Chapter Ten #2
“I’d apologize… but I’m not sorry that she’s safe with you, so I won’t insult us both by lying,” he says, pulling on one skate. “I’d do anything for my sister, and I’d do it all over again if given the chance. I’d do whatever it takes for her.”
This might be the first time that Luka and I have something we both can agree on.
“I get it. I have sisters too. I would have done the same thing.”
He reaches down and ties on his first skate.
“So what do we do now?” I ask.
“Nothing… yet,” Luka says, tightening his skate. “His text was a threat because he’s losing control. That man doesn’t yell when he wants something—he strategizes. He’s hoping she breaks under pressure, or you do. And trust me, Scottie, he may be boxed in legally, but he’s still dangerous.”
My stomach knots.
“He can't touch you on American soil,” Luka continues, “not without lighting himself on fire. He’s already being watched by both countries. The U.S. wants him locked up for life. Russia wants to use him as a warning. One wrong move? He disappears into a Siberian hole forever. That’s why he’s pushing this political marriage.
It gives him cover. Legitimacy.” Luka ties his other skate viciously tight.
“But don’t mistake limited options for no options. A cornered wolf still has teeth.”
“Great,” I mutter. “So he’s playing mind games.”
“Exactly,” Luka says. “He’ll text, send threats, try to guilt Kat, and manipulate in any way that he can.
Because if my grandmother blesses your marriage?
He loses. Completely. She has a bigger pull in the New York theater scene than my father, and if she wanted to, she could loosen the reins on Kat’s renewal.
She doesn’t have pull in Seattle, and neither does my father, and that’s why this is still our best bet. ”
I huff a breath. “So he’s bluffing.”
“No,” Luka corrects with a humorless smile. “He’s calculating. And that’s worse.”
I let out a low chuckle. “Like our pool game.”
He snorts. “What can I say? He taught me one useful skill.”
I run my fingers through my hair and shake my head. This is all so complicated, and I can’t believe Kat is caught in the middle of it. Luka and Katerina’s father makes my mother’s attempts to match me with a girl from home look saintly by comparison.
“You need to stay close to her,” Luka says.
“No distance. No gaps. Keep your schedules tight. Get photographed together, make this look real from my grandmother’s perspective.
Remember that my grandmother built the family legacy, along with my grandfather.
Letting Katerina go could mean the end of an era.
She’ll only agree to it if she thinks this is real between you, too, and there is no shot of a divorce so that Kat can marry Maxim. It’s still a long shot.”
I nod, the plan forming whether I want it to or not.
“And Scottie?”
“Yeah?”
His gaze meets mine. They’re icy blue, cold and serious, just enough anger in them to pin me to the spot, though his anger isn’t directed at me. He’s angry with his father, and I know it.
“I meant what I said. If he tries to take her back against her will, he goes through me first.”
Then there’s a small beat.
“And then,” Luka adds quietly, “he goes through you.”
It hits me exactly the way he intends it to.
Not as a threat, but as trust, as a joint responsibility to protect Katerina.
“She’s my sister,” Luka says. “If you’re going to wear that ring, you protect her like she’s your wife.”
I swallow.
Two nights ago, standing on that rooftop with her hand in mine, she felt exactly like that.
“I will,” I say. “You don’t have to ask.”
Luka nods once, satisfied, and some of the tension drains from his shoulders.
Before either of us can say more, the doors bang open and the rest of the team floods into the locker room. Practice time.
Coach Haynes appears in the doorway, clipboard in hand, whistle around his neck. He gives me a tiny nod. One that says congratulations without breaking his terrifying-coach persona—then barks for everyone to circle up.
Just like that, the world shifts back to hockey.
The ice is the only place that’s ever quiet in my mind. The only place where the noise shuts off and everything narrows into a single point: the puck, the play, the win.
It’s exactly the kind of noise my brain needs right now so I don’t spiral over the fact that Katerina’s father already knows we’re married and is currently sending ominous text messages across time zones.
“Listen up!” he calls, clapping his hands once. “We’ve got a tight turnaround this week. We’ve got a good shot this season, boys,” he continues. “But we don’t coast. We sharpen. That means today’s practice is heavy conditioning and special teams. Let’s go.”
Everyone groans collectively. Luka mutters something in Russian that’s definitely not a compliment. Hunter pretends he’s dead.
I push to my feet and start toward the ice tunnel, trying to shift gears. Husband mode off, hockey mode on. But my brain doesn’t fully cooperate.
