Page 104 of Puck Prince

I nod. I already know what he’s going to say.

“Is your helmet on too tight? Get it together!”

Iknow,man.

We are up against the New Orleans Anglers for a home game, and I am out of it. I’ve been out of it all week, really. Ever since the charity ball.

The photos leaked, and I was up half the night worrying about Summer and Nicky.

And Callie.

Between my shitshow of a not-so-private private life and all the recent almosts with my fake girlfriend, I’m skating with two left feet. I shove my mouthguard back in and hunker down. I’m not about to lose to a team named after a fish with a Christmas light on its face all because of my girlfriend. Who isn’t my girlfriend.

Fuck.

I knew taking Callie to the charity ball was a bad idea. I felt it beforehand, but as soon as I saw her dress (stunning) and her hair (gorgeous) and the way her ass looked while she was wearing her stilettos (fuck me twice), thoughts of her have circled my mind on repeat, turning my brain into jelly and my game to, well, shit.

“Owen! Pass!” Dax shouts at me. But just before I whip him the puck, the center for the other team snatches it.

The announcer bellows through the speakers. “Interception by Nathanson and…”

He scores. Fuck my life.

“I don’t know where Sharpe’s head is today, but it’s not on the ice,” the announcer adds just to toss a cherry on top of this shit sundae. I don’t even have to look at Coach Coleman to feel him incinerating me from the sidelines.

“Owen…” Lance slides up beside me.

“Dude, I was open!” Dax shouts as he skates past.

We skate back into formation, and I do my best to shove all the noise out.

But I haven’t slept. I’ve hardly eaten. I’ve avoided Callie, which in turn means I’ve avoided the training room where I usually work out and stretch. I didn’t even get taped up before the game today. That’s a first. It’s my good luck ritual—not to mention how it helps keep my joints in line.

I don’t know why I’m so bent out of shape. The photos and rumors about Summer and Nicky have more or less fizzled out, but I guess that’s not even what’s really eating me.

All the close encounters with Callie lately have me frustrated, in more ways than one. Because that night when I picked her up for the charity ball, she took my breath away. It’s not just that she’s hot. Which, obviously, she is. It was the way it felt putting my arm around her when the paparazzi slammed us with an explosion of camera flashes. It was the way she leaned into me on the drive over. It was the way she was both charming and professional when talking to my teammates.

The world seemed to fade away when we were on the dance floor, like we were alone in the universe and it was nothing but us, the music, and a sky full of stars.

And speaking of stars……

Someone hits me so hard I see a galaxy’s worth of them. I go sailing, but not before my ankle catches on my own stick. My knee jerks to the side, popping loud enough to echo off the ice.

The game comes to a halt.

I can’t move. I can’t breathe. I lie on the ice in the fetal position trying to get my bearings. It feels like there’s an anvil on my chest, and I’m trying to suck in air through a coffee straw.

“You good, Sharpe?” Miles asks as the team circles me.

I can’t form words. But it’s not the ringing in my ears or the wind knocked from my lungs that has me in crippling pain.

It’s my knee.

Oh, God…

“Hang on, bud. I got you.” I hear Lance’s voice through the blood thrumming in my ears. Then I see him. He kneels down in front of me, pries my helmet from my head, and tosses it aside before pulling my mouthguard out. Maybe he should have left it—the pain is so bad that I need something to bite down on. “Medics are coming.”

“Owen Sharpe is down, ladies and gentlemen, and from the looks of it, it’s bad.”

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