At the end of the regular season last spring, Carter and Derek crossed paths in the second period. Despite Carter’s clear instigation, Derek received a game misconduct while Carter got off scot-free. Losing my brother had hurt, given the team was already down several defensemen due to injuries. In the end, we lost by one goal—and missed out on qualifying for the playoffs. Derek was still holding a grudge against Carter. And so was I.

We fell silent again, watching the massacre on the ice continue. Or Amelia did, anyway. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from Luke. Even when he was on the bench, it was impossible to focus anywhere but on him for more than a few seconds.

She nudged me with her elbow. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine.” I wrapped my arms around my body, wishing I’d worn a jacket over my gray hoodie. Boyd University’s arena, Northridge Center, was always bitterly cold, but I’d been in such a daze that I hadn’t even thought about it before walking out the door.

“Have you guys talked since?”

“Kind of,” I said. “Not really.”

Luke had sent me a string of increasingly frantic apology texts this afternoon. Not trying to get me back so much as attempting damage control, echoing last night’s pleas to remain friends. At first, I ignored him, but after his fifth text, I finally caved and replied, telling him it was fine (it obviously wasn’t) and that I just needed some time (as in, forever). Partly because I was a pushover, and partly because I didn’t want drama between us to take his head out of the game tonight. Regardless of how I actually felt, I needed to placate him so he didn’t blow it for the rest of the team.

Despite that, Luke was almost unrecognizable on the ice tonight—slow, distracted, and all kinds of useless. He had already taken more penalties than he had in any game last season. Stupid penalties too, like obvious hooking and high-sticking. I couldn’t even blame Carter for those.

The rest of our team wasn’t faring much better. They were clearly upset with their lackluster performance, which was fueling a vicious cycle.

I wanted to tear my hair out over it all.

Amelia tipped forward, squinting at the players’ bench. “Ugh. What now?”

Paul and Carter were engaging in some sort of verbal back and forth through the plexiglass dividing the benches. Carter chirped something, and in response, Paul wound up and lobbed his water bottle over the partition, aiming for Carter’s head. He dodged it at the last minute and discreetly flipped Paul off while the coaches weren’t looking. But of course, the coaches caught the water bottle toss.

Like I said: devious.