Page 16 of Slap Shot (Charm City Chill #3)

H eather

Heather pushed open the glass doors of Chill headquarters, laptop bag slung over her shoulder and coffee clutched in her free hand. Her body still hummed with memories of Oliver's touch, and her mind cycled through the implications of what they'd done.

Professional. She needed to be completely professional today.

The elevator ride to the third floor was endless, every floor ding reminding her of the soft sounds she had made when he'd touched her, the way he'd whispered her name. By the time she reached her office, her cheeks were flushed and her pulse elevated in a way that had nothing to do with caffeine.

She'd barely settled at her desk when her phone buzzed with a text from Oliver:

Good morning. Sleep well?

The innocent question made heat pool low in her stomach. She'd slept terribly, tossing and turning as her body remembered every moment of their encounter.

Eventually. You?

Like a rock. Speaking of a rock...

Heather stared at the eggplant emoji and snorted.

It wasn’t long after she settled into her office that her phone buzzed with news alerts. She scrolled, her stomach sinking as she read headline after headline:

Chill Coach Under Fire After Player Medical Leaks

Locker Room Questions Kovalchuk's Leadership

Former Players Speak Out: 'Women Don't Understand Hockey Culture

The articles were brutal, painting Coach Vicky as either incompetent or deliberately negligent. Social media was worse. Anonymous accounts spread rumors about player dissatisfaction, team dysfunction, and calls for her resignation.

Heather recognized a coordinated attack when she saw one. The timing, the messaging, the way certain phrases kept recurring across different platforms. Someone was orchestrating this campaign against Coach Vicky.

Someone with serious digital skills and no conscience about destroying a woman's career.

Their hacker.

But they'd stopped the breach. They'd locked down the systems, traced the attacks, shut them out completely. How had someone gotten Coach Vicky's files?

She pulled up her security logs. The honeypot she'd set up, the fake personnel files designed to trap whoever was hunting for sensitive information, had been triggered overnight. But instead of falling for the trap, someone had used it as a roadmap to the real data.

They'd been played.

Hours later, Heather was deep in damage control when her office door opened without warning.

"My system's been compromised," Oliver said, his face flushed with panic and exertion. "Someone's using my credentials to access our network. They're in right now, Heather. They're..."

"Oliver, what are you doing here?" she hissed, moving quickly to close the door behind him. "If someone sees you—"

"I don't care," he said, his breathing already elevated. "My entire setup has been hijacked. They're using my access codes, my digital signature. If anyone traces this back..."

The panic in his voice, the way his hands were shaking, broke through her concerns. Without thinking, Heather moved to him, wrapping her arms around his rigid frame.

"Hey, it's okay," she murmured against his shoulder. "We'll figure this out."

"Heather?" Stephanie Ellis opened the door. "Sorry to barge in. but— Oh."

Oliver jerked away from Heather's embrace, his face burning with embarrassment and residual panic. Charlie looked between the humans with concern.

"Stephanie," Heather started, but the PR director held up a hand and closed the door.

"Relax. I'm not here to lecture you about HR policies. After all, I was dating Marcus all last year."

Heather frowned. "Then why does Ivy have such a problem with players dating staff? I mean, everything worked out fine with you and Marcus."

"Because Ivy's been gunning for any excuse to cause problems ever since Dmitri turned down her dinner invitation last month," Stephanie said with a wry smile. "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, and all that."

Oliver's breathing was still too rapid, his eyes darting toward the door.

“But that’s not important now,” Stephanie said. “I’m hear about the hatchet job someone is doing on Coach Vicky. What’s going on?”

"Someone's hijacked Oliver's personal systems," Heather said, pulling up her security logs. "They're using his digital signature to access our network, making it look like he's behind the breaches."

"But we stopped them," Oliver said, his voice strained. "We locked them out completely."

"Apparently not well enough." Heather's jaw tightened as she studied the data. "They used our own honeypot against us. Made us think we were trapping them while they mapped our real security."

“Shit,” Stephanie said. "I need to get ahead of this from a PR standpoint."

"What can you do?" Heather asked.

"Damage control. Create some positive distractions, maybe get Mateo to help with some fun YouTube content to shift focus away from the crisis.

