Page 84 of Penalty Box
I hid my sudden vulnerability behind a sardonic laugh. “No truth bombs on an empty stomach, please. Have a little heart.”
The laugh he gave was only somewhat committed. “I’m not here to play matchmaker,” he said. “But I’d be a fuck-up of a friend if I didn’t say something. You don’t have to do anything except say you’ll think about it.”
Mason was all I thought about, but I didn’t want Hunter to know that.
“Will that be all?”
He finally accepted his efforts as fruitless, and thankfully left without saying another word about it.
I sat there for a minute, staring at the collection of items in varying states of disrepair. My hand hovered over the rotary tool again, not quite ready to go back to work, not quite ready to sit with the ache.
The silence crept back in. I flicked the brush on and started again, letting the grind pull me into that hyper-focused space where nothing else could touch me. The pipe hissed as I turned it, a faint shimmer from the weld catching the light.
The thing I was most proud of in metal work was that we didn’t erase damage, but reshaped it into something viable again. Reinforced it to outlast another break.
My phone buzzed from the back pocket of my jeans, and habit won as I pulled it out.
Mason: Did you catch the game?
I managed to stop another habit before it thawed my cold shoulder, and changed my mind about replying. He didn’t have that kind of access anymore. Maybe not ever again, if our last talk was anything to go by.
The phone went back into my pocket, and I steadied the pipe with both hands. The rotary tool bit into the metal with a sharp, high-pitched screech.
The door stayed closed. No more unexpected visitors or surprises. Just me and the work.
I found a rhythm and leaned into it like some form of meditation. Far away from the press, the spin, and the lucky flick of the wrist. Here hands moved without thinking and it was all about grinding, smoothing, and hiding calloused fingers in gloves.
Down here there were no headlines, and no perfect game replays. This world was hot steel, a healthy dash of stubbornness, and a woman who didn’t know how to stop feeling for someone who’d already walked away.
I adjusted the torque and pressed harder, sparks lighting up the dim corners of the room. If I worked long enough, maybe I’d forget what it felt like when he told me it was over between us.
My phone buzzed again, and exasperated, I pulled it out.
Mason: I can’t stop thinking about you.
26
Mason
I knew something was wrong the second I walked into the locker room and the music cut out mid-track.
Coach stood dead center with his arms crossed, expression unreadable. The rest of the team hovered around, peeling off layers to hit the showers. We’d gone through one of the hardest training sessions yet, but we were all riding high on our 4–2 sweep of the Canucks in the first round of the playoffs.
“Good show out there,” Coach said, looking at each of us in turn. “But I’m thinking of switching things up a bit for the second round.”
Murmurs rippled through the locker room, and my heart leapt into my throat when Coach’s gaze came to rest on me.
“Calder, you’re benched for Game 1.”
The words didn’t land at first. Not really. I stood there blinking stupidly at him, as if he were speaking a different language.
Grayson took a step forward. “Coach, are you sure tha—?”
Coach raised a hand that instantly silenced the captain, like some magical mute button.
“Nothing personal,” Coach went on. “It’s just about priorities. Besides, I think some of the other guys are ready to show up, and I want to give them the chance.”
“What?” My brain finally clicked. “Our formation’s working. We’re winning. Why mess with it now?”
