All Chapters of Twin Aces: Claimed by the Alpha Captain (MM Romance): Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

Orion POVI see the thread before it spreads far enough to matter, and that is the only reason I have any chance of stopping it. Just after midnight, my phone buzzes with a message from someone I never ignore. I am already awake and staring at the ceiling as I listen to Lucian’s breathing across the room. He has not been sleeping well lately. I can tell the difference now between his real sleep and the kind where he only lies still while waiting for exhaustion to knock him out.The message is brief: Look at this now. It includes a link.I open it. The page loads slowly, and for a moment, I hope it is something small, a stupid comment, a clip from the game, or a fight in the tunnel, something I can dismiss. Then I read the title: Someone want to explain why Northveil’s new forward smells wrong in the tunnel? Is there an Omega on the roster?Everything inside me goes cold. I read it once and then again, but I do not keep going. I do not need to read the comments or the speculation. I do

Orion POVI do not sleep, not because I am unable, but because I simply do not want to. Lucian fell asleep almost an hour ago, and I haven’t moved since. My arm is still around him, resting exactly where it was when his breathing slowed, and his body finally released the tension it has been carrying for years. The room is quiet in a way that feels earned.I watch him, though it is not the way I have watched people before. This is not passing attention or casual interest; this is something else entirely. It is focused and detailed, as if I am unwilling to miss a single thing. Lucian is different when he is asleep; he is softer. The iron control he carries when he is awake has vanished, leaving no tension in his jaw and no careful stillness in his expression. There is only ease. He looks younger like this, yet he does not look weaker. He is simply unguarded.I take it all in without fully realizing I am doing it. I notice the way his hand curls loosely against the pillow and the slow, d

Orion POVThe ice tells the truth. It always has. You can hide things in a locker room, a hallway, or in the way you speak or do not speak. You can bury secrets under routine, structure, and discipline, but you cannot hide them here. You cannot hide them on the ice. Out here, everything reveals itself.The first practice after everything feels the same for exactly thirty seconds. Then it does not. It begins small with a pass that is nothing complicated and entirely routine. Lucian cuts across the blue line, and I send the puck where he should be. I do not send it where he is, but where he will be. He is already there with his stick down and his reception clean. No adjustment is needed. The play continues fast and sharp, but something beneath it shifts.Another pass follows from a different angle and with different timing, yet the result remains the same. He moves before I call, and I adjust before he finishes. There is no delay, no correction, and no second-guessing. The drill resets.

Orion POVI tell myself it is just dinner. That is the lie I use from the moment I ask him. It is not a date and not anything that needs a name. It is just food and just an evening out of the hotel room before the walls start closing in on both of us. It is just a place with low light, no cameras, and no one from the team asking questions they pretend are jokes. It is just dinner.Lucian looks at me for a second when I say it. He looks like he knows exactly what lie I am telling myself and has decided not to embarrass me by pointing it out."Dinner," he repeats."Yes."He studies me for another second, then nods once. "Okay."That is all. There is no teasing, no challenge, and no careful refusal. It is just okay. And somehow that makes it worse. Or better. I have stopped pretending I know the difference.The place I picked is small and out of the way. It is tucked between a bookstore and a closed tailor shop on a quieter street several blocks from the hotel. There are dark windows and

Orion POVMaddox stops pretending on Thursday. He does not do it with a joke or one of his half-smirking comments that sound casual until you realize they are not. He waits until practice is over and the room has mostly cleared. He waits until the last of the noise from the showers and the trainers has faded into the hallway. Then he closes the locker room door behind him and looks at me as if he is done circling the point."We need to talk."I keep stripping tape from my wrist. "That usually means you are about to annoy me.""That usually means you already know I am right."I glance at him once. Maddox is leaning against the lockers with his arms crossed. His posture is loose, and his face is unreadable in a way I do not trust. He is in a better mood than he should be for someone about to say something dangerous. I toss the tape into the bin and sit down on the bench."Say it."His eyes flick once toward the hallway to check that no one is coming back. Then he says, "He is Omega."It