on the seat beside him.
“Morning.”
He held a travel mug the size of a thermos. After taking a long drink and settling in, he pulled out his phone.
The bus continued filling. Crim took his usual spot near the front. Mikael claimed the back row with one of the other forwards. The noise level climbed steadily, voices bouncing off the narrow interior.
Tolrek boarded last. Conversations didn’t stop but the volume dropped half a notch. He moved past Brashe and took the seat directly behind mine.
I didn’t turn. My laptop was open, and I’d loaded the scouting package. The Silver Slayers had a power play tell I’d isolated in four different games, and I needed to review the sequences one more time before we arrived.
I directed my gaze to the screen. The bus pulled out of the parking lot and onto the street. We’d ride six hours. Maybe less if traffic cooperated. I had work to do.
Warmth pressed against my back.
The seat separated us by several inches of padding and structural support, but I felt his heat anyway.
Orcs ran hotter than humans. This was observable fact. Something about their metabolism and muscle density that I’d heard explained at least twice and couldn’t remember the details of because I’d been concentrating on other things.
I made myself focus on my work. I needed to make power play entries, outline defensive zone coverage, and report specific positioning patterns their center used when setting up in the offensive zone.
I tagged sequences. Made notes. Cross-referenced everything with earlier footage to confirm the pattern held.
Brashe shifted in his seat across the aisle, hooking his leg up over the back of the seat in front of him that was fortunately empty. I heard the movement and felt his gaze land on me. Then I felt him looking past me, at Tolrek.
He returned to his phone with the kind of attentiveness that meant he’d seen something and was choosing not to comment on it. Which was its own kind of commentary.
Thirty minutes into the ride, someone dropped something in the back. A water bottle, probably, based on the sound. It rolled down the aisle toward the front, bouncing off my left leg as it passed.
Mikael laughed. “Nice hands, rookie.”
Tolrek growled.
Mikael’s laughter cut off.
Crim picked up the bottle and tossed it onto the seat beside him, not looking back.
Brashe’s mouth twitched, but he didn’t look up from his phone.
I kept working.
Forty-five minutes in, Brashe turned to face the back. “You were in the maintenance room yesterday.”
The words were directed past me. Who cared about that?
Tolrek grumbled. “Yes.”
Wait a minute. My fingers paused on my keyboard, and I stared at the screen I was no longer seeing.
“Giving up hockey for HVAC work?” Brashe asked.
“No.”
“Wiring, then.”
“No.”
Brashe took a drink of his coffee. “Just checking on the heating system, then.”
Tolrek said nothing.
Yesterday, my office had finally, suddenly, been warm when I’d arrived, and I hadn’t needed to wear my sweatshirt.
Tolrek had made sure it was fixed for me.
The knowledge settled in my chest next to all the other things I’d been collecting about him. The folder that had his name now.
I closed the scouting package and opened the neutral zone transition patterns file, something that required enough attention I wouldn’t think about the warmth at my back or the fact that Tolrek had made sure I wouldn’t be cold anymore.
The miles passed. I worked.
When we stopped for lunch, I stayed on the bus. Brashe raised an eyebrow at me on his way out, but his gaze cut to Tolrek, and he kept going.
Forty minutes of quiet. Just road noise and the hum of the engine and the knowledge that he’d stayed too. I could hear him behind me, both of us alone in a vehicle with empty seats and only inches of padding between us.
At some point, my pen rolled off the edge of my seat. His hand appeared over my shoulder, setting it back without a word.
I didn’t turn.
“Thank you,” I said.
He didn’t reply, but the heat at my back remained all the way to the hotel we’d stay at tonight, after the game. When we pulled into the hotel parking lot, I had twenty seconds to pack up my laptop before the aisle filled with bodies.
Tolrek stood, and the warmth disappeared. I told myself the loss of it didn’t register as a specific absence.
I was lying to myself, but I did that a lot lately.
Away arenas always felt like walking into someone else’s house. Familiar enough that you knew what you were looking at, but wrong in how that added up.
The Silver Slayers’ building was older than ours. I did my walkthrough, identifying the layout so I wouldn’t waste time later trying to find the bathroom or the route back to the team area.
I located the press level access on the northeast corner and claimed a seat. The sight lines were good. Better than good, actually. I could see the full ice without obstruction, and the angle gave me clean reads on both zones.
I set up my workspace, connecting my tablet to the team network. Tugging my headset from my bag, I synced it for communication with the assistant coaches. Then I made sure my software ran as it should.
My father found me ten minutes before warm-ups.
“All set?” he asked, dropping into the seat beside me.
“Yup.”
He scanned my setup and nodded. “Good. Their power play is going to test us. If you see anything new, flag it immediately.”
“I will.”
“You always do.” He smiled, the warmth in it landing in the place that remembered being seven and following him to practices because he was the only parent I had left.
“Talk to you later, then.” He left, moving back down to ice level and the away team’s bench. I could tell he was already lost in coach mode, because he wore his game face, the version of him that belonged to the team.
I turned back to my screen.
Warm-ups started a short time later, both teams skating through their routines. I was supposed to be watching the Silver Slayers. Logging their entries, tracking which forwards paired with which defensemen, and noting anything that deviated from what I’d seen on tape.
My gaze fell on Tolrek instead. He skated through the warm-up with the same control he brought to practice. It would look boring to anyone who didn’t understand what they were watching.
I turned my attention to the Silver Slayers. Their power play unit was on the ice, running through entries. I logged three different looks, tagged the sequences, and pushed a note through the tablet to the assistant coach managing things like this. Doing my job.
The woman who’d stood in a stairwell yesterday and kissed Tolrek until she forgot where she was didn’t exist right now.
Play started not long later, and our first period was clean.
I stayed locked in, tagging things in real time, flagging patterns that mattered. Their power play deployed exactly the way I’d predicted. The tell was there. Our penalty kill read it and made some great moves, shutting them out.
I pushed the confirmation through the tablet and got an acknowledgment from the bench.
Between periods, I ran my log cleanup, reviewing tags to make sure nothing had been mislabeled. Then I prepared notes for second period adjustments.
My father would be in the locker room now, addressing the team. He’d use the information I’d given him to make changes that would keep us competitive. This was us at our best.
I didn’t let myself think about the other version, the one where he didn’t know his daughter had been kissing a player on his roster.
The second period started with the standard deployment. Our first line took the opening faceoff. I tracked the neutral zone positioning and logged the entry, then moved my attention to the defensive structure.
Tolrek was on the ice.
The play developed.
Their forward drove the zone, cutting toward the high slot with speed. A good read on his part. He’d identified a gap in our coverage and was exploiting it.
Tolrek tracked him.
I saw his positioning in real time. It was textbook. He was exactly where he needed to be to cut off the passing lane and force the forward wide.
Brutal contact was coming.
I’d watched this sequence play out a hundred times in the past two weeks, on video and in practice, noting his half-second hesitation and protection of his left side. Followed by a retreat from contact he used to meet head-on.
Instead, he absorbed the hit and made the play, stripping the puck and sending it up ice in one motion.
Our forward received the pass cleanly. Three strides later, he hit their zone and shot, scoring a goal.
The arena erupted.
I sat in the press level with my hands frozen on the keyboard. No one in the building understood what they’d just watched except me.