The new car started on the first try, because it had no personality at all. I made it in to practice right on time. I heard the voices from a long way off and half expected them to go silent as soon as someone sensed me coming.

But when I stepped into the locker room, they all just kept right on talking. Not the buzz of jokes and jibes like the Thunderheads, but at least they weren’t silent.

Thank Gretzky.

I strolled over to my spot on the bench next to Slade who was messing with the laces on his left skate.

My name, written on masking tape, had been added above the bench. It wasn’t permanent, but it was there. When I looked up, Steele, who sat across the room, nodded at me.

That was a start. It would take time to prove to the captain I could be an important part of this team. I wanted the win just as badly as they did and would give everything I had to get it.

“Coach know you’re here?” Slade asked as he worked his other skate.

I shrugged off my shirt. “He should. I’m his Dead Man.”

“Not you, asshole,” some guy across the room said. “He wanted the wizard, not your broke ass.”

I shot a look over at the mouth.

Dark hair fell down to his shoulders and then some. That had to be a pain in the ass under a helmet. I mean there was flow, and there was flow, but this was more like the damned Mississippi, just waves after waves of hair.

His eyes were the lightest green I’d ever seen, but everything else about him skewed dark. His features hollowed at the cheek and black eyebrows cut a hard V across his forehead, dipped in a permanent scowl.

Resting asshole face.

He waited, all kinds of interested in my response. Like he was looking to start a fight. Like he was begging for it.

I squinted and sniffed to get a read on what kind of marked he was. Came up short until he tipped his head reacting to a movement behind him, and I knew.

Coyote.

Philippe Nadreau, the only coyote on the team, and he wanted to make trouble with the one wolf everyone hated.

I took a breath, thought about how to play this. I could not be bothered to second-guess every damn interaction on this team.

“Kiss my broke ass, Wile E.” I flipped him off and went back to putting on my gear.

A few muffled snickers followed that. Maybe some of the players had room for a sense of humor wedged in beside those ponderosa pines shoved up their furry asses.

And if not?

Let them come at me. Coyote first. I could hold my own.

Slade shook his head. “Make friends a lot, do you, Spark?”

“I’m here for the hockey, dude. Don’t care about anything else.”

“Your mouth says hockey, but your eyes say fight me.” He gathered his gloves and stick. “No win on that play,” he shot over his shoulder as he left the room.

The rest of the players strode out of the room in a steady stream, leaving only a couple of us stragglers behind. I sat to tie my skates.

“We don’t like you.”

I looked up. Coyote and two other guys crowded close, glowering.

One of the guys was none other than Kremlin Kitty, the D-man by the name of Paski. He was a fourth-marked tiger and it had been hate at first sight between him and me since the first game we’d played against each other this year.

The guy on the other side, Roman Zima, stank of mountain lion. He was a fourth line center who was making a name for himself by fighting his way up the league.

Hadn’t killed anyone yet.

That they could prove.

“I don’t care,” I said. Calm. Peaceful, even. Coach Clay would be impressed with all this Zen I was omming. “I’m here to work hard and snag some W’s.”

I went back to ignoring them. Nadreau closed in, breathed on me. I didn’t know if he was going for intimidation or if he just had zero personal space boundaries.

“I got no issue with you, Nadreau,” I said, not looking up from adjusting my skates. “Maybe you want to keep it that way.”

One heartbeat, two. He snorted. “Big talk, pigeon,” he said. “You think you can take me? Think you’re a big hero? Bring it, Dead Man.”

My heartbeat kicked up a pace. I inhaled and exhaled, counting down by threes. Hell, yes, I wanted a fight. It would feel fantastic to punch his smug face.

What was stopping me?

Bite, tear, break, the beast in me snarled.

Still, I didn’t rise to the bait. I was here for hockey. And I would damn well prove it.

Nadreau sucked air through his teeth. “Pathetic.” He turned and stormed off.

And then there were two. Cats.

Wolves and cats did not get along.

I knew what was coming. They were going to rough me up. Give me a couple bruises to remind me of exactly where I belonged in this club. I healed fast. If they were careful about where they landed blows, no one would need to know. This could be just our little secret.

It wouldn’t be the first time this had happened.

My shoulders tightened and my stomach clenched. The wolf growled, wanting to turn, fight, kill. Wanting to take them down and piss on them. That was not going to happen.

This was all a part of being on a new team. Being the new guy. A test of sorts to see what I was made of. I could take it.

