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Veskar’s grin widened. “Sure you didn’t.”

He let the silence stretch, watching me. Waiting.

“She’s Crim’s sister, apparently,” he finally said. “They adopted her when her parents died.” He said it casually, as if it wasn’t a grenade rolling across the floor between us. “She’s a doctor.”

Crim didn’t talk about her often, but when he did, his words held a protective edge that made it clear she was off-limits in every way that mattered. His sister. Not by blood, but by choice. Which, in orc culture, made it more significant than blood.

Crim was one of the few people on this team who didn’t look at me and see only the brute in the net. He asked how I was doing, and he meant it. He treated me like I was more than the weapon Coach sent out to intimidate the other team.

I didn’t have many people in my life like that.

None, actually.

I wasn’t going to blow that up for a woman at a party, not even one who’d made my chest do things I still didn’t have words for.

Veskar pushed off the wall, his smile showing how pleased he was with himself.

“Relax, Kedish.” He smacked me on the arm as he passed. “I’ll let you know how it goes.”

He strolled away, whistling through his tusks.

I stared at the empty hallway where she’d disappeared before making myself move.

The locker room smelled like sweat. Tolrek was already there, unlacing his skates. He didn’t look up when I walked in, but he nodded once in acknowledgment.

Good. I didn’t want to talk.

We’d just finished practice. I’d already removed my pads, gloves, and outer gear and handed them off to the staff. They would clean them and hang them to dry. But I still wore the sweaty stuff underneath, plus a hoodie I’d thrown on after removing my outer gear.

I peeled off my hoodie and the compression shirt underneath, then my pants, and tossed everything into the laundry bucket.

I’d come off the ice sweaty and half-feral, yanking everything off before limping out into the hallway, where Veskar had cornered me with a few questions.

I headed for the shower, where I hoped I could make my brain shut off. I kept picturing the end-of-the-season picnic ten months ago. The sun had been shining, and even though we’d lost in the second round of playoffs, I’d felt good. Like the world had been dipped in honey. Paper lanterns had been strung between trees, and they swayed in the light breeze. Food covered the tables, and my teammates and their families were drinking and laughing and pretending the season hadn’t just ended with a loss.

I’d been holding court near the grills, telling some story I didn’t remember now. The usual show I put on for cover. Make them laugh. Keep it light. Don’t let them see past the grin.

Ellie walked straight up to me as if she’d decided I was worth her time and she’d come to collect.

Women approached me all the time. It came with the territory: the size, the tusks, and the reputation. Some wanted a thrill. Others wanted a story. Some just wanted to say they’d bagged the brutal goalie everyone gossiped about.

Ellie coming up to me hadn’t seemed like that. It felt like she’d looked around the whole damn pavilion full of players, coaches, staff, and their families, and picked me.

While she stood there teasing me about god complexes, I’d been two seconds from asking her if she wanted to get together sometime soon.

Then I saw Crim, scowling from where he sat at a picnic table.

She was the sister, the one he talked about all the time. She was at school, finishing an advanced degree.

She was off-limits before I even saw her face.

I could’ve played dumb and pretended I didn’t know who she was. But Crim was one of the good ones. He didn’t treat me like I was a blunt instrument. He saw past the reputation everyone else clung to.

So I shut her down fast.

“That’s cute.” I didn’t even finish the thought. Just turned away, acting dismissive, like she was background noise I couldn’t be bothered with.

Dismay had flickered across her face, then the walls came up. She’d forced a laugh and said something I didn’t catch because my pulse was throbbing too loud in my ears.