Page 12

Jacob

“What the fuck is wrong with you?”

Hayes is shoveling cereal into his mouth like it’s his last meal, with a face as long as my dick. His usual morning cheerfulness is missing, and he doesn’t look up from the table at my question.

I narrow my eyes. “That study group get you down?”

“More like the pussy turned sour,” Shawn says, buttering toast at the counter.

I’m watching Hayes when Shawn speaks, and his shoulders tighten at the joke. I thought Shawn was poking fun last night, but maybe his suggestion was closer to the truth than Hayes’ explanation. Who studies after a hockey game when there is beer to drink and girls to fuck?

“Seriously, dude. You should have come out with us last night.”

“The party was jumping,” Shawn says. “Not that Jacob noticed. He disappeared upstairs before we’d even found the keg.”

I don’t smile at the memory. The girl was pretty and sweet, and the sex was decent. By the time I was halfway through, my head had been pounding so hard that I could barely keep a rhythm, and when I came, I thought I was going to have a stroke. I managed to toss the condom and swallow some pills, but it’s only temporary relief. It always comes back, and then I’m hunting for more pain relief. Sometimes it feels like I’m close to losing everything that keeps me sane.

Who would I even be if I can’t play hockey or fuck?

My fingertips twitch. It’s like I’m gripping onto the edge of a cliff, barely holding on. But I have to, for my brothers and our fucking legacy.

Hayes grunts, misery rolling off him in waves, and my frustration percolates. We don’t keep secrets, but my brother’s silence over something I know nothing about has revealed an unpleasant truth. Maybe Hayes is keeping secrets.

You keep secrets, too, my conscience whispers, but I hear it loud and clear. I keep secrets when they’re for the collective good. There are certain things my brothers are better off knowing.

But whatever is going on with Hayes doesn’t fall into that category, and I don’t like the fissure opening between us.

“Is it a girl?” I ask. “Because, if it is, just spill the beans, dude. We’re not here to judge. We’re your brothers.”

Hayes looks up and narrows his blue eyes, his unshaven jaw giving his dark expression an additional layer of gloom. “Just leave it, okay. Can’t I have a morning to myself when I’m not having to put on a fucking show?”

“A show?” Is that what he usually does?

His big hand swipes over the lower part of his face, rasping against his stubble, and he goes back to eating, ignoring my question. I shoot Shawn a confused look, and he shrugs, none the wiser.

This isn’t good.

Footsteps thud against the wood floor in the den, and Malik appears shirtless in the doorway, rubbing his close-cropped hair. The dude is ripped and huge, so I’ve no idea how he managed to sleep on our couch last night. “How’s it hanging, Draytons?” he asks, flopping into a free chair.

“Long and limp right now,” Shawn says, staring down at his groin. “But thankfully, it’s only a temporary state of being.”

“You got more toast?” Malik eyes Shawn’s plate. His uneaten breakfast is shoved across the table, and he stands to find more bread.

Malik takes a huge bite, licking butter crumbs from his lips as he chews. He’s eating and scrolling through his phone simultaneously, and he’s as good at multitasking off the ice as he is when he’s padded up. He grins and then laughs out loud. “You guys ever watch Icing the Cake ?”

“What the fuck’s that? One of those shitty Netflix baking competitions?” Our mom used to watch those, along with a ton of other mindless bullshit. I take a gulp of coffee, still watching Hayes, who continues to appear lost in his own world.

“Nah. It’s this hockey channel, except it’s about baking, too?”

“What’s about baking?” Buttons appears with his hair sticking up on one side and his chest bare. He ruffles his hair like he’s trying to put it right, but it only makes him look more like a crazy scientist on the brink of a breakthrough. He leans against the counter, eyeing the pot of coffee.

“Help yourself,” Shawn says, pushing an empty mug toward him.

“Hockey and baking?” Hayes’s confusion reflects my own.

“Yeah. She’s funny as fuck. Making cakes that look like dicks and her commentary about hockey bros is on point.”

“Oh, yeah?”

Malik nods, raising his eyebrows. “You’ve been featured.”

“What?”

He turns his phone to show me, and I snatch it out of his hands, turning the volume up so I can hear what’s being said over the footage of me. It’s not exactly flattering. Shawn almost inhales a chunk of bread and washes it down awkwardly with gulps of lukewarm coffee. “Shit, dude. She called you out.”

