CHAPTER 5

ELLE

The first week is clinical.

That's my strategy: approach this like any other assignment. Document the team dynamics. Interview the secondary players. Attend practices. Write observations. Maintain professional distance.

Stay away from Blake.

It works for approximately thirty-six hours.

On Thursday morning, I'm in the press box watching practice when Blake comes off the ice and pulls his shirt over his head—a completely normal locker room activity that apparently requires me to stop breathing. The tattoo I knew about—a series of geometric lines down his left shoulder blade—has been joined by something new. A compass rose on his right shoulder. Intricate. Detailed. The kind of tattoo that takes multiple sessions and a lot of commitment.

I'm staring hard enough that Vault—one of the defensemen and apparently someone who notices everything—catches me looking and grins at me like he knows something I don't.

I look away so fast I nearly give myself whiplash.

The scar on his ribs is new too. A diagonal line, maybe three inches long, that cuts across his right side. It's old enough to have faded to white, but it's there. A reminder that his body is not the same body I knew. That five years of being hit repeatedly by three-hundred-pound men has rewritten him.

He's more powerful now. That's the thing I'm trying not to notice and can't stop noticing. Not just physically—though that's obvious. His shoulders are broader. His arms are carved in a way they weren't before. But it's more than that. There's a weight to him now, a presence. When he enters a room, people feel it. His teammates give him space that they don't give each other. They fear him and respect him in equal measure.

And he's watching me.

I know this the way you know someone is staring at you from across a crowded room. I can feel it. His attention is like a physical thing, pressing against my skin, and I don't know how to write about hockey strategy when every nerve in my body is hyperaware of Blake Delvalle's gaze.

Friday, I decide to interview some of the secondary players. Safer. Easier. Away from him.

I sit down with Martinez, one of the younger forwards, and he's personable and open, telling me about the team's chemistry, about Blake's leadership style. "Cap's different than the last guy," he says. "Like, the previous captain was all rah-rah. Blake? He doesn't say much, but when he does, you listen. It's like he doesn't waste words."

"What about his approach to the younger players?" I ask, my pen poised over my notebook like I'm a real journalist and not a woman whose heart is doing something irregular in her chest.

"He pushes us hard. But he—" Martinez pauses, choosing his words carefully. "He notices stuff. Like, I had a bad game last week, and after practice, he pulled me aside and we watched the tape. Showed me exactly where I was losing positioning. No drama. Just factual. And then he said, 'You're better than that. Do better.' And I did."

It's exactly the kind of leadership quote I need. Exactly the kind of detail that rounds out the Blake Delvalle profile that I'm supposed to be writing.

I hate it. I hate that he's good at this. I hate that five years away from him means he's had five years to become someone better, stronger, more capable.

I hate that I'm attracted to it.

Saturday, I make a tactical error.

I'm in the press box, and I've just finished interviewing one of the assistant coaches about training methodology, and I'm taking notes, and I look down and realize I've filled three quarters of a page with observations about Blake.

*New shoulder tattoo—compass rose. Multiple sessions. Commitment symbolism?*

*Scar on right ribs—surgical? Injury? Doesn't seem to affect mobility.*

*Leadership style: quiet authority. Players respond to him without him raising his voice.*

*The way he moves across the ice—more economical than it used to be. Less flash. More precision.*

*Eyes: still the same color but colder. Like he's locked something away behind them.*

My handwriting is going progressively more frantic as I document him like he's a subject, not a person I used to love, not someone whose body I've memorized, not someone whose attention on me right now is making my entire nervous system misfire.

I rip the page out of my notebook and tear it into small pieces.

Then I notice he's watching me do it.

Blake is standing near the edge of the ice, his skates off, his gear half-removed. He's looking directly at me, and his expression is completely unreadable. He saw me take the notes. He saw me tear them up. He knows exactly what I was documenting.

Our eyes meet for one long second.

Then he turns away and walks into the locker room.

I sit there, my heart hammering, pieces of paper with his observations scattered across my lap like evidence of a crime.

**FIVE YEARS AGO**

I have been planning this weekend for three months.

Not in an obsessive way, but in the way you plan something you're really looking forward to. I found a cabin online—a small place in the mountains, two hours from the city. A place where Blake and I could just be, without hockey, without obligations, without the constant noise of his schedule dictating our lives.

