Page 131 of Stick It
The third period starts. I try to catch the guys’ gazes, but they avoid looking my way. Any spare moment, I search for some kind of reassurance, but their faces remain unreadable.
Anxiety knots in my stomach, clawing up my throat. What if they believe what they saw? What if they think I’m a slut?That I played them all? That whatever we were starting to build is already over?
With every question unanswered, I push myself harder. Faster. I channel the sick churn of emotions inside me into every shift, every play. I crash into my opponents with unrelenting force, steal pucks with ruthless efficiency, and fire shots at the net like my life depends on it.
I check Lucas so hard he stumbles, my shoulder slamming into his ribs. When he snarls, I just skate away. I don’t even feel triumphant over besting him. I’m numb to it all.
I deke through the Glaciers’ defense, driving the puck forward, weaving past bodies like they’re nothing. When I finally get my chance, I take the shot—and score. The horn blares. The crowd erupts.
I don’t celebrate. I don’t stop. I demand the puck on every shift, pushing my body beyond its limits, refusing to let them take this from me.
They can try to ruin my name, but they will never take my game.
39
FINN
Celebrations are goingon all around me in the locker room, but I am immune to it all. For the first time, I’m not joining in with the rest of the team, not celebrating our win against NSU.
Instead of being sweet with victory, the air around me is thick, suffocating. I’m distantly aware of skates clattering on the floor, the snap of a towel as the guys change out of their gear, but I barely register any of it. It’s background noise to the questions flying like loose pucks inside my head.
The only thing in the room I am aware of is Dylan’s absence. She was hauled into Coach’s office the second the final buzzer went. That, and the fact that Griffin, Ethan, and Jax are as quiet as I am. Like me, they aren’t partaking in the celebrations, not caught up in the high of the win. Heck, looking at the four of us, you’d think the Steelhawks lost tonight when we fucking dominated.
Even if it was Dylan who was ultimately responsible for our destroying win. She was on fire out there tonight, especially in that third period. Until that video, I’d been loving every secondof being on the ice with her. Watching her do her thing.Helping her. We were a solid team, and it showed.
But after? My body was in the game, going through the motions, but my head was elsewhere.
I drop onto the bench, ignoring the pumping music from someone’s phone and the general buzz of laughter around me as I rest my elbows on my knees and lean forward, closing my eyes. The images from the jumbotron play on a loop in my head.
I knew Dylan was getting close with the others, that lines had been crossed. But seeing her doing the exact same thing with guys from NSU…
What the fuck does that mean? Was she using us—them? Does she get off on screwing her teammates? I don’t understand. All I know is the bitter taste of the acidic bile that crawled up my throat as clip after clip played out before me.
I shake my head, willing the pictures away, but they are burned into my retinas.
Kyle was right.
He warned me. Fuckingwarnedme and I didn’t listen. Continued to get close to her, unable to physically stay away. I groan into my hands.
I should havetrustedhim—my best fucking friend.
Whatever Dylan’s game is, it’s clear none of us meant a goddamn thing to her.
I was foolish to believe she was different. She’d wholly captured my attention that day she rocked up to the porch in her little denim shorts and Converse, and I wanted to believe that maybe, just maybe, she was the kind of girl who meant the things she said.
But I was wrong.
So. Fucking. Wrong.
My head snaps up as a hand claps my shoulder, and I look up at Kyle’s pinched, sympathetic expression. “Come on.” Hegestures toward the door, and barely sparing the others a glance, I grab my things and follow.
I’m not paying any attention to our surroundings as we leave the arena, as I drop into the passenger seat of Kyle’s Mercedes. The small town of Blackstone blurs past my window.
“I’m sorry, man,” he says, glancing my way. “I tried to warn you.”
My stomach knots. He did. And like the idiot I am, I ignored him.
“I just—I don’t get it,” I mutter. “She seemed?—”
