Page 45 of Blades Out
The panic retreated inch by inch, reluctant and vicious.
I opened my eyes—when had I closed them?—and scanned the street. Empty. Normal. Daylight bright and ordinary.
You're safe.
He doesn't know where you are.
You're in public. It's daytime. There are people around.
But the words felt hollow even as I thought them.
Because darkness didn't matter to men like him. Witnesses didn't matter. Rules didn't matter.
I'd learned that lesson young and hard.
My hands still shook when I pushed off the wall and forced myself to keep walking.
The stadium rose ahead, solid and real.
I focused on that. On the weight of my phone in my pocket. On the sound of distant traffic.
On anything except the truth screaming beneath my skin.
I didn't feel safe. Not here. Not anywhere. Not anymore.
The arena swallowed sound whole.
I climbed the stands slowly, boots echoing against the concrete steps, until I found a spot halfway up—high enough to see everything, low enough that I didn't feel exposed. The cold bit through my jacket immediately, sharp and clean, carrying the smell of ice and old sweat.
Empty seats stretched in every direction. No crowd. No noise except the distant scrape of skates and the occasional shout from down on the ice.
Pre-game practice.
I pulled my knees up, wrapping my arms around them, and watched.
The team moved in patterns I didn't understand—drills maybe, or warm-ups. Bodies cutting across the ice with speed that looked reckless until you realized how controlled it actually was. Stop. Pivot. Sprint. The puck appeared and disappeared, passed between players like some secret language I'd never learned.
I tried to focus on the movement. The rhythm. Anything except the spiral my thoughts kept trying to drag me into.
Your father is being released.
My fingers dug into my shins.
Focus on the ice. Just watch. Don't think.
A door opened near the bench. Someone new stepped out—taller than the others, moving with that same deliberate silence he carried everywhere. Black practice jersey. Hair tied back.
Rhys.
My breath caught.
He didn't rush onto the ice like the younger players. Didn't showboat or joke around. He simply glided forward with an efficiency that made everything look easy—controlled, silent, lethal grace wrapped in athletic competence.
The team shifted without seeming to notice they were doing it. Made space. Adjusted their patterns. Like they felt his presence the same way I did—gravitational, unavoidable.
He called something I couldn't hear. Two players immediately changed direction. His eyes stayed narrow, focused, scanning the ice with the kind of attention that missed nothing. Pure concentration. No wasted energy. Every movement intentional.
I'd seen him intimidating. Seen him distant and unreadable. But watching him here—in his element, doing what he'd built his entire life around?—
