Page 31

I awoke with a start, forgetting where I was for a second.

My eyes drifted around, taking in the wood-paneled walls, the extra twin beds with dark blue comforters, the old TV, and the hockey trophies and pictures scattered around the room. An overflowing suitcase full of guy clothes sat in the corner of the room.

Right.

Grand Prix.

Two months in Montreal.

Patrick quit.

My stolen purse.

My missed flight.

My old archnemesis taking pity on me and bringing me home…

Speaking of archnemeses…Kappy, who was actually comforting to me last night, was nowhere to be found.

There was something different about him last night. He seemed calmer, more introspective. I’d attribute the change to aging, but the two of us were arrested for our hot-headedness just a couple months ago. A person didn’t mature that quickly.

Rolling out of bed, I tiptoed across the cold floor and rummaged around in his suitcase for some socks and a hoodie. I hoped he wouldn’t mind, but I was currently freezing .

Stepping out of his room, I immediately heard voices floating from the kitchen, so I started that way.

“It’s just hard. I don’t want you to leave,” Teresa said in a teary voice. “Maybe I should move to Chicago. Just to make sure that—”

“No, Mom, all you have to do is relax,” Kappy said.

I froze up in the hallway, not wanting to intrude, but not knowing how to make an entrance.

“You just have to take care of yourself, this stress isn’t good for you. It’ll be fine, I promise,” Kappy reassured her.

“But it could—”

The floor creaked under my weight, and Kappy’s neck snapped to the side.

Teresa sniffled up her tears and pushed away from her son.

She braced her hands against the counter and breathed for a couple seconds before nodding to herself.

When she lifted her head to face me, she tried her best to smile.

“Good morning, Piper.” But her face slightly cracked.

“Excuse me for a second, honey,” she forced out while bolting from the kitchen.

“Mom, don’t…” Kappy’s shoulders fell.

My eyes bounced between Teresa’s wake and her son. Avoiding eye contact with me, he picked up the spatula to take over the French toast his mom started.

“Everything okay?” I asked tentatively.

“Yeah.” He rubbed his forehead and braced himself on the kitchen counter, looking much larger than his frail mom who held that stance only seconds ago. “Life’s just stressful.” He rubbed his jaw. “As usual, right?”

“Right,” I agreed, wondering what kind of conversation I just interrupted. “We’re going back this morning?” My eyes darted to the hallway. “Did you need to stay longer? If you can get me an uber to the hotel, you wouldn’t even have to drive me to—”

He shook his head. “I have to get back. I have some training scheduled.”

My mouth gaped open. Because for the first time in my life, I couldn’t say the same. I didn’t have a single thing scheduled. I felt completely untethered.

He gave me a gentle grin, like he could read my mind. “Sometimes, you’re at a complete loss right before the best stuff happens. The world evens out like that.” His eyes roamed down my body and he stiffened. “That’s my favorite hoodie.”

I shifted uncomfortably. “Sorry, want me to take it off? ”

He chuckled incredulously as he shook his head and mumbled to himself, “Always evens out.” With a sigh he looked over at me. “How’d you sleep?”

“Good.” Great, actually, I thought. I’m not sure if it was knowing that I wasn’t alone or the fact that I had a day from hell, but I slept like a baby through the entire night. “You?”

He smirked as he flipped a piece of toast. “You snore.”

My eyes widened. “No, I don’t.”

He nodded. “You do, almost as bad as Colt.”

I gasped. “Why didn’t you stop me?”

He shrugged. “It’s not as bad when you do it.” I swatted his chest, but he just stared at my hand with an amused little grin.

“Wait, are you playing me?” I demanded.

“Maybe.” He smiled, making lines appear around his eyes and his mouth, like his whole face worked to create it.

It was a great smile.

A smile I missed.

My heart tripped over itself.

Whoa, wait. Slow down, Piper.

“Thanks, I needed that laugh,” he tacked on.

“Dick,” I said, but there was no bite behind it.

He just laughed as he plated the French toast and handed it to me.

__________

After a tearful hug goodbye, Teresa stood alone on her porch with watery eyes and a smile as she hugged herself against the morning chill and waved to us.

We sat in comfortable silence in his truck. Kappy seemed lost in thought, a little worry line appearing between his eyebrows, and I think that’s why he missed the turn to the highway.

“The highway.” I craned my neck to look back at it. “You missed it.”

