Page 56 of Hard Check

I laughed and typed a message back.

Carver:Enjoy your trophy. I have a drawer full of identical socks.

Three dots appeared immediately.

Pike:They miss their brother. Tragic sock separation. I'm sending ransom photos tomorrow.

I smiled at the screen. It was Pike—bright and ridiculous, fearless in ways I was only beginning to understand.

My thumbs hovered over the keyboard as I considered responding with something equally flippant. Instead, I typed:

Carver:I miss you too.

It was as close as I could come to articulating the revelation still settling over me. After decades of carefully controlled emotions and relationships maintained at arm's length, Pike made me want to take the risk to know myself.

Chapter fourteen

Pike

Myphonebuzzedagainstthe kitchen counter as I stood barefoot, waiting for the coffee to finish brewing. The email notification sat there like an unexploded grenade—sender:Kevin Morrison, Agent. Subject line:Call me. Good news.

I knew what good news meant. In hockey, only one kind made agents wake up early on a Tuesday.

My thumb hesitated over the screen. The coffee maker gurgled behind me, filling my apartment with the rich scent of dark roast—the expensive kind Carver had started buying after discovering my caffeine standards.

Evidence of him was everywhere: his backup phone charger coiled by the toaster, yesterday'sLewiston Sun-Journalfolded to the sports section he'd been reading aloud to me in bed.

I opened the email.

Pike—NHL Rookie Camp invitation came through. Syracuse Sentinels. September 5-12, 2026. This is it, kid. Call me when you're vertical.

The words blurred, then sharpened, and then blurred again. Syracuse Sentinels. Rookie Camp. The phrase I'd been chasing since I was nine years old, stick-handling tennis balls in my parents' basement.

I should have felt lightning in my chest. I should have whooped loud enough to wake the neighbors. I should have called my parents, my sister, and everyone who'd watched me grind through junior leagues, college, and my current purgatory of professional hockey.

Instead, my stomach clenched like I'd swallowed ice water at 2 AM.

The coffee maker beeped its completion, but I couldn't move. My bare feet were rooted to the floor, toes curling against the hardwood grain. Outside, early morning Lewiston stretched gray and quiet under November clouds.

It was supposed to bethemoment. It was the payoff for every 5 AM practice, every hit that left me dizzy, and every summer spent in stuffy training facilities instead of at the lake with friends.

So why did it feel like someone was pulling the floor out from under me?

I thought about Carver's face in sleep—how the perpetual tension around his eyes finally relaxed, making him look younger than his thirty-one years. His hand found mine sometime during the night, fingers weaving together like we'd been doing it for decades instead of weeks.

I've wanted this my whole life,so why does it feel like I just got benched?

The phone rang. Kevin's name flashed across the screen. I let it buzz twice before answering.

"There's my future NHL star." Kevin's voice boomed through the speaker, impossibly cheerful for seven-thirty in the morning. "How's it feel to be living the dream, kid?"

"It feels..." I swallowed, searching for words that wouldn't sound ungrateful. "It feels incredible. Surreal."

"As it should. Syracuse has been watching you all season. That chemistry you've got with Carver? That's what caught their attention. They want to see how you adapt to higher-level talent."

"When do they need an answer?"

"Already gave it. You're going, Pike. This isn't a maybe—this is your ticket to the show."

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