Vice and Vixen

CASPIAN POV 

Helmets and pads bang and clack against wooden stalls as the team strips down after practice. We’ve been gearing up for our first away game series at none other than our rival school—also in the Toronto area—Gravenmore institute, and despite the hiccups in our first two games at home, I’m feeling good about how the team is meshing.

At least, for the most part.

The exception is when I’m on the ice with Orlov. The rhythm between the two of us is still shaky at best, usually looking more like Bambi on ice than two top-tier college athletes who have been on the same team for years. But it’s better than it was a few weeks ago.

Honestly, I don’t think Coach thought this whole thing through. While tossing us out on the ice together might be a good idea in theory, it’s clearly not working well in practice. Figuratively and literally.

There’s a  reason we’ve spent most of our college careers on two different lines. It just works better that way. Causing less issues between us, since we both have our time to shine. We don’t have to cross paths more than necessary, and we work better with different people. Only problem is, those people graduated last season, and for the time being, we’re all each other has.

Most of the guys undress quickly, ready to rush off to the shower before heading out. But then Coach steps out of his office, and almost immediately, the team comes to a halt.

“All right, guys,” Coach booms, authority and respect demanded by his tone alone. And it does, because silence falls over everyone, every set of eyes in the place fixated on him. “It seems there’s been some concern at the administrative level about steroids and other performance enhancing drugs at the collegiate level. Two other schools in the Sports league had multiple players testing positive on either their hockey and football teams. I’m sure the lot of you are clean, but we have to be sure. So”—he holds up a sterile plastic container we’d have to be blind to not recognize—“let’s make this quick and get about the rest of our day.”

I heard about this last week.

Gravenmore  football team had players who tested positive for illegal Enhancers . I almost didn’t believe it at first, but one of my high school friends who’s a student at Gravenmore confirmed it’s true.

Supposedly, a lot of the players are looking to appeal, claiming false positives, but the jury’s still out on that being the truth.

But if this is what we all need to do to prove none of us are cheaters, fine by me. So I do exactly what Coach requested. I shower, do my business, drop off my sample to the lab tech waiting by the door, and go about the rest of my day.Beckett, my office. Now.”

Coach’s call echoes through the locker room as I start dressing for the Gravenmore game later that week. I’m not even out of my street clothes yet, so I shuffle my way through countless half-dressed athletes until I reach the door of Coach’s office.

I knock twice before opening it as a courtesy, and when the door swings open to reveal all three coaches, I realize there must be some information about the team we’re about to face that he needs to share with me.

Or someone died, but I’m banking on the former.

“You wanted to see me?” I ask, leaning against the frame.

“Yes. Close the door and sit.”

My brows furrow, but I follow his instructions despite my confusion,.sliding into the seat across from him. He leans back in his own chair, steepling his fingers as he stares at me. Not saying a damn word to let me know why the hell I’m in here when I should be getting dressed.

Thirty seconds pass, the silence is already close to unbearable, so I break the ice. “Did you just want to look at my pretty face before we go out to kick some ass?”

His hands drop, and he leans forward over the desk, grabbing the top paper out of the file folder I hadn’t noticed when I first came in.

“On the contrary. You’re in here because you failed your drug test.”

I don’t think I heard him right, because it sounds like he said—

“What? That’s impossible.”Coach slides a piece of paper across the desk. “Then how do you explain this?”

I glance down at the paper, where my drug test shows a positive result for—

“Drowse?” I ask, dumbfounded. “Coach, I’ve never touched that shit.

Even when I got my wisdom teeth out back in high school and they gave me God knows what kind of narcotic for the pain, I still didn’t take anything stronger than Tempra.”

But from the wary look he gives me before glancing between both the assistant coaches, my rebuttal won’t matter. Results are results, and none of us can do anything to change them.

My stomach sinks, the contents in it threatening to make a reappearance.

“This can’t be right. It’s not mine, I swear, Coach. The lab must’ve gotten it mixed up with someone else.”

He nods once. “I want to believe you, Captain You’re a lot of things— including the biggest hothead I’ve ever coached—but I’d never peg you for something like this. You care too much about your future career to pull this kind of stunt.”

“Which is why I didn’t do it!” I say with earnest, rising to my feet in panic. My attention darts between the three men before falling back to Coach. “I swear on my life, I didn’t do this. There has to be some kind of mistake. Tell me there’s something you can do.”

The look Coach gives me, paired with the creases running through his forehead, tell me he’s already tried working though solutions. Probably long before he called me in here. And the only reason to have called me in here is if he came up empty.

“This isn’t something I can just take your word for and hide it, Beckett.

Of course, we had the lab check for which opioid it was, seeing as one drug that falls in that category is Blackpearl—”

“Balckpearl?” I almost screech.

“—but it came back as Codonil and Vice.”

Oh.

Well, I guess it could have been a lot worse.

“Look, Caspian . Vice might not be black pearl  or crystal rush  or Glass , but prescription like these are still classified as banned substances without a

medical exception filed with the Sports league...” He continues on, droning about the policies and bylaws enacted by both the school and the Sport league —ones I’m perfectly fucking aware of, because unlike some, I’m not one to waste an opportunity I worked my ass off to earn—while I try my best to figure out how the hell this could’ve happened.

The more I think about it, the only possibility besides the lab results getting mislabeled or swapped somehow, would be that I took something without knowing it.

Could there be something in the medicine cabinet back at my apartment that was mislabeled?

It’s a long shot, considering I don’t even have any narcotics prescribed to me currently. Never have, apart from the one time years ago I just mentioned to him. I doubt Orion does either. He’s as straightlaced as they come, but I still make note to ask him about it when—

“...and because of it, I have no other option than to suspend you.