Page 18 of Locke

“Get the fuck off me, you motherfucking snitch,” Adam snarls in frustration.

My chest feels heavy and my blood freezes in my veins.

Those are the first words he’s spoken to me in almost ten years.

Motherfucking snitch.

He’s the only person in the world who could say those particular words and have them mean what they mean, a truth that has been between us for a decade finally said out loud in a place where I can’t walk away from it.

And while I am indeed a snitch by his definition, the fact that he’s choosing now to lay this on my doorstep causes rage to sweep through me.It’s hot, blinding, and there’s no controlling it.

Fucking ten years and he chooses now to open the door to our past.

I shove him hard.

Not a hockey shove.Not a body check or a positioning move or any of the hundred types of physical contact that are part of this game.I shove him the way you shove someone you want to look at you, both hands on his chest, hard enough that he stumbles back two steps and his eyes come to mine for the first time all night.

He looks surprised.

Good.

He shoves me back and I smile around my mouth guard in joy that he’s willing to engage.

The refs are already whistling, and the crowd has picked up on two players who are no longer trying to get at the puck but at each other.We lock in, both of us breathing hard.

Then we lunge at the same time.

Gloves hit the ice simultaneously, which tells me he’s been waiting for this too, whether he’d admit it or not.

And then we’re into it and it’s nothing like the fight with Morrow in Portland.That fight was anger looking for a target.This is years of guilt, regret, blinding fury and betrayal—and I let it out through my hands.Violence is the truest language that has ever spoken about me when on the ice.

Adam’s good, but then again, he always was.We grew up fighting and scrapping in practice, and when we left the ice, we scrapped in the room.The kind of sparring that exists between people who trust each other completely.Adam played with me long enough that he knows my tendencies and I know his, and for the first ten seconds of fists flying, we’re perfectly matched.

But I’m bigger now.

And angrier.

All of the guilt and hurt I’ve felt has been transformed into rage and I’ve been carrying this misery for years without a rewarding outlet for it.

My knuckles catch Adam under his chin and his head rocks back.I latch onto his sweater and deliver one—two—three more hard punches and he starts to sag.

I should drop him, but I don’t.I try to haul him back up so I can hit him again.The refs and linesmen swarm in and attempt to pull us apart.Someone has my jersey from behind and someone else has my arm, preventing me from landing just one more solid punch.

Unfortunately, I’m ripped away, dissatisfied with the outcome, especially since Adam seems to have regained his feet.I cut open his chin and it’s freely bleeding.He’s heaving, sucking in oxygen and glaring at me as a trainer comes out on the ice with a towel for him.

I start to turn away, but Adam isn’t finished with me yet.“You fucking traitor,” he screams.

My entire body flinches but I don’t look back.I know the bench heard it.Pretty sure the officials did too.The crowd is roaring their approval as we’re both motioned to our respective penalty boxes.

Adam jerks the towel away from the trainer, presses it to his chin, and waves off any further help.He slowly skates to the penalty box, the altercation apparently over in his mind.

It’s not over for me.

Traitor.

He’s got a lot of fucking nerve calling me out like that, and he should be taught a lesson.

I go back in, fast before anyone understands what’s happening.I lunge for him, catch him by surprise, and manage to land one more hit to the side of his helmet with my fist, hard enough that his skates go out from under him.