Chapter 14
Ivy
Veilarath's got its pecking order, and tonight's venue sits at the bottom. No Glasshouse with its three-sixty mountain views from the ice palace perched on Mount Crow.
Tonight, we head up Void for Game two.
The mind-fuck mountain. Of course it fucking is.
Where the snow shifts when you're not looking and paths double back on themselves.
Where riders swear they've seen their own tracks ahead of them, fresh as morning.
A twisted playground of optical illusions that makes you question if you're losing your goddamn mind or if the mountain just wants to watch you break.
Snow dusts the windows of the kitchen, as my finger hovers over a new text message.
I pale.
Distractions are good. Relax.
Like clockwork, my muscles unwind. Trust is a fickle thing…
It's been two years. Two years since I've been hung up, strung up, and left here to rot.
Days pass. The weather changes. Swells get bigger, more dangerous, and every day, I stay here.
Metal biting into my wrists with the memories of that little girl who was twelve years old and wishing for her daddy to come home.
A door opens. I recognize the sound. Heavy. Metal. Rot…
Footsteps echo in. The polished shoes. Awesome. Those are the ones I remembered from two nights ago when he decided to try something new with me.
He bends down, a mesh veil covering his face. He only wears it on Fridays and Mondays. Never asked why. Not once.
“You need to be cleaned up,” his voice is one I'd forever remember. Sometimes he's more chatty than others. I wish he wasn't.
His fingers wrap around the chain that binds me, and he yanks. My shoulders scream. Joints pop.
“Walk.”
My legs don't remember how. Two years of kneeling, crouching, hanging—muscles have forgotten their purpose. I collapse the moment he releases the chain, my body hitting stone like a sack of wet sand.
He sighs. Disappointed. The worst sound.
“Get up.”
I try. God, I try. My arms shake, bones grinding against each other as I push against the floor. Everything burns. Everything breaks.
A boot connects with my ribs.
Air leaves my lungs in a rush, and I curl into myself, a wounded animal protecting soft organs from the next blow.
“Pathetic.” He crouches beside me, that mesh veil brushing my cheek. “Two years, and you still haven't learned.”
Learned what? How to die properly? How to stop wanting to live?
His hand finds my hair—what's left of it—and he drags me upward. My scalp screams, but I don't make a sound. Sounds only encourage him.
My feet find the floor. Somehow. Muscle memory from a life before this one kicks in, and I manage three steps before my knees buckle again.
He releases me—
The memory shatters like glass against concrete.
My hand trembles around my coffee mug, the ceramic clicking against my teeth when I take a sip. Cold. The coffee's gone cold, and I don't remember how long I've been standing here, staring at that text message like it holds the secrets to the universe.
Distractions are good. Relax.
Easy for him to say. He's not the one trapped in a snow globe with a man who looks at her like she's the last drink of water in a desert. He's not the one whose body keeps betraying every logical thought in her head.
“You look like you've seen a ghost.”
I spin, coffee sloshing over the rim.
Asher leans against the kitchen doorframe, arms crossed, watching me with those eyes that see too much. He's already dressed for the Games—black thermal gear hugging every line of his body, hair still damp from a shower.
“Maybe I have.” I set the mug down, wiping my hand on my jeans. “This house has enough of them.”
He doesn't laugh. Just keeps staring, that crease between his brows deepening. “You were somewhere else just now.”
“I'm always somewhere else.” I force a smile. “It's called having thoughts. You should try it sometime.”
The deflection doesn't land. He pushes off the doorframe and crosses the kitchen in three long strides, stopping close enough that I have to tip my head back to meet his gaze.
“Where do you go?” His voice drops low, just for me. “When you look like that?”
“Nowhere good.”
“That's not an answer…” he warns, as if waiting. For what, I don't know.
“It's the only one you're getting.”
We stand there, locked in a battle neither of us will win. The morning light catches the sharp edge of his jaw, the shadows beneath his eyes. He didn't sleep either. Good. Misery loves company.
“Hey, lovebirds!” Atlas's voice cuts through the tension like a machete. He saunters in, grabbing an apple from the bowl without breaking stride. “We leaving or what? Void's not gonna climb itself.”
Asher's jaw tightens, but he steps back, giving me room to breathe. “Yeah. We're leaving.”
