Page 30 of Play Maker

My face flushed with heat.

“I mean, it wasn’t anything more than grabbing his jersey and trash talking,” I added. “Maybe we wrestled a bit.”

That didn’t sound any better. The image of me and Axel grappling, our bodies so close, all sweaty and frustrated, had my heart beating triple time.

“Jace,” Josie warned.

“I can’t help it. He insults me all the time and I’m not gonna stand there and take it. You know I’m not made that way. And because he’s a Lund, he thinks he’s better than everyone else,” I snapped. “He hardly talks to anyone on the team, not to mention he threatened to out Maddox and Kayden a while back.”

There was a longer pause on the other end of the line.

Josie was calm in situations where I was not. Always level headed.Think, then act.Part of it was her personality but a lot of it had to do with everything she’d been through in her life. She’d taken over my care when she was only a twenty-year-old girl herself. My mom died in an accident and my dad wasn’t in the picture. I couldn’t imagine taking on a child at my age. All that responsibility. Josie grew up fast and sacrificed a lot. Sometimes I forgot that she’d lost everything too when my mom passed.

“He acted like an asshole, that I’ll give you,” she replied. “But you said he apologized to them and is trying to do right. And you know better than to judge someone based on their name or their shitty behavior. You don’t know what he’s dealing with.”

“Some people are just jerks.”

“That’s also true,” she chuckled, and the raspy sound made me homesick. “But remember what we talked about Jace? A lot of times when people lash out, that’s when they’re hurting the most. It sounds like Axel has problems in his life and he just doesn’t know how to deal with them.”

Josie had a point. I didn’t want to admit it, but there was something going on with him.

“You’re probably right. But I have no idea what it has to do with me. Okay, that’s not true,” I paused. “He thinks I’m this awful person. I have no idea what Preston said about me, but I have a feeling he’s gaslighting Axel like he did me. And if that’s the case, how am I going to convince Axel otherwise?”

Josie made a humming sound like she always did when she was pondering something.

“That’s tricky,” she replied. “You’ll probably have to approach this like you’re playing offense. What happens when you’re faced with an opponent that’s out playing you? What do you do?”

“I study them. I watch the tape. Watch them on the ice. Analyze them and figure out the best way to maneuver around them. And then I act. I’ve got to be bold.”

“There you go. You need to watch and listen. Don’t just argue with him. Listen to what he’s saying, and maybe what he’s not. And then you need to be up-front about what happened between you and Preston. If he doesn’t believe you, he doesn’t believe you, but at least you tried. You’ve been carrying around that secret for a while now. Maybe it’s time you let more people know what really happened.”

“I told Dane and that was enough. You know that I don’t like talking about it.”

“I do know that. And I know that there was stuff that you shared with your therapist that you didn’t want to share with me, and that’s fine. If you were talking to someone you trusted, and you were okay, I was okay. I just don’t wanna see you hurt yourself like that again,” she paused. “Have you been alright lately? Do you need to talk to your therapist?”

“I…I don’t know. Maybe,” I admitted, lowering my voice. I ran one agitated hand over my head. “Before my practice with Axel last night, I sat in the bathroom for a while and contemplated making myself sick. I didn’t do it, but the urge was strong. Just when I think I have everything under control, I don’t.”

“Says every adult every day,” she confessed. “Don’t ignore the warning sign. Call your therapist.”

“I will,” I promised.

“You’re doing so well, sweetie, and I’m so proud of you. And I’m just a phone call away. You’re not alone. Remember that. You areneveralone.”

Axel’s troubled blue eyes came to mind.

No, I never felt alone. But I was starting to think that maybe Axel did. And why that bothered me, I didn’t even want to think about.

CHAPTER 11

AXEL

MONDAY EVENING

Boots N’ Burgers was the busiest place in Sutton, and renowned for their pub food.

Unfortunately, I had no appetite. I was grumpy as fuck knowing that Jace was about to walk through those doors any minute now. The thought of seeing him after our last practice had my stomach clenching painfully.

I’d gone to the gym last night, but even after a long workout, sleep wouldn’t come. Instead of lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, I’d opened my laptop and worked on my economics paper. Sure enough, an hour after I started typing, I fell asleep. That should’ve been a clue right there that I had to change my major ASAP.

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