Unsteady

It takes one sentence out of my mouth to convince my parents to let me take the boys to Sadie’s competition. Even more, they decide they want to be there as well.

My mom, most of all. Something about Sadie turns her fierce in her protectiveness, stronger than it was over me as a child. She doesn’t tell me anything about it, but I can see the way she feels written across her face and in her frequent questions about my girlfriend—beyond the normal amount.

So, Thursday, the day of her long program for the competition, we leave before the sun is up, and while the boys sleep in the car my dad ordered, I chat quietly with my parents.

The rink is slightly crowded, but the majority of people in the ice plex are coaches and teams, a few news crews and reporters preparing for the streams, and a rather small audience.

Which means, we get good seats.

“I’ve never got to do this before,” Liam says, kicking his feet back and forth in the seat next to me. My mom sits on his other side, only because Oliver opted to sit between my father and I.

“What?”

“He means see Sadie skate,” Oliver says, eyes scanning the far boards as he searches for his sister. I’m doing the same, but neither of us have spotted her yet. “We never get to. Not like this.”

Another lump forms in my throat, and my mom clearly picks up on it as she jumps in with, “Well, then this will be a first for all of us. And we have to cheer really loud for her, okay?”

Liam howls, and elbows me in the side. “I’m gonna be the loudest one so Sissy knows it’s me.”

The competition is slow as they move through their groups. But about an hour in, Sadie appears in the warm-up skate with her blocked group.

She’s wearing a Waterfell zip-up over her dress, so I can only see a bit of black fabric beneath it, her legs in mesh black instead of the tan of her competitors. Her hair is braided tight against her head, back into an equally tight and shiny bun, not a strand out of place.

She isn’t smiling, none of them are as they take the ice and skate a bit. She throws a few jumps, spins a bit, but I can tell by the lines of her tight-clad legs, she’s waiting. She’s holding it all back right now.

I spot Victoria skating around as well, just as focused and determined. I see their coach as well, arms crossed as he stands at the boards and watches. I watch him for a few minutes and realize he’s only watching Sadie.

Judging by the jackets circling, half his team is out there, and yet he’s focused solely on her. Correcting her, calling her over repeatedly.

Still, I wait. And still, he never does it for another skater.

Luc’s words haunt me again. Kelley’s not normal. And if you don’t know what’s going on in that fucking rink…

I cross my arms, heat licking the back of my neck as Coach Kelley speaks harshly to her. I see Sadie roll her eyes, and it almost makes me smile, until I see him grip the sleeve of her jacket and twist it until it works like a leash.

What the fuck?

Standing before I can think twice about it, I excuse myself for the bathroom and instead head straight to the other side entrance where the teams are. I wait for someone to stop me, but then realize wearing my Waterfell athletics issued jacket is working in my favor.

Sadie spots me before I make it to the boards, her eyes shooting wide as she jerks back from Kelley and skates briskly towards the exit.

There’s a mix of apprehension and excitement across her face, like she might want to smack me, but that she also can’t believe I’m here.

Because no one ever has been before.

I wait for her coach to kick me out once he spots me, but another one of his skaters is too busy arguing with him at the gate—or maybe they’re just talking, but he’s the one spitting his words.

“What the hell are you doing here?” she asks, but her cheeks are flush as she pulls me along into a back spot against the wall, away from the clamoring of skaters and the smell of fresh ice and hairspray. “Where are my brothers?”

I smile, and put my hands on her shoulders, spinning her so I can point to the group of us on the far right.

“They wanted to see their sissy skate.” I pause, dipping my head into her neck to breathe in her perfume against her skin. “And so did I.”

“You’ve seen me skate a thousand times,” she murmurs, but softens under my hands, relaxing lightly.

“Not like this.”

“You never know. I might suck,” she retorts, turning to gaze up at me, eyes somehow more intense with the darkened shadow and glitter. Lips still the same signature dark cherry color, more matte and fierce now against her very pale skin.

My hand raises almost subconsciously, finding my favorite little patch of freckles beneath her eye, letting my palm graze her face just slightly.

“You’ll be the best one out there,” I whisper. “Okay?”

“You’re not allowed to be back here,” her coach hisses as he approaches from behind, standing so close that if Sadie stepped back, she’d barrel into his chest. “You’re third, my terror.”

He hisses the name, and fury—white-hot and terrifying—crawls my spine at the sound of it. At the implication. His hand wraps up around her neck, before coasting her spine and pressing his fist into the center until she straightens, shoulders back.