I swipe to the next episode, and we all listen. It’s about hockey players using underhand tactics in their dating lives. She’s clever, I’ll give her that. Then a picture of my brothers and me pops up, and I grimace. “Sounds personal,” I say. “Like some hockey bro pissed her off, and now she’s railing against all of us.”

“Yeah.” Malik’s attention drifts over Hayes’ hunched form. “Did you check out the comments? So many women with stories to tell.”

I flick through, reading some and shaking my head. “Dude’s need to improve their off-ice game,” I say. “Who the fuck needs to tell lies to get girls into bed? I’d never do that shit.”

“Not everyone’s as pretty as you.” Malik rests back on the chair, cupping the back of his neck with his palms.

“Only most of the people in this room.” I raise my eyebrows, and he laughs. If anything, Malik has an attractive edge on us with his smooth brown skin, angelic smile, and ultra-white teeth. He’s like a young Tyson Beckford.

He places his hand over his heart. “You wound me, Jay.”

“Fuck off.”

I hand back his phone, still smarting over the comments about my on-ice performance. Is it so transparent that I’m struggling with Skarsgard? If it is, I need to improve my poker face. And hope that Skarsgard isn’t tuning into the commentary of random women online.

“What the fuck is up with you?” Malik shoves Hayes’ shoulder, earning himself a furious look. “That girl you were with last night didn’t put out?”

“I was right!” Shawn yells, making me jump.

“What girl?”

Hayes turns into a statue of himself, spoon hovering between the bowl and his mouth.

“A blonde.” Malik holds up his phone to an Instagram post of a woman sandwiched between two football players. Snatching the phone back, I squint at the picture, finding the clear outline of my brother in the background, curved over a blonde. I can’t make out anything other than her hair color because Hayes’ big head and huge body obscure everything else.

“Who’s the girl?”

As the words leave my lips, Hayes stands, shoving the chair back so hard it skitters across the tiled floor. In three strides, he’s out of the room and stomping up the stairs.

“Who the fuck pissed in his Cheerios this morning?” Malik asks. We all focus on the space Hayes has left empty. The half-eaten bowl of Cheerios stares back.

“The dude took his spoon with him.” Shawn pulls the bowl towards him and tips the remaining milk and cereal into his mouth with zero finesse.

Buttons wastes no time in taking a seat, slurping his coffee like a toddler.

“Who turned this place into a zoo overnight?” I scowl, but my attention drifts back to the door and the image of Hayes’ retreating form. My brother is keeping secrets. Secrets that are making him miserable, and I need to get to the bottom of what’s going on.

***

Practice is grueling. Hayes is like a stranger, skating as though his body’s present but his soul is absent. Coach Thornton is determined to extract blood, and the team grinds through drills without any flare. It’s brutal.

In the locker room, Hayes slumps next to me, unfastening his skates viciously. His face is set in an unfamiliar scowl, and for the first time, I don’t know how to approach my own brother. In the end, I go with the direct approach because the pain in my head has constricted like a wire wrapped across my temples, tightening, tightening, tightening.

“Secrets, Hayes. You seriously going to let that shit between us?”

Hayes shoves his skate into his bag, muttering something under his breath. When he looks at me again, his jaw is tight. “It’s none of your business, Jacob.”

“You’re my brother. Everything is my business.”

Hayes stands up now, towering over me like he thinks it’s going to make me back down. I don’t bother standing to remind him that I’m six-two and the inches he has on me are negligible.

He doesn’t respond, and when Lindsey calls my name, reminding me that I have physio time, the issue is left unresolved.

The tension follows me to the physio. By the time I sit on the treatment table, I’m wound so tightly I can barely sit still. The therapist, Lindsay, gives me her usual once-over, clipboard in hand, scanning my almost naked body. This part of hockey life has always made my body feel like a machine that needs oiling, less a part of me and more like a functional implement Coach wields every game.

“Anything bothering you today?” she asks, pen poised like she’s ready to make a huge list.

“My shoulder.” I roll it to illustrate, wincing a little. “It’s stiff on this side.”

Lindsay nods, making a note. “All right. Lay down, and we’ll work on loosening it up.”

I rest face down on the massage table as she smooths her hands over my tight muscles, searching for the tension and knots, assessing the sore spots before using pressure to ease the pain. Her hands are stronger than they should be for such a small woman, and it hurts, but in a good way, as if my body senses that this is what it needs to recover fully and get back to peak play.

