The Hockey Captain Wants His Plus-Size Ex Back Chapter 02
Easton shut the locker room door behind me.
He stood in front of his locker, helmet tucked under one arm, his expression as cold as ever.
“If you’re trying to make Cole jealous,” he said, “don’t use me.”
“I’m not using you. I meant it,” I said sincerely.
Easton looked at me for a long moment, as if he were deciding whether I was lying to him or to myself.
“I let you in because I don’t like watching people laugh at someone’s body,” he said. “That’s all.”
“I know.”
“Then go home, Mia.”
He turned away and opened his locker.
The sharp click of metal made my fingers curl against my palm.
Easton thought I had come to him because of Cole. Because I wanted revenge. Because I needed a new man to orbit after the old one had pushed me away in public.
I couldn’t blame him.
In my last life, even I had believed Cole was my whole world.
That night, I had rushed onto the ice like a lunatic.
In front of eight thousand people, I had cried and asked Cole what those five years meant. I asked him how he could kiss Vanessa after promising me everything.
Cole had looked at me with disgust.
“We’re just neighbors,” he said without the slightest trace of guilt, pushing my hand away in front of everyone. “She’s been obsessed with me for years. I felt sorry for her, so I was nice. That doesn’t mean I owe her a relationship.”
Then he glanced at my body, his voice colder.
“Look at her. Do you really think I would date someone like that?”
Someone filmed the whole thing.
By morning, I was on TikTok.
By the third day, the video had twenty million views.
#CrazyGirlMeltdownAtChampionship
People edited sad violin music over my face. They froze frames of me crying and turned them into memes. They zoomed in on my body, on my shaking hands, on the way my jersey stretched across my stomach.
My mother and stepfather saw it too.
They said I had humiliated the family and threw me out for good.
My mother tossed my suitcase onto the porch. Then, even crueler, she said, “Sometimes I wish you would just disappear.”
Abandoned by everyone, I lost weight like I was trying to disappear inside my own depression.
And still, I thought about Cole.
I thought if I became as pretty as Vanessa, he would look back.
I wanted to run for cheer captain.
One apple a day. Black coffee. Ice water until my stomach hurt.
I woke at four every morning to train. I ran until my vision went white. I practiced jumps until my knees bruised purple. I gripped the barre in the empty gym and vomited because there was nothing left in me to burn.
The weight fell off fast.
So did my life.
On the day of cheer captain tryouts, I never made it to the mat.
Someone locked me in a storage closet behind the gym.
My blood sugar crashed. I pounded on the metal door until my nails split.
I screamed Cole’s name until my throat tore open, but no one came.
At the very end, when my fingers were numb and my body had stopped shaking, the door finally burst open.
It was Easton Vale.
He carried me out like I weighed nothing, his arms locked around me, his breath rough against my hair.
“Stay with me, Mia,” he kept saying. “Look at me. Stay with me.”
His eyes moved over my thin, shaking body, and for the first time, I saw panic crack through his cold face.
“Why did you do this to yourself?” His voice broke. “You were already fine. You were good. You were cute. You didn’t have to become like this for anyone.”
I remembered asking him, barely able to form the words, “Why are you saving me?”
His eyes had been red.
“Because I like you,” he said. “I’ve liked you for years.”
Then he bent over me, his face breaking in a way I had never seen from him before.
“All of you,” he said. “Before. Now. It was always you.”
But it was too late.
My last thought before the world went black was that if I ever got another chance, I would choose the right person.
When I opened my eyes again, I was back in the arena, watching Cole kiss Vanessa beneath the Kiss Cam.
I had really been given a second chance.
Now Easton stood a few feet away from me, alive, whole, still looking at me like I was trouble he did not want.
He pulled his jersey over his head.
I forgot what I meant to say.
The movement revealed a body built by discipline and force: broad shoulders, defined arms, lean muscle shifting under pale skin. When he reached for a towel, the muscles in his back moved cleanly under the locker room light.
My face went hot.
Easton paused, then glanced at me.
The coldness in his expression eased by a fraction. Not much. Just enough to make my heartbeat stumble.
“Still here?”
I lowered my eyes at once.
“I’m leaving.”
“You should.”
He stepped closer.
Before I could move, his hand landed beside my head, and he caged me lightly against the door. He did not touch me, but the heat of him surrounded me all the same.
I panicked. “Wait—”
“Wait what?”
There was the faintest edge of amusement in his voice.
I stared very hard at the floor.
“Nothing.”
Behind the door, Cole’s slightly irritated voice drifted closer.
“Where did she go?”
Vanessa answered softly, “You’re not actually worried about her, are you?”
A pause.
Then Cole laughed.
“About Mia? Don’t be ridiculous.”
His tone was careless, but a little forced.
“She asked Easton for his number.”
“She’s trying to make me jealous,” Cole said. “That’s all.”
A teammate snorted. “You sure?”
“Please. Look at her.” Cole’s voice lowered, but not enough. “Her body makes me sick. You think I’d want that?”
Something in the locker room went still.
Outside, Cole kept talking.
“Three days,” he said. “Maybe five if she wants to be dramatic. She’ll come crawling back. Mia can’t live without me.”
Another boy laughed. “That confident?”
“She’s always been cheap like that.”
I did not feel sad.
Instead, I felt nothing but a clear, cold exhaustion.
Easton slammed his palm against the locker room door.
The sharp sound swallowed the laughter outside.
“You should go,” he said again, but his voice had changed.
I turned back to him.
“Where do you train?”
His eyes narrowed slightly. “Why?”
“I want to work out.”
“Ask a trainer.”
“I’m asking you.”
“You shouldn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because if you’re doing this to get back at Cole, you’ll quit the second he looks at you again.”
I met his gaze. “I’m not doing this for Cole.”
Easton was silent for so long I thought he was going to refuse.
Then he said, “North Athletic Annex. Six a.m.”
I tried not to smile too brightly.
I failed.
“See you tomorrow,” I said.
Easton looked away first.
I saw his ears turn red again.
When I opened the locker room door, the hallway fell quiet.
Cole was standing there with Vanessa under his arm. His face changed when he saw me come out, something dark flashing through his eyes before he forced a laugh.
“There you are,” he said. “Enough drama. I’ll text you later.”
Vanessa’s fingers tightened on his sleeve.
I walked past them.
My phone buzzed before I reached the exit.
Cole: Don’t be childish. Vanessa and I are just for the summer. You know I’ll marry you in the end.
A second message followed.
Cole: Wash my jersey before tomorrow.
Then came a photo.
Cole in the locker room mirror, championship medal between his teeth, shirt lifted to show his abs.
I looked at it for three seconds.
In my last life, that photo would have made me cry.
Tonight, I thought of Easton pulling his jersey over his head. Of the hard lines of his shoulders under the locker room lights. Of his broad back, his damp hair, his red ears, and his voice saying, Come in.
Cole suddenly looked ridiculous.
Then I blocked him.
Deleted his number.