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He wasn’t just talking about my future—he was digging into the past I hadn’t outrun. The career that got ripped from my hands. The ref hit that ended everything. The suspension that branded me a failure. It was all still there, festering beneath my skin like an infection I couldn’t shake.

“I fucking know I’m a failure, all right?” The words tore from me, raw and vicious. A confession and a wound all at once. “You don’t have to keep reminding me.”

For the first time, something in his expression flickered. A crack in the armor. Maybe regret. Maybe understanding. But it wasn’t enough. Nothing ever was.

“I’m not calling you a failure,” he said, voice steady but weighted. “I’m asking you to step up.”

I let out a sharp breath, shaking my head. He didn’t get it. He couldn’t see how deep this went.

“Have a life,” he pressed, tone softer but still firm. Like he actually gave a shit. “Build something. You deserve that.”

Deserve. The word felt foreign coming from him, as if I hadn’t spent my whole life being told I had to earn every goddamn thing.

My mind went straight to Iris. The only thing that felt real in this mess. The way she looked at me, the way she fucking saw me—even when I didn’t deserve it. Especially when I didn’t deserve it.

But how the hell was I supposed to build anything when I was already standing in the wreckage?

A bitter laugh scraped its way out of my throat, sharp and ugly, because it was too fucking late for that. Or at least, I’d convinced myself it was.

Dad exhaled through his nose, like he was choosing his next words carefully. Like he already knew he was about to hit a nerve.

“And… be careful with Iris.”

Every muscle in my body went rigid. Fucking sucker punch. My grip tightened around my coffee cup, a hair away from shattering it between my fingers.

He saw it. He’d always had a way of reading me too well, picking apart my weaknesses before I could even recognize them myself.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I bit out, the words tasting like rust and regret.

Dad didn’t flinch. He just sipped his coffee, his stare pinning me in place like a goddamn spotlight. Like he was already peeling back every layer I’d tried to keep hidden. Measuring just how deep I was in this. Just how completely fucked I already was.

“I see the way you push her. The way you look at her.” His voice was low, even. A scalpel instead of a blade. A warning. “She’s talented. She’s got a future. Don’t… complicate that.”

I let out a slow breath through my nose, forcing myself not to react. Not to give him any more ground than he’d already stolen.

Too late.

Because I knew. I fucking knew exactly how much I’d already complicated it. The taste of her was still on my tongue. The feeling of her body pressed against mine still lingered like a brand seared into my skin. I couldn’t erase it, couldn’t shove it back into some untouchable corner of my mind.

She was mine now.

And if anyone tried to take her from me—if he tried to make me choose between her and hockey, between her and whatever future he thought I was supposed to chase—I already knew how that would end.

I met his gaze, my smirk slow and deliberate. A challenge. “I’m just coaching her, Dad.”

Liar.

His expression didn’t change, but something flickered in his eyes—doubt, suspicion, maybe even disappointment.

He knew I was lying.

And I knew I didn’t give a fuck.

“Knox,” my father warned, his voice edged with something that made my pulse kick up a notch.

I leaned back in my chair, feigning indifference, but my heart was hammering against my ribs like it wanted out.

“I’m doing my job. I’m getting her ready.” The words came out sharper than I meant them to, but I didn’t fucking care. If he wanted me to back off, he’d be waiting a long time. Defiance coiled around me like armor, a shield against whatever lecture he thought he was about to give.

Dad exhaled, slow and measured, but when he spoke again, his voice carried that weight that always managed to hit its mark.

“You’ve got your demons, Knox. Don’t make her carry them too.”

My jaw clenched so hard my teeth ached. There it was. The real hit. He knew me too well—knew my past, knew how I destroyed everything I touched. And maybe that was the worst part… the fact that he was right.

I’d burned bridges. Dragged people down with me. But I wouldn’t do that to her.

“She can handle herself,” I muttered, but even to my own ears, it sounded weak—like I was trying to convince myself more than him.

Dad’s gaze softened, just for a second, and that almost broke something inside me. Almost.

“You know her mom walked out, right?”

The words slammed into me like a sucker punch, knocking the air clean out of my lungs.

Silence stretched between us, thick and suffocating. The only sound was the rush of blood pounding in my ears.

What?

I blinked, my grip tightening around the edge of the table as if it could ground me. “What?” My voice came out rough, raw.

Dad didn’t flinch. Just met my gaze with a steady resolve that told me he wasn’t fucking around. “She left when Iris was young. Just up and vanished without looking back.”

Everything clicked into place.

The fight in her. The walls she put up. The way she acted like she had something to prove every second of every day. She’d been left before. And now? Now I was the reckless bastard barreling straight into her life with no regard for what kind of damage I could cause.

I swallowed hard, my throat tight, thoughts spiraling faster than I could catch them. What if I was just another version of what had already broken her?

“Fifteen,” Dad went on, his voice steady, emotionless—like he was reading off a scouting report. “Right before Championship weekend. Came home one night after practice, her mom was packing. Said she needed more than this life. Never came back.”

The words landed like a blade to the gut, sharp and merciless.

Iris had never told me.

I had built her up in my mind as this golden girl—untouchable, unstoppable. A player with raw talent and an unshakable drive, backed by a family who pushed her toward greatness. But now? Now, I saw the cracks.

And it wrecked me.

Every single piece of her suddenly made sense.

The way she played like she had something to prove, like failure wasn’t just a loss but a death sentence. The way she clenched her jaw every time someone underestimated her, how she skated with a reckless kind of fury that told me she wasn’t just chasing victory—she was running from something.

This wasn’t about the jersey. It never had been.

She fought for control—on the ice, in the locker room, with me—because control was the only thing that had ever kept her from falling apart. And now I understood why.

