Chapter 8
She turned the page.
Staring back at her was a high-resolution printout of her own medical records.
An orthopedic X-ray of two human hands, the delicate metacarpal bones crushed into jagged fragments, cross-hatched with surgical pins. Beside the scan, clipped with a rusted metal pin, was the official tournament roster of the Minnesota State Collegiate Men’s Invitational from that very same weekend seven years ago.
The roster of the visiting powerhouse team that had shared the arena with her collegiate program.
Four names were highlighted with fluorescent yellow marker.
Below the roster, written in August’s steady, precise, immaculate handwriting, were dates, game schedules, and medical incident summaries spanning the last eighteen months of professional hockey:
1. *DEREK VANCE — (Chicago).* Underneath Vance’s name was a taped news clipping from last week: *Vance Sustains Torn AC Joint and Severe Shoulder Separation Following Hit by Bennett.* Across Vance's name was a single, thick, uncompromising line drawn in dark red ink.
2. *NOLAN VANCE — (Minor League Affiliate / Call-up).* A clipping from three months prior: *N. Vance Sidelined for Season with Fractured Fibula After Neutral Zone Collision with Bennett.* Struck through with the same heavy, unforgiving red ink.
3. *MARCUS GRIER — (Edmonton).* A handwritten line: *Rogers Place, November 18. Match misconduct. Boarding.* A fresh, bold line of red ink was slashed violently across Grier’s name, the ink still slightly glossy, dried only an hour before the game had begun.
Three names.
Three brutal assaults.
Three careers derailed or permanently damaged.
Fallon’s chest seized, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped animal as the icy, suffocating truth crashed over her.
Derek Vance hadn't been an accidental target. Nolan Vance hadn't been an incidental casualty. Marcus Grier hadn't been a random veteran caught in a mindless enforcer’s frenzy.
They were the three men who had cornered her in that unlit concrete tunnel behind the Duluth rink seven years ago. The three men who had held her down against the cold cinderblock, laughing while they brought heavy graphite sticks down across the bones of her hands until her Olympic dreams were ground into dust—all to guarantee their affiliate school’s path to the championship.
August had never been a mindless brawler.
He had never been an out-of-control stray throwing away his life for adrenaline.
Every fractured knuckle, every multi-game suspension, every fine, every shattered bone in his own body had been a calculated, deliberate execution of vengeance on the men who had stolen her hands.
Fallon turned the page with trembling, numb fingers.
At the top of the next leaf was the fourth and final name on the Duluth roster.
It was not crossed out.
It was circled three times in heavy, black ink, with a countdown date scrawled beneath it: *NEXT FRIDAY — HOME OPENER.*
The final unchecked name belonged to the opposing team's captain, the undisputed superstar of the league, and the man who had ordered the hit on her hands seven years ago:
*GAVIN STERLING.*
