Delayed Penalty (Crossing the Line, #1)(66)

"You nearly killed her!" I barked, Leo was near me now, skating by and trying to push me back. Shoving Leo backward, I didn't even look to see if I did damage. I finally had that numbness. "You knew what you did, didn't you? You knew when I said I had taken a girl to the hospital that night, didn't you? Fucking admit it."

"I knew. What do you want me to say?"

His casualness pissed me off. I had these memories. They haunted me. And now, staring at him, it was like they were real again. They were happening now. I could smell the blood, feel the chill of that night, hear her moan, watch her wrenching in pain, and now I see him standing over her.

My fist clenched again at the memory, my knuckles white. The memory was not a memory any longer; it was a f*cking nightmare.

"She was virgin…" I gasped, trying to hold on. I sounded desperate, and I was. "Did you know that?"

I watched him. I wanted a reaction out of him. Something that told me he was sorry or that he never meant to hurt her the way he did. I got none of that because you couldn't get a reaction out of someone who didn't give a shit.

"Oh, come on!" Dave rolled his eyes, shaking his head in disgust. His teammates began circling, and refs got in between, shoving us backward. "Why does it even matter?"

"It matters!" I shouted, struggling to get to him. I was livid and wanted revenge. In an aggravated motion, I ripped my helmet off. It skidded to the boards. "It f*cking matters, and you know it!"

"Why?" He sounded offended, annoyed, and restless. He knew where this was going and from the look in my eyes, I was sure he knew how it was ending. "Is it because you didn't get a chance at the cherry?" He laughed bitterly. "That's it, isn't it?"

I found numbness.

I lunged for him, throwing punches I wasn't landing at first, but then once I started connecting, every f*cking memory was told through my fist. It was like I stopped seeing what was in front of me and lived inside a memory instead.

"She walked away, man." Dave snorted, completely missing the point, struggling to get me off of him. "Get over it."

I had no idea what was going on around me, just that refs, coaches, and teammates were all shouting around us, but I couldn't stop, not until I couldn't lift my arm.

When I couldn't move, when he was lying on the ice, bleeding, a vision just like Ami, I stood or tried to at least. "Walk away from that, you son of a bitch."

I wanted to f*cking kill him, but there was a bigger message here.

This time, my message, the message our sport so clearly sent sometimes, was a personal one: You f*ck up, you pay for that shit.

I was escorted to the locker room and started ripping away my gear, throwing the best I could given my condition. The trainers were there, and I was told I needed to head to the hospital. When I felt the blood pouring from my face and the pain in my chest, I decided maybe it was a good idea.

I wondered if she knew. We knew things about each other, shit we never had to say. She knew me, deeper than bones and deeper than soul.

I knew from the first touch; the same passion flew through both of us. As livid as I was, and I still felt inside, I couldn't help but think it wasn't all about me. I flinched at my thoughts and her reaction.

There was a girl about to know the truth, the truth that just might rip those stars from the sky.

Staring at my hands, bloody and broken, I was disappointed, too. I was disappointed that I didn't use my head, and that here we were in playoffs and I let the team down. I also knew had any one of my boys known what I knew, they would have reacted that way, too.

"So what's going to happen to Dave?" I asked, once at the hospital, my voice shaking in fear that the answer would be nothing.

"If he is the one, he will be arrested," Detective Paulsen said. I had Leo call him as soon as they sent me to the hospital. He met me at the hospital. "He will be questioned, I assure you."

I heard the pitch in his voice when he got here, his breathing, his eyes—it all told me what I needed to know. He knew all along it was Dave. How I missed it this long was disturbing. Now everything made sense. The way he acted the next day, the way Paulsen asked questions about the guys on my team that day. The way he blew off any tip I gave him and the way Blake was so easily forgotten about. Paulsen had known all along.

"You guys better do something about him or you'll have the entire Chicago Blackhawks team in jail in about an hour," Leo warned the detective, moving from the chair and standing beside him, knowing we'd all go after Dave again if it came to that. His scowl deepened when the detective said nothing, and I realized I had never seen Leo so upset. I'd never seen him so intense, so angry, and well, so protective of a girl. Ami had that way about her.

Detective Paulsen rolled his eyes. "Like I said, he'll be questioned."

Leo started pacing the room, his hands in his hair. "I was with him that night. I was f*cking with him!" A look of realization came over him. "And I had breakfast with him that morning. Oh, for Christ's sake! I even knew he'd been with a girl that night. He told me." I could understand Leo's frustration and betrayal. We trusted Dave. He was our friend, and now it was like we didn't even know him. Dave was the last person I would ever think could do something like that to another person. Sure, he f*cked around, but trying to kill a woman? No. Never did I think he would have been the one.