Somehow I'd known that something catastrophic was going to happen tonight. All the signs had been there. Things had been going too well. Dad and I were starting to break the ice. The company was seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. People in town were not so hostile to us anymore. I had friends. I had my second kiss, this time with a boy who seemed to like me.

The life of Carlota Bernal Solis always seemed to careen out of control when things started going well. I'd learned that hard lesson when I was an elementary school kid.

Dean was not moving.

A cry tore off my throat as I jumped over the barrier. More joined. For the first time I was not interested in going after the bullies. I just wanted to make sure that he was okay. That everything was going to be okay.

I slid to my knees once I reached him. "Dean?"

"Don't touch him!" someone barked to my left. I was violently shoved aside by Gauthier as he led two men toward Dean. I recognized them as the same that carried me away when I broke my nose, and they came prepared with the sling.

"Is he okay?" I asked.

Someone else pulled me away by the shoulders, this time less forcefully. I glanced back to see that it was Pace. He grabbed my shoulders in a firm grip that wasn't going to let me go if I decided to go berserk. He needn't have worried, I was frozen with fear.

The three adults and the referees crowded around Dean. The pulse of my blood in my ears sounded like the drums of war, a symphony to the battle that was already waging inside of me. I desperately clung to the hope that he was just passed out, that he'd react soon and turn his brilliant eyes into a glare directed at the Eagles. And then as soon as that happened my gloves would come off and I didn't care if I tore my knuckles open, I was going to rearrange some faces tonight. I was through with seeing the people I cared about be hurt in front of me. I was strong now. I could protect them and myself.

Except he'd been fallen like a tree log right before my eyes and I hadn't done shit to prevent it. I'd been too far from him. I shouldn't have obeyed Coach when he called me in. I should have stayed by Dean.

An icy hand wrapped itself around my throat and made it harder to breathe. For the first time in years I prayed.

And then Dean stirred with a groan.

I wasn't the only one who leaned closer. We all wanted to know if our friend would be fine.

"Hyde, tell me where you are," Gauthier demanded and Dean complied. He sounded as though he'd just woken up from a long nap, but that had to be better than nothing, right?

"What just happened?" I heard him ask, clear as day. Dean put his hands under him and hauled himself up on all fours. He staggered, but he didn't fall as he lifted his head up.

"Oh!" I exclaimed, putting my hands over my mouth to hold back another scream. The entire arena burst into applause.

He was fine.

Dean was fine.

"Gracias, Diocito," I said in my mother tongue.

Gauthier directed the two men to ease Dean into the sling, and I heard them instruct him to remain still in case of a concussion.

Weren't concussions a big deal?

I caught a big commotion in the audience from the corner of my eye as someone burst out of the packed bleachers. It was no other than Peter Hyde, Dean's father. He jumped two stairs at a time as he made it downstairs to meet the men carrying his son. I turned my body to follow as well, but Pace's vice grip stopped me. I'd forgotten about him.

"Let me go," I told him.

"Oh yeah? And where do you think you're going?"

I wiggled until I freed myself from him and faced him with a frown. "I need to make sure he's okay."

"So do we," he said, jerking a gloved hand at the entire team as we watched the men take our Captain away. "But we have a game to win, and we can't do that if we all go after them. You have to cool your head down and get it back in the game."

I flapped my mouth open and closed, motioning toward the disappearing figure of the men as they headed outside of the arena. In the back of my mind I could understand that what he was saying made total sense, but at that second I couldn't see how he could be so calm and ruthless about it.

"Are you out of your fucking mind?" I exploded. "That's our friend, your best friend they just took away on a suspected concussion! How do you expect me to keep a cool head and win the game now?"

Pace's face contorted with an anger I'd never seen before. It caught me off guard as he grabbed me by the collar of my jersey and pulled me closer. He growled as he said, "With the same kind of cojones Dean had when that was you in a sling. Wouldn't you be absolutely furious if the whole team unraveled because you were down?"

My lips trembled. I wanted to cry.

My head hung and I said, "It's not fair."

"That's right, Charlie. Life and hockey aren't fair. The show goes on."