I watch him walk away, my pulse still thundering from the memory that clings to my skin like oil. Two years in that yacht. Two years of learning to survive things that should have killed me.
And now I'm worried about a boy with pretty eyes and a mouth that promises sin.
Priorities, Ivy. Get your fucking priorities straight.
I shove the phone deep into my pocket, the same way I wish I could everything else in my life.
“Okay, and what about this?” Punk sniffs, tightening her hair in the pony she has piled it into. “I’ll come to the third one because I won’t be fucking sick!” Punk has never been interested in the slopes. Not ever. It’s cute that she’s trying now that she’s dating Atlas.
Luce zips up her coat. “Are you sure you don’t want to come? If only to watch your brother-in-law take on the games?”
Punk clutches at her stomach. “I wish I could. I don’t know what I ate yesterday, but I feel off this morning.”
The alcohol. And the lack of food.
I don’t say voice it. We’ve all lived through our range of eating disorders, and I’m not about to trigger Punk’s.
“Doesn't matter.” Atlas pulls her against him, her small frame disappearing into his chest.
Camille presses herself into Asher's side. Guilt sinks its teeth into my ribs, gnawing at bone. I'm stealing this from her. Some people search forever for their person. Maybe he's hers. Maybe I'm the villain in her story.
“If you don't change your face—” Luce's elbow finds my ribs, her smile forced and brittle. “You're going to broadcast that you want him buried in your guts instead of hers.”
I feel his eyes on me before I spot him, a specific warmth crawling over my skin. When I look up, Asher's stare is a physical thing connecting us across the room, holding me captive. My lungs freeze.
Altitude. That's all it is.
And lack of oxygen.
“Is the A/C on?” I dip down to one of the drawers in the island of the kitchen, pretending to look for something. Anything. Hopefully a thing that would make sense when I — “A-ha!” I pop back up, holding a small tin. “I knew I stashed this in here.”
“You did not!” Luce gasps, snatching it off me and popping open the lid.
I snap it closed and take it back, dropping it into the pocket of my bomber jacket. “I did. Let’s go.”
We bolt from the house in a chaotic mess, and when Jord rushes us into the waiting city car, I'm painfully aware of who's next to me.
Asher’s thigh presses against mine, searing me right through his jeans. Shit. How the hell did we land in this arrangement?
“Where's Parker?” Jord stares out the window opposite me.
I shrug. “Sick. Whatever they drank last night must have been good.”
“Speaking of,” Luce murmurs without looking up from her phone. “Where did you all go?”
How’d I end up sandwiched between both Jameson boys?
When his thigh rests against mine again, I reach into my pocket for my phone, desperate for a distraction. When the hell did I become such a fucking school girl?
“Everywhere,” Asher answers absently, but judging by his tone, I’m gonna say that it was uneventful. “They were the only two who ate, so maybe that was it.”
Resting back, I open the last text I sent to Leon as the car ascends the steep hill that leads to the drop-off point for Mount Void.
I miss you this time of year.
The text bubbles start and warmth fills my fingers. I need Leon. I’ve missed him more than I’d ever admit lately.
If it makes you feel better, Nonna has made me watch fucking Greece.
Ignoring his obvious purposeful typo, I tap out my response.
Psshhh. She has excellent taste. It’s you that is outdated.
“Oh please, tell me you’re messaging Leon.” Luce can’t help but stir the pot.
I glare at her as the car rolls to a stop. “Of course it’s Leon.”
Asher’s thigh taps against mine, but before he can be completely obvious, I fling the door open and—crap.
Onto a single camera lens.
“Fuck.” I blink up at the barrel staring back at me. I can think of a few different kinds of barrels I’d rather be looking at than this one.
A heavy hand rests on my lower belly, gracefully pulling me against his body as he steps out of the car.
I don’t have time to process the possessive nature of his actions when the reporter starts popping off.
“Ivy, how do you feel about Asher’s performance? Do you think he’s going to take the trophy?”
“Uh…” Words catch in my throat. Okay. So this has thrown me off.
I flash my best Barbie smile. “Not likely. He's a bit… off this year.”
The hand on my belly tightens. It’s both a warning, and a claim.
