Puck Drills & Quick Thrills (CU Hockey Book 5) Read online

  Puck Drills & Quick Thrills

  CU Hockey Book 5

  Eden Finley

  Saxon James

  Contents

  Puck Drills & Quick Thrills

  1. Westly

  2. Jasper

  3. Westly

  4. Jasper

  5. Westly

  6. Jasper

  7. Westly

  8. Jasper

  9. Westly

  10. Jasper

  11. West

  12. Jasper

  13. Westly

  14. Jasper

  15. Westly

  16. Jasper

  17. Westly

  18. Jasper

  19. Westly

  20. Jasper

  21. Westly

  22. Jasper

  23. Westly

  24. Jasper

  25. Westly

  26. Jasper

  27. Westly

  28. Jasper

  29. Westly

  30. Jasper

  31. Westly

  32. Jasper

  33. Westly

  34. Jasper

  Epilogue

  Thank You

  About Saxon James

  Eden Finley

  Acknowledgments

  Puck Drills & Quick Thrills

  Copyright © 2021 by Eden Finley & Saxon James

  Cover Illustration Copyright ©

  Story Styling Cover Designs

  * * *

  Professional beta read by Les Court Services.

  https://www.lescourtauthorservices.com

  Edited by One Love Editing

  https://oneloveediting.com

  * * *

  All rights reserved.

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher.

  For information regarding permission, write to:

  Eden Finley - permissions - [email protected]

  or

  Saxon James - permissions - [email protected]

  Disclaimers

  While we stuck as close as we could to the NCAA guidelines and rules in regards to hockey, we took creative freedom with some small details, because fiction is supposed to be fun.

  * * *

  Names, colleges, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the authors’ imaginations or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  1

  Westly

  I march across campus like I’m on a mission. Because I am.

  Professor Eckstein just made my shit list, and it’s really hard to do that. I don’t hate anyone. I rarely get mad. Unless it’s at my brother, Asher, for doing something stupid. Which he does. A lot.

  But even Asher’s not on my shit list.

  Being a hockey coach and ex-NHL player, I have dealt with a lot of overgrown, testosterone-filled man children in my life. It takes some epic levels of assholism to piss me off. Without having met Professor Fuckstain, he’s already managed to get on my bad side. What kind of coldhearted A-hole does he have to be to deny a student extra credit when they’re dealing with real-life shit?

  My brother’s grades aren’t great—I’m not delusional here—and yeah, he could maybe dedicate more time to study, but when? When does Asher get the chance? He goes to classes, then to hockey practice, and then we go home to a house full of kids that I’m responsible for because our parents went out to dinner one night, lost control of their car, and never came home.

  I’m the legal guardian of five minors when a year ago, I was throwing my money away on partying and sleeping with anything that moves.

  Responsibility hit me harder than an enforcer with a grudge, and it feels like I’ve been slammed into the boards repeatedly ever since.

  There’s no way I could handle it all on my own, so I asked Asher to postpone his spot in the NHL to play Division I college hockey and help me around the house. It’s only until he graduates and the kids are a bit older. Hopefully after four years, I’ll actually have the hang of this pseudoparenting thing. Asher may be above asking for help, but I’m not. Plus, I felt it needed to be us who looked after them. We’re their big brothers, and I didn’t want strangers raising them.

  Because of the sacrifices Asher’s making, I’ll do anything to make sure the NHL is still in the future for him. I got my chance; he needs his. Just as soon as I figure out what I’m doing.

  The first step of making sure that happens is keeping Asher on the team.

  The fact he asked for extra credit and admitted he needs help is a big thing for my stubborn-headed twenty-one-year-old brother. And this fucking professor shoots him down because, why? He likes being a sadistic asshole to his students?

  Asher’s not dumb. He has the brains, but it’s hard for him to retain information he doesn’t care about. He only cares about hockey, and until recently, I understood it because I was the same. Now I have other shit to care about, like making sure my five siblings don’t have a traumatic adolescence. I have to say, I’m not off to a great start.

  I’m the epitome of that meme where everything’s on fire with the caption “Everything is fine.”

  I’ve just gotten Asher to actually put in some effort with his classes, and I thought it was paying off, but I could tell as soon as he walked into practice today, he wasn’t only pissed off. He was defeated.

  Isn’t it a teacher’s job to encourage their students?

  I storm into the mathematics building but have absolutely no idea where I’m going. It’s been six years since I walked these halls as a student, and Fuckstain wasn’t one of the professors then, so I don’t know where his office is.

  As I pass by the different lecture halls and classrooms, I scan each of the doors, trying to find his name, and then near the end of the building, I find it.

  Prof. Jasper Eckstein.

  I barge through the door without even pausing to knock.