Coach Martel called us all back to the bench for a timeout. He told us that while Dean was out we had to do a change of plan. What he said didn't register in my head, but I still went out there and played as best as I could. It felt like every step I took was heavier, like I was skating and passing in slow motion. The game wasn't as thrilling anymore, the adrenaline coursing through my veins had nothing to do with it and all to do with the uncertainty of whether Dean would be okay, really. Whether he'd be able to join us again soon and kick Eagle feathery ass.

We managed to contain them to nil goals until the end of the first but the mood was sombre as the buzzer went off.

How were we going to survive two more periods of pummeling without our Captain?

At the third attempt of someone giving us a rousing speech, I stood up and said, "Fuck this."

I dropped my gloves on the bench and elbowed guys aside until they let me out. Coach Martel and the two Assistant Captains caught up to me.

"The locker rooms are off bounds, Bernal," Coach said.

"If you want my head in the game," I said as I glared at him and the other two boys. "You're going to have to let me see what his status is. Then I'll give you the best fucking performance you've ever seen."

His lips thinned. Coach Martel was a good guy. Moreover he was a smart guy. He could probably tell that nobody, not him, not our two massive Assistant Captains, would stop me from doing what I set out to do.

Coach huffed. "Brian, stay with the team and keep them in line. Pace, come with us."

The tension in my body released a little. I opened my mouth but Coach stopped me with a raised hand.

"Whatever you're about to say, can it. I'm not doing this for you. I need all my players focused and your anxiety is disrupting the entire bench."

I closed my mouth and nodded. We walked in silence to the locker, which was why we clearly heard a loud bang coming from it.

All three of us paused and looked at each other. When we heard someone scream stop was when we ditched the pretense of calm and took off into a run. We burst into the locker room to something none of us were prepared to see.

Dean was on the floor, trying to get up. I wondered if he'd fallen, but he was neatly on top of the sling. So where had the banging come from? Who had screamed?

"What the hell is going on?" Coach Martel asked and I saw just what the commotion was.

Peter Hyde had Gauthier by the collar of his sweatshirt and against the row of lockers.

"Is this what you wanted?" Peter asked. "Did you want to see my son turn into a useless piece of shit like you?"

Gauthier spat a blob of blood on the floor that turned out to be a tooth. He smiled up at the other man, as though he hadn't been punched so hard that he was guzzling blood from where his tooth had been.

"You mean, like you?" Gauthier asked, tilting his head to the side. "Weren't you the one who sabotaged my skates, made me fall and break my neck and never be able to play again, just because my skills intimidated you?"

Peter Hyde slammed him harder into the lockers and even though he was positively foaming at the mouth with anger, he didn't deny the allegations.

I gasped, and it drew their attention to me.

"You were the one who sabotaged Hyde's skates?" I asked our Assistant Coach, the school nurse. The guy who was in charge to keep us healthy and safe.

"Holy shit," Pace whispered.

Coach Martel took a step forward. "Gauthier, what is going on here? What are you talking about?"

Dean grabbed his side and forced himself to a sitting position. "Dad, can you not be a dick for once in your life and stop antagonizing the guy who is pointing a gun at us?"

Wait, what?

I looked around and noticed that before we burst in, Gauthier and the Hydes had been alone. The other two guys were not in sight. I wondered where they'd gone until I latched onto what Dean said. At first it made no sense to me, seeing that Gauthier was trapped between the wall that was Peter Hyde and a row of lockers. And then I saw the glint of what was in Gauthier's hand. Coach Martel must have noticed it at the same time, and his reaction was to grab Pace and get the boy behind him. I was too far from them, closer to Dean.

My reaction was to crouch in front of Dean.

He groaned. "Charlie, get away from here. Call for help."

"I am the help," I said through gritted teeth. I was not afraid of the gun that Gauthier held in his hand. He pointed it out, from my vantage I couldn't see exactly where, but one thing was fore sure. Peter Hyde was in the way, and that was who Gauthier had the biggest grudge against.

I didn't think Coach Martel or Pace knew it, so I had to do something.

