Chapter 1
Maya
The laminated edge of the badge presses into my palm where I'm gripping it inside my coat pocket.Maya Maddox, Editor-in-Chief, Briarcliff Chronicle.Eight hundred words are due by six, and all I've fucking written is fourteen words, not one of them the opening.
My breath fogs in front of me. Salt crusts the walkways where the plows pushed snow into gray banks, and the February air slips under my collar, finding the bare strip above my scarf.
I pass the arena on the quad's east side. The lights are still on inside, the fluorescent glare spilling through the high windows. As I approach the rink-level service door, a delivery kid has it propped open with his hip, angling a stacked dolly of shrink-wrapped cases through the narrow gap. Air off the rink carries that chemical tang of frozen water, and underneath it comes thedeep grind of blades. Practice should be over, but a shot cracks against the crossbar, hard enough that my hand closes tighter around the badge. My stride stutters for a half-step before I force it even again.
I keep my eyes locked on the path, but my coat feels too tight across my chest, and the badge is digging into my palm hard enough to leave a mark.
My next step falters.
Through the narrow opening, I catch a slice of rink—blue boards, white ice, a net dark at the far end. Dante stands at the center line, stick balanced across his shoulders, hands draped over either end. He's looking straight at the door, straight at me.
All that fucking distance, and he finds the gap, catches me mid-step on the path. The look holds for three full seconds, long enough for my breath to jam behind my ribs, before he turns and skates toward the bench, his posture square beneath the pads.
The pulse at my throat kicks harder, and metal floods the back of my tongue, sharp as winter air. I swallow once. The taste thins. I force a count—eight in, eight out—until the air goes down clean.
I keep walking. The path takes me past the door, and I tuck my chin like that can hide me.
I try the lede in my head.The Titans' senior class has outscored every recruiting cohort in the program's history. More injuries, more suspensions, more sealed disciplinary files than any class before them. Five players, one semester left, and the program needs them perfect.
The sealed files don't match the dates. And I'm still missing the goddamn stat line from today's scrimmage.
Cole waits on the bench outside Aldrich, shoulders rounded in the way they always are after practice, feet planted, forearms braced on his thighs, a second cup already marking my spot sixinches from the edge. His cell lies facedown on the slat between us.
He looks up when my boots crunch on the path. Half-second read—bag, face, done. After a beat, he grins at me, wide and unhurried, all teeth.
"I've been here four fucking minutes," he says. "Your coffee's cold."
"Then you should have timed it better."
"Yeah, no shit. I timed it perfectly. You're late."
"I'm exactly on time. You're early. There's a difference."
I sit. Fourteen inches of bench between us. The iron bites through my coat and into the backs of my thighs. When I pick up the cup, I recognize it from the cart near the science building—green awning, too far from this bench to be convenient. He walked the extra distance. I drink, and it's lukewarm. He bought it long enough ago for the heat to fade. My fingers tighten around the cardboard sleeve before I make them stop.
"Practice run long?"
"Addison's trying to fucking kill us before Cornell gets the chance." He rolls his neck. The chain necklace catches the flat winter light, links shifting against the hollow of his throat. I watch the movement. "Standard February bullshit."
The sweatshirt sleeves are pushed to his elbows, and the ink on his forearms surfaces where the fabric rides up: geometric shapes I've studied before, the compass rose on his left wrist. His hair is almost dry, curling at the temples with the last dampness. He should be freezing. Somehow, locker-room heat still rolls off him, and I can feel the contrast from here.
His sandalwood soap layers over arena ice, the shampoo he hasn't switched from since freshman year. His knee is angled toward me, has been since I sat down, a few degrees off center. The heat of him reaches me through two layers of clothing, a strip of warmth along my left side from shoulder to elbow. Myother side stays at the temperature of the bench. Two inches the other way would put it out of reach. I don't take the two inches.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I pull it out.
Mom: How's your week going, sweetheart? Tell Cole I love him, and he better be eating real food. Call me tonight?
Cole watches while I read it, his chin level, his gaze dropped to the screen with the same easy access he's had for nine years. I keep my eyes on the message until the words blur.
Me: We're good. I'll tell him. Love you.
Mom: Love you more. Both of you. Be safe.
I turn the phone facedown on my thigh.
