Page 3 of Blitz
The phone was my warning system. My fire alarm. I didn’t pick it up to talk. I picked it up to survive.
The message was simple. A lone photo, forwarded from Tom’s Instagram. His arm slung casually around me, my head tipped slightly toward his. It wasn’t anything.
Below it, my father had typed:The cameras have caught you touching sin!
My stomach dropped.
Classic him. No context. No conversation. Just a warning dressed up as scripture, like he thought he was standing at apulpit instead of slinging shame over text. Like he had any right to say a damn thing about my life after our contract.
I stared at the message, my grip tightening on the tiny phone until the plastic creaked. This was the curveball. I’d felt it coming. He always found a way to remind me that he was watching.
“Trick! Security just called,” someone said, cutting through my spiral. Now what? “There’s someone downstairs for you.”
“Who?”
“Don’t know. Greg said it’s personal.”
I blinked, heart thudding as if I’d been caught doing something illegal. I turned back to the photographer. I was thankful for the interruption, even if my chest was tight—I didn’t do anything personally. “Are we done here?”
He nodded, distracted by adjusting some lighting rig.
I didn’t say goodbye. I shoved my hands deeper into my hoodie pockets and walked off the set without glancing back, using the stairs to get down, and stopped just before exiting the lobby. My breath hitched and my heart punched against my ribs as if it were trying to escape. Panic curled in my gut, sharp and sudden, coiled tight like a spring ready to snap. My palms were slick, my vision narrowing as thoughts raced—who was out there wanting me? Did they want a golden boy hockey player or an asshole wanting to be punched? What character would I have to play? Not knowing was kinda shit, and I didn’t do surprises. Tension flooded my veins, thick and hot, locking up every joint until I couldn’t move or think without spiraling into worst-case scenarios.
“Hey, you okay?” a voice said behind me, and I whirled to face a half-smiling, half-concerned Tom.
I focused on his stupidly pretty face and sneered. “Oh, fuck the hell off,” I snapped, and pushed out of the door, my anger at being spotted enough to snap my daydream. I didn’t thinkhe followed me, and I strode to the main desk, seeing an empty lobby apart from some kid sitting on the sofa.
“What?” I asked Greg, who pointed at the young girl without saying a word. “We don’t let fans in.”.” I moved to leave, but the girl had moved—damned fast—and blocked my way.
She couldn’t have been more than seventeen, eighteen maybe—but then, what the hell did I know—and she smiled up at me. She was in jeans and a simple T-shirt, the kind you could pick up in a three-pack at Target, and her hair was scraped back into a no-nonsense ponytail. There was no makeup I could see, but she didn’t seem plain—just real. Her dark eyes were wide, curious, and maybe a little nervous, like she wasn’t sure if she was about to get yelled at or hugged. There was something familiar in how she stood too—shoulders back, chin lifted as if she’d practiced this moment in the mirror a dozen times and wasn’t about to flinch now.
“Hi, Cole Harringtonthe Third.” She extended her hand to shake.
I ignored it.
“You shouldn’t be in here; there are scheduled times for meet and greets,” I said. “Give Greg your name, and he’ll add you to the list.” I stepped back so Greg could see her and me in case I got accused of something awful; I mean, Jesus, she was a young woman, and I was the bad boy of hockey, and I’d been accused of unfounded shit before.
“My name is Rebecca Jensen.”
“Okay. Tell Greg.”
“I’m here to see you.”
“As I said, we have meet and greets.”
“I’m your sister.”
“Fuck off.” My mouth moved before my brain could catch up. Sister? No. That word didn’t belong to me. That word wasn’t part of my life. My entire world had always been me—solo,closed off, self-contained. No siblings, shared birthdays, hand-me-downs, or late-night whisper fights across a hallway. Just me and the silence I’d made peace with. And now? This stranger wanted to rewrite my entire history with a few words. That was a new one. I’d had four pregnancy accusations—two of them from women I’d never even met, one from a former one-night stand who’d forgotten she was married, and one who thought wishful thinking made it real. I’d punched a photographer in Vegas after he’d tried to shove a lens up my nose during a hangover. I’d been accused twice of getting too handsy in public—both dismissed, but the stain lingered. I’d been called every name in the book by commentators and sports pundits alike. But this? A long-lost sibling showing up out of the blue in the Railers lobby? That was a first.
“No, you’re not,” I scoffed. If there’s one certainty I have, it’s that I don’t have siblings. “Greg, can you get over here and deal with this.”
“Cole Harrington, the second, was your father, same as mine,” she said, her voice steady, like she’d rehearsed this a hundred times. “My mom, Georgie Jensen, was your dad’s PA for a couple of weeks. She never told me about him—not until last year when she was diagnosed with cancer.” She paused then, grief in her expression. “She told me to stay away, that it was safer that way, until I turned eighteen at least. And I’m eighteen now, I mean… look, when she passed away there was a lawyer explaining everything.”
She reached into her bag and pulled out an envelope, which was thick and official judging by its weight. “There’s a genetic match, an affidavit, photos… the whole kit and caboodle.” Then, she smiled—wide and awkward—and added, “Hey, big brother.”
“Is this a scam? Because if it is, save us both the time and get the hell out now. I’ve seen enough people try to angle in with a sob story and some paperwork. You want money—there’s a lineforming behind my last three fake cousins and a guy who swore he babysat me once in kindergarten and said I told him my dad would give him money. So, unless you’ve got more than a manila envelope and a smile, I suggest you turn around.”
“She said you’d be like this,” she muttered, then sighed. “Take this, asshole.” She thrust the envelope at me. “Call me.”
