Page 69 of The Players We Hate
She didn’t care why I’d taken the internship. She didn’t want to hear Wells’s name or the fallout from what he’d done. What she wanted was distance, clean lines she could point to if anyone asked. Plausible deniability.
I locked my phone and shoved it into my coat pocket without replying. The zipper scraped against my knuckle as I did, grounding me for a moment.
I pulled my scarf tighter and picked up my pace. The cold had settled deep, but standing still wasn’t an option. My head was too full, and moving was the only way to keep from falling apart right there on the sidewalk.
I thought I was ready for this. I’d studied, done the work, sat through meetings trying to blend in. But being inside wasn’t what I expected—it was messier.
The players didn’t trust me. The coaches kept their distance. And Talon… he was harder to read than all of them. He watched me like I was trouble, and maybe I was. But I didn’t have a choice. I was already in.
I rounded the quad, dorm buildings coming into view. A couple of students passed by, laughing as one kicked at a leftover clump of snow from the storm earlier this week. Their breath puffed white into the night, easy and careless in a way I hadn’t felt in a long time.
For a second, I envied them.
Then I looked back down at the sidewalk and focused on what mattered.
There was a game on Friday night. Home ice. The Wolves were facing a cross-town rival, and the arena would be packed with scouts, boosters, and board members. Every set of eyes would be locked on the ice.
Gavin wasn’t cleared to play. That was what the report said. But he’d be there on the bench. Present, but not part of it. And that meant something.
Talon had noticed it too. Studying, watching, the same way I was. I didn’t trust him, but that didn’t change the truth. We were both walking the same path. We just had different reasons for being on it.
I let out a slow breath, the air fogging in front of me. My fingers shifted inside my gloves, jaw locked tight. The tip I’d filed tonight might be enough to get people to ask questions, but questions wouldn’t fix anything if the records were already scrubbed and the reports rewritten.
The longer I watched Gavin, noticing how his energy dipped and spiked and how he traded quiet words with that booster in the black coat with sharp eyes, the more I wondered. It felt bigger than an injury.
And I was running out of time to prove it.
My boots crunched over salt as I stepped onto the walkway of my building. The light above the door flickered once, then came on, throwing pale blue across the bricks.
I grabbed the handle, my fingers unsteady. Not from the cold, but from everything weighing on me. I wasn’t stopping tonight. I needed answers.
And if Talon thought I’d back down because he didn’t like me digging into his team’s secrets?
He was about to find out just how unshakable the governor’s daughter could be.
Chapter Twenty
Wren
The crowd roared as the puck dropped, but it barely registered.
I stood against the wall near the tunnel entrance, tucked out of sight from the student section and well away from the bench. My badge hung from my lanyard like it actually meant something, but it didn’t stop my chest from pounding, the same way it always did when I felt out of place—like I was sneaking around where I didn’t belong.
Gavin wasn’t on the ice. Word had already started to spread that he quit the team, but it didn’t sound official. It sounded like something whispered in passing, like no one wanted to say too much. The timing gnawed at me. Was it my anonymous tip that pushed him out, or was something else forcing him to walk away? Either way, it didn’t feel clean.
The rest was falling apart.
Talon and Kade were closing in. I’d seen the film Talon kept watching, the way his eyes tracked Gavin in practice like he was waiting for him to slip. They were circling him,same as me. I knew because I’d overheard them talking about Kade’s notes—and he’d slipped, mentioning his stepsister was in the crowd tonight with her camera. Which meant she might’ve caught more than she realized.
If the people Gavin had been meeting with figured out things were coming apart, there was no telling what they’d do—or who they’d go after.
I shifted the clipboard in front of me, pretending to take notes. My eyes kept drifting toward the far hallway. Timing mattered. Too early or too late, and someone could notice.
I waited until the announcer’s voice echoed overhead, calling a media time-out. The arena lights dipped, and a fundraising video played across the Jumbotron. Fans stood, stretching their legs.
Cameras swung away from the bench.
This was my chance.
