Page 15 of The Pucks We Freeze
That was when I felt it again. The same twist in my gut I’d had the night of the storm when I caught a glimpse of the notebook in Kade’s room.
It wasn’t just a bad game. Gavin was off. Way off.
And now I couldn’t ignore it.
I slammed the laptop shut and grabbed my camera, heart hammering. I didn’t care if Kade was already home or if I’d catch him mid-brooding session. I had to tell him what I saw. If something was going on, if Gavin was throwing plays, I wasn’t going to sit back and not say anything. Not when it could cost Kade everything.
The walk from the cabin my dad had me staying in to the main house was quiet, the paths still damp with leftover slush. I let myself in through the back door but froze when I heard his voice.
It carried down the hall from his room. Deep. Low. Tense. “I’m telling you, Talon, it lines up. That play was a setup. I don’t know how bad it is yet, but if he’s working with someone…”
My chest tightened at the mention of Talon. Tatum had talked about him before. Her older brother from back home. Captain of Rixton’s team.
I edged closer, standing just beyond the frame of his cracked bedroom door.
“I’ll send you the footage. Just keep an eye out. If Gavin’s mixed up in something, we might be looking at more than a bad play. We might be looking at a bigger problem.”
My stomach flipped. Kade and Talon weren’t just watching Gavin. They were planning something.
The faucet turned on, then off. I barely had time to knock before the door swung open. Kade stood there with a towel slung low on his hips, hair wet and messy, skin still damp from the shower.
I looked away, heat rising to my cheeks. “Sorry, I…”
He blinked once, then smirked. “You always show up when I’m half-dressed or half-wrecked. Which is it tonight?”
I held up the camera, my fingers still curled tightly around the strap. “I saw something in the pictures. Gavin Cruz, the one who went down during the play? Something’s off. It didn’t look real. Like he meant to do it.”
His expression darkened. Wordlessly, he stepped aside and motioned for me to come in. A shirt hung from the back of a chair, and he pulled it on with one hand as I stepped up to his desk, opening the photo files.
I leaned forward, palms braced on either side of the keyboard, scrolling through the sequence while the tension in the room thickened with every frame. He moved in behind me, close enough that his shoulder brushed mine, his breath warm at my temple.
“This one,” I said, pointing. “He was wide open. No defense on him. But instead of taking the shot, he looked over toward the bench. Then he lost the puck.”
Kade studied it in silence, then nodded once. “Send me the file?”
“I’ll save them for you now,” I said, biting the inside of my cheek. “You’re not going to get hurt over this, are you?”
His hand brushed my lower back, lingering. “Worried about me?”
My voice caught. “You know I am.”
I turned to face him, intending to push the conversation back to safer ground. But the way he looked at me, like he hadn’t stopped since the game, made my breath catch.
“You still wearing my hoodie?” His fingers hooked the hem, tugging gently as he stepped closer. “You know what that does to me?”
My breath stuttered.
“I couldn’t stop watching you at the game. You were right there, wearing my name, and all I could think about was dragging you into the locker room and showing you exactly what it does to me. What it means to me.”
My heart skipped, the weight of his words pressing against my chest.
“And what’s that?”
“Like you belonged to me.”
His hand found my hip and pulled me closer. Every inch of him radiated heat, control just barely tethered. His mouth hovered near mine, and the thrum in my veins drowned out everything else.
“Is this okay?” he asked, voice thick and rough. “Because I’m going out of my goddamn mind, Willow.”
