Chapter Two #2
“You cried at a squirrel yesterday.”
“It looked burdened.”
Claire gently reclaimed the room. “For now, Frankie and Coop, I’d like you two to draft the event flow. Reese and Hayes can review captain messaging. Wren, campaign language. Birdie—”
“Psychological warfare.”
“Community engagement,” Claire corrected.
Birdie nodded. “Same file, different font.”
Coop looked at Frankie. “We can work after weights?”
“No.”
He waited.
She looked annoyed that he waited.
Then she said, “Before practice tomorrow. Rink lobby. Seven.”
“Done.”
“No coffee with foam art.”
“I wasn’t planning foam art.”
“You seem like a person who could be tempted.”
“I’ll resist.”
“Good.”
Brenda beamed. “Wonderful. I love the teamwork.”
Frankie stared at him.
Brenda’s smile dimmed by ten percent.
Coop stood as the meeting wrapped, gathering folders and sticky notes.
Reese and Hayes drifted toward the hall, talking quietly.
Birdie cornered Wren to explain, in detail, why Asher Reed was “a menace with cheekbones and poor sportsmanship.” Nolan left with an entire sleeve of crackers he had not arrived with.
Frankie stayed seated, writing one last note in her tiny book.
Coop should have left.
He knew that.
He had weights. He had class. He had three unread texts from his mother asking if he had eaten a vegetable this week. He had a life not entirely centered around making one goalie look at him again.
But he stayed.
“Can I ask you something?” he said.
Frankie did not look up. “Legally?”
“Emotionally.”
“No.”
He smiled. “That was fast.”
“I’m efficient.”
He leaned one hip against the table, leaving space between them. Always space. “Rule four yesterday.”
Her pen stopped.
There.
Not much.
Enough.
“What about it?”
“Thank you.”
Her gaze lifted.
Guard up.
Immediately.
“For what?”
“For noticing.”
The lounge had emptied enough that the quiet felt private.
Frankie’s fingers tightened around the pen.
He did not soften the moment with a joke. He wanted to. Instinct tugged hard.
Make it easy.
Make it light.
Make sure she didn’t regret being kind.
But that was the thing, wasn’t it?
He was tired of sanding himself down into easy.
So he let the words sit.
Frankie looked away first.
“It was obvious,” she said.
“Not to everyone.”
“Everyone is bad at looking.”
He breathed out a laugh. “You’re not.”
“No.”
Simple.
True.
It landed somewhere under his ribs.
Frankie closed her notebook and stood. “Don’t make it weird.”
“I won’t.”
“You’re already considering it.”
“I’m considering three versions of it.”
“Pick none.”
“Copy that.”
She started toward the door, then stopped beside him.
Close enough that he could smell cold coffee and rink air and the faint clean soap from her hoodie.
Not perfume.
Frankie did not seem like a perfume person.
She seemed like a person who would call perfume “decorative fumes” and then somehow be right.
She held out a protein bar.
Peanut butter.
His brain stalled.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“Tribute.”
He looked at it.
Then at her.
“You said tribute was dead.”
“It’s not flirting.”
“Right.”
“Recovery snack.”
“Of course.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Do not smile like that.”
He was absolutely smiling like that.
He tried to stop.
Failed.
Frankie shoved the protein bar into his chest.
“Hydrate,” she said.
Then she walked out.
Coop stayed there, holding the bar like an idiot.
Hayes appeared in the doorway two seconds later, because apparently best friends had terrible timing as a legal requirement.
He looked at the protein bar.
Then at Coop’s face.
“Oh,” Hayes said.
Coop pointed at him. “No.”
Hayes’s smile was slow and deeply unhelpful. “I didn’t say anything.”
“You said oh.”
“It was a small oh.”
“It was a loaded oh.”
“It had context.”
Coop put the protein bar into his hoodie pocket with as much dignity as he had left.
Not a lot.
Hayes leaned against the doorframe. “So how’s co-planning with Frankie?”
“Professional.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Productive.”
“Sure.”
“Hydration-focused.”
Hayes laughed.
Coop shook his head and started for the hall. “I hate when you’re happy.”
“I know.”
“You used to be more broody.”
“Reese says I’ve diversified.”
“Disgusting.”
Hayes clapped him once on the shoulder as they walked out. “Careful with Frankie.”
Coop stopped.
The hallway stretched ahead, cold and bright.
He looked at Hayes. “I’m not playing with her.”
Hayes’s expression shifted.
Captain gone.
Friend there.
“I know,” he said.
Coop nodded once.
Because he wasn’t.
Whatever this was — this careful, strange, not-flirting tribute economy with rules and sticky notes and glances that felt like small doors opening — he was not playing.
Frankie Callahan was not a challenge.
She was not a puzzle.
She was not a wall he got to brag about climbing.
She was a person who had learned to survive by letting nothing in.
And Coop—
Coop was starting to understand that he did not want to get past the wall.
Not like that.
He wanted her to open it.
Only if she chose.
Only if she wanted.
Only if, someday, she looked at him and decided he was not another puck coming too fast.
From down the hall, Frankie’s voice cut back toward them.
“Vale.”
He turned.
She stood near the exit, one hand on the door, expression flat.
His heart did something embarrassing.
“Yeah?”
“Seven means seven.”
He smiled.
Softly this time.
“I’ll be early.”
Her eyes narrowed.
But she did not say no.
Then she disappeared through the door, leaving him with a peanut butter protein bar in his pocket and the very serious, very inconvenient feeling that the most dangerous shot of his season had already been taken.
He just hadn’t heard it hit the post yet.