A meaty fist slammed the back of my shoulder, hard enough I grunted.

Bad. The cats liked hearing prey make sounds.

I turned, squared off. There was no human reason in those heated, glittering eyes.

“Take your shot, then get the fuck out of my face,” I snarled.

I didn’t have to ask twice.

Paski pounded his fist into the side of my head.

I’d been expecting a body shot—easier to hide, but this asshole was not fucking around.

Everything went buzzy as he followed that blow with a jackhammer to my collarbone, which popped as it broke, and a punch to my side that cracked a rib.

I clenched my fists and swung. But he was fast for such a big guy.

He laughed and spit in my face.

“Fuck you—”

Before I could get anything else out, the mountain lion grabbed the back of my neck and threw elbow shots to my face that I could not duck.

The wolf howled with rage. What had been buzzy went black, and sparks of furious pain snapped through me.

My vision went red hot. Caught fire.

I could feel the shift. The edge, the fall beckoning me to leap.

Kill. Maim.

Visions of tearing my tormentors apart flashed through my brain with gruesome detail. Flesh pierced, shredded, wet and thick, stretched until it snapped. Bone crushed, blood bursting.

I swung, missed, swung again, blind with fury.

“Paski, Nadreau! Get your asses on the ice.”

I couldn’t place the voice. Was having a hard enough time standing against the storm of the beast’s rage.

The beating hearts I wanted to—

—bite, tear, devour—

—end, moved away. Distant, distant, gone.

A new heart stood alone with me, not too close, steady, beating, beating.

“Spark?”

I blinked, but saw only blackness. I thought I was standing. Slowly I became aware of the cold hard floor against my legs, the wall against my back, the taste of blood sliding down my throat.

I was on my ass. Aching.

The heart crouched. Foe? No. But not friend.

“Get that out of your system?” Tabor Steele asked. Captain. The one who should be holding this team together, the one who should make us click. Belong.

But he was not alpha. He couldn’t be. Because I…

“No one wants you here, Spark. You don’t even want to be here. But I didn’t think you were this stupid.”

It took a hell of a lot of concentration just to breathe. So I focused on that and let his words roll over me like slow water. I was still in man form. I was vaguely impressed with my control not to go full beast and tear their throats out.

It would have been—

—easy—

—wrong.

“Anything broken?”

I shook my head.

“You need the trainer?”

Dr. Jerkwad? I shook my head again. “I’m fine. Winded.”

“Take a minute. Pull yourself together. Then get the hell out on the ice before Coach comes back here and finishes the job those two goons started. Like I need your shit in this shit show.”

I blinked and Steele came into focus, crouching. I hated how perfect and golden all-American he looked. Wanker.

“Jesus, they hate your face.” Steele frowned. His eyes skipped as he took in the blood and bruises. He shook his head just slightly, his lips pressing a frown. “Grow a brain, dumbass. There’s no wizard to save you here.”

He rose, and walked out of the locker room.

I sat there for a full minute just breathing. I wasn’t wallowing in pity, wasn’t nursing pain or plotting revenge. I was burying everything as quickly and deeply as I could. My hurt, my sorrow, and my anger.

Oh, so much anger.

I piled everything I had on top of that. All the denial and disinterest I could muster. What happened to me didn’t matter. What happened to my body didn’t matter.

All that mattered was hockey.

And hockey was out there, on that ice.

The wolf snarled and strained under the chains of my numbed emotions, snapped at the bars of my detachment.

Because Steele was wrong. I didn’t think there was anyone on my side.

It had been years since Steele had been the new guy. Years since he hadn’t been the captain of a team.

He’d forgotten how much of an enemy a player was when they first joined a team. He’d forgotten how much anger, hatred, maybe even frustration and fear a player could throw on the new guy. Just to have a place to hang it. Just to have a way to make sure it wasn’t rotting in their own head.

I inhaled, grunted at the bite in my lungs. Those ribs were a mess.

I rubbed my shaking hand over my eyes, pressing away the moisture there, then wiped the blood off my cheek and from under my nose. I heaved up to my feet and breathed, breathed, breathed until the pain notched down to bearable.

One eye was fuzzy, but the other was clear. My teeth weren’t too loose. I couldn’t breathe out of my nose yet.

But I was standing.

I grabbed my gear, keeping my left hand out of action as much as possible to guard the broken collarbone, and walked out to the ice.

Because I was here for hockey, damn it.

And nothing they did to me would change that.