The locker room smelled like sweat, metal, and something close to war.
Silas sat alone on the wooden bench, knuckles split open, jaw tight, an ice pack pressed to his ribs.
The rink was quiet now. Practice had ended an hour ago. Most of the team had left.
He liked the silence.
It was the only place he could think.
The leak had worked.
Toby’s numbers had been clean — small discrepancy, nothing criminal, but enough to spook investors and stall the Whitestone-Sterling merger. Enough to buy time.
Time for what?
He didn’t know.
He only knew he wasn’t letting her be shipped off to New York like a piece of inventory.
He reached into his bag to pull out his thermodynamics textbook.
It wasn’t supposed to be here.
He frowned.
He distinctly remembered leaving it on the desk in Ivy’s room
