“You mean—” I start, but Coach shoots me a look like daggers and I clamp my mouth shut.
“Caulfield is stronger on the backcheck,” he says. “I need someone with size and a good defensive mindset centering my top line. James, you’ll be in a better position to break out on the wing, which is something you’re especially good at. You can still have your place in the slot. Cicero, you know what you’re doing.”
“What about face-offs?” I ask. I don’t even care that I sound like a brat right now; he can’t just take away the position I’ve been playing my entire goddamn life and hand it to Jaysen. He might as well be handing him the top pick while he’s at it.
“We’ll see,” Coach says. He gives me a look like he’s daring me to keep challenging him. I bite my tongue.
Coach goes on to giving us our roles on power plays and penalty kills, and I’m on the second PK unit, like what the hell? I twist my grip around my stick and refuse to look Coach in the eye. I can practically feel the smugness radiating off Jaysen.
I need someone with size, he said, like teams haven’t been relying on me in spite of my size my entire life. As if I’m not the NHL’s top prospect at five foot five. That’s unheard of, but here he is acting like he knows better than NHL Central Scouting.
It eats at me for the rest of the day and well into the next. What gives Coach Campbell the right to decide where I play, how I play? He didn’t even make it five seasons in the NHL. His team is nothing more than a stepping-stone for me.
Now I know what people mean when they say their blood is boiling. We might as well be walking through drills at practice the next day, but my face burns and sweat prickles my forehead. Rage goes through me in waves. I have never been this angry in my life.
I keep as much ice between me and Jaysen as possible, but he’s determined to make my life hell. It’s probably twenty minutes into practice when he shoulders into me between drills and taps my skate with his stick. “Serious question,” he says. “How long’s your twig? Thirty-eight, right?”
“Yes,” I deadpan. Sure. Of course I use a stick sized for actual children. If I play along, he’ll get bored and leave me alone. That’s how it works, right?
Except he smiles. Leans back so his weight’s on one foot, all casual and cocky. “I’m thinking about shortening mine a bit.” He tilts his head and looks at me out of the corner of his eye, his smile turning vicious. “Might help me out at center.”
Hatred surges through my chest, a flash of heat that has me seeing red. I lash out before I can think better of it, the satisfying crack of Jaysen’s stick breaking under mine almost enough to calm me down. He wanted it shortened, well now it’s fucking shortened.
He gapes down at the snapped shaft in his hands, the other half on the ice at his feet. Someone’s shouting, “Hey, hey, hey!” as the team closes in around us, but all I see is Jaysen. He slowly lifts his eyes to me. His lip curls a second before he throws down what’s left of his stick and shoves me so hard into the boards my breath wheezes out of me. His hands twist in my jersey and pin me back against the glass. I reach up, heart thundering, and grab him by his cage, pulling down hard enough to break his neck.
“You little shit,” he snarls.
“Fuck you!” I snap.
Someone tries to pull him off me but both of us tighten our grips, not even really fighting, just pushing and pulling and raging and hating until arms loop under his armpits and haul him back, both of us holding on until we can’t anymore. The guys fill in the space between us, holding us back, forcing us to glare at a distance.
I know Jaysen hates me. He’s made it perfectly clear from the moment we met. But I’ve never seen it like this, written so obviously on his face. The tendons in his neck popping out, his whole body straining like he’s ready to lunge as soon as someone gives him some slack.
There’s a flash of something hot and dangerous through my chest. I feel my eyes widen, my heart stutter.
Jaysen makes being violently pissed off look good.
I shove down the thought as Zero pushes through the team and stands between us, red-faced and fuming. “The fuck is your problem?” he shouts at both of us. Neither of us answer. “Forget you’re on a team now?”
He looks back and forth like he’s waiting for one of us to speak up just so he can cut us off and yell some more. He’d make a good coach. I glance past the crowd of my teammates to see the real coaching staff gathered at center ice, arms crossed as they watch their captain handle this.