Page 26 of Off-Ice Misconduct
My fingers push into the edges of the bruise, not enough to damage, just enough to remind him who’s in charge.
“Alright. Jeez.” He huffs, glowering, but this time it’s got a toddler’s sulk to it without any real heat. He doesn’t want to tell me. “I think you’re gonna be mad, though—if this whole scene is anything to go by,” he mutters.
“Probably.” I work gently, rewarding him for good behavior. Encouraging him.
“Remember the whole drama with Delta Gamma?” I nod. “It’s escalated. Turns out that Freshman Andy’s a reporter for The Shadow Gazette. Things got twisted, and he’s under the impression that Celeste was my girlfriend, wrote all about it in a scathing article titled,Ace McKinnon, Hockey God or Filthy Lying Cheater?I didn’t even know they were allowed to publish shit like that. Anyway, it came out today, which resulted in a major retaliation. Beta Sigma frat saw it as their opportunity to move in on Delta Gamma—they’ve always been jealous of our alliance with them. They were waiting with paintball guns, and they attacked us when we got home, trying to look like knights in shining armor. The house is a fucking disaster.”
“Why don’t I see a splash of paint on you?”
“I’m not the hockey captain for nothing,Da—uh, sir. I’m fast.”
He almost called me Daddy, didn’t he? He’s thinking about it. Unfortunately, so am I.
“Anyway, it pissed them off. Someone had rubber bullets. They targeted me.”
“They shot you in the face?” I say between gritted teeth.
“Tried to. I dodged that. This was from being grazed. It did take me out, though. I fell and rolled over the pavement. Wasn’t wearing my jacket at the time because we’d just come from the gym. My arms are scratched to shit. Didn’t have time to clean upbefore coming here and figured showing like a disaster on time was better than being late.”
I’m gonna have every one of those little shits strung up by their fingers.
“Don’t,” he says.
“Don’t what?” I finish with the blood around his nose. Better, but now the swelling’s more apparent. I fish an instant ice pack from my bag. They’re not as good as real ice, but it’s better to have something on this immediately.
“Do whatever it is your face is saying you wanna do.”
“Am I that obvious?”
The corner of his lip quirks into a half smile. “To me, you are.”
I wish I didn’t like that, but I do.
“I can’t let this go. It’s my duty to report this kind of thing to the dean,” I say as if I had any intention of doing that instead of handling it myself, hiding behind a thinly veiled shield of professionalism he already knows I don’t possess.
“That will make everything worse. Besides, the dean’s used to frat wars. He doesn’t act unless someone is severely injured but shit like that will get back to the other house. They’ll only retaliate harder.”
“You were shot in the face.” He may consider this a graze, but I don’t. What if that rubber bullet had hit him in the eye? His hockey career would be over, or worse. “This is more than a little fraternity dispute. He should be preventing tragedies, not waiting for them to happen before he does anything.”
“Never part of a fraternity, were you, sir?”
“I was too busy.” School served as a break from the fights for entertainment that my uncle called work, but it never got me out of it completely. Besides being forbidden from joining one, I wouldn’t have had the time. But if this is the kind of shit that’s considered normal, I’m glad I missed it altogether.
“Anyway, admittedly, Uncle Patrick might be more partial because it was me that got hurt, but I don’t want special treatment.”
Right. His dad’s besties with the dean. “You don’t make any sense. You’re fine with special treatment when it’s arriving late to class, but not for this?”
“Arriving late to class doesn’t hurt anyone. No one complained until you,” he says. “And we give back for that. We bust our fucking asses in practice, dragging our sorry sacks of bones to bed early during the season, missing most of the events on campus, so we can bring the sort of entertainment and money—don’t forget the money—to the school all year. Having the dean come to my rescue when he wouldn’t for anyone else? That’s the kind of nepotism I’m not on board with.”
I don’t agree with his logic, but it gives me new McKinnon insight.
Once the instant ice pack is wrapped in a cloth, I make him hold it to his face. “Twenty minutes on, twenty minutes off for the rest of the night.”
He rolls his eyes. “I know, sir. Not my first injury—hockey player, remember?”
As if I could forget.“You mentioned it a time or two.”
McKinnon smiles again, almost wistfully. “What are you gonna do during the season, sir? You think this is bad, wait until I play a real game. But what I haven’t figured out is whether it’s all students you fuss over like this, or just me?”
