Page 47 of Bro Code

He stopped and turned around, exasperated. “Come on, dude. You’re not seriously following me into the shower.”

Louis stopped, blinking like he hadn’t even realized that’s what he was doing. He put up his hands and stepped back.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” said Riley. “Because you seem…strung out.”

“My mom is not doing well. But it’s fine.”

“Oh.” He paused, frowning. “Sorry to hear that.”

“Thanks.”

“Is it serious? Do you need to call her or something?”

“No.” Louis lowered his hands and firmly shook his head. “I need to do this.”

Eyes narrowing, Riley studied him. His face didn’t look like the face of someone dealing with something ‘not serious’. Riley thought about telling him that, but decided to keep his mouth shut. It wasn’t his place to get in the middle of that. And he understood wanting to focus on work when other things in your life were difficult. That’s what the ice was for him. Or at least, it used to be, before everything went to shit.

Louis wanted to focus on work. Fine. Maybe he was onto something that New York and Montreal had missed. It wouldn’t hurt to let him poke around. It’s not like anything else was working.

Riley folded his arms. “Alright. What’s your plan?”

Louis blinked. “My plan?”

“If it’s not an injury and it’s not a curse, then what is it and what do we do about it?”

Looking slightly stunned, Louis said, “I don’t…actually know. I didn’t – I didn’t think that far ahead. I just wanted someone to listen to me.”

“Okay. Well I’m listening.”

Louis’ face dissolved into an emotion that was hard to classify. Relief, maybe. Gratitude? He held Riley’s gaze and smiled grimly: Thanks. For seeing me.

Riley returned the smile: I do see you. And I’m here. He spread his hands. “You think you can fix me?” he said. “Alright then, nerd. Fix me.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Louis

Was he using Riley as a distraction?

Yes, obviously. That didn’t change the fact that it was work that needed to be done.

Louis sat beside Holly in the press box at the San Jose game that night, so wired he felt like his teeth were vibrating. That afternoon, he and Riley had agreed to work together in secret to get to the bottom of his issue. Holly wouldn’t listen to him? Fine. Louis was taking matters into his own hands.

Which meant he was in dicey territory, professionally-speaking.

Riley’s data belonged to the NHL. Any processing or analysis had to be authorized. Louis hadn’t gotten permission for the analysis he’d done on Riley that afternoon. And if he and Riley kept working in secret and Holly found out he was wasting compute running his own queries…

Well, it would be bad. Not like, go-to-prison bad, but definitely Louis-is-a-corporate-liability bad. He could lose his job – and how the fuck was he going to pay for Manman’s cancer treatment if that happened?

Yet, here he was, risking his job, to follow a fucking hunch. Because why?

Great question. Really, just an outstanding question that Louis couldn’t answer. He could’ve just let it go. But Louis was the guy who flew to the Olympics to make sure his friend wasn’t fucking a monster. He didn’t let things go. He was proud of that.

And…he cared what happened to Riley. Merde, that was hugely inconvenient.

After the game he ran the usual scripts, and walked out of the press box with his bag over his shoulder. It was the same thing he did after every game, but this time, his insides were jumping all over the place. He passed Riley in the tunnel, talking to two people that looked like his parents, and Riley caught his eye as he went by. Louis felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. Suddenly, they had a secret. They were in this together.

It wasn’t illegal, he reminded himself as he called an Uber and went out to the parking lot. It wasn’t illegal. It was just…dicey.