I managed to catch Pace's eyes and I jerked my head towards the door, mouthing at him to call the police. His eyes widened and he shook his head. I mouthed at him to fucking do it. He was out of sight for Gauthier or Dean's dad and the closest one to the door. He was the only one who could safely escape. His entire body trembled, but finally he slinked backward and out the door.

Gauthier started laughing then. "You should run away like your friend, Charlie. I don't really want to see you hurt. Or you, Martel. You've been decent to me."

"Why are you doing this, Florian?" Coach asked, his voice trembling as he raised his hands in the air. "I don't understand."

"You don't, because you're not a bully."

Peter Hyde picked Gauthier up and was about to slam him against the lockers again when he found the barrel of the gun pressed against his chin. His hands let go of the collar and he took a step back.

Gauthier hauled himself off from his vulnerable position and pressed forward, making the other man retreat until he stood next to Coach Martel.

With more force that I expected him to have, Dean grabbed me by an arm and pulled. I lost my balance and fell on my ass, and he took advantage of that to haul me partially behind him.

"Stay there," he growled. I tried to escape, but his grip around my arm tightened with bruising force.

"See, Charlie here and I have a lot in common." As Gauthier said this he casually pointed at Dean and I with his gun. And kept it trained on us. "He has PTSD and so do I. He breaks into violent bursts and so do I. Except that mine all have the same target."

"Me," Peter Hyde said with a snort, but he was clever enough to keep his hands up. "After all these years?"

"It doesn't matter how long goes by, I'll never forget that it was you who destroyed my dreams." He uncocked the gun as he spoke. "I was glad to see that karma caught up to you with a shattered knee, but you think I'll let you raise your son into the star I could have been? Fat. Fucking. Chance."

Then he aimed straight at Dean.

I realized right then that Gauthier's greatest revenge wasn't on firing that gun at Peter Hyde, the man who tormented him and hurt him. It was to shoot Peter Hyde's hope down. And that was his son.

My life flashed before my eyes. The guayoyo in the morning at home. Playing with Miguel and my cousins back home in Venezuela. Making arepas with my mom as we waited for dad to come home in the evenings. The mountains outside the window. The sun shining a bright yellow. The same spun gold that made Dean's hair. The blue sky in his eyes.

The pop pop pop that took the life of mi mamá. The seatbelt that had strapped me in place and kept me from reaching for her.

But I was free now. Dean's grip was not going to prevent me from saving him.

This was what I'd trained myself for. What I boxed for. To defend myself. To protect others. To prevent a tragedy from ever happening in front of my eyes again. To hone my reflexes until they were faster than the horror heading my way.

I stood up with a roar. The surprise made Dean's hand slack and I tore myself free. He tried to grab at me again but was disoriented. He failed.

His dad and the Coach screamed. They told me to stop.

But they couldn't stop me.

Gauthier panicked. He lifted the gun at me and pressed the trigger. I was already lunging at him when he did, but the bullet went out anyway and I felt it.

I had a mission, and my mission was to not let anybody else I cared about die.

My shoulder jerked back under the shattering force of the blow, but my body swung around, guided by the years of relentless practice. My opposite hand swung around and knocked the gun off his hand. It went off again as it clattered to the floor. I saw the Coach and Peter Hyde spring into action and then there was the hard impact of the floor.

A voice called my name above me. I rolled back with a groan and saw Dean. He was screaming. My eyes were closing.

"Don't you fucking give up!"

Those words penetrated through the thick fog that was quickly taking over my mind, through the haze of searing pain that seemed to be taking over my entire body. I wondered if my mom had felt this pain. If it'd been worse with two more bullets.

She'd want me to fight. Dad would kill me if I gave up. Miguel would kill me twice if I bled myself to death.

I sucked in a breath and opened my eyes. They couldn't focus on his face, but I felt Dean's hand pressing against where it hurt the most.

"I won't," was all I managed to choke out before everything faded.

and you thought the previous chapter was WILD.

remember when i warned you multiple times that you were not ready for this rollercoaster ride? i wasn't kidding 😂