27. TATE #2
We hit the third period. This hockey game feels like it’s been going on for a thousand years.
But North Point comes out with their heads down.
Coach Bruce must have done a version of what I did in the locker room.
They’re locked in. Focused. I stand with my arms crossed, occasionally calling to switch up the lines, but I’m otherwise absent from this game.
Ryan has turned into the Terminator on skates. Cold. Deadly. He intercepts the puck, it hits his blade with a crack, and he shoots … scores! But there’s no celebration from him or their team. Just a quick dip to the bench for some water. I keep my gaze on him, willing him to just look at me.
He doesn’t.
So far away from me. Right fucking there, but miles away.
Is this what I’ve been missing by being in love? The ability to feel someone ripping themselves away emotionally?
I don’t know what’s going on in your pretty little head, dollface, but I’m going to remind you who the fuck your husband is.
Two minutes left, and Bruce pulls the big guy, their goalie.
What was his name again? Don’t remember.
Empty net. I won’t be commissioner anymore, so it’s not as dire that we win, and I’m half hoping North Point ties this up because Ryan’s been desperately trying to do that all period.
But after his period-opening goal, no one’s been able to get one past our goalie, Lars.
But we haven’t gotten past their human-shaped wall either.
There’s no way North Point won’t get the bid and end up going to Regionals anyway.
It’s better for everyone if this game ends.
McKinnon’s whacking his stick on the ice, defense tightens like we’ve practiced, they’re an unstoppable unit, even with six of North Point’s best on them—it’s just not North Point’s night, and the sun’s shining out of McKinnon’s ass brighter than it usually does.
And then.
Shit.
Chaos happens all at once.
Ryan barrels into McKinnon, and his head hits the boards. The puck’s loose, but only for seconds.
Shep had it plus open ice. It’s a clear shot straight into the empty net. Goal. The horn sounds, our team jumps, launching off the boards, sticks flying.
But Ryan hasn’t given up on his mission to kill McKinnon.
Ace falls, his helmeted head hitting the ice.
Ryan pounds on his cage with his fists as if he has the strength to punch through it, but all he’s doing is damaging his pretty hands.
He’s going to get suspended for that shit.
McKinnon looks unconscious, but it’s hard to say for sure.
Fuck it.
I’m about to hop over the boards and slide my ass across the ice in dress shoes, but the refs swarm in and pull him off Ace. Ryan fights them, body shaking, and a sound comes out of him that I’ve never heard before. Utter agony.
I can’t move, paralyzed by that sound. Something happens inside me. A breaking open. A ripping. My bones shattered to oblivion. Is this what being connected to another person means? Feeling the sharpness of their pain?
When I told Ryan I loved him, I meant it, but it was more from having made a logical—and delightful—conclusion. I gave up everything to have him, I always want to be with him, I never want to live without him.
So, gotta be love, right?
But now I feel something big. And how fucking cliché, but it’s in my chest. It’s not rainbows and running through meadows, though; it’s pain unlike I’ve ever felt before.
It hollows me out, scrapes my insides raw, and leaves me a husk.
My heart shredded, never to be put back together. Instant slaughter.
They pull Ryan off to the dressing room, skates dragging through the river of blood on the ice. I’ve got to get there. To him.
“Coach.” It’s McKinnon’s friend, Shep. “Medics need you in there.”
Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Yeah, Ryan beat the shit out of Ace. My thoughts should be, “Is my star player okay?”
Okay, no. They should actually be, “Is Ace okay? What can I do to help?”
But they’re not. I want to jump the boards, slide through the puddles of blood, and get to Ryan.
But I have to approach this logically. My relationship with Luke is already on a one-way ticket to Demolitionville.
If I’m not there to make sure his boyfriend is alive, watching over him till he can get to Ace, that’ll definitely torpedo any chance of repair.
Ryan is emotionally distraught, but he’ll live.
Five minutes. I know Luke, and he’ll get to Ace in less than five minutes. Then I head straight to Ryan.
Ibarrel my way down the hallway, turn, and slam my hand against the North Point locker room door, pushing my way inside.
I expect the usual chaos and commotion, similar to my team postgame, but you could hear a pin drop over the fans drying the equipment.
I set eyes on their giant goalie, mentally snapping my fingers.
Rhys. That’s his name. It’s on our wedding certificate. But who I don’t see is Ryan.
What the fuck? He should be in here. There’s no way anyone had time to take him out of here unless it was planned.
I don’t believe what my eyes are telling me.
I charge further into the locker room. Some of the players have headed to the showers, but a lot of them are waiting to get into the trainer’s room to be looked at. It was a rough game.
That’s where I expect Ryan to be, but a quick peek inside tells me he’s not. There’s a relentless crawling beneath my ribs, the agitated energy gathering. The fragile leash I keep on my temper slips another notch.
I storm back to the dressing room. My eye catches on a jersey number, hanging in a cubby. Usually, these are tossed into the laundry bins after games. This one was left on purpose.
Savage. Number seventy-eight.
I round on the goalie. “Where is my husband?” The words scrape out rough and dangerous.
The big guy actually flinches. “Coach told him to get changed without showering. They just left.”
“Do you know where they went?” I say slowly so it penetrates. Was he hit with too many pucks?
“I don’t.”
Hmmm. On second thought, that’s coolness I detect. Not something I’m a stranger to, but I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve it from him. I don’t doubt I’ve done something, I just don’t know what it was.
The crazy one wanders over, his face tensed with thought, as if he’s still deciding if he should help me. “Sorry about him, he’s going through something. Coach didn’t say where he was taking Ryan. Lemme grab my shirt, and I’ll show you to Coach’s office.”
I shake my head, because I doubt Coach Bruce simply dragged him away to his office. “I’m not going to waste time on a wild goose chase. If you don’t know where he is, I have other ways of locating him.”
My palm hits the door, almost knocking it off its hinges on my way out.