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CHAPTER 42

LIZZY

WOMBATS ARE REALLY THE BEST.

My life had changed so dramatically in such a short time that once we were back in Virginia, back into a bit of a rhythm, I felt a little whiplash.

"Whiplash?" Drea asked, frowning at me across the table at the Teakhouse Tavern, where I’d been invited to meet up with the WAGs for drinks.

(I’d had to ask, but I was informed that WAG meant Wife and Girlfriend and was told that if I hadn’t been so busy all the time when I’d been here before, this would have happened much sooner.)

"Yes, you know, from everything shifting directions so fast," I explained.

Clara lifted her wine glass and grinned at me. "To whiplash, then. You sure look happy."

Joey joined in, and we all toasted as their smiles added to the warm feeling of belonging I’d been experiencing since coming back to Virginia.

"I am happy," I confessed. "Happier than I ever thought I could be, actually."

"I can’t believe you’re a princess," Joey said, bumping my shoulder. "I feel like it’s wrong to just sit here drinking with you in a bar. Maybe we should be having tea sandwiches or something instead. Something fancier."

"Tea sandwiches?" Drea asked, wrinkling her nose at Joey.

"Like cucumber sandwiches. Or Vegemite or whatever."

"Vegemite is not fancy," Clara said. "It’s vile."

"Agree to disagree," I said. "I actually really like it."

"You should try it, actually, Joey, now that you’re such an Aussie-phile," I added.

"Am I? What is that? Is that a thing?" Joey looked ready to be offended.

"You do have a pet wombat," Clara pointed out.

"Wilma is not a pet," Joey said. "He is a member of the team who happens to live with us and occasionally disassembles our couch or poops in the laundry room." She tried to deliver this with a straight face but couldn’t.

"What do you mean disassembles your couch?" I asked.

"He roots around in the cushions until they all fall off all over the floor, and then he burrows through them." Joey shook her head, smiling.

"I don’t know how you can live with that thing," Drea said, rolling her eyes.

"You live with Rock Stevens," Clara pointed out.

"Point made," Drea laughed.

We talked for more than an hour, making plans to meet again soon for lunch and discussing Rock and Drea’s upcoming wedding, which would take place at the end of the season.

"You’re coming to the game tomorrow, right?" Joey asked me as we headed outside.

"Of course," I told her.

Declan had been so excited to get back to playing, he had been able to talk about nothing else for at least a week, and returned from practice each day acting like he’d been on a play date with friends.

"I’ll pick you up on my way," Joey told me, her eyes glowing.

We hugged goodbye, and I drove home, back to my husband, still processing all the ways my life had changed for the better. And to think, it had all begun with a murder plot against the man I loved.

The world was weird.

The next night, Joey picked me up to head to the arena.

I was nervous, but I wasn’t sure why.

"I know why," she said when I mentioned it, giving me a knowing smile from the driver’s seat.

"Why?" I asked.

"Because this is your first game as Mrs. Declan MacArthur," she laughed. "And your first as a princess! The media’s going to be all over you."

The news of our wedding—and of Declan’s true identity—had been fairly widespread, with a few gossip magazines calling for exclusives, though neither Declan nor I thought that would be a good idea. Even without our participation, there’d been plenty of articles about the Wombat’s royal winger, and one had even deemed him the most fascinating man in hockey.

I was just glad the man I loved was no longer the target of anti-monarchist rebels.

There had been a lot of debate about whether Declan’s name on the team (and on his jersey) should remain Gillespie, since that was how the public knew him. In the end, it was my position that led him to demand they change it.

He didn’t want me wearing "some other guy’s jersey," he said, and no amount of rationalizing would make him see that if I wore a jersey with his number that said Gillespie, it would still be his.

"You’ll wear your proper name," he had insisted when he presented me with my jersey.

The game was a hotly contested match with the Quill Boars, whom Declan informed me the Wombats hated more than any other team. "What even is a quill boar?" I’d asked Joey, but she wasn’t sure.

"It’s not a wombat, I can tell you that," she’d said.

We arrived at the arena, but instead of heading straight for the doors, Joey moved around to the back of her SUV. I paused, and when she pulled open the back door, I understood.

"Come on, Wilma," she called, picking up a small carrier. "You’re on tonight." A snuffling sound came from within, and I saw the fuzzy brown body of the wombat inside.