His fingers span wide enough to brand me through layers of winter gear, and I shift forward, testing boundaries I shouldn't.
He forces me back against him as the reporter closes in on me. Blonde hair whips toward my face as she ducks closer. Too close. Personal space means nothing when there's a story to chase.
“Just so you know, I'm Team Ashvy!” She yells out proudly as Asher directs us through the crowd.
One moment I'm drowning in synthetic vanilla and camera’s flashing, and the next, I'm airborne. Asher lifts me in the air as if I weigh nothing, moving me away from people as quickly as possible.
My boots hit snow with a soft crunch when he lowers me back down.
His smirk spreads over my ear. “Smart ass.”
I can’t stop the sound that rips from my throat. A laugh, sharp and real. I throw my head back, my gaze locking with his. His own smile breaks free, mirroring mine. Dimples deep, eyes bright. God. Right now, he looks like my Asher.
Mount Void stretches wide before me, a carnival entrance trapped in eternal scream.
Neon pulses through fog, and rooked metal archways mark the entrance, sharp edges jutting at fractured angles.
Welcome signs hang from rusted chains, their cheerful letters fighting shadows that bend wrong, contort where they shouldn't.
This whole place stinks of manufactured insanity, nightmares painted in candy hues.
It only just hits me that our quiet exchange was broadcasted out in the open in front of a very friendly camera disguised as a Sports Anchor.
Asher cuts ahead, following Jord and Luce toward the chair lifts and Atlas finds this the perfect moment to slip in behind, dragging me against his side.
“Ah, our little Ivanya. Have you not been on Instagram lately?”
What the fuck is that supposed to mean?
He releases me and lunges for the door before I can demand answers, holding it open with that stupid quirk of his.
My eyes catch on a gray and white board mounted on the wall with pink lettering scrawled across its surface. That one. I snatch a water bottle from the counter, crack the seal, and drop the board at my feet, clicking my boots into place.
Luce taps my hip with hers as I slide up beside her out the back, waiting on the chair lifts.
“Don’t stress about all the photos. We all know Parker doesn’t give a fuck, and the rest? Well—” she pauses, her green eyes turning dark around the edges as Jord slides into an incoming chair. “Punk.”
Atlas sweeps Luce up into his arms and she yelps before they’re both on the same chair with Jord and Punk, and then it’s just me.
And Asher.
Where the hell did Camille go?
Fuck. It’s a forty-minute ride up. Forty minutes with nothing but—
“I’m not gonna bite, Venom. Get in the chair.”
I don’t answer, but his hand finds mine. He tugs me into him, just in time for the chair to catch my fall. Flinging the bar down, I secure us both in as we ascend higher into the clouds with our legs dangling and our boards attached.
Silence.
Nothing but silence.
The kind of silence that’s comforting. That feels like home.
I peer over the edge, taking in the sight that spreads out below. Void is a display of twisted carnival lights where twisted obstacles snake down in impossible spirals, each turn designed to mess with your head. It’s kind of genius.
“Bought a house here, just needs some work.”
My head whips to him. His face has that bite of frost that turn his cheeks slightly pink. I don’t know what it is with him, but he has the kind of swag that makes you want to swallow him whole. It’s a trick. You’d choke on him.
“What?” I blink away my perverted thoughts. “You bought on Veilarath?”
Because of all the things I expect him to say, that was not one of them.
His attention drops to my mouth, before lifting back to my eyes. Beautiful bastard.
“Yeah, I did. Amongst finding a fiancée, I managed to find the only available lot of land left on this island.”
All the happiness I felt a moment ago drops, along with my smile. I don’t care that he witnesses it either.
I change the subject, avoiding Camille. “I thought it was hard to purchase here?”
He shrugs, spreading his arms out. I wonder what goes on in that head of his during times like this. During moments like this.
”You mean you don’t know how I bought property on the most exclusive island on the continent of this side of the world?” He asks, brow quirked.
I pause. He stole the words right out of my mouth.
“I mean,” I tease, our gazes locked in. “Yes.”
He clucks his tongue. “Careful, Venom. Maybe I'm not who you think I am.” His mouth twitches. “I mean, for all you know, I could be a killer.”
Interesting choice of words.
He laughs at his own joke, and something in the sound makes my pulse stutter. Was it even a joke?