Page 104 of Blades Out
I turned away, grabbed a puck from the bucket. "If you don't actually need?—"
"What the hell is going on with you?"
I didn't answer. Kept my eyes on the puck, stick tapping ice in a rhythm that meant nothing.
Maddox skated closer. Not aggressive—just deliberate, the way he moved when he'd decided something mattered enough to push.
"You were snappy all practice. Unfocused. You left early yesterday without telling anyone where you were going." He counted off each point like he'd been cataloging them. "You're avoiding eye contact with everyone, including Barrett. And you're carrying tension like a live grenade."
My knuckles went white around my stick. "I'm fine."
"You're lying." He stopped three feet away, close enough I couldn't ignore him. "I've seen this before. Hell, I've been this before."
I forced myself to look at him. "I don't?—"
"You got someone under your skin."
The words landed like a physical blow.
I froze. Stick still against ice. Breath caught somewhere between my lungs and throat. Every muscle locked down in defensive rigidity I couldn't hide fast enough.
Maddox's eyes narrowed. "Thought so."
"You don't know what you're talking about." The denial came automatic, hollow.
"Yeah. I do." He shifted his weight, settling into a stance that said he wasn't moving until he'd said his piece. "Because I looked exactly like you do right now when Kennedy got under mine."
I wanted to skate away. Walk off the ice. End this conversation before it went places I couldn't afford to go.
But my legs wouldn't move.
Maddox's expression shifted—lost the sharp competitive edge he wore like armor and showed something rawer underneath. Something almost vulnerable.
"Listen." His voice dropped, quiet and fierce. "If you want her—lock that shit down."
Heat flashed through my chest. Denial. Terror. Something uncomfortably close to hope. "It's not?—"
"I don't care what it is." He cut me off. "What I'm saying is this: if someone ever looked at Kennedy the way I look at her?" His jaw tightened, eyes going dark with possessive intensity. "I'd fucking kill them."
The words hit like electricity down my spine.
Images slammed through my head unbidden: Ben leaning close to Olivia at the café counter. The rookie asking her to dinner. Any man touching her, wanting her, thinking they had the right to claim what I'd already marked as mine in every way that mattered.
Rage coiled hot and vicious in my gut.
Mine. The word screamed through me with primal certainty I had no business feeling. She wasn't mine. I had no claim. No right.
But every cell in my body rejected that logic.
Maddox watched my face, reading whatever I couldn't hide. "Yeah. There it is."
I dragged air through clenched teeth. "She's?—"
"Doesn't matter." His voice went harder. "You think I didn't have a thousand reasons Kennedy and I shouldn't work? Age, timing, my reputation, her family, the media, fucking Gary and Jake and their bullshit?" He shook his head. "None of it mattered. Because the second I admitted I wanted her, everything else was just noise."
My heart hammered against ribs that felt too tight.
"Don't wait until someone else steps in," Maddox said quietly. "You'll regret it."
