Page 161 of The Pucking Arrangement

But the puck—the puck—is skidding toward center ice.

Nate reaches it first, flipping it into the empty net.

5-2.

The final nail in Vegas’ coffin.

The clock ticks down. Thirty seconds. Twenty. Ten.

The arena vibrates, fans screaming, fists pounding against the glass.

The buzzer sounds?—

And the world erupts in chaos.

We’ve done it.

Stanley Cup Champions.

Gloves and sticks litter the ice as bodies crash together in celebration. Liam finds me first, his face a mask of pure joy as he crushes me against him.

“We did it, you crazy Russian bastard!” he shouts over the deafening roar. “We fucking did it!”

More bodies pile on—Adam, Finn, Nate—a tangle of sweaty, exhausted limbs vibrating with triumph. Coach appears, face split by a grin I’ve seen maybe twice in three years. He looks almost human, something like pride softening his perpetual scowl.

But my eyes are already searching, looking past the celebration to the stands.

To her.

She’s standing at the glass now, somehow having made her way down from the family box. My jersey stretched across her back as she presses against the barrier, a flash of blue against the sea of faces. Her eyes lock with mine, something bright and fierce in them that makes my heart slam against my ribs harder than any body check.

Wait for me, I think.Just wait.

I take a step toward her, desperate to close the distance, to reach her through the pandemonium, but the celebration swallows me whole. Bodies crash into me from all sides, arms locking around my shoulders, gloves slapping against my helmet.

“We fucking did it!” Adam roars, dragging me back into the fray.

“Champions, baby!” Finn tackles us both, nearly sending us sprawling.

I try to maneuver toward the glass where she stands watching, but it’s like swimming against a riptide. The sea of blue jerseys pulls me deeper into center ice, away from her. The commissioner appears, suits materialize, cameras flash. The Stanley Cup—seventy pounds of silver perfection—gleams under the lights, waiting for us.

I search for her over shoulders, between bodies, my eyes constantly tracking back to where I last saw her. She’s still there, but something’s changed. Sophie’s beside her now, tugging an O’Connor jersey—Liam’s number 11—over my 55. Family photos. Team protocol. Of course she needs to represent her brother for the official pictures.

My stomach twists as my number disappears beneath Liam’s, like watching some part of my claim on her being erased.

“Your turn, big guy,” Liam shouts, shoving the Cup into my hands.

The weight of it hits me—ten years of chasing this moment. But all I can think is that I’d trade it in a heartbeat to be standing in front of her right now, telling her all the things I’ve been too afraid to say.

I hoist the Cup overhead, the roar of the crowd washing over me like a physical force. My teammates slam into me, the celebration building to chaotic heights. When I look back toward the glass, the space where she stood is filled with other bodies, other faces.

“Families coming down!” someone shouts, and suddenly the ice is flooded with wives, girlfriends, children. Ris barrels across the ice in her tiny skates, Galina carefully following behind. More chaos. More bodies. More noise.

In the swirling mass of humanity, I catch flashes of her—copper hair, flushed cheeks, that smile that’s been haunting my dreams for weeks. But she’s always just out of reach, swallowed by the crowd, pulled into photos with Liam and Sophie, hugging her brother, being passed around like the Cup itself.

The frustration builds in my chest. So close. So damn close, and yet I can’t get to her. Can’t pull her away from this madness to tell her what I need to say.

Maybe it’s for the best. The words I need to say deserve more than a shouted confession over the roar of twenty thousand fans. They deserve privacy. Time. The truth of what I feel for her isn’t meant for the ice.

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