Page 81 of Wild Card 13

People insisted arenas smelled like home.

To me, they smelled like my father.

Long before he owned the Frosthawks, before boardrooms and press conferences and draft nights consumed every spare minute of his life, there had been rinks exactly like this one. Community arenas with rattling heaters that never quite kept up with Minnesota winters. Bleachers polished smooth by generations of parents. Volunteers pouring burnt coffee into paper cups while the concession stand sold hot chocolate and popcorn that tasted exactly the same every season.

I'd spent enough of my childhood inside buildings like this that I could've found the locker rooms blindfolded.

It didn't mean I liked hockey.

"You're smiling." Naomi was watching me instead of the warmups, bundled beneath an oversized forest-green scarf that swallowed half her face. She balanced a paper cup of hot chocolate between both hands, looking entirely too pleased with herself.

I glanced sideways. "I am not."

"You absolutely are."

"I'm cold."

"You've been cold since October."

I tucked my gloved hands farther into the sleeves of my wool coat and looked back toward the ice before she could continue her interrogation.

Varsity warmups had already started. Pucks snapped crisply against the boards. Skates carved white ribbons across fresh ice. Coach Whittaker stood near the bench barking instructions that absolutely nobody was listening to.

I understood every drill without thinking about it.

Defensemen rotated low.

Centers supported below the dots.

Wingers stretched the neutral zone before curling back through the middle.

Years of sitting beside my father had taught me hockey almost by accident.

I knew systems.

I knew positioning.

I knew exactly which mistakes would earn a player extra conditioning after practice.

What I didn't know—what I still couldn't explain—was why anyone willingly chose to get hit by another human being traveling twenty miles an hour.

A body slammed into the glass directly in front of our section.

The boards rattled hard enough to shake my boots.

Naomi didn't even flinch.

I winced automatically.

"There he is," she said.

My eyes had already found him.

Helmet tucked low. Jersey half untucked because apparently that was physically impossible for him to avoid. Flying through warmups with the same reckless energy he approached literally everything else in his life.

Most players conserved movement before puck drop.

Ty looked like he'd been shot out of a cannon.