Chapter 21: Overtime

The Harbormen coach did something in overtime that I had not drawn.

He put Dario back on the ice.

Dario had sat in the stands for two periods in a ball cap.

Now he came down the tunnel in his own jersey with his helmet in his hand.

The crowd made a noise.

"He's desperate," Cillian said beside me, watching.

"He's out of ideas."

"That makes him dangerous."

"No," I said. "It makes him predictable."

I turned the tablet toward the five men at the end of the bench.

The play had one line of text across the top.

I had written it in the tunnel while the rest of the building screamed.

Right circle faceoff. Let him cheat the point.

"He's going to hold the left side," I said. "Every time. Because he's done it for ten years and I'm the one who made him do it."

The bench went quiet.

"So we make him pay for it."

Cillian took the faceoff.

He lost the draw on purpose, and the puck slid to the Harbormen center, and Dario floated to the left point, exactly where I had known he would go.

Then everything happened in a second and a half.

Our left winger stripped the puck off the boards and passed it back to our defenseman at the point.

The defenseman sent it flat across the ice to Cillian, who had swung wide.

Cillian didn't shoot.

He took one stride and slid the puck through the slot to our right winger.

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