All Chapters of P^CKED BY MY STEPBROTHER: A HOCKEY ROMANCE: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

I'd been in love with Caleb Park for four years.Four years of sitting in hockey stands screaming his name. Four years of making him playlists, remembering his allergies, dropping everything when he called. Four years of being the girl who was always there – steady, reliable, waiting for him to turn around and finally see me.The scrapbook took me three weeks. Hand-trimmed photos. Captions in my best handwriting. Ticket stubs from his first collegiate goal. A pressed carnation from the gas station bouquet he bought me for my birthday. Every inside joke, every memory, every moment I thought meant something – bound together and organized chronologically because that's what I did. I turned my feelings into something pretty and hoped it would be enough to make someone want them.The love letter was in the back sleeve. Two pages. Nine drafts. Sienna – my roommate – had approved it with a nod: "If he doesn't kiss you after this, I'll kiss you myself."Zara had read it over FaceTime with her

Three days later, I still couldn't stop touching the bruise on my collarbone.It had turned purple, then blue, then a sick yellowish green that I covered with concealer every morning and checked every night like a secret I was keeping from myself. The bite mark sat just below my collarbone – low enough to hide under a crew neck, high enough that anything with a wider neckline was a confession.I wore crew necks for three days straight. Sienna noticed. Sienna noticed everything."You've worn that same hoodie rotation since Wednesday," she said, eyeing me across our dorm room. "You hate that grey one. You said it makes you look like a depressed librarian.""I'm cold.""It's heated in here.""I'm emotionally cold."She let it go. Temporarily. Sienna always let things go temporarily – she stored them like ammunition and fired when you least expected it.***The game was Friday night. The whole campus was buzzing, and for once it had nothing to do with Caleb.Everybody was talking about th

Coach Harlan's voice cut through the hallway like a blade."Maddox! My office. Now."Neither of them moved for a full three seconds. Caleb's fists were still curled. Rhys was still watching him with that terrifying calm – the kind that said I've already decided how this ends and you're not going to like it.Then Rhys stepped back. Casual. Unhurried. Like he was choosing to leave, not being called away.He turned toward the coach's office – and on the way past Caleb, his shoulder connected with Caleb's chest. Not accidental. Not subtle. A clean, deliberate check that knocked Caleb sideways a half step and sent a message louder than any punch could have.Rhys didn't look back."I'll catch you later, Naomi."My name. He said my name. He'd heard it when Caleb yelled it thirty seconds ago and he'd already pocketed it, already made it sound like something different in his mouth – lower, slower, like he was tasting it. Like he'd been waiting for it.My skin prickled from my neck to my wrists

Caleb stood at the end of the row with his coffee and his entitlement and waited for Rhys to move.Rhys kept not writing in his notebook."I said you're in my seat.""Didn't realize they assigned seats in college." Rhys still didn't look up. "Thought that stopped around the same time people stopped making scrapbooks for guys who don't want them."The class inhaled. Thirty people sucking in air at the same time. Someone in the back row whispered oh my God. Caleb's face went from dark to white – not from fear, from the precise, surgical humiliation of being publicly connected to the Valentine's night story in a room full of people who already knew it.He stepped forward. Fist curling around his coffee cup hard enough to dent it."Say that again.""Mr. Park." Professor Whitfield's voice was sharp from the front. "Sit down or leave. You're eight minutes late and you're disrupting my lecture.""He's in my–""There are fifteen empty seats in this room. Pick one."The silence was excruciatin

Campus also had opinions.The Thornfield gossip machine ran on coffee and cruelty, and Rhys Maddox walking across the quad with his arm around Naomi Ellis was premium fuel. By Monday morning, it was everywhere – group chats, Instagram stories, a thread on the anonymous campus confessions page that had three hundred comments before lunch.caleb's girl moved on FAST - that's not moving on that's upgrading - she's rebounding with the transfer?? - messy! - have you SEEN him though. i'd rebound too - wasn't she obsessed with caleb like two weeks ago? - this is embarrassing - plot twist: it's hot actuallyI read them all. Shouldn't have. Did anyway. Sitting in the library with my laptop open and my Gatsby essay untouched, scrolling through strangers' opinions about my love life like it was a spectator sport."You're doing this to get back at me."I closed my laptop.Caleb was standing at the end of my table. Hands in his pockets. That expression – concerned, measured, the golden-boy mask fi