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The thing about bombs is you never hear the one that gets you—until it’s already detonated.

We’re midway through power play drills when the first phone buzzes. Then another. Then twenty more, a symphony of notifications that cuts through the sound of pucks on ice. Players slow, confused, as Coach blows the whistle.

“What the hell is going on?”

Weston’s already checking his phone, face shifting from curiosity to shock to something that looks like pity when his eyes find me.

“Nic,” he says quietly. Too quietly.

“What?”

He hands me his phone, and the world tilts off its axis.

The photo is grainy, obviously taken from distance with a long lens. But it’s clear enough. Me and Chelsea outside the team hotel in Minneapolis three weeks ago. My hand on her lower back. Her face turned up to mine. The space between us nonexistent, intimate, damning.

The headline screams: OUTLAWS THERAPIST IN SECRET AFFAIR WITH TROUBLED PLAYER

“Fuck.”

The word escapes as more phones light up. Group texts. Social media alerts. The story spreading like wildfire through the team, the organization, the world. I look around at faces shifting from shock to judgment to careful neutrality.

“Hendrix!” Coach’s voice cracks like a whip. “My office. NOW.”

But I’m not looking at him. I’m looking through the glass to the elevated viewing area where Chelsea stands frozen, face white as the ice beneath my skates. Maddy’s beside her, phone pressed to her ear, already in crisis mode.

Our eyes meet across the distance. In hers, I see everything—terror, regret, apology, and underneath it all, the same desperate want that’s been killing us both. Then she turns and disappears, probably running like always.

“HENDRIX!”

I tear my gaze away, skating off the ice on legs that feel disconnected from my body. The walk to Coach’s office is a perp walk, every staff member staring, whispering, already choosing sides.

Patricia’s already there when I arrive, laptop open, damage assessment in progress. Coach slams the door hard enough to rattle the certificates on his wall.

“Tell me this is fake,” he says.

“Which part?”

“Don’t.” Patricia’s voice is sharp. “Do not play games right now. Is this photo real?”

I could lie. Could claim it’s doctored, taken out of context, anything but what it obviously is. But I’m tired of lies. Tired of pretending. Tired of everything except the truth.

“It’s real.”

“Jesus Christ.” Coach sinks into his chair. “How long?”

“Define ‘how long.’”

“Hendrix—”

“Two years ago. Vegas. Before she worked here. Then nothing until...” I pause, calculating how much truth to reveal. “Recently.”

“Recently,” Patricia repeats. “While she was your therapist. While you were in mandated treatment. While her father is your coach.”

“Yes.”

“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” Coach’s control finally cracks. “The position you’ve put this team in? Her career? My reputation?”

“I know.”

“Do you? Because from where I’m sitting, you’ve destroyed a brilliant young woman’s career for—what? Because you couldn’t keep it in your pants?”

“It’s not like that.”

“Then tell me what it’s like.” Patricia leans forward. “Help me understand why you’d risk everything—your career, hers, this team’s stability—for an affair.”

“It’s not an affair.” The words come out rough. “It’s...”

Everything. It’s everything.

“It’s complicated,” I finish weakly.

“Complicated.” Coach laughs, but it’s ugly. “You know what else is complicated? The lawsuit her father could file. The ethics investigation she’ll face. The media circus that’s about to descend.”

My phone buzzes. A text from a number I don’t recognize.

Unknown: This is just the beginning. More photos coming unless we can reach an arrangement.

“Shit.” I show them the message. “Someone’s trying to blackmail us.”

Patricia’s expression goes deadly. “Forward that to me immediately. Do not respond. Do not engage.” She types rapidly. “I need to coordinate with Maddy, legal, and PR. Coach, we need all players off social media immediately. No comments to press.”

“What about Chelsea?” I ask.

“Dr. Clark,” Coach corrects coldly, “is no longer your concern.”

“Bullshit. This affects her more than—”

“You’re suspended.” The words hit like a slap shot. “Effective immediately. Pending investigation into conduct detrimental to the team.”

“Coach—”

“Get out. Security will escort you to clean out your locker. You’re banned from team facilities until further notice.”

“You can’t—”

“I can and I am.” He stands, every inch the authority figure who owns my career. “You wanted to play with fire, Hendrix? Congratulations. You burned it all down.”

I stand slowly, rage and regret warring in my chest. At the door, I pause.

“For what it’s worth,” I say quietly, “she tried to stay away. This is on me.”

“No,” Patricia says, already deep in crisis mode. “This is on both of you.”

Security’s waiting outside—Jenkins, who’s worked here twenty years and used to sneak me extra ice time as a rookie. He can’t meet my eyes as we walk to the locker room.

The team’s still on the ice, but support staff lines the hallways, phones out, documenting my walk of shame. Tomorrow it’ll be on every sports blog—” Hendrix Escorted Out After Scandal Breaks.”

In the locker room, I pack mechanically. Gear that’s been my life for eight years shoved into bags like evidence. My nameplate above the stall, my number, my existence here—all about to be erased because I couldn’t stay away from the one person who was off limits.

My phone buzzes constantly—reporters, teammates, numbers I don’t recognize. I ignore them all, focused on one thing: Chelsea’s still in the building somewhere, facing her own reckoning.

I’m almost to the exit when Weston appears, still in full gear.

“Don’t,” I warn.

“Wasn’t going to lecture.” He falls into step beside me. “Just wanted to say—I get it.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I saw how you looked at her. How she looked at you.” He pauses. “Sometimes the heart wants what it wants, consequences be damned.”

“Tell that to her career.”

“Nic—”

“I’ve got to go.” Security’s getting impatient. “Take care of the boys. And if you see her...”

“Yeah?”

But I don’t know how to finish. Tell her I’m sorry? That it was worth it? That I’d do it all again?

“Just make sure she’s okay,” I finish.

Outside, media vans are already gathering. I pull my cap low, duck into my car, and drive away from the only life I’ve known. My phone rings—Jerry, my agent, probably having seventeen heart attacks.

I don’t answer. Instead, I pull up the photo that’s destroying everything. Study it like game tape, looking for clues. Minneapolis. Three weeks ago. The night after a brutal loss when Chelsea happened to be at the team hotel for an away series.

We’d argued in the hallway about boundaries, about staying away. Then somehow ended up outside, her shivering in the cold while I tried to convince her that what we had was worth the risk.

The photo caught the moment I broke through her defenses. The moment before she kissed me like drowning. Before she pushed me away and ran back inside, leaving me in the Minnesota cold.

Someone was watching. Waiting. Building a file to use against us.

My phone rings again. This time, it’s her.

I stare at her name and let it go to voicemail. What could we possibly say now? The bomb’s exploded. The casualties are being counted.

She doesn’t leave a message.

At my apartment, I pour a drink I don’t touch and watch my life implode in real-time on social media. The takes are brutal. I’m a predator who targeted vulnerable staff. She’s an opportunist who seduced a player. We’re both symbols of everything wrong with professional sports.

None of them know the truth. That she made me want to be better. That I made her want to be real. That we fell in love in all the wrong ways at all the wrong times.

Another unknown number texts.

Unknown: 48 hours to respond or the equipment shed photos go wide.

Equipment shed. Where she came undone in my arms. Where we stopped pretending for fifteen desperate minutes.

I forward it to Patricia and pour another drink I won’t touch. Outside, snow starts falling, covering Chicago in white like it’s trying to hide our sins.

Somewhere in this city, Chelsea’s facing her own destruction. Her father. The board. The death of everything she worked for.

All because I couldn’t stay away.

All because she couldn’t either.

The house of cards we built so carefully has collapsed, and we’re both buried in the rubble.