She tries to hide it, but I see the wince—my eyes shooting to her coach’s with a threat pooling in my mouth. But before I can say a word, just as I pull Sadie into my arms, he storms off. A legion of skaters are exiting behind him, the warm-up likely over.

“Stop,” she whispers, and for a moment I think I’ve held her too tight, that I’ve hurt her. My arms drop from her as if I’ve laid flat against a burning stove.

It only takes a moment for me to realize she’s warning me off her coach.

“He can’t touch you like that, Gray,” I whisper, albeit a bit harshly.

Her back is up, again, the divot of her brow that I love so much taunting me as she crosses her arms. “You don’t know him. He just cares about me. He wants me to do well, work hard.”

“You work harder than most of the athletes I know, Gray. And I know a fucking lot.”

“He just doesn’t want me distracted. He’s focused.”

“You are focused. No one is more determined than you.”

What I want to say is that what her coach had the balls to do in front of me is only the tip of the iceberg, that it can only mean how he treats her behind closed doors is worse. And sure, I didn’t figure skate ever, but I grew up in a rink. I went to a goddamn private hockey academy with some of the strictest coaching staff I’ve ever experienced.

And not one of them ever raised a hand to me.

But she’s about to skate, and the last thing I want is to pull her down. Never again.

So, I swallow my words for another time and press a deep kiss to her forehead, before tilting her chin up.

“You’re a killer, Gray. Say it.”

“I’m a killer,” she mutters, rolling her eyes even as I bottle up the slipping smile.

“Good girl.” I smirk. “I’d kiss you but I don’t want to mess up your lipstick.” As I say it, she presses a dark red kiss mark into my palm, so I can hold it.

“I’m proud of you, and so are your brothers. Now, go show them their sissy is a badass.”

She does.

By the time I’m back to my seat—with hot chocolates for the boys, she’s next.

Without the jacket, Sadie is dressed in a strappy black mesh dress that matches the thin black of her tights, long mesh sleeves that sit just on the cusp of her shoulders, strategic panels of thick black covering some, while the other see-through panels display the hard lines of her stomach and waistline.

She takes her place at the center, poised and beautiful, before the speakers begin blasting Metallica’s “Enter Sandman,” which sends a vibrating laugh through both my father and I.

And just like the first time I saw her skate while hiding in the tunnel, Sadie Brown skates like she’s on fire. Pure passion, pure unrelenting strength. Her movements are hard and fast, her spins so quick she turns into a blur. She hits every jump hard, but lands them. Every. Single. One.

My fingers are melded into the chair by the end of her program from keeping myself seated when I want to jump up every time and scream, “That’s my girl,” at the top of my lungs.

Liam cheers just as loudly as he promised. Oliver grins happily, watching his sister with wonder in his eyes. Me too, bud.

By the end of it, my cheeks hurt from my uncontrollable beaming smile. I’m so goddamn proud of her, so lucky to call her mine.

So lucky that she calls me hers.

She bows and looks over at us, winking at her brothers and blowing a snarky little kiss that I know is all mine. I clench my hand a little tighter where her dark lipstick mark still lies.

It doesn’t matter how much distance there is right now, as long as she’ll have me, I’ll be right here. Waiting and cheering from the bleachers, if that’s what she needs.

Another anxiety disappears overnight.

Kane isn’t just opting out of the Harvard game—Freddy apparently did some digging, as he hurried to inform me when I enter the Hockey House.

Toren Kane isn’t allowed to play at Harvard.

It took some intense scouring of the internet to find a video, as it seems someone tried to have it covered up. But there is a quick clip of the incident, shot on a shaking cellphone.

Someone says something taunting, spitting in his face. Kane grasps the kid’s cage and flings him off like an irritating insect, before entering some trance, easily seen with his helmet discarded. There’s a girl, a little redheaded Harvard student by the sweater she wears, sitting two rows from the glass, staring at him in that same wonder-filled way.

His teammate jerks on the collar of his jersey, pulling him out of the staring contest, and suddenly, he jerks forward and slams his glove against the glass.

“Get the fuck out of here!” he screams, and the already pale girl goes nearly white, standing and stumbling up the stairs to the exit, the boy next to her following blindly.

Still, Kane continues to wail on the glass for a moment before there’s a sound of shattering glass and the video cuts off.

“At least we won’t have to deal with him tomorrow,” Freddy says.

It’s a small gift, but I’ll happily take it.