Semua Bab Hockey Hazard: When Desire Crosses the Ice: Bab 21 - Bab 30

Impressing the Calculus professor might just have been the best thing Noah had done today but at the worst possible time because after class, the GSI had told him the professor wanted to see him in his office immediately. Noah could not say no, although he had considered that option for exactly half a second, because he was tired of carrying around a briefcase that felt more illigal every minute he carried it. Refusal was not really an option, unless he wanted to attract attention, so he went.Over the next hour and a half, he had sat in that office, taking an oral exam for 215. An hour and a half with two million dollars’ worth of cocain sitting beside his chair while the professor grilled him on derivatives, limits, proof and integration techniques. At the end, the professor was genuinely impressed and Noah had gotten four extra credits. Coach would be happy about that but that hour and a half had been torture for Noah because of what was in that briefcase and he thought he deserved

By the time Noah made it to Yost Ice Arena with the briefcase gripped tightly in his hand, it felt like it had fused to him over the course of the day. His shoulders ached from carrying it around campus for nearly ten hours. Every step felt heavier than the last.He entered through the side doors and was immediately hit with the familiar scent of sharpened skates, rubber mats, sweat, and cold air. The sound of voices echoed faintly down the hallway toward the meeting room, but he had to stop by the locker room first and shove the briefcase deep into his locker, behind spare gear and practice jerseys.He stepped into the meeting room just as Chase paused the projector, and every head turned toward him.“You’re late,” Coach Jenkins said flatly. He sat near the boards with a notebook open on his knee.Noah exhaled slowly through his nose. “Sorry.”Before Jenkins could continue, Chase’s voice cut in smoothly from the front of the room. “I told him to be here in three minutes, Coach.”Noah

The dorm room felt too small. Not physically, South Quad was spacious enough for what it was, but the air felt tighter, and heavier, like it had settled around Noah’s shoulders and refused to lift.“Yo.” Reid came into the dorm like a storm with too much energy and nowhere to put it. The door slammed open hard enough to shake the frame and Noah looked up from where he sat at his desk, immediately shoving the small plastic wraps deeper beneath a folded hoodie inside his drawer before Reid could notice.“You good?” he asked.Noah blinked, dragged back into the room. He ran a hand over his face. “Yeah.” “You look guilty as hell,” Reid said, tossing his backpack onto his bed. “You’ve been staring at your wall.”“Thinking.” Noah said with a huff, then shut the drawer calmly. “You always enter rooms like you’re being chased?”Reid ignored that completely. His blond hair was damp from the showers at Yost and he was grinning in a way that usually meant trouble. “There’s a party tonight,” he s

“Off the ice!”Tuesday morning training ended with the sharp scream of Coach Jenkins’ whistle cutting across the rink. The team began peeling away immediately, skates carving toward the benches while sticks clattered against the boards. The cold still clung to Noah’s skin beneath his gear, sweat cooling too fast in the arena air as he pulled off his gloves.“Get ready your playbooks,” Jenkins added loudly. “Bus leaves at twelve sharp Thursday, and if any of you idiots embarrass me at the hotel, I’ll make you skate suicides until your lungs collapse.”Noah stepped off the ice more slowly than the others. His legs ached from practice, his shoulders tight beneath his pads, but his mind wasn’t on hockey right now. It hadn’t been on hockey for days. The countdown Adrian had given him to sell off the drugs was sitting over his head like a loaded weapon.He stripped off his helmet and walked toward Coach Jenkins, who was already flipping through notes near the boards.“Coach. You got a minute

The night had settled over Ann Arbor in cold sheets of rain by the time the hockey team bus rolled back onto campus on Sunday. The away game had been brutal from the first puck drop and everybody looked it. Shoulders sagged beneath exhaustion, and even the louder players kept conversation short as they unloaded equipment outside Yost.Noah was the last to step off the bus. His body ached, his jaw still hurt from a hit he had taken in the second period, and exhaustion sat deep in his bones after the nonstop week he had survived between hockey, classes and trying to sell cocaine to rich college kids while pretending his life was not collapsing behind the scenes.And Justin. That part still sat somewhere sharp inside him.He adjusted the strap of his bag over his shoulder and started toward the arena entrance when a black SUV pulled slowly to the curb. He stopped walking immediately and the passenger window lowered halfway. One of Adrian’s men sat inside.“Mr. Voss wants to see you.”Noah