“We’re not going to the highway,” he said, driving one-handed while he rested his other elbow on the door.

Uneasiness swelled in my chest. “Then where the hell are we going?”

With a chuckle, he lifted his glovebox to take out some sunglasses. “Just relax, Piper.”

“I can’t,” I said through gritted teeth. “I thought we were going home.”

“We are.” He shrugged and the corner of his mouth tipped up. “Eventually.”

He was loving this way too much. “Kappy,” I huffed, “I need to get back to—”

“To…” he drawled, giving me a questioning look.

I angled my jaw to the side. “You were much nicer last night, you know that?”

He laughed as he ran over a huge pothole, which jolted me, and that’s when I finally looked up.

He pulled into Centre Ice, or…what used to be Centre Ice.

The large, cracked parking lot was completely empty.

The block letter sign that used to read the name of the arena was dull and missing letters.

With chipped paint, broken lobby windows, and crumbling brick, the building we used to call home was completely abandoned and falling apart.

It felt like all humor was sucked out of his truck.

We sat in silence for a minute, like we were acknowledging a death.

Kappy cleared his throat and took off his sunglasses. “Wanna go inside?”

“Are we allowed?”

He pressed his lips together in thought. “Not sure who would stop us. C’mon.”

Wandering inside, I coughed a couple times because of the thick layer of dust over top of everything.

The sun’s rays seemed to catch the dust, making everything appear a little hazy.

All the arcade games and vending machines were cleared out, making the lobby look larger than usual.

What used to be the concession stand and pro shop were now just empty box rooms.

I silently followed Kappy into the West side rink, the same rink where we once crashed the zam. Half the boards were missing, and the ice was completely gone. Instead, the room was filled with a large cement slab.

Kappy walked out onto the cement and made his way toward the center. “They’re gonna tear it down soon.” He squinted up at the bleachers where we once sat together. “I wanted one last look around. ”

He looked so sad and somber in that moment that I walked over to him and held his hand.

He stared at our interlocked hands for a beat. “I have a question for you.”

I met his eyes.

His chest heaved with a breath. “It’ll be a shock, but just…stay with me, all right?”

“Okay…” I drawled, deeply confused.

“What if…” He licked his lips. “What if I skate with you?”

My body went still. I stared at his face, replaying his sentence, thinking maybe I misheard him. My eyes darted over his face, trying to detect the joke, because he couldn’t be serious. I blurted out a laugh. “You’re kidding, right? Funny joke. Ha-ha.” I tore my hand out of his grip.

Blowing out a sigh, he raked a hand over his hair. “I’m dead serious, Piper.”

“Why? Why are you saying this?” I whispered. “Are you making fun of me?” The question just popped out, but as soon as I said it, I wished I could take it back. I wasn’t supposed to ask that. He’d never admit it anyway.

His eyebrows tugged together. “Why would I make fun of you?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” I blurted out sarcastically. “Maybe because you’re you .”

He kicked up an eyebrow. “I don’t joke when it comes to you, Piper, you know that. And I wouldn’t joke about this,” he said, making me even more confused.

He walked across the concrete to the team box and casually lifted himself to sit on boards, letting his legs hang freely.

“Why not?” He licked his lips to hide a grin.

“Think about it…an NHL player going into figure skating? We’d be the talk of town.

We’d steal all the hockey fans.” He let out a little chuckle.

“The whole world would be watching. Everyone would be cheering us on.”

I shook my head, trying to clear the confusion. “What about hockey? What about your team? You would never be able to do both. People love to tear down ice dance, but it’s a full-time commitment. It’s a whole different sport , Kappy. It would take a lot of work.”

He shrugged. “A lot that I’m willing to do.”

I stared at him, but he didn’t flinch away.

This couldn’t be real. He’s playing you again, but this time, about your life’s work.

“No.” I said flatly, putting up a hand. “Absolutely not.”

Surprised flashed across his features. “No, you don’t want to skate with me?”

“Yeah, no.”

“Yeah, no?” He scratched his cheek and let out a little chuckle. “Which is it?”

My hands went to my hips. “It’s not funny. No , you cannot skate with me. For one, you would never be able to keep up, and two—”

“Keep up?” His eyebrows pulled together as he jumped down from the boards. “I can do anything you can do.” He paused for a beat and studied my face. A curious little smirk played on his face as he rocked back on his heels. “In fact”—he cocked his head to the side—“I bet it’ll be easy, sweetheart.”

