Iced Out

Chapter 2: The Captain’s Eyes

COLE

The ice was the only place the noise stopped.

Out here, there were no ringing phones, no final notices from bookies, no reporters asking invasive questions about a legacy I was barely holding together. Out here, there was only the cold burn in my lungs, the scrape of steel cutting frozen water, and the heavy, comforting weight of the puck on my stick.

I took a pass from Dmitri, feeling the familiar, brutal rhythm of the practice settle into my bones. I didn’t have to think. I just had to execute.

“Again!” Coach Brentwood barked from center ice, his whistle piercing the chilled air.

I pivoted, sending a spray of shaved ice flying as I dug my edges in. But as I turned, my eyes flicked up to the glass-walled viewing box perched above the lower bowl.

Diane was standing there. That wasn’t unusual; the PR piranha practically lived to watch us sweat. But it was the woman standing next to her that made my jaw clench.

She stood out like a lit match in a dark room. Dark auburn hair pulled back so tight it looked painful, framing a pale, sharply contoured face. She wore a tailored black suit that screamed corporate, but the way she held herself, spine ramrod straight, chin tipped up in a gesture of pure, clinical defiance, didn’t belong in a front office.

*Another suit,* I thought, irritation flaring hot in my chest. *Another babysitter from Management.*

I drifted toward the boards, my breathing heavy, wiping a layer of sweat from my brow with the back of my glove. I pushed my helmet up, letting the cold air hit my face, and stared directly at her.

Usually, when I gave front-office staff that look, the dead, flat stare that had earned me a reputation as the most unapproachable bastard in the league, they looked away. They checked their phones. They coughed.

She didn’t do any of those things.

Through the thick pane of reinforced glass, her eyes locked onto mine. Even from twenty feet below, I could tell they were green. Not a soft, mossy green, but a sharp, calculating emerald. She didn’t flinch. She didn’t blush. She just crossed her arms over her chest and held my gaze, analyzing me like I was a puzzle she had already figured out how to take apart.

A low hum of adrenaline, entirely separate from the hockey drill, buzzed at the base of my skull. It wasn’t just annoyance. It was a threat response.

“Hey, Cap!” Jake Morrison’s voice grated over the ice as he skated up beside me, slapping his stick against the boards. Jake was my backup captain, and he never missed an opportunity to remind everyone that he was waiting for me to step down. He followed my line of sight to the glass box. A slow, slick smile spread across his face. “Looks like they finally brought in the new shrink. Not bad to look at. Think she needs a tour of the locker room?”

“Keep your head on the ice, Morrison,” I snapped, my voice freezing over. “Before I put you into the glass.”

Jake chuckled, unfazed, and skated off to join the defensive line.

I tore my eyes away from the green-eyed woman in the box and pushed off the boards. I needed to move. I needed the violence of the drill to burn off the sudden, irrational tightness in my chest.

“Line up! Breakaway drills!” Coach yelled.

I took my position. Dmitri fed me the puck. I exploded forward, crossing the blue line with a burst of speed that left the rookie defenseman stumbling backward. I dropped my shoulder, faked right, and pulled the puck sharply to my left to load up a backhand shot.

*Snap.*

It wasn’t a sound. It was a sensation. A white-hot, jagged wire of agony ripped through my left shoulder joint, radiating all the way down to my fingertips.

I didn’t miss the shot. The puck still sailed past the goalie’s ear and hit the back of the net. But the follow-through was wrong. My left arm dropped a fraction of a second too early. To compensate for the blinding pain, I subconsciously shifted my weight, stiffening my spine and letting my right side take the brunt of the deceleration as I hit the brakes.

To the rookies, to Coach Brentwood, to Jake, it looked like a flawless, aggressive finish.

I skated a slow circle behind the net, rolling my left shoulder backward under my pads to work the joint back into place. *Breathe in. Breathe out. Bury it.* If the team knew the captain was playing with a torn rotator cuff, it would be blood in the water. If Management knew, they’d bench me. And if I was benched, I couldn’t pay my dead brother’s debts.

I took a deep breath, the pain fading to its usual dull, throbbing ache, and started to skate back to the center line.

As I glided past the viewing box, I looked up on instinct.

Diane was already walking toward the door, checking her phone. But the woman, the shrink, was still standing at the glass.

Our eyes met again. But this time, she wasn’t looking at my face. Her gaze was tracking down, fixated entirely on my left arm. Her brow was slightly furrowed, her head tilted a fraction of an inch to the side.

My blood ran cold.

*She saw it.*

She hadn’t just watched the goal; she had watched the mechanics of my body. She saw the hesitation. She saw the weight shift. I could see the clinical realization blooming in those sharp green eyes.

I slowed my skating, my jaw locking so hard my teeth ached. I stared up at her, an unspoken warning hanging in the frozen air between us. *Don’t you dare.*

She didn’t blink. She just pulled a sleek silver pen from the pocket of her blazer, clicked it open, and wrote a single line on the notepad in her hand. Then, she turned on her sensible heels and walked out of the box, leaving me staring at the empty glass.

I gripped my stick until my knuckles turned white under my gloves.

Dr. Calloway wasn’t just another front-office babysitter. She was a sniper. And she had just put a target directly on my back.