" Stephanie paused, considering. "Actually, Oliver, would you be willing to have Charlie featured in another video with Lauren?

The dog adoption content always does well. "

"That's a great idea," Oliver said, managing his first genuine smile since the crisis began. "Charlie loves working with Lauren, and it would give people something positive to focus on instead of all the negative press about Coach Vicky."

"Perfect. I'll coordinate with both of them.

" Stephanie moved toward the door. "You two figure out how to stop this digital nightmare, and I'll handle the public relations side.

Between Mateo's charm and Charlie's natural camera presence, we should be able to generate some feel-good content that drowns out the controversy. "

She opened the door, then paused. "And for what it's worth? Ivy Hodges can stuff her workplace relationship concerns. Some things are more important than corporate policies."

OLIVER

After Stephanie left, the office felt smaller, more claustrophobic. Oliver moved to check his secure communication system, and his stomach dropped as he saw a new message waiting.

The sender ID made his pulse spike: HexAngel.

Having fun yet, partner? Your girlfriend's security is impressive. Almost stopped me.

Almost.

Check the news in an hour. You'll love what I've done with your credentials.

One way or another, you're coming back to play with me.

He stared at the screen, recognition washing over him. The familiar taunting tone, the casual cruelty, was pure Kai. HexAngel, more like HexDevil.

His breathing became rapid and shallow, his hands clenching at his sides. The office walls seemed to press inward, and suddenly he was back in that warehouse three years ago, zip-tied to a chair while men asked questions about federal investigations.

"Oliver?" Heather's voice sounded distant.

"Kai," he whispered, the name scraping his throat. "Kai Moreno is our hacker."

Charlie immediately pressed against his legs. The familiar pressure helped anchor him to the present moment, reminding him that he wasn't in that warehouse anymore.

"He's supposed to be in prison," he managed, his voice tight. "Federal prison. Maximum security. He can't be—"

His legs were unsteady, but Charlie's presence kept him upright. He forced himself to breathe deeper, to focus on the dog's warmth against his leg instead of the panic.

"Check the facts," he told himself, running his hand through Charlie's fur.

With Charlie against him, Oliver’s breathing began to slow. He turned to his computer, pulling up secure databases and digging deeper than his previous searches.

"What are you doing?" Heather asked.

"Triple-checking," he said, his voice steadier now. "Something's not right. Kai shouldn't be able to coordinate attacks like this from maximum security."

He broke the first layer of federal database security, then the second. Each barrier he bypassed revealed more detailed records, more recent information. When the real data finally loaded, his chest tightened.

"Son of a bitch."

"What is it?"

"Kai was released two months ago. Early release for good behavior, transferred to a halfway house program.

" He pulled up the dummy search results he'd found earlier, the ones that had shown Kai still incarcerated.

"But look at this. He created false database entries to make it look like he was still locked up.

Anyone doing a standard search would find these fake records instead of the real ones. "

"Which means he's been planning this for weeks," Heather said. "Free to operate while making everyone think he was still in prison."

"And he violated his probation the minute he started hacking again."

“Why is he doing this?”

"Kai was my partner during my white hat days. We worked on government contracts together, tracking down criminals, exposing corruption."

"What happened?"

Oliver's jaw tightened as he pulled up archived case files. "There was a job. We were tracking a group selling military secrets. Dangerous people with serious connections." He paused, the memories still raw. "When they got too close to discovering our identities, Kai sold me out to save himself."

"He betrayed you to the criminals you were investigating?"

"Fed them information about the federal investigation, told them exactly where to find me." Oliver's voice stayed level, but Heather could see the cost of the memories in his eyes. "They grabbed me after work one night. Held me for three days, asking questions about what the feds knew."

Heather's breath caught. "The warehouse."

"Kai's betrayal put me there. If a homeless man hadn't heard something and called the cops..." Oliver shook his head. "I got out. Eventually. But the trauma never left."

"And now he's back."

"Using the same hacker handle, the same signature techniques." Oliver pulled up network logs, cross-referencing attack patterns with Kai's old methods. "But he's evolved. These attacks are more sophisticated than anything he could do back then."

"Which means he's had time to improve his skills," Heather said. "And find new resources."