With her hands on me and my endorphins flying, the nagging thud in my head lessons a little, especially when her fingers kneed the corded muscles in my neck.

“You’re really tight here. You stressed out?”

All the fucking time.

“Not really. Except when Coach is railing me.”

“He has a special way with words.”

We both laugh lightly, and she taps my shoulder. “Turn over.”

I follow her instructions, fixing my gaze on the ceiling while her hands work into the tight muscles around my jaw and across the front of my shoulders. Her fingers press and knead, their rhythm grounding me, and for a little while, the buzzing of the air conditioning becomes my only focus. The headache fades into the background, along with the thoughts of Hayes, the looming game, and the pressure to both shine and let Skarsgard succeed for the sake of the team.

When her warm palms leave my skin, the cool air brushes against me, snapping me out of the haze. “All done.” She pats my shoulder. “Try to relax more. Let go of some of that stress. Your shoulders shouldn’t live up by your ears.”

“Yeah,” I mumble, sitting up and leaning forward to test how much relief her work has given me. My shoulders are loose, but the dull ache in my head stirs again, creeping back like a shadow I can’t escape. I brace myself for the coming pain, plastering on a smile that’s more practiced than real.

“Thanks,” I tell her, my voice steady even as my head pounds with renewed insistence. I act like everything’s fine because that’s what I do—it’s what I’ve always done.

But my mind’s already spinning again, about Hayes and the game tonight. The voice in my head that undermines everything I’m trying to achieve, and the damn headache I can’t shake, are a heap of bullshit crowding me from every corner.

I step out of the physio room, rolling my shoulders. The fluorescent hallway lights seem brighter than usual, forcing me to squint, worsening the thump, thump, thump in my skull as I head back to the locker room. Most of the guys are long gone, their banter and laughter replaced by the echo of my footsteps. The empty space is heavier somehow, pressing in on me.

I grab my bag and sit on the bench, running my hands over my face. I know I should say something about my head—maybe to Lindsay, maybe to Coach—but the thought of being pulled from the lineup is worse than the pain. And it’s been like this for months. How would I explain keeping it from them for so long? We’ve got a big week ahead, and I can’t afford to be sidelined. Not now. Not when the real risk is being told I can never play again.

The sound of the door creaking open pulls me from my thoughts. Hayes strides back in, his face still set in a hard, unreadable way that’s so unlike him. For a second, I think he’s going to ignore me, but he stops a few feet away, crossing his arms.

“You’re still here?” he asks.

“Yeah,” I mutter, standing up and unzipping my bag. “Physio. Had some knots to work out.”

Hayes shifts his weight, glancing at the floor like he’s deciding whether to say something. Finally, he exhales sharply and looks back at me.

“Look,” he says, his tone softer than before. “About earlier... I didn’t mean to blow you off. I just—” He breaks off, dragging a hand through his hair. “It’s complicated, all right?”

I shrug, trying to play it cool. “Yeah, sure.”

His eyes lock on mine. “It’s... personal.”

For a moment, I don’t know what to say. I want to push him, to demand more, but his firm tone makes me pause.

“All right,” I say finally, my voice quiet. I want to unleash my disappointment, but I don’t have the strength to warn Hayes that this is just the start. If he lets a woman come between us, there’ll be nothing left. Hasn’t he learned anything from our mother? I want to remind him I’ve got his back. I love him and will always put him first, but his eyes are shuttered, and the lines around his mouth tense.

Hayes studies me for a long moment before sniffing and blowing out a breath. He turns to leave, and I watch his broad back fill the doorway and then disappear.

He’s my baby brother, and the connection between us has always been strong. Who and what is coming between us now?

I take more pills, craving the oblivion of a nice, tight pussy and the pleasure that wipes away all my tension for just a little while. It’s so fucked up that sex, something that should be about pleasure, has twisted into a way for me to forget about life, and reassure myself that I’ve still got what it takes.

I don’t stick around for much longer, dressing and gathering my things. When I step outside, the chilled air slaps me awake, cooling the heat in my head but not lifting the weight in my chest.

Our next game is looming, and all I can do is push everything down and focus on the ice. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about hockey—and life—it’s this: you can’t let anything slow you down. Not headaches, not strained relationships, not even your own doubts. You keep skating; you keep moving because that momentum is the only thing stopping you from falling flat on your face.