Epilogue
Nyah
Irubbed my hands together briskly and stomped my feet on the hockey rink flooring. “Let’s go, X!”
Beside me, Violet’s eyes were bright and shiny, excitement and pride shining as her breath misted in front of her lips. “I’m so nervous for him.”
Her phone rang, and she took it out, blinking at the display then answering it quickly. “X?” She listened for a second, then sighed and said, “Okay. When I hang up, I’ll do it. Good luck. I love you.”
She ended the call, and I raised an eyebrow.
“Did he need a last-minute pep talk?”
She shook her head and leaned down to pull something from beneath her seat. “No. That would be too normal.”
It took me a second, and an almightily pissed-off hiss, to realize the thing that had been beneath the seat was a cat carrier with a very angry feline inside. “What the…?”
Violet shook her head and held it up so the cat could see the ice through the mesh of its enclosure. “X insisted Harold needed to come and that he would feel like he wasn’t part of the family if he didn’t. Look, Harold. Daddy is going to come out of those doors any minute now.”
I hid a laugh.
Dax leaned over from my other side, offering everyone some of his fries, though quickly removing his hand when Harold tried to take a swipe at him through the mesh of his prison.
“I can’t wait for this. The team here is terrible.
X’s show is going to be the best part of the game.
If anyone is well-suited to being a club mascot, it’s him.
” He shoved another fry into his mouth. “What’s his costume like? ”
Violet grimaced. “It was supposed to be a python but—”
“Ladies and gentlemen!” the announcer said with fake enthusiasm over the loudspeaker, cutting her off. “Please put your hands together for the newest member of the Saint View Vipers, team mascot, Vicious the Viper!”
The lights in the rink went out for dramatic effect, the spotlight shining down on the doors at the far end of the rink.
X, dressed in his homemade, sparkly snake costume, stood there proudly.
I tried to hold in a laugh. “I can see where you were going with the snake…but does it kinda look like a…”
“Big black sparkly dildo?” Whip asked.
Violet hushed him. “Don’t say that in front of the cat! He has a cape! Dildos don’t have capes!”
The crowd went wild anyway. From down the row, far away from the dildo talk, Violet’s kids stood and whooped and hollered at their father.
Beneath more sequins than I’d ever seen in my life, X waved and did a little shimmy. In gold skates, he moved slowly across the rubber-matted floor to get to the ice.
Violet stood and cheered and shouted, and the rest of us followed suit, screaming in the dark.
The people around us laughed at X’s dance moves, and he fist pumped the air, hyping them up, clapping his hands together above his head, encouraging the crowd to do the same.
We joined in, big grins all around. I couldn’t deny the mood was infectious. The claps got faster and faster as he approached the ice.
“He’s doing so good!” I said to Violet. “He’s made for this!”
She couldn’t hold in her laughter, or her pride. “Isn’t he? I think he’s found his calling. The crowd is loving it!”
Loving it was an understatement. There was something ridiculously perfect about the way X flashed his sparkly cape and danced his way to the ice, and the crowd around us lapped it up.
“I really had my doubts about this,” Violet leaned in to say to me. “But I take them all back. He’s—”
X stepped onto the ice for the first time.
His arms pin-wheeled. His feet kicked, trying to keep him upright.
None of it was to any avail. He went down like a sack of potatoes, crashing hard.
The entire stadium winced all at once. You could hear it in the collective “ooh” that reverberated around the circle.
X lay on the ice for a second, doing his best stunned mullet imitation. He lay there for so long and so still, I wasn’t fully sure if he was just trying to get his bearings or if he’d hit his head and knocked himself out.
But then his arms and legs started air flailing, and suddenly he looked more like a turtle stuck on his back, trying desperately to flip over but unable to, due to the weight distribution of his massive shell. Or in X’s case, his massive mascot head.
Violet clutched my hand. “Oh, this is bad, isn’t it?” She clapped her free hand against her leg. “Come on, X! I mean, Vicious the Viper! You got this!”
Whip, on the other side of Violet, sank lower in his chair. “This secondhand embarrassment burns worse than an STD.”
I snorted on a laugh, and even Violet was trying to keep herself in check.
It was so bad. It was clear to me that if X could normally skate, he definitely couldn’t in that suit, with a snake head five times the size of his own. “Didn’t he practice in costume?” I asked, wincing as he finally found his hands and knees and crawled around the ice, trying to find the railing.
