Page 3 of Wrap Around (Forbidden Goals #7)

Defending Silas and helping him make big plays is easy. I know where he's going to be before he gets there. I know exactly how fast he'll cut across the blue line and exactly when he'll dish the puck. It's in my blood and in my bones. We move like we were made to move together.

It makes me sick.

I hate that I can feel him before I see him. His presence brushes across the back of my neck every time he changes direction. It’s like the air bends around him and pulls me in the right position.

We run one of our old plays during a scrimmage without even meaning to.

I swing wide, and he hits me with a pass just over the blue line.

I dish it back while he trails in behind, fakes the drop to confuse the man covering him, then rips a clean shot directly into the goal.

The moment the puck hits the net, we move in to bump fists like we're sixteen again.

He smiles at me, celebrating the victory, relishing in the ease of playing with each other again.

Fucking smiles at me.

I hate it.

I hate it so much that I start botching the plays on purpose.

I shoulder-check him every time I pass, and I hang back just enough to let the opposition slam into him whenever I get the chance.

I hold on to the puck too long when he’s calling for it, and when I do pass, I shoot it too hard.

He scrambles to keep up with my bullshit, and we end up losing the scrimmage.

We earn extra drills thanks to my bullshit.

At the end of one of our line rush drills, while Silas is laughing with one of the other guys about Coach being a hard-ass, I cut across the zone and stop short, spraying him with ice as he skates towards the slot.

Silas doesn’t even flinch. He just looks at me like he expected it.

Like he sees me unraveling in real time and feels sorry for me .

And it pisses me off even more. It takes everything in me not to throw down my gloves and start a brawl.

I want to hurt him.

Coach Dempsey keeps our line back for extra passing drills, griping the whole time about the effortless plays he saw at the start of the scrimmage and where the hell those players went.

“Just a fluke, I guess,” I mutter, shrugging like I’m not the one screwing it up on purpose.

I don’t think Coach buys it. Not when Silas is out here doing everything right, and I’m the one throwing it off, hoping he’ll see the mismatch and split us up.

I want to play. I want to win. But not like this . Not with him.

Not when every second on the ice with Silas feels like a fuse burning down.

When the drills finally wrap, Coach waves off the others with a nod towards the showers, but gestures for me and Silas to stay behind. “You two, hang back.”

He waits until the ice is mostly cleared before he speaks. “You think I’m blind out there?” he says. “You’ve got chemistry. I saw it in the first five minutes. And I’m not tossing that just because one of you has his head up his ass.”

Silas says nothing. Neither do I.

“You need to figure your shit out,” Coach snaps. “Because if I have to pick which one of you gets reassigned, it won’t be based on seniority. It'll be based on who’s showing up to play.”

He doesn’t wait for a response before turning around and walking towards the tunnel. We follow after a beat, neither of us speaking as we head towards the locker room. The hallway is quiet. Everyone else is already inside, done with their post-practice routines.

By the time we make it to the showers, most of the team has already finished. There are only a few guys lingering, and the steam is thick in the room. It clings to everything. The tile, the air, my lungs. I can't pull in a full breath.

I hear the water hit his skin before I see him. Once I do, I can’t unsee him. He’s less than twenty feet away, naked as the day he was born, back to me, head tilted under the spray like he isn't being eaten alive by the same torment. Fucking asshole.

The humidity makes everything worse. It feels like his presence is wrapping around my throat the same way I want to wrap my hands around his and squeeze. I'm dizzy from the heat, from not being able to breathe, from the memory of his mouth on mine. Fuck.

"You good, Shep?"

"I'm fine," I snap, sharper than I mean to.

Brent flinches, then walks away.

I close my eyes, shame twisting in my chest. This isn't me. I've never been so quick-tempered.

I'm the quiet, unflappable one. I'm known for keeping my chill, for never letting the other side get to me.

Even the reporters that stay back after games or hang around the practice arena never got under my skin, with all their bullshit about "the Shepherd who left his flock" and the never-ending inquisition about why I left home and never talk about anything.

I've never once spoken to the media, and Coach knows better than to put me up for any interviews.

I've always been polite and professional. Other than leading the team in a quiet prayer before each game, I don’t talk much. I’m the guy who shows up first and leaves last. The guy who works harder than anyone and keeps his head down, just grateful to still be playing.

But now he is standing in the same goddamn shower room, and I can't breathe.

He ruined everything. He wrecked me.

And no matter how far I ran, how much I gave to this game, how hard I tried to erase the past... He's still here.

And it's making me crazy.