The thought of losing everything she had built for herself terrified her.

And the thought of losing me?

Maybe that terrified her too.

When I pushed her in practice, when I took control, when I pressed her up against the lockers and made her fight back—it wasn’t just about dominance. It was about something deeper. Something neither of us had put words to yet.

She let me push her because, deep down, she trusted me not to leave her afterward.

That realization hit like a punch to the ribs, stealing my breath.

It was more than lust, more than the reckless way we kept colliding into each other. It was trust and fear, tangled together in something dark and unbreakable. And I knew now—she didn’t just want to win. She wanted to know she wasn’t alone in the fight.

I swallowed hard, my pulse hammering in my ears.

What the hell would happen if I walked away? If I turned my back on her now?

Would she shut down? Let those walls slam back into place, convincing herself that she had always been alone?

The thought clawed at my insides, something cold and unfamiliar sinking deep into my bones.

Because for the first time in years, I knew what real stakes felt like.

And losing her?

That would be the one loss I wouldn’t survive.

"We should go," Dad said, folding his paper. "We have practice in a couple of hours."

I pushed back from the table; the chair scraping against the floor, and walked out without another word. The door swung shut behind me, but it felt like I was stepping into a void—like the second I left that coffee shop, I stopped existing altogether.

The air outside was thick, heavy, pressing down on me as I climbed into my car. The engine growled to life, but I didn’t give a shit about where I was going. I just drove—windows down, wind cutting sharp against my skin, the world blurring past in streaks of asphalt and fading daylight.

One hand clenched the wheel, knuckles aching from the force of my grip. My mind was a fucking battlefield, and at the center of it all was her.

Her body under mine, breathless and wrecked.

The way she had let go for me, let me take her apart, piece by piece.

The memory clung to me like a brand, hot and permanent, sinking into my bones.

But it wasn’t just that—it wasn’t just about how she felt, how she tasted.

It was the way she looked at me afterward, like I was something more than the wreckage I’d been trying to outrun.

And that terrified me.

Because I knew who I was. The guy who ruined everything he touched. The guy who let a cheap hit and his own reckless pride cost him everything he had worked for. The guy who burned out too young and had nowhere left to go.

And Iris? She deserved better than a man like that.

I gritted my teeth, pressing harder on the gas, the speedometer creeping higher as if outrunning the thought could erase it.

Then I saw it again—her eyes when Chris kissed her.

That split second of hesitation, the flicker of pain before she forced herself to smile like it didn’t fucking matter. But it did. It mattered more than I had any right for it to.

I had no claim on her. Except I did.

The thought hit me hard, knocking the breath from my lungs. I wanted to be the one who had her back, who pulled her out of the fire instead of pushing her into it. But how the hell could I do that when I was the fire?

And what happened when she realized it? When she put the pieces together and saw me for exactly what I was—a man standing at the edge of something he had no business holding onto?

What if she found out? What if Chambers found out?

My grip tightened, rage burning through me like gasoline meeting a lit match. My reputation was already walking the razor’s edge, but bringing her into it? It could destroy everything.

The weight of it all pressed down on me, suffocating, but when I closed my eyes, all I could see was her.

And I knew—I wasn’t letting go.

The thought of walking away clawed at me, burrowing under my skin like a wound that refused to heal.

The idea of never touching her again, never hearing her gasp my name, never feeling her melt beneath me—it was worse than any pain I’d ever known.

Because I needed her now. More than I’d ever needed anyone. And that was fucking dangerous.

I pulled into the rink, the parking lot stretching out empty and lifeless under the dull glow of the streetlights.

It matched the hollowness sitting in my chest, the ache I couldn’t shake no matter how hard I tried.

I killed the engine and stepped out, my breath curling into the cold night air, but it did nothing to cool the fire burning inside me.

The silence followed me as I made my way to my office, slamming the door shut behind me. The sound echoed in the small space, a sharp reminder that I was alone. Alone with my thoughts. And that was the last fucking place I wanted to be.

Through the glass wall, I could see the ice, pristine and untouched—for now.

But not for long. I knew she’d be here soon.

Iris always pushed herself past the breaking point.

First one on, last one off. A relentless pursuit of perfection, as if proving herself on the ice could make up for all the things life had stolen from her.

A part of me admired that. The other part? The one buried beneath obsession and possession? It wanted to rip her away from all of it—from the pressure, the expectations, the goddamn fear that clawed at her heels like a ghost she couldn’t outrun.

And then, she appeared.

The second Iris stepped onto the ice, the rest of the world blurred. Time froze, the hum of fluorescent lights fading into nothing as I drank her in. Strong. Sharp. Fucking perfect. But now, I saw more than just her talent, more than just the ruthless determination that set her apart.

I saw the girl who had been left behind. The girl fighting like hell not to need anyone. Not to need me.

Her skates sliced through the ice, her body moving with the kind of control that took years to perfect.

Every movement was precise, calculated, but beneath it, I could see it—the crack in the armor, the hesitation she tried to bury.

Like if she let someone too close, they’d see just how close she was to breaking.

I exhaled sharply, raking a hand through my hair as the frustration clawed higher.

She didn’t get it. She didn’t understand that every time she pushed herself past her limit, every time she skated like the ice was the only thing keeping her together, it twisted something inside me.

It made me want to rip her off that rink and keep her locked away where no one else could push her—not even herself.

Because I knew what came next.

I was the man who could destroy her.

And yet, I was already too far gone to stop it.

I leaned forward, elbows braced on my knees, watching her in the dim light of the rink. My pulse pounded in my ears as the realization hit me with the force of a body check against the boards.

I was already halfway in love with her.

And it scared the hell out of me.

Because love? Love was just another word for ruin.