Page 72 of The Price of Ice

He’d taken her to a cafe in his neighbourhood he’d always thought looked nice and found them a secluded table. Not that he thought anyone knew there who he was or cared.

And even if they did, they wouldn’t for long.

It would be nice not to worry about being in the public eye.

“You look sad.”

Kallen glanced up from his drink. “Yeah.”

In the car, he’d shared how once he’d told Levy his decision, he’d been able to move his legs again. Going to sleep had been tough, but the failed sex had distracted him from the possibility of waking up paralysed again. And then Brad had shown up and successfully derailed his thoughts to much more realistic concerns.

“I’m sorry.” She grabbed his hand, her grip a little too hard. All his life, everyone had told him that he’d inherited everything that made him good at hockey from his father. No one had seen his mum talking him up, asking him about school and holding him when he cried.Lettinghim cry.

“I really thought it was worth it,” he admitted, feeling foolish and hurt and so small. His throat closed up and he had to blink fast to keep from making a spectacle of himself. God, he was a right mess.

“Kallen.” She tugged at his hand. “It’s not your fault. We shouldn’t have let you get so close. We should have protected you.”

He shook his head, rubbing the back of his hand over his cheeks as he lost the battle with the tears.

“You just loved it so much,” she whispered. “It’s a poor excuse, I know. But you loved it, and he loved sharing it with you. I thought— No, Iconvincedmyself that he’d keep you safe.”

Kallen snorted, sniffling a little. “Me too.”

She nodded; her own eyes reddened. “I think he wanted to believe it too, that he was so strong that he could protect youfrom all this—” She cut herself off, and then her face twisted and she spat the word after all, low but vicious. “Bullshit.”

He watched her, wide-eyed. He’d never heard her swear before. His mother was the type of person who said ‘sugar’ when she dropped something and called terrible drivers ‘silly’. It hadn’t seemed to matter when Kallen, her youngest child, had started to drop the occasional bad word in her hearing, she’d kept speaking the way she always had.

“But you are quitting,” she said now, straightening in her seat. She was a full head shorter than him, but there was steel in her eyes that made him echo the pose.

“I am,” he said, low and raspy, glad she was on his side. He took a sip from his coffee and tried again. “I am quitting.”

She nodded, lips curving upwards despite the lingering sadness. “Good. No one’s going to hurt you again, Kallen. Maybe those hockey people think omegas are weak, but that’s only because they haven’t seen an omega protect her children. I will do whatever I have to, but you are going to be okay, and you are going to be safe.”

And it was ridiculous, because he was nineteen years old, an adult fully capable of protecting himself, but he turned his face to the side, pressing his lips together and covering his mouth with his free hand as a sharp sob escaped. His mother was on her feet faster than he could have moved in skates, pressing her body to his side so he could hide his face into her shoulder as he started crying in earnest.

She held him close, fingers in his hair, not speaking, just being. It’d been a long time since she’d stood between him and the world, and he hadn’t thought he was allowed this comfort anymore. He’d been told he wasn’t, that if he wanted to play hockey then he had to toughen up and become independent, capable of handling it all on his own. Unfeeling, truly, becauseonly someone who couldn’t feel could tolerate the life he’d signed up for.

The worst part was that he was so ashamed. Because he’dwantedto believe the lies. He’d always known, deep in his gut, that it wasn’t possible to sleep with his whole team and be okay. He’d been terrified from his very first heat with the White Cats, well before anyone had done anything to prove him right. They weren’t innocent, but neither was he.

Maybe they believed the lie because it benefited them, the alphas got someone to fuck, and Management got to raise kids to become hockey superstars and make it all into a narrative of family for their fans.

His mother walked him to the toilets, but she didn’t ask him to stop crying, only rubbed his back. The door opened once while they were there, and he heard a quiet apology before it closed again. He wanted to stop, but he couldn’t, like he’d stoppered it all up inside for so long, now he didn’t get a choice anymore.

By the time he could breathe again, he stumbled to the sink to wash his face and blow his nose. “I’m sorry,” he told his mum, waving at her wet jumper.

“Don’t be silly.” Passing him some tissue and then using some more to pat at the wet spot on the wool, dabbing at it delicately in a way that made him smile. It was the exact careful touch she’d used to clean up skinned knees.

“Are you okay to go back to the table?” She was looking at him steadily, seemingly not at all concerned with them monopolizing a public toilet.

“Sure, tell me what Mrs Hendrich is up to this week.”

Their elderly neighbour had always been odd, but in the years since Kallen had moved out, her behaviour had got positively bizarre. There was no harm in any of it—lights spelling poems on the grass and gnomes who were moved one step further across her own garden each day, but his mother tookpictures when she could and shared them with him and his brothers.

“Oh, you won’t believe it!” his mum said, immediately sounding happier.

BY THE TIME THEY MADEit home, he couldn't stop yawning. It was barely noon, but too much had happened and crying always took a lot out of him.

Maybe Brad was right, and he was on the lookout for trains now because he could sense the danger in getting too close to hockey right now. It wasn’t worthit, the life of misery and humiliation he’d signed up for to have it, but it was still worth a lot to him. He could see there was no other path, but it didn’t mean this one wasn’t breaking his heart.

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