Page 17 of Blitz
“Kinda closed off,” I began, but then realized I was doing him a disservice. “Polite, a bit snarky. I like him.”
Ty cocked his head. “You know who his dad is, right?”
I frowned, chewing that over. “Nope.” Given he’s Cole Harrington the Third, I figured there’s a CH2. Was that who Ty meant? The name didn’t ring any bells.
Ty lifted an eyebrow. “You ever heard of Pastor Cole? Big down in Georgia, spreading the word of praise and damnation.”
I ran the name through my brain. It seemed familiar, something in the background noise of early Sunday mornings. Ty supplied the rest. “Big-time televangelist. Sunday morning fire and brimstone.”
“Ohhh,” I said slowly, the image coming into focus. “Yeah, I think I caught something like that once while flipping channels.”
“Yeah, that’s the one. Weird, huh? That his kid ended up in hockey.”
Yeah, it was odd now that I thought about it. “Maybe God told him to follow in the footsteps of the holiest of hockey players, Wayne Gretzky.”
“Maybe you’re an idiot.” Ty shouldered me playfully. I shouldered him back. It had been a damn good day.
SEVEN
Trick
It was onlya fifty-minute flight from Harrisburg to Philly. With the right car and no cops, I could’ve driven it in a couple of hours.
But no, we flew. Because tradition. Because of team bonding. Because—fuck me—the noise.
The back of the plane was in chaos. Goalies, man. Fucking loud, unhinged, caffeinated chaos. Sokolov was laughing so hard he snorted, and Whitmore wasn’t far behind. Someone was playing music from a Bluetooth speaker. No one had shut it down. I hated all of them equally in that moment.
And then, there was Noah. Of course, Noah.
He was sitting beside me, all elbows and long limbs, practically climbing over me to talk to the goalies across the aisle.
“—and then, Dad caught me with his stick, like full-on hooked me around the waist, and I went down like a sack of crap. Said, ‘That’s how you finish a check, son.’” Noah grinned.
Sokolov barked a laugh. “Legend.”
“Bet he could still lace ‘em up,” Whitmore added.
“Oh, hedoes,” Noah said, still grinning. “Last summer, he joined the vets for a scrimmage. He skated circles around all of them.”
Of course he did.
The great Stan Lyamin. Hockey god. Superdad. Because, of course, Noah lucked out with the perfect family. And I didn’t resent it—not really—but I envied the hell out of it, and that made my chest tight in a way I couldn’t shake. Like something sharp pressing just beneath my ribs, reminding me of what I’d never had.
Noah leaned back into his seat with a satisfied sigh, jostling my shoulder like I wasn’t trying to disappear into the fuselage. “Gotta love my papa,” he said fondly, and stared out of the window.
I almost commented that he seemed close to his family, but the words stuck in my throat. What would that even mean coming from me? Close wasn’t a language I spoke. Not with my father. Not with anyone. So, I stayed quiet, let it hang there, and stared ahead as if I didn’t care.
Noah stretched out and stole the armrest between us. “I’ve been studying Philly tapes all week—Halme and Bannister are solid Ds—fast, aggressive, and smart.”
“We’re not likely to play them in a pre-season game,” I mused.
The point was that pre-season was all about getting a team to gel and playing the new guys; hence, why I was here in this pre-season game against the Philadelphia Forge, because my gelling in our practice runs hadn’t exactly happened. I mean, I was passing more; I was learning the Railers’ plays; I was working hard, but something… it wasn’t right.
“Shame.” Noah fake-pouted. “I know I could have beaten both of them.”
I didn’t doubt it. He had the raw skill, the pedigree, and most of all, he had self-belief. I’d spent so long trying to walk a line—sabotaging myself enough to keep expectations low, but not enough to drag the rest of the team down—that I’d forgotten what kind of player I actually was. I never attempted to tank the Phantoms—hell, we’d made it to the playoffs—but I’d let the off-ice drama speak louder than anything I did with a puck. And eventually, they’d stopped listening altogether.
“You excited for this?” he asked, elbowing me, and fuck, his elbows were sharp. I loved hockey—it was my escape, my everything—and I was excited. Not that I’d admit it.