I booked it for a specific weekend in October. I told Blake about it six weeks in advance. I reminded him multiple times. I made it clear: this weekend is important to me. This is the thing I'm asking for.

"Baby, I wouldn't miss it," he said the last time I brought it up. "Two days with you, no interruptions. I'll be there."

He sounded like he meant it. I believed him because I wanted to believe him, because believing in Blake's promises had always felt safer than acknowledging that his promises came with asterisks.

Thursday night, he calls.

"Hey, babe. I need to talk to you about something."

My stomach drops. I already know what he's about to say.

"The team needs me for a practice session this weekend. One of the rookies is really struggling, and Coach wants me to work with him one-on-one. It's just this weekend, and I know it's—"

"You promised," I say quietly.

"I know, and I'm sorry. I'll make it up to you. We can go to the cabin next weekend, or—"

"Next weekend you have a game."

"Then the weekend after—"

"Blake." My voice is steady, but I'm dying. I'm actually dying. "You promised me. You promised me this weekend. You promised that for one weekend, hockey wouldn't come first. And I need—" I stop myself. Because what's the point of asking for something he can't give? "Never mind. Go to your practice. Have fun."

"Elle, don't do this. Don't make this a thing. It's just—"

I hang up.

I stand in my apartment, and I understand something crystalline and clear: I cannot spend my life waiting for Blake to choose me. I cannot build a future with someone who promises forever but delivers only when it's convenient.

I don't go to the cabin.

Instead, I pull down the suitcase from my closet and start packing.

It takes the entire weekend.

**PRESENT DAY**

Monday morning, I'm back at The Forge Arena, and Blake is everywhere.

Not physically everywhere—though he is that too. But mentally, emotionally, I cannot escape him. He's in the notes I can't take. He's in the observations I can't write down. He's in the space between my professional armor and my actual feelings.

I'm trying to interview Vault about the team's defensive strategy when Blake skates past behind him, and I lose my train of thought completely. Vault notices, grins, and I want to sink through the floor.

"Sorry," I say, refocusing. "Can you walk me through how Blake signals the coverage adjustments?"

It's a legitimate question. It's also asking Vault to talk about Blake in detail, which is a strange thing to do, and Vault knows it's strange, but he answers anyway.

"He's got this thing where he taps the ice with his stick three times if he wants a shift in coverage. Most guys just yell or use hand signals, but Cap? He's got this whole system where he can communicate without disrupting the flow of play. It's why he's such a good captain—he notices what other people miss."

He notices what other people miss.

He noticed me tearing up the page. He noticed that I was documenting him instead of the team. He noticed that I can't look at him without my body betraying me.

I excuse myself from the interview, saying I need to grab coffee. In reality, I go to the bathroom and splash cold water on my face and try to remember how to be a professional.

When I come back, Blake is sitting at one of the empty press stations, ostensibly reviewing something on his phone. But he's positioned where he can see me. Where I can feel him watching.

I pretend he's not there.

It's the hardest thing I've done in five years.

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday—the pattern continues. Blake's attention is a constant weight. It's not threatening. It's not obvious. But it's there, undeniable, and my body responds to it despite every rational argument I construct.

I'm aware of him crossing the ice. I'm aware of his voice in the locker room interviews (he's being cooperative, giving me good quotes, being exactly the kind of subject a journalist dreams of). I'm aware of the way his eyes find me in the press box even when he's in the middle of practice.

Friday night, I'm supposed to write my first piece for the Chronicle—a five-hundred-word profile of The Forge's opening week and team dynamics. It should be easy. I have good material. I have quotes from multiple players. I have observations about the coaching style and the team's chemistry.

But every time I try to write, my fingers find their way back to Blake. To the compass rose tattoo and what it might mean. To the scar on his ribs and whether it limits him. To the way he's built himself into something powerful and dangerous and completely impossible to ignore.

I delete it. Rewrite. Delete again.

At 2 AM, I have three hundred words and no direction.

I give up and go to bed, and I dream about pointed looks across an arena and the weight of his attention like a hand on my skin, and I wake up hot and frustrated and so angry at myself that I want to scream.

This is not how this is supposed to go.

This is not part of the deal.

The deal was: I stay embedded. I prove the photos mean nothing. I do my job. I get my story. Six months ends and we move on.

But Blake's attention is rewriting the terms, and I don't know how to negotiate when the leverage is my own body's betrayal.