Chapter 3 Blood on the Ice
~Author's POV~
"You. And you. Corner battle drill. Now."
Dominic said, and he didn't even look twice at Ava when he said it. He just pointed his stick between her and Liam like he was picking two random names out of a hat, like the girl standing on that ice wasn't the same one he'd watched slip out the back door three hours earlier without a word.
Ava's stomach dropped anyway.
For one wild, panicked second, she searched his face for something, a flicker, a crack, anything that told her he recognized her as more than another body on his roster. She found nothing. His jaw was set, his grey eyes flat and professional, and he was already turning away to address the rest of the team like she was invisible.
"Everyone else, circle up on the far blue line," he said. "Watch and learn how this program is going to run."
Liam skated up beside her, closer than necessary, his mouth curling into that same smirk from the locker room. "Guess the new coach doesn't play favorites," he muttered, low enough that only she could hear. "Lucky you."
"Lucky me," Ava repeated flatly.
She didn't look at him. She was still watching Dominic, waiting for some sign that he understood what he was doing, pairing her against the biggest, meanest player on the team in a full-contact drill on her very first day. But he only lifted the whistle to his lips.
"Corner battle," Dominic said, loud enough for the whole rink to hear. "Full contact. Puck goes in the corner, first one to control it and get a clean shot on net wins the rep. No pulled hits, no easy passes. I want to see who actually wants to be here."
A few of the guys on the blue line exchanged glances. Somebody whispered something Ava didn't catch, but she saw the way a couple of heads turned toward her, then toward Liam, like they already knew exactly what this drill was really about.
Bones, still in his crease near the far net, pulled his mask down slowly, like he didn't love what he was about to watch.
"Coach," Liam said, skating a little closer to the bench, testing the water. "Are you sure about full contact? First day and all."
"Did I stutter, Reed?"
"No, sir."
"Then get in position."
Dominic's tone left no room for argument, and something about the flatness of it made a few players shift uncomfortably where they stood. This wasn't a coach softening the first day of tryouts. This was a man drawing a line in the ice and daring anyone to cross it, and Ava realized, with a jolt that ran straight through her chest, that he was doing this on purpose. Not to protect her, not to punish her, either.
To test her, harder than he'd test anyone else, so nobody in that rink could ever say she got special treatment.
It should have made her angry. Instead, something in her settled, because at least now she understood the rules of the game they were both going to have to play.
She skated to the corner and took her position.
Liam lined up across from her, all six-foot-two of him rolling his shoulders like he was getting ready to hit a brick wall for fun. He wasn't smirking anymore. His face had gone serious in that particular way boys got right before they decided to prove a point with their bodies instead of their mouths.
"Don't take this personal," he said.
"I won't," Ava said. "Just try not to hurt yourself."
Dominic dropped the puck into the corner and blew the whistle.
Liam moved fast, faster than Ava expected from someone his size, closing the gap between them in what felt like half a second, two hundred and ten pounds of muscle aimed straight at her with his shoulder dropped low, clearly intending to flatten her against the boards and end this before it even started.
The whole rink seemed to suck in a breath at once.
Ava didn't panic. She'd been hit like this before, by boys twice her size on frozen ponds who never learned to pull back, and something in her body had learned a long time ago exactly what to do with fear like this. She waited until the very last possible second, until Liam's full weight was already committed, already too far forward to correct.
Then she dropped low and spun.
It happened so fast most of the guys on the blue line missed the actual mechanics of it, just saw the blur of her reverse pivot, her blades cutting a hard, clean arc on the ice as she rotated her whole body out from directly in front of him, using his own momentum against him like she'd rehearsed it in a dream a thousand times.
Liam's skates kept going. His body didn't have anywhere left to go but forward, straight into empty space where Ava used to be standing, and he slammed face-first into the plexiglass with a crack loud enough to echo off the rafters.
The boards shuddered.
Ava was already gone, scooping up the loose puck that had rolled free from the collision, her blades eating up the ice in three fast strides that put her clean in on net before anyone had even processed what they'd just watched.
She didn't hesitate.
She snapped a quick wrist shot up under the crossbar, bar-down, the puck ringing off the iron with a sharp metallic clang before it dropped into the back of the net.
Nobody moved.
Nobody breathed.
For one long, suspended second, the entire arena went completely, deafeningly silent, thirty grown men standing frozen on the blue line, sticks slack in their hands, staring at the girl who had just put their captain face-first into the glass and buried a shot top shelf like it was nothing at all.
Bones was the one who broke first. A short, disbelieving laugh burst out of him before he could stop it, hand flying up to cover his own mouth like he couldn't believe the sound had come from him.
Liam pushed himself off the boards slowly, one glove pressed on his cheek where the plexiglass had caught him, and when he turned around his face was blotchy red, humiliation and fury fighting for control of his features in front of his entire team.
"That was a dirty hit," he snapped, voice cracking with anger.
"That was a clean drop and a legal check," Dominic said, before Ava could even open her mouth. His voice was calm, almost too calm, but there was something tight underneath it, something coiled. "You committed too early, Reed. She read you like a book."
Liam's jaw worked like he wanted to argue, but one look at Dominic's face told him that wasn't a fight he was going to win in front of the whole team.
Dominic's eyes moved to Ava next, just for a second, just long enough for her to catch the flicker underneath the coach's mask, something that looked almost like pride fighting to get out before he crushed it flat again.
Then his whistle went to his lips, and he blew it hard, sharp and final, the sound echoing on the silent rink like a verdict.
"In my office," Dominic said, his jaw clenched so tight the muscle jumped along his cheek. "Both of you. Now."
