Breakneck Hockey (Heartbreak Hockey #3)

32. Penalty Box

Chapter 32

Penalty Box

Casey

S itting in the locker room, I don’t talk to anyone. I follow my brother around like a lost cat. Once again, he has to be here for me, deal with my problems, when it should be the other way around.

Does the team know I’m on my way out? Do they know I’m boyfriends with Boston’s first-line right-winger? Do they know I’m the worst twin brother ever to live? Worse, he might pay for my mistakes. I’m gonna do my damnedest not to let that happen. I plan to feed myself to the bureaucratic hockey wolves and at least salvage my brother’s hockey career. I’m the one who blatantly disregarded everything Milton said. I danced on the grave of his good intentions. I’ll pay for that, not Stacey.

Speaking of my boyfriend, what the fuck happened to him? He should have texted me by now. I know I’m kind of a dick for bailing on our flight together, but I couldn’t take another fight. We already fought so much yesterday morning. I needed to figure my shit out. Or so I thought. Turns out, I’m not so good at that. All I did between stressing over my position on the hockey team and my brother’s love life, was regret not sitting next to Sutter on the plane.

God damn it. This is a mess.

“You ready for this, Case?” Stacey bumps me with his elbow.

“Oh, yeah. I’m fucking ready. Let me at Boston.” At least there’s that. Pounding the shit out of Boston is the one joy I have left.

On the Ice

M y face-off is with Sutter. Because why wouldn’t it be? That’s how karma works. He nods his head like the cocky motherfucker he is and makes a kissy face. I don’t wait for the puck drop, I check Sutter with my stick—yeah, that’s called foreshadowing. That’s how the rest of this game’s gonna go.

Sutter chucks his stick to the side, lunging. Desperate whistles repeat themselves, but we ignore them, already out for blood, and we won’t be satisfied until we get it. I won’t be satisfied until I’ve taken a piece of him. There’s a crack against my helmet—that’s got to smart the knuckles—and two refs pull him off me.

We’re dragged to the penalty box for roughing, though I’m sure the refs wish there was a better name for what we just did.

Also, maybe the penalty boxes for opposing teams shouldn’t be side by fucking side. Yeah, sure, there’s a space in the middle with some dudes in suits that technically separates us, but he’s right there.

I slam my hand on the glass and climb the bench so I can yell at him. “Get used to the way the game looks from behind the glass, Sutter.”

He spreads his arms wide in a “bring it” gesture as the suited man inside coaxes me down from the bench.

The refs have their eyes glued to us. We’re not gonna get away with our usual, so the brawls have to be worth it. Though, even I can admit that I’ve kinda lost the plot. I’m supposed to be helping my team win a hockey game, instead, I’m engaged in a war with my asshole boyfriend.

Why? Because I don’t know where I stand with him, and I can’t ask him like an adult. I want to punish him for leaving any room for doubt.

This is exactly why Sutter and I shouldn’t be allowed to have a relationship. We don’t know how to use our words until after we’ve pounded the shit out of each other. We escalate the smallest shit until we don’t know why we began fighting in the first place and we’re just two testosterone-filled cavemen, duking it out on the ice.

You’d think knowing what your issues were would help you find a solution. It doesn’t. All it does is bring understanding to why you do it. Your issues have to be a problem of major concern to even begin to want to change. Changing a deep-rooted pattern that you get pleasure from, even if it sometimes results in a bloodbath, is a near-to-impossible task. It’s our pattern. How we operate. We’re aggressive people and we need to let off steam in a physical way. It’s what makes us right for one another.

So long as all that breaks are my knuckles across Sutter’s face, I don’t see fit to change us.

But now my damn heart is involved, and it’s lighting my veins with cool fury. Sutter was supposed to understand me enough to chase me. He was supposed to understand me enough to fix the ache in my heart by being there, even when I’m a confused squirrel.

He’s not supposed to leave me to my own devices. How many times is it gonna take for him to learn?

I get banned from face-offs. No one says that, but I’m not given the opportunity. Stacey is, though, and damn, he’s a demon tonight. I guess that whole thing with Dash has fueled him. He cuts across the ice with the razor edge of Messier and the grace of Gretzky. Unfortunately, heartbreak is good for his hockey career. He scores two goals in the first period.

Meanwhile, I’m—apparently—doing my best to sink what’s left of my hockey career into the gutter. Sutter and I are on each other. I’ve succeeded in pissing him off enough to trigger his retaliation instincts, which are also known as his “teach Alderchuck a lesson” instincts.

Sometimes the refs let us fight, other times they send us straight to the box. We’re both spitting blood by the time the first period comes to a close, but thankfully not chicklets. I’ve somehow managed to keep all my teeth, no matter how many hockey brawls I’ve been in.

“Are you gonna be alright, brother?” Stacey says. I’m stewing in the locker room, choking down some electrolytes while the right side of my face swells, thanks to Sutter’s southpaw.

Him worrying about me pisses me off more. He shouldn’t have to do that. I should be the one asking him that. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine. You look like you were run over by a fist. Oh right, you were.”

“Ha, ha.”

He huffs a sigh. “You’re in love with him.”

“I want to ruin his perfect smile.”

“If you did, you woulda done so by now. You love his smile.”

I guess. But only because he doesn’t smile a lot. Sutter forgot how to smile.

Because he lost his first best friend—his dad—when he was a little boy. My heart squeezes for him.

“It’s part of why you’re so mad at him,” Stacey says. “He’s got the potential to rip your heart to shreds. This situation with the ‘you know what’ has your mind spinning in that direction, doesn’t it? Because you know how quickly and unexpectedly someone you love can be taken away, so you wanna push it all away. You’re tryna push him away hard out there.”

“Clearly, he’s not getting the message.”

“And you wouldn’t want him to.” My brother leans over top of me, his shadow casting its darkness over my ire as if maybe it could swallow it away. “Picture it. You needling Sutter and him not responding.”

I try, but it’s impossible. I can’t picture a time where he hasn’t responded to my on-ice badgering. Nor me his. That’s a thing that will never be. It’s something I can always count on. My lips twitch, threatening to smile.

I can always count on it.

The smile never happens. I frown instead. “He didn’t respond to my off-ice needling.” I didn’t do it on purpose, exactly, but I expected a reaction when I sent him that text. A big reaction. Instead, I got nothing.

Or wait.

Maybe he finally got it. I remember his “bring it on” attitude when we got our first penalty tonight. He was telling me to give him my worst because he’ll never back down, and that he’ll never end our dance.

Well, fuck. I might have to call that Sutter romantic.

Okay, cue the return of my smile. Bet Sutter’s actually super turned on right now from all the fighting.

Stacey squeezes my shoulder. “There you go. You got it.”

I stand up so I can crush the life out of him with a hug. “Thanks, Stace. I’m gonna totally annihilate Sutter next period.”

A throat clears. “No, you’re not.” That’s from an official-looking dude who’s stepped into the locker room. “You’re out of this game.”

“What? You can’t kick me out during intermission. That’s not a thing.”

“It’s not something that happens, but there’s nothing that says it can’t happen. It’s for the best, before you end up with a criminal assault charge.”

Fuck my life, but it’s just as well. Once I meet with the owners, I’m done anyway. I’m just a violent sex fiend. Better to go out with a blaze of glory.

“Case—” Stacey says.

I shake my head. “It’s fine. I did this, I need to pay the consequences.”

Still a piss off, though. I storm out of the dressing room and out of the stadium with no clear idea of where I’m going or what I’m gonna do next.