"Oh my gosh," I breathed, bending down to peek inside. "Hi, Wilma!" Wilma’s little nose pressed against the mesh carrier, investigating me properly before he snuffled again.

"Does he stay with you until halftime?" I asked as we headed inside.

Joey nodded. "Once we’re up in the WAGs suite, I’ll put him on his leash. He’s pretty well-behaved up there—usually." Together, Joey and I headed up to the suite where the WAGs generally gathered to watch the game. It was a much better view than where I’d sat previously, though part of me felt sad to be farther away from the action.

Wilma, for his part, was well-behaved. He waddled around, sniffing everything, climbing up on whatever he could reach, and making little snuffling noises that I found adorable. But soon, my attention was pulled to what was happening outside the glass. When the Wombats took the ice for warm-ups, my heart skipped a beat. Declan flew out onto the center of the ice, looking gleeful—like a child back on the playground for the first time in far too long. I couldn’t see his smile, not with the beard and the helmet and all the gear, but I felt his happiness.

The energy inside the arena was electric, the tension thick enough to cut with a skate blade. At the end, the Wombats and the Quill Boars were tied with less than a minute left on the clock, and every single player on the ice was moving like their life depended on it. My heart pounded as I gripped the railing in the WAGs suite, eyes locked on Declan as he streaked across the ice.

He was so fast! The puck shot out from a scramble near the boards, and Declan took off, intercepting it at center ice. The arena roared as he broke away, and ducked past two defenders, cutting toward the goal.

"Come on, come on," I whispered, barely aware of Joey and the others cheering beside me.

A Quill Boars defenseman closed in, trying to force Declan out, but he didn’t take the bait. Instead, he faked left, his skates carving a sharp arc into the ice before he snapped the puck backward—right onto Rock Stevens’s stick.

Rock blasted a shot at the net, but the goalie deflected it, and the puck rebounded—straight back to Declan. Without hesitation, he flicked his wrist, sending the puck over the goalie’s shoulder and tucking it into the top corner of the net.

The goal horn blared and the crowd exploded.

My breath left me in a rush, my heart soaring as I watched Declan throw both arms into the air, his teammates mobbing him in celebration.

Joey grabbed my arm, shaking me. "That was incredible!”

I was laughing, cheering, and maybe screaming his name as he turned toward the stands, pumping his fist. It was too far to see it, but I knew he was looking at me. I pumped my arms in the air and screamed his name.

This was his home. This was where he belonged.

And as I clutched the jersey he’d insisted I wear, the one that bore his true name, I knew—it was where I belonged, too. Coming back to Virginia had been the right thing. For both of us.

At the end of the night, I waited. The team gathered for the coach’s comments, cleaned up, and met with the press before I was finally able to give Declan the hug and kiss I’d been dying to give him.

“Wife,” he growled in my ear as he pulled me against his hard body.

“You were amazing,” I told him. We were about to leave the arena, hand in hand, when a gruff voice called out from behind us.

"Lizzy?" I turned to find Coach Merritt waiting, a strange look on his face.

"Yes, Coach?" The coach looked uncomfortable, shifting his weight and rubbing a hand across the back of his neck like he was afraid to say what was on his mind.

"I just wanted to say that I’m sorry for doubting the importance of the PR work you were doing here."

"No, Coach, that was… It wasn’t like I knew what I was doing." Coach had been filled in on everything—from Declan’s true identity to the reason I had been here in the first place.

"I know that. But it doesn’t mean you didn’t do a good job. And I wonder, if you’re gonna be around anyway, if you might consider taking an official PR position with the team." I looked between the coach and Declan, who was grinning.

I wondered if it would be a bad idea—too much proximity? But there was nothing I wanted more than to be near Declan and the found family I had made with the Wombats.

"I would like that—if you and Declan don’t feel like it would be too much. Also, if you don’t mind that I actually have no formal public relations training whatsoever."

"Well, I just figured that meant we could get you for a steal," Coach said with a smile. Given that I was now a princess and money was not my concern, he was probably right.

I looked at Declan, not wanting to accept without his input, but my heart was jumping inside me. “What do you think?” I asked him.

"That sounds great," Declan said. "But no pressure. If you want to do something else—something unrelated to the Wombats—I totally support it."

"Who in their right mind would turn down time with wombats?" I asked.

And as Declan and I left the arena, I knew it was true.

Wombats really were the best.