Prologue — September 2024, Easthill Academy

Declan heard about the new guy before he ever saw him.

Polish kid. Transfer from some prep school in Connecticut. Supposedly fast as hell.

The rumours filtered through the locker room like they always did—half-truth, half-bullshit, all delivered with the kind of casual cruelty that came naturally to seventeen-year-old boys with too much money and not enough supervision. Someone said his dad was a diplomat. Someone else said he'd gotten kicked out of his last school. Declan didn't pay much attention. Easthill got a new scholarship kid or international student every year, and they either fit in or they didn't. Either way, it wasn't his problem.

He had enough problems.

The rink was cold, the way it always was in early September, that sharp bite in the air that meant the season was really starting. Declan laced his skates with the methodical precision his father had drilled into him since he was six—left skate first, pull tight at the ankle, double knot, check the tension. Right skate, same routine. Don't rush. Don't get sloppy. His hands moved automatically while Coach Kincaid's voice echoed off the boards, barking instructions about the practice drills.

"Dawson, you're centering the first line. Felix, left wing. And our new addition—Kowalczyk, you're on the right."

Declan's head came up.

That's when he saw him.

The new guy—Kowalczyk, apparently, though Declan had no idea how to pronounce it—was already on the ice, doing lazy circles near the blue line. He moved like he'd been born on skates, that effortless glide that separated the good players from the great ones. Tall, maybe six-one or six-two, with dark hair that curled slightly at the edges of his helmet and a build that was all lean muscle and long limbs.

Declan looked away.

He pushed off from the bench and joined the line forming at centre ice, focusing on the drill setup. Coach wanted them running a breakout pattern, something simple to start. Get the rust off. Build chemistry. All the usual first-practice bullshit that Declan could do in his sleep.

Except he couldn't stop noticing the new guy.

Kowalczyk took his position on the right wing, and even standing still, he had this presence—something in the way he held himself, confident without being cocky. When Coach blew the whistle, he exploded off the line with a speed that made Declan's chest tighten. Fast didn't even cover it. The kid moved like water, like something fluid and unstoppable, and when Declan sent the puck up the boards, Kowalczyk was already there, stick ready, collecting the pass without breaking stride.

He buried the puck in the top shelf before the goalie could even react.

"Nice hands, Kowalczyk!" Coach called out.

The new guy didn't celebrate. Just skated back to the line, and as he passed Declan, their eyes met for half a second.

Blue. His eyes were blue, that pale, almost grey-blue that reminded Declan of winter mornings. And there was something sharp in them, something assessing, like he was taking Declan's measure and finding him... what? Wanting? Interesting?

Declan looked away first.

They ran the drill again. And again. Each time, Kowalczyk was right where he needed to be, anticipating plays before they developed, moving with a kind of instinctive intelligence that you couldn't teach. Declan found himself watching—just to understand the timing, he told himself. To build chemistry. That's what centers did. They watched their wingers, learned their tendencies.

That's all it was.

On the fourth rep, something went wrong.

Declan took the pass from the defenseman and pivoted, looking for an outlet. Kowalczyk cut toward the middle at the same moment, and they collided—not hard, but enough that Declan felt the solid weight of him, the heat of another body even through all the padding. They went down in a tangle of limbs and sticks, sliding into the boards with a crash that made the whole team whistle and hoot.

"Jesus," Declan muttered, trying to extract himself.

"You need to look before you turn." The voice was accented—not heavy, but definitely there, shaping the vowels differently. Kowalczyk was already pushing himself up, and he wasn't smiling.

"I did look," Declan said. "You cut inside."

"Because you had no outlet. I was giving you an option."

"I had Felix streaking up the left—"

"Felix was covered." Kowalczyk held out a gloved hand. "You want to argue, or you want to get up?"

Declan stared at the offered hand for a beat too long. Then he took it, let himself be hauled to his feet. Kowalczyk's grip was strong, sure, and he pulled Declan up easily, like he weighed nothing.

"Thanks," Declan said, because his mother raised him to have manners, even when he wanted to shove someone into the boards.

"No problem." Kowalczyk's mouth quirked, just slightly. Not quite a smile. "Try to keep up next time."

Then he skated away, leaving Declan standing there with heat crawling up the back of his neck.

Asshole.

But the thing was, Kowalczyk was right. Felix had been covered. And Declan had been so focused on running the play the way Coach drew it up that he'd missed the better option. He'd missed what was actually happening on the ice.

He didn't like being wrong.

He liked even less that the new guy had been the one to point it out.

The rest of practice passed in a blur of drills and scrimmages. Declan played well—he always played well—but he was aware, constantly, of where Kowalczyk was on the ice. It was like having a splinter under his skin, this nagging presence he couldn't ignore. Every time they ran a play together, Declan felt that same tightness in his chest, that same hyper-awareness of the space between them.

In the scrimmage, Kowalczyk scored twice. Both times off Declan's passes, because apparently they did have chemistry, even if Declan didn't want to admit it.

After practice, in the locker room, the team clustered around Kowalczyk like he was some kind of exotic animal. Asking about Connecticut, about his old team, about whether it was true he'd played in some elite European development league over the summer.

"Just a training camp," Kowalczyk said, peeling off his gear. His accent made the words sound almost musical. "In Kraków. My uncle coaches there."

"That's in Poland, right?" someone asked.

"Yes." Kowalczyk didn't elaborate. He had his back to most of the room, and Declan could see the line of his shoulders, the way his practice shirt clung to his frame. There was a tattoo on his ribs, just visible when he reached up to pull the shirt over his head—some kind of symbol or crest, dark ink against pale skin.

Declan looked down at his own hands, focusing on untying his skates.

"Yo, Dawson." That was Petrov, grinning like an idiot. "You and the new kid looked good out there. Coach is gonna love that line."

"Yeah," Declan said. "Maybe."

He didn't look up. Didn't let himself look across the room to where Kowalczyk was standing, half-dressed and laughing at something someone said. Didn't let himself think about blue eyes or sharp smiles or the way it felt to be pulled to his feet by someone who saw through his bullshit in under an hour.

Declan Dawson was good at hockey. Great at it, even. He'd been groomed for this his entire life—captain of the Easthill Academy team, full ride to Boston University already locked in, NHL scouts watching his every move. He knew how to play the game, on the ice and off.

And the first rule, the most important rule, was simple: don't get distracted.

So he finished unlacing his skates, grabbed his bag, and headed for the showers without saying another word to anyone. He didn't need to make friends with the new guy. Didn't need to figure out why his pulse kicked up every time they made eye contact.

He just needed to play hockey.