Chapter 72 CHAPTER 72

Chapter 72 CHAPTER 71
Jax’s Pov

​The iron latch of the penalty box didn’t just click when the horn died; it gave a sharp, metallic ping-clack that bounced off the wire mesh partition and cut straight through the roar of the three thousand rail workers spilling over the timber barriers.

​I didn't wait for the supervisor to slide the plywood panel back. I threw the flat of my glove against the frame, the wood slamming into the exterior rubber molding with a heavy, hollow whump that shook the local tracking ledger right off its nail. My runners hit the gray sheet before the echo was even out of the rafter trusses?, the split sole of my left boot letting out that long, screeching shriek-shatter as I threw my whole two-hundred-and-ten-pound frame into a dead, flat-out sprint toward the home goal mouth.

​The ice wasn't clean anymore; it was a chaotic, yellow soup of silver shavings, frozen tobacco spit, and the dark, irregular tracks left by thirty pairs of heavy work boots.

​"Jules!"

​The shout didn't have any play behind it, just a raw, gravelly rasp that felt like it was clearing the kerosene from my lungs by force. I didn't see the linesmen trying to clear the center circle, and I didn't see Harrington’s gold-jerseyed defense line gathering their sticks by the boards. I could only see the small, blue-jerseyed circle of the medical staff huddling around the base of the white goal frame, their heavy dark parkas looking like crows over a frozen ditch.

​Fin, the old trainer, was down on both knees in the slush, his short, calloused fingers caught in the gold border of Julian's collar. His medical kit, that old, rusted tin tackle box with the latch missing was sitting open next to his boot, a couple of yellow-rimmed gauze rolls already soaking up the gray water from the sheet.

​"Don't lift him yet, Jaxom!" Fin barked as my steel cut a deep, five-inch groove into the ice right next to his shoulder. "The three-line is completely out of the slot. If the pleural wall shifts before we get the harness on…"

​"Get out of the way, Fin," I growled.

​I dropped down onto the gray sheet, the ice freezing through the knees of my canvas breezers instantly, a sharp, wet chill that smelled of the ammonia pumps beneath the floorboards. I didn't use the leather gurney straps. I slid my right forearm straight under Julian’s neck, my grease-darkened fingers catching the thick triple-ply polyester of his shoulder seam to hold his head steady against the glare.

​Julian’s face was entirely white, not the aristocratic white of the Thorne boardroom, but a thin, translucent gray that made the blue branching of his veins look like ink lines under his skin. His mouth was slightly open, his chapped lips working on a slow, rattling swallow that didn't have enough pressure behind it to clear his teeth. Every time his heart gave a small, flat thud against his sternum, the white zinc tape beneath his torn jersey let out a short shuck-click against his skin, the adhesive smelling of dry oxide and old medicine.

​"Jax," he whispered. His blue eyes were wide, clear, and looking straight up through the wire cage of my helmet, but they had that dull, unseeing glaze of a boy whose brain is running on nothing but the cold air from the river. "The... the rubber. Did it stay under the wool?"

​"The rubber’s in the bag, Jules," I muttered, my large palm flattening against the white tape of his ribs to feel the rise. "The score is three-two. The box is closed. We’re clearing the gate."

​"Help me up," he breathed. A sharp, needle-like spasm ran through his jawline, his long fingers catching the sleeve of my canvas jacket with a weak, loose clawing that didn't have enough muscle behind it to bunch the cloth. "The scouts... the Detroit wire opens at noon, Jaxom. I’m not... I’m not sitting on the mat when the linesmen clear the registry."

​"You aren't sitting, King," I said.

​I didn't ask Fin for the clearance. I braced my right runner against the unpainted timber of the frame, locked my left arm under his thighs, and lifted his long, six-foot-two frame up against my chest with a single, brutal surge of my hips. Julian let out a short, wet gasp, a sharp catching sound in his throat that ended in a dry click against his collarbone, his forehead dropping until it was pressed straight into the rough canvas of my collar, his wet blonde hair smelling of salt and gray sweat.

​Finny, the freshman goalie, caught Julian's stick off the ice, his hand shaking so hard the ash blade let out a rhythmic clack-clack against his leg guards as he followed us toward the exit.

​We didn't take the main gatehouse runner where the boosters were still shouting into the wire mesh. I drove my boots straight through the small plywood door of the secondary tunnel, the narrow, four-foot-wide cinderblock passage that ran behind the boiler lines and smelled of wet horsehair and old grease. The darkness hit us instantly, the yellow sulfur glare of the rink dying against the rough brick walls, leaving nothing but the low, sixty-cycle hum of the water heaters and the heavy, rhythmic thrud-thrud of my work boots dragging through the gray slush toward the lockers.

​The corridor didn't widen out near the varsity wing; it stayed narrow, a dark, low-roofed vault of painted green concrete where the damp from the ice rink settled into the ceiling casing like gray lard.

​Twenty feet from the locker room threshold, the air changed. The sour reek of the liniment and old wool was cut completely by a sharp, dry smell, the expensive, chemical reek of Turkish leaf tobacco, English shoe wax, and that clean, dead scent of freshly pressed wool that hasn't ever sat in a cold car or a garage bay.