“We only finished putting the final touches on it last night. There was no time.” She gripped the cat carrier and covered the mesh with her hand. “Don’t watch this, Harold. It’s not pretty.”
X managed to get back up, only to crash again. The crowd erupted into laughter, like it was all part of the show.
Eventually, two of the players skated out onto the ice and helped him up.
X hung between them while they hauled him off the ice, and we all politely clapped.
Violet bit her lip. “That’ll probably be on the news tonight, won’t it?”
I tucked my arm through the crook of her elbow. “Oh, one-hundred-percent. But for now, let’s just watch the game. Hopefully the players can skate better than X can.”
She nodded, and I left her to wrangle her two overexcited kids, her men, and a very angry and probably slightly chilly cat. Though part of me did wonder if Harold had rage to keep him warm.
I settled back in my seat and leaned into Dax.
“French fry?” he asked me, offering me the paper bowl full of deep-fried goodness.
I grinned at him and kissed his salty lips instead. “No, thanks.”
He kissed me back. “You feeling okay? You should eat.”
“You worried about my lack of desire for a heart attack?”
“No, just worried that coming out here today was too much, too soon. I still think you need to go to the hospital and get checked out.”
I sighed. It wasn’t the first time we’d had this argument since I’d run into his arms outside Francine’s house. He’d been nagging me for days.
But I shook my head. “I can’t afford it. I have no health insurance. Unless I want to go running back to my father, which I do not, I can’t afford to be going to the hospital for no reason.”
Dax picked up my hand and threaded his fingers through mine. “Having a miscarriage is not no reason. Being held captive for over a week is not no reason.”
I knew that. But I also felt fine. At least, mostly fine. I was weak and tired, but it was nothing rest and watching X crawl around the ice wouldn’t fix. I’d stopped bleeding. Being here was good for me.
“I promise, I’m okay. You can take me home straight after this and pamper me for the rest of the night if you want.”
Dax nodded at that. “Exactly what I plan on doing for the rest of my life.”
My stomach sank at the easy way words like that fell off his tongue. “Don’t say things like that.”
He glanced over at me, his eyebrows furrowing. It took him a long moment of silence to say, “Why not, Nyah? I know what I want.”
I breathed out a long shaky breath, a smile forming on my lips. I turned away so he wouldn’t see. “Let’s just watch the game.”
He didn’t push me. Just like I’d requested, he gave me space. I shoved the thoughts away, and we watched the game, cringing every time the other team scored.
Which was a lot. Our team sucked as bad as X’s skating.
During the third period, my phone rang. It was just a string of numbers, but instantly, my blood ran cold.
I quickly cancelled it and shoved it in my purse.
It rang again, and my gut knew that until I picked it up, it would just keep going.
If I didn’t answer, it would be worse.
Dax was distracted, shouting at the players on the ice. I slipped the phone from my bag and answered it quietly, turning to face Violet, so Dax would be less likely to hear. “Dad?”
Violet looked at me sharply.
I’d had his number memorized since I was old enough to know what numbers were. His voice on the other end of the line was no surprise.
“Hello, my princess. Long time no speak. How are you?”
I fought to stiffen my spine. To not let his smooth tone and fake care get to me. “I’m not even going to ask how you got this number. What do you want?”
There was a moment of silence on the other end, where I could practically feel the crackle of his annoyance that I’d dared to speak to him like that.
It was not how I’d been raised. I’d been brought up to speak to him only with the respect my mother had claimed he deserved, as head of our family.
It hadn’t taken me long to disagree with her.
But I’d mostly kept my true opinion of the man to myself, never wanting to rock the boat, knowing that whenever I acted out, it was my mother he took his anger and frustration out on.
But I’d left. I’d gotten out. And I’d realized I couldn’t live my life for her. She’d made her choices. I had to make mine.
“I think it’s time you came home, princess.”
“No.”
This time, there was no hesitation. “I wasn’t asking.”
I closed my eyes. He never was.
I’d been waiting for this day. Known it was coming. “No,” I said again.
My father sighed. “Nyah Louise, I have been incredibly patient with you. I allowed you to run off and spread your wings because your mother wanted you to have that freedom. But playtime is over. I need you home.”
This man had never needed a woman for anything in his life, apart from to fuck or raise his children. Since I wouldn’t be doing either of those, there was only one other reason he would be summoning me home.
And I didn’t even have to wait for him to say it. “Your marriage has been arranged.”