  The guy behind the desk startles at my abrupt entry, but all the words die on my lips as soon as we lock eyes. His are the palest blue I’ve ever seen, and he has a jawline that could cut glass.

  I was expecting an old, grumpy dude with gray hair and beard. I was not expecting … this.

  Jasper Eckstein is sex wrapped up in the package of a Sunday school teacher.

  From his light brown hair, filled-out muscles trying to break the seams of his tweed jacket, and pleasantly curious expression, I think I’ve walked into the wrong office. Or Eckstein shares the space with the Adonis in front of me. He’s midthirties at most. This can’t be the professor who has a reputation for hating jocks. He doesn’t look mean enough to be bitter.

  But then he scowls and proves me wrong. “Can I help you?” He’s eyeing me the exact same way I’m doing to him, but his gaze catches on the logo on my polo shirt—a C and U with the word hockey underneath.

  “I—”

  He cuts me off. “You’re here about Asher Dalton.”

  I do have the right office, then, and his reputation precedes himself. “I am. I’m Westly, Asher’s—”

  “Assistant coach. I remember the dean telling everyone at a function—that you didn’t attend—how great it is to have a recent NHL player at the school. And then he actually boasted about how much they’re paying you while simultaneously telling me there’s no room in the budget to expand the math department. So yeah, I know who you are.”

  Okay, I think his reputation is actually understated.

  “Asher is—”

  He cuts me off again. “Not
suited for my class. He still has time to drop it, and it won’t affect his grades. He can keep his precious spot on the hockey team and pick up a different class next semester.”

  “His schedule is too tight as it is. All he was asking for was an extra-credit assignment to boost his grade.”

  “Not my problem. I don’t give extra credit. That’s what I told him, and I’m not going to change my mind simply because he sent his big brother to fight his battles.”

  I cock my head.

  “You don’t think I missed the same last name, Coach Dalton?”

  “What is your problem?” I snap.

  “You jocks are all the same. You think you can bully your way into getting what you want, take without asking, and demand exemptions because you can balance on skates and put a disc in a net. I don’t give preferential treatment to anyone, let alone those who don’t deserve it.”

  “We’re not asking for preferential treatment. Just for some help.”

  “Which is why you muscled in here without knocking? Look, I’m going to tell you the same thing I told your brother. I can’t help you.”

  A big fuck you is on the tip of my tongue, but I can see the official HR complaint now.

  “Why do you work at a sports-dominated school if you hate it so much?”

  The question is rhetorical, but when I turn on my heel to leave, I swear I hear him mutter, “I’ve been asking myself the same thing.”

  I know I’m more than a little tightly wound when Coach Hogan tells me to let up on the boys. I’ve been barking drills at the team for over an hour with barely a break to catch a breath. Or hydrate.

  Asher seems to be the only one enjoying it because it’s getting all his anger out from his run-in with Eckstein.

  The guys hit the showers, and I help the equipment manager, Kole, put away all the cones and nets so I can resurface the ice, but I need to skate for a bit first. I move around the rink, and the phantom sounds of a packed arena fill my ears.

  Back when I attended this school, we were a good team but never the best. I only ever saw a Frozen Four my senior year, the year Coach Hogan first started at the school, and even then, we were knocked out in the first round. These boys … there’s so much talent on the team, so much potential. A few of them have future NHL prospects, and as much as I’d like to say I’m nothing but happy for them, a pang of longing stabs at me when I think about their futures in pro hockey when mine was cut short.

  Then the longing gets squashed out by guilt because I don’t want my siblings to ever think they ruined my life. They’re going through loss and grief, and I’m here whining I don’t get to be a fuckboy anymore.

  I push my legs harder and keep going until my thighs and calf muscles burn, my chest rises and falls in quick pants, and sweat drips down my forehead.

  The ice beneath my blades, the sting of temperature-controlled rink on my face … I miss playing. It’s a vicious cycle. I miss my carefree life and then feel guilty for missing it. Over and over again, I put myself through this emotional torture, but I don’t let it show on the outside. I can’t.

  It’s my job to keep my shit together. For our family’s sake.

  And speaking of family, I realize I need to get home to relieve the babysitter. Last year, our fifteen-year-old sister, Zoe, would look after the kids until Asher and I got home from practice, but it all became too much for her. Amen, sister. A-fucking-men.

  We’ve hired a nice recently retired woman who lives down the street to watch them in the afternoons. She makes sure Rhys, the thirteen-year-old, doesn’t run off, Hazel, the eleven-year-old, does her homework, and Bennett and Emmett, the nine-year-old twins, don’t kill each other.

  Just an average day in the life of a single legal guardian.

  Welcome to my hell.

  2

  Jasper

  Why am I always the goddamn bad guy?

