Secret Obsession: A Dark Hockey Romance (Hockey Gods)

I sit in an interrogation—excuse me, interview—room, with my lawyer beside me. He’s young. Not quite just-out-of-law-school young, but young enough for me to question his experience. To which he gave me a baleful glance and continued like I hadn’t even spoken.

He arrived at the house two minutes before the police. He gave me a once-over, noting the blood on my hands, soaked through my sleeve, and the only blood that was mine: on my temple.

My head still aches.

“Caleb Asher,” he introduced, not bothering to extend a hand. “Can you tell me what happened? Quickly.”

I did. The truth. It all fell out, minus the murder in my apartment. I didn’t know where he had put his brother’s body, or if any evidence remained in my apartment. But police probably wouldn’t have reason to search it with the intent of finding blood… it was just involved in the break-in. Nothing more, nothing less.

But the rest: that this man had been stalking me, that he put another girl in the hospital, that he hit Miles’ car in a threat of aggression. Then later hitting Miles’ rental car and taking him from the crash, kidnapping me—

And then I lie.

Well, I omit.

I think Mr. Asher knows when my tale veers off course, because my words come slower. He brought me down here in the freezer, intent on torturing me. I cut myself free. Attacked him when he was distracted. The gun went off, yes, but I got the better of him. I saved myself, but I didn’t save my landlord.

He accepted it all with a nod, and then the police came screaming in. Detective Barrister was right behind them. An officer stayed with us while they searched the house, finding the two bodies.

Everything was a flurry of motion after that.

He advised me not to speak, so I didn’t. I kept my mouth shut, my eyes down. I didn’t cower, I barely trembled.

Okay, that’s a lie. I trembled the entire time.

Just fifteen minutes prior, I made two calls: one to Mr. Asher, and the next to 9-1-1. And I watched Greyson and Steele bodily drag Miles away from me.

The officer put me in the back of the cruiser and drove me to the station. My lawyer met me there.

Now, the door opens, and Detective Barrister comes in.

Having rehearsed my story once, I feel better about selling it.

Mr. Asher doesn’t look at me, but he launches into some speech about self-defense. How this man has clearly been stalking me, with the police failing to come close to stopping him or protecting me.

The detective seems inclined to agree, although she swabs my hands and clothes for gunshot residue. She gives me a shirt to put on as she bags mine, noting the tape’s sticky remnants on my wrists.

She swabs that, too.

“She’ll give a written statement,” Mr. Asher says as I tune back in. “And then Ms. Reed needs to go to the hospital. It should’ve been her first stop.”

“Her injuries aren’t life threatening,” the detective counters.

“Hmm,” the lawyer replies. “And if she has internal bleeding? Did Mr. Freeman kick you, Willow? Strike you in any way?”

I motion to my temple and lick my lips. “He injected me with something. I think.”

“Drugs that are working their way out of her system as we speak,” Mr. Asher spits. “I expected better from you, Detective. And seeing as how you haven’t brought charges against my client, I am electing to get her immediate medical attention.”

He stands and helps me rise, too. His hand on my forearm is cool and firm. He guides me out ahead of him, past the detective, down the hallway. We don’t stop until we’re at his car, a matte black thing that probably costs more than the hockey house.

When we’re closed inside, the seat belt tight across my chest and hips, he glances at me. “I don’t need to know the full truth, Willow. But if there’s anything in your story that they could poke holes into…”

I bite my lip.

“Miles,” I whisper. “He was communicating with… Freeman… on his brother’s phone. Taunting him about me.”

“He was in the basement?”

I nod. My eyes burn.

He pulls out of the station and turns toward the hospital. “We’ll keep him out of it unless necessary,” he mutters. He hands me his phone. “Call him. Have him meet us at the hospital.”

“The gunshot went off next to his head.” I glance down at the screen. His lock screen is a gorgeous dark-haired woman, holding a toddler in her arms. They’re both dressed in black puffy jackets and hats with pom-poms, standing outside with snow all around them. “He’s probably already there for a burst eardrum or something. He couldn’t hear very well when they left.”

He sighs.

I call Miles anyway and confirm.

“We’ll see you soon,” I tell him.

“Self-defense is your best bet,” Asher continues. “If Miles was there, he could corroborate…”

“Miles can’t be dragged into this,” I interrupt. I grip the handle over my head and fight nausea. He’s driving fast, whipping around corners like he owns them. “It’ll open up a whole other avenue of investigating—please, just trust that having him involved would do more harm than good.”

We get to the hospital in record time, and I leap out of the sports car. The lawyer follows close behind. At the ER desk, he takes over, explaining what happened and why I’m here. I pretend not to notice that he slides the nurse a wad of cash, which she tucks into her pocket with a furious blush.

And then we’re being led back to a curtained-off bed, and the nurse runs through what I can only imagine is standard procedure for someone who was attacked. When she asks what happened, I tell her that I was drugged, locked in a case freezer—which then seemed to be rolled, which I now can assume was when Freeman shoved it down the basement stairs, and then I fought him, albeit briefly.

“Can you find Miles?” I ask the lawyer.

He nods, sliding his phone back in the pocket of his slacks and striding out.

“You brought in the big guns,” the nurse whispers to me. “Caleb Asher is the best defense attorney on the East Coast. Most handsome, too.”

“He’s married.” I spotted the ring on his finger earlier. Not that it really matters.

“They were on the cover of a magazine a few years ago.” She glances over her shoulder in the direction he went. “Maybe I should ask for his autograph.”

I manage not to roll my eyes.

“I need to draw blood to run tests,” she says, wheeling over a tray.

“Okay.”

The curtain whips back just as she pushes the needle into my arm. I wince, and suddenly Miles is on my other side. He drags me into his chest, and only the nurse’s grip on my arm keeps me from launching at him.

“You okay?” he whispers in my ear.

“Don’t answer that,” Mr. Asher says from the foot of the bed.

Miles shoots him a look.

I take his hand, trying not to wince again when the needle moves, the nurse switching out a vial for another one. We both look at it, the way my blood fills it, and bile rushes up my throat.

“I’m going to be sick.”

The lawyer passes me a plastic tub, and I lean over it just as my stomach contents rush up and out.

Gross.

Miles strokes my hair away from my face. When the heaving subsides, the nurse passes me a cup of water and takes the tub away. She’s already bandaged my arm, a wad of gauze taped to my skin.

“Our doctor will be in to check your head wound,” she says. “It looks deep. It may need stitches.”

The curtain closes, leaving Miles, me, and the lawyer with the illusion of privacy.

“Don’t talk to anyone,” Asher orders. His tone is brisk, no-nonsense. “Don’t answer any questions. Not here, not at the station, not in front of your goddamn house. If the police bring you down for another statement, or under the guise of follow-up questions, make sure I’m there before you say or write a word.”

“Okay.”

He pats my foot. “We’ll get you through this. If they even decide to press charges. And don’t confuse these flimsy curtains for walls.” He flicks one, and it sways against his finger.

I take a breath and force a smile. He ducks out, and then it’s just Miles and me.

We don’t say anything. I stare at him, he stares at me.

There’s a lot I want to ask. How his ear is, if his hearing is impaired, what the fuck he’s going to do with Knox. But I can’t say that now. It’ll be saved for later, when I get the clean bill of health, and we’re safe at home.

Home.

Weird to think about the hockey house that way. But the longer I think on it, the more I realize it’s true. It’s home—but more than that, Miles is.

And I want nothing more than to go home to him.