The second my blades hit the ice, the world finally clicks back into place.
It’s always been like this for me. All the noise cuts out, and the static quiets. The intensity narrows into something sharp. I needed this, especially after my father’s accident, when I needed to step up and help the family as the oldest.
On the ice, everything is simple. There isn’t a father needing weekly physical therapy, a mother feeding and raising four more kids, not including me.
There’s no room for mafia fathers, or fake marriages, or the terrifying fact that my wife is the most breathtakingly flexible human I’ve ever seen.
I push off hard, letting momentum carry me wide across the rink. The cold air burns my lungs in a way that feels honest, like it’s scraping everything off my mind except the parts that matter.
Coach blows the whistle and calls out drills. I fall into rhythm effortlessly, body moving on autopilot with the rest of the team. This is our year to make the playoffs again, and this time we’re going all the way.
I hit a sharp turn too fast, blade carving deeper than necessary, and Luka nearly slams into me.
“Focus,” he snaps.
“I am focused,” I snap back.
He lifts an eyebrow. “On the ice, or on my sister?”
I glare.
He smirks because he knows he’s right.
We move into conditioning sprints. Sweat beads at my temples, soaking into the collar of my shirt. My legs burn. My lungs ache. But it feels good. And for the next hour, that’s exactly what I do. I let the ice take every messy, complicated feeling and quiet it until all that’s left is pure focus.
Coach blows the final whistle. I’m dripping sweat, chest heaving, every muscle buzzing, but for the first time all day, my mind is clear.
I shower and then head to Serendipity’s for brunch, grabbing Katerina a sticky bun for later… just in case. Because now it seems she’s on my mind all the time.
The city hums around me. Cars roll by in slow waves, the distant wail of a siren, people wrapped in coats marching past with coffees like armor. I shove my hands into my pockets and let my mind drift in the direction it keeps wanting to go. To her.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I slow down, glancing at the screen.
Mom.
I wince. The wedding. Right… This was coming.
I tap the answer button, bracing myself.
“Scottie James Easton.”
My mother always opens with my full name when she’s either proud or furious. Today it sounds like the second one.
“Hi, Ma,” I say, dragging a hand through my hair. “How’s Montana?”
“How’s Montana?” she repeats, with an angry squeeze in it. “Don’t you ‘How’s Montana?’ me. My son got married on Saturday, and I found out from your sister’s group chat at THREE IN THE MORNING.”
Ah. Yes. The group chat. I wish there were a way to opt out of those damn things.
“Okay,” I say carefully. “So you heard.”
“Heard?” she yelps. “I nearly had a heart attack! I woke your father up out of a dead sleep screaming because I thought maybe you’d eloped with someone we’ve never met—which, apparently, YOU DID.”
“Technically,” I say, “we didn’t elope. It was a planned wedding. Just… very fast.”
“Oh, Scottie.” Her voice drops, shifting into the soft disappointment tone that always guts me. “Why didn’t you tell us? Why wasn’t I there? I would have helped. I would have—”
“It wasn’t that kind of wedding,” I say gently. “Her visa situation made everything time-sensitive. We didn’t want to risk her getting stuck in Russia if anything fell through.”
“Russia? What… who is she? Don’t tell me she’s a mail-order bride… Scottie.”
Mail order bride. Does my mother really think my game is so bad that I would have to pay to get a woman to be willing to marry me?
That idea that she might believe that stings a little.
“No, she’s not. She’s the sister of a player on the team.
I’ve known him a long time, and she and I started dating…
” I start the lie, knowing this is going to be the hardest part.
Lying to my mother doesn’t come easy to me.
She’s too sweet to lie to. “And when I found out that her visa was almost up, we decided to get married. I just knew I had to marry her.”
That last part is true at least. I had to marry her… or else her father would drag her back to Russia. The fewer lies, the less I have to keep track of.
Silence swells through the line.
“You decided to get married so she wouldn’t have to go back to Russia?” she asks as if trying to wrap her head around it.
“She’s a ballerina, and she’s damn good. She’s been training in the US since she was fourteen. She went to Juilliard… she’s been here on a work visa. Things happened fast between us—I can’t explain how I feel about her, but I knew I had no choice. I couldn’t let her go back.”
Again… none of that is a lie. Luka’s bet left me with no choice, she is a damn good ballerina, and I couldn’t in good conscience let her go back and marry someone her father is forcing on her. I’m not proud of how I’m spinning it, but I have to.