  I push back my anger long enough to go over tomorrow’s lesson plan, but it doesn’t take long to bubble to the surface again.

  Who does Westly Dalton think he is? Storming into my office to throw a tantrum over his slacker younger brother. That’s jocks for you. Acting first and thinking second, sticking together even when they’re in the wrong, and everyone’s content to let them get away with it.

  Something has to be done.

  Unlike Coach Dalton, I know stomping my feet and expecting to get my way doesn’t work. The dean won’t care. Westly is his star recruit, and Asher is their star player. If I go to the dean, I can already see him telling me to give the extra credit and be done with it. Or worse, give Asher a pass even if he doesn’t know the material.

  The jocks in my high school got away with that shit, but I won’t allow it in my class.

  Not happening. Everyone gets an equal opportunity, and everyone has to put in the work to pass.

  I rub my jaw, the skin rough under my fingers, already needing a shave.

  The mature side of my brain is telling me to let it go. I stood my ground, I got my outcome.

  The part of me that’s still the bullied teenager I was in high school wants to put him in his place.

  My juvenile side wins out.

  Coach Hogan is no better than the dean when it comes to his staff, but where the dean folds under the funding brought in by the sports teams, Coach Hogan doesn’t have that stress and likes to keep a tight leash on his coaches and his team. We’ve never seen eye to eye on much, but I know he won’t be impressed to learn his superstar is running around bullying the faculty.

  Coach Hogan is an asshole jock, but he has morals.

  By the time I head across campus toward the arena, it’s getting late, and if the steady stream of navy-and-silver windbreakers is anything to go by, I’d say practice has just finished. Some of the team recognize me but don’t say anything, which is fine by me. I’m no longer easy to intimidate, but I don’t think I’ll ever get past large groups making me nervous.

  I shoulder open the door to the arena and hesitate before picking a direction down the hall. I’ve never been here, and I honestly thought I’d never have to be.

  I reach a set of double doors that lead to the rink and decide to shortcut through there to reach the locker room. I’m expecting it to be deserted, but there’s a lone figure out on the ice.

  It’s not until I’m closer that I realize who it is. Coach Dalton is skating hard and hasn’t noticed me yet. His dark hair is stuck to his forehead with sweat, and I wonder how long he’s been at it. He’s clearly still got anger to work out with the way he’s tearing up and down the rink, bent low, strong legs displaying power in every move. It would almost be attractive if he wasn’t an undomesticated caveman.

  I slip past without him noticing and make my way down the long corridor until I reach Coach Hogan’s office. He’s sitting behind his desk, staring at something on his monitor. And instead of barging in like an oaf, I knock on the doorframe.

  It takes a moment, but when he pulls back and sees me, his face stretches into a smug grin. “Eckstein. Come to join the hockey team, have you?”

  “Funny,” I answer. “And the last-name thing might be how you do it down here, but I’ve asked you to call me Jasper.”

  “Right. Jasper. Why are you here? Want to whine about my budget some more?”

  “We both know it’s bullshit—”

  He interrupts me with a long groan, but I keep talking.

  “Math is the foundation for jobs that will benefit the economy. Engineers, doctors, literally anything to do with computers and coding—”

  “We’ve been over this. I don’t make the budget … I just bring in the money for it.”

  For the love of jocks. How is peacocking a prized trait? Sometimes it’s like the rest of the world has gone mad. I suck in a long breath as I take the seat across from him. “I’m not here to talk budgets. I want you to keep your coaches and players under control.”

  His cocky attitude disappears in a snap. “Why? What happened?”

  That’s more
like it.

  “Asher Dalton is failing my class, so I suggested he drop it in order to keep his place on your team. Instead of following my suggestion, he ran to his big brother. For some reason, Coach Dalton thought storming into my office and making demands would somehow change my mind.”

  Paul leans back in his chair and takes me in. “What demands was he making?”

  “He wanted me to give Asher extra-credit work so he could pass. Which I don’t do for anyone.” It’s a blanket policy of mine. When your class is a core subject for numerous degrees, I can usually count on one hand the number of students who actually want to be there. Asher Dalton is far from one of them. And he’s far from the first wanting extra credit because he couldn’t manage his course load.

  “You’d think you’d reconsider, given the circumstances,” Paul says.

  “I’m completely unconcerned about whether your players keep their spots or not.”

  “I’m not talking about him keeping his spot on the team.”

  I frown. What other circumstance could he mean? It hits me, and I almost laugh. “Because he’s ‘NHL bound’?” I’ve heard that thrown around about Asher more times than I can count. “Again, I’m unconcerned. One student isn’t more important than any other.” His lack of argument back is setting me on edge. “I swear this school acts as though the Daltons are God’s gift to hockey. Just because his brother played professionally doesn’t mean he will.”