I angled my jaw to the side. “Oh, you little—”

“Nothing about me is little.” He grinned proudly, flustering me even more.

“Ice Dance is not easy,” I fumed.

Amusement danced in his eyes as he grinned down at me. He hit a nerve, and he knew it. He dipped closer to me and whispered, “You scared I’ll show you up?”

My mouth dropped open. I had no words.

He laughed. “What? Carl got your tongue?” He wagged his eyebrows at me.

Frustration swelled up inside of me, making me want to smack the smirk right off his face “No. I refuse to entertain this. Besides, I can’t just let you quit hockey. That’s…that’s insane!” I burst out.

“ Let me?” He arched a skeptical eyebrow. “Didn’t you recently yell at me for using that phrase?”

I shook my head at him, then starting power walking to the board’s door.

Behind me, I heard him blow out a breath before jogging to catch up to me. “Wait, Piper. Please. Just give me one more minute.”

Rolling my eyes, I stopped walking and turned to face him.

A little crease formed between his eyebrows. “I don’t know how this went off the rails so quickly,” he said, rubbing his jaw.

“You don’t?” I deadpanned.

His shoulders fell with a breath. He turned his attention to the broken, dusty scoreboard still hanging up at the back of the empty rink. “Look, I reached my dream. And that was all thanks to you. ”

I held my temples. “So, this is, what? You paying off some sort of debt to me?” I shook my head. “You don’t owe me for giving you some shitty ice times, like, a decade ago.”

He bit the inside of his cheek. “It wasn’t just that, Piper, and you know it. Besides,” he sighed, “this has nothing to do with any of that. Not really, anyway.”

“Then why? Why would you do this?”

His eyes danced with mischief. “Sounds fun.”

My shoulders dropped. There it was. He was playing me. “I’m sorry, did I hear you right? Because it sounds fun? ”

He grinned as he looked around the empty rink, taking it in one last time. “Don’t worry about my reasons. You want a partner or not?”

I walked right up to him, right into his personal space, and took his chin in my hand. “Did you get hit too hard?” I maneuvered his head around to study his pupils. “Take a puck to the head?”

“No.” He laughed and gently grabbed my wrist. “I want to do this.” His thumb swiped back and forth over my wrist, and I had to suppress a shiver. That was another reason we couldn’t skate together—my body would react to him. “I have my reasons, and they are…self-serving,” he mused.

His words broke whatever trance he put me in and I pulled back. “You can’t just say that. What does that even mean?”

“We’ll be famous, Piper.” He wagged his eyebrows.

“You’re already famous, dufus.”

“I’ll be more famous,” he said with a laugh. “We’ll go down in rink history. Plus, I’ve never been to the Olympics before, it’s on my bucket list. What do you say?”

My feet felt rooted to the cement floor. “You could be on the USA Hockey Team in a second if you wanted.”

He chuckled. “But I’d have a helmet on the whole time. I want the world to see my pretty face.”

I blinked at him. “You’re insane.”

“Just think about it,” he pleaded.

Swallowing hard, I stared up at him. He really was the perfect height for a partner, and I knew from personal experience that he was a good dancer.

From our college days, I knew he had great edge control, so he had the ability to master footwork.

And he was a great teammate, there’s no way he’d ever let me hit the ice.

But no .

Nope.

I shook my head out.

This was crazy, there’s no way he was serious. I scanned the arena around us. “Should I be looking for hidden cameras?”

“No.” His shoulders shook with a laugh. “I took us here for privacy.” His brown eyes were serious when he said, “Give me one practice, then decide.”

“Ice dance is not easy,” I repeated, leveling him with a glare.

His nose flared with a breath. “One. Practice.”

I’m not sure what compelled me to agree, but I heard myself saying, “Fine. One . But—”

“Let’s gooo!” he shouted, his voice echoing in the empty arena. He looked way too happy about this.

“It’ll be pointless anyway,” I finished, trying to bring him back down to reality. “No coach will take us. No one wants me right now, and they surely won’t want you ,” I warned him.

A wry chuckle popped out of him. “What a pair we make, eh? Let me worry about the rest.” He grabbed my hand and tugged me toward the exit, but I still pulled back a little.

“If I find out this was all a joke, I’ll kill you. You know that, right?”

A full dimpled smile spread on his face, making my heart stutter in my chest. “I’m not scared of you, Viper,” he said with a wink.

But maybe I’m scared of you, my heart whispered.