Off-Limits

Alex Kim had always followed the rules-at least, the ones that mattered. Work hard, train harder, and never let emotions get in the way of the game. But the one rule he should've never even considered breaking? Falling for Bella Carter, the coach's daughter.

From the moment Alex met her, he was doomed. She was everything he wasn't-warm, effortlessly kind, and always seeing the best in people, even a gruff, guarded hockey player like him. With her bright smile and relentless optimism, Bella made it impossible to ignore the way she lit up every room she walked into. And yet, she was strictly off-limits.

Coach Carter had spent years turning Alex into the player he was today, placing his trust in him as a leader on the team. But if he ever found out Alex was secretly seeing his daughter? The fallout would be brutal.

It didn't matter that Bella was the only person who could make Alex drop his defenses, that she saw through his tough exterior when no one else could. It didn't matter that, with her, he wasn't just Ace, the star player-he was Alex, the guy who played guitar when he couldn't sleep and feared disappointing the people he loved most.

She wasn't supposed to look at him like that, all soft and full of something dangerous. He wasn't supposed to want her the way he did. But the more he tried to stay away, the harder he fell.

Now, every stolen glance across the rink, every accidental brush of fingers, every secret meeting in the quiet corners of campus-it was all leading toward disaster. Because when you play with fire, you either burn bright... or crash and burn completely.

And Alex? He wasn't sure he'd survive losing her.