​A wall of men was standing right across the water riser.

​There were six of them, their broad shoulders filling the four-foot passage until the green paint of the cinderblocks was completely hidden behind their coats. They weren't wearing the red nylon windbreakers of the Grand Rapids press crews, and they didn't have the grease-stained track jackets of the regional association clerks. They wore tailored, heavy wool overcoats of a deep, uniform charcoal gray, coats with hand-stitched silk lapels and silver bone buttons that didn't let out a single scritch when they shifted their weight off their heels.

​Their boots were calfskin, black and narrow, polished until the yellow light from the single bulb hanging from the ceiling cord showed two separate, perfectly vertical reflections on the leather toes. None of them had a stick, and none of them had a kit bag. They stood with their long, pale fingers tucked into their pockets, their faces flat, white, and completely unbothered by the noise of the crowd outside.

​Arthur Thorne stepped out from behind the center post.

​He didn't look like he’d spent the morning driving through the freezing rain past the coal bunkers. His gray hair was parted with a silver comb, every strand lying perfectly flat against his skull, his black silk scarf tucked into the neck of his overcoat with a neat, double-looped knot that looked like it had been tied by a clerk at the Merchant’s Trust. He was holding a slim, black leather folder under his left arm, the calfskin stamped with the small, gold crest of the Thorne Legal Group right below the brass latch line.

​"Stop there, Jaxom," Arthur said.

​His voice didn't have any volume to it, just that quiet, royal steel that had been running the probate courts in Grand Rapids since the winter of sixty-five. It didn't carry an echo against the cinderblocks; it just sat in the cold air between us, flat and heavy like a piece of lead plate.

​I didn't drop my arms. I kept my big knees bent, my skates planted six inches apart on the wet linoleum, my shoulder pads locking against Julian's good side until the gold stitching of my jersey pulled into a tight white line across my shoulder blades. I could feel Julian’s ribs giving that short, rhythmic click-shiver against my chest, his breath coming in shallow, hot hitches that turned into gray steam the moment they hit the canvas of my collar.

​"Get out of the lane, Mr. Thorne," I growled, the gravel in my throat thick enough to turn the words into a scrape. "The boy’s running on nothing but zinc tape. He needs the trainer’s table before the noon wire closes."

​Arthur didn't look at my face. He didn't look at my bare knuckles, where the skin over the middle joint was still split and leaking a thin, dark trail of Liam’s blood onto the floor. He kept his eyes fixed entirely on Julian's pale forehead, his fingers reaching under the leather folder's latch with a slow, mechanical regularity that had no play left behind it.

​"The trainer’s table is an administrative courtesy, Jaxom," Arthur said, his voice dropping half a tone into that low registry he used for the liquidation hearings. "And the noon wire doesn't open for boys who don't have an entry form logged with the registry board. Julian... look at me."

​Julian shifted his weight by an inch, his long legs letting out a short, wet thump against my shins as he tried to find a footing on the linoleum. He didn't lift his head all the way, he couldn't clear the tape line without the third rib catching the muscle but his blue eyes found his father's face through the gray shadow of my brow, his chapped lips tightening into that flat, stubborn line from the equipment bay.

​"The... the roster holds, Arthur," Julian whispered, his voice thin as a wire lath. "The margin was fifteen. Clain’s got... Clain’s got the clipboard upstairs."

​"The clipboard is a local piece of cedar, Julian," Arthur said. He slid a single sheet of long, blue\-lined legal paper out of the black folder, the parchment let out a sharp, clean crinkle that sounded entirely out of place in the dark tunnel. "The regional board doesn't look at wood. They look at the ledger."

​He didn't hand the paper across the gap; he laid it flat on the green\-enamel lid of the water riser between us, his silver fountain pen balanced right across the blue margins like an iron needle on a slate template.

​"The Flint plant options were settled at nine this morning," Arthur said, his gray eyes small and level under his silk scarf. "The probate judge signed the secondary decree after the noon mail left Grand Rapids. As it stands on the county book, Julian, you have exactly forty-eight hours before the sheriff’s office executes the disclosure on the travel account. You don't have a name that can clear an NHL draft minimum, and you don't have the sixty\-thousand\-dollar insurance waiver to sign the Detroit entry form."

​He took a step closer, his narrow calfskin boots leaving a small, clean circle in the gray slush where my work shoes had dragged the mud from the parking lot.

​"But the firm has the secondary registry," he continued, his voice dropping into that quiet, suffocating drawl that didn't allow for a breath between the words. "I’ve spent the last two hours in box four with the draft board president. He knows about the three-line, Julian. He knows the third and fourth ribs are floating, and he knows that if you take the ice in Chicago next week without the firm's private medical exemption, you won't clear the first warmup before the state doctors pull your license for good."

​He pointed his finger, the small, white index finger with the gold signet ring, at the blue-lined parchment on the water riser.

​"This is the permanent quit-claim for the north-side real estate," Arthur said into the quiet. "You sign over the remaining trust rights and the entry shares from your mother’s estate to the family group before the noon buzzer sounds on the wire. In return, the firm executes the secondary waiver. I’ll personally guarantee the Detroit board clears the clearance for both you and the mechanic here. You’ll both be on the first-round registry before the train leaves the gatehouse today. You’ll have your steel, you’ll have your professional entry, and you’ll have the sixty\-thousand\-dollar contract held at the Merchant’s Trust before the winter line leaves the ice."

​The six men in charcoal coats didn't shift their fingers. They stood like gray pilings in a frozen river, their shadows stretching out across the linoleum until they met right at the toe caps of my Graf skates.

​"And if he doesn't sign?" I growled, my left fist balling inside the canvas pocket until the coarse wool let out a dry, protesting rip along the seam line.

​Arthur finally looked at my face, just a single, cold glance that didn't carry more weight than a look at an options sheet on a clerk's desk.

​"If he doesn't sign, Jaxom, the firm pulls the medical waiver within five minutes," he said, his lips barely moving behind his silk scarf. "I will personal blackball every entry form that carries the number twelve or the number forty-four from here to the Canadian border. The Detroit scouts will have the disclosure statement on the morning train, and by Monday night, you’ll both be standing in Fin’s garage, watching the junior varsity line take the ice in Chicago through the wire fence. You’ll be two regional numbers without a sheet to skate on."

​He took the silver pen off the blue paper, the metal letting out a short, clean click as he held the black cap toward Julian’s fingers.

​"The clock is running, Julian," Arthur whispered. "The noon train is at the platform."

​Julian didn't look at the silver pen. He didn't look at the six men in charcoal coats, and he didn't look at the gold crest stamped into the calfskin folder on his father's hip.

​He turned his head slowly, his blue eyes finding mine through the dark green shadow of the tunnel. His face was still gray, the cold sweat standing in tiny, yellow-rimmed beads along his hairline, his breathing coming in those short, wet hitches that made his chest protector vibrate against my own ribs. He looked at the split joint on my right hand, at the dark, dried crust of Liam's blood that was still flaking off my skin onto the gray linoleum, then he looked back up at my wire cage, his mouth opening by half an inch into a slow, quiet drainage of the old, aristocratic pride he’d carried since Ann Arbor.

​"Jaxom," he whispered.

​"I’m here, Jules," I muttered, my arm tightening across his shoulder blades until the white zinc tape went rigid under the wool. "The lock is closed. You don't have to sign a single line for this man."

​"I know," Julian breathed.

​He reached out with both hands, his long, bare fingers trembling so hard they could barely find the margin and picked up the blue\-lined legal paper off the green\-enamel lid of the water riser. He didn't use the pen. He didn't look back at the locker room threshold where Fin was waiting with the bandage shears.

​He jammed his thumbs straight through the center of the parchment.

​The heavy legal paper didn't give easily; it let out a loud, coarse SHRRR-SCHUCK that echoed off the painted cinderblocks like a dry lath breaking under an iron boot. Julian didn't stop with the first rip. He folded the sheets over, his long fingers catching the blue borders, his weight shifting into his heels as he tore the contract into four separate, ragged teeth of white and blue fiber, the edges frayed like old packing paper from a cellar basket.

​He didn't hand the pieces back.

​He let his hands drop, the shredded fragments of the Thorne real estate inheritance falling out of his fingers in a slow, irregular drift that hit the gray slush right around Arthur’s calfskin toes. One of the white strips landed flat against the wet black leather, the ink lines blurring instantly into a greasy gray smudge as the salt water soaked through the fiber.

​"We don't need your draft, Arthur," Julian said.

​His voice wasn't thin anymore; it had that flat, stubborn steel that had been sitting in his bones since we sat on the stone wall behind the greenhouse, the voice of a boy who had left his name in the drywall dust on the third floor and didn't have an ounce of waste left in his jaw.

​"We earn our own ice," he whispered, his blue eyes brilliant and entirely empty of fear under the bare bulb. "Get out of our lane."

​Arthur Thorne didn't move his hand. He stood there with the silver fountain pen still balanced between his fingers, his face completely frozen into a gray, featureless carving that looked older than the timber bleachers behind the wall. The six men in charcoal coats didn't lunge; they looked down at the shredded parchment around their boots, then back at the massive, grease-stained navy jersey with number forty-four on the back that was already moving forward through the middle slot.

​I didn't wait for them to clear the gap.

​I shoved my right shoulder pad straight into the center man’s chest, the heavy canvas driving into his silk lapels with a loud, hollow whump-clack that pushed him three feet back against the water riser. I didn't look back to see if his boots slipped on the paper. I kept my arms locked tight around Julian’s ribs, my skates letting out that loud, violent crunch-hiss as we cleared the threshold of the varsity door, the oak panel slamming behind us with a final, heavy thump that cut the tunnel off for good.

​The noon train to Detroit was letting out its first long, iron whistle past the coal yard, but as I laid Julian down onto the clean leather of the trainer's table, the ice was entirely ours. And the line was finally clear.

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A/N: I hope we like it!

Thank you all so much for the support, truly appreciated!