38. Lilah #2
When had he planned on telling me? Was that his plan, to break it to me during this weekend away?
He’d hoped to let me down gently. Or maybe he just wanted to keep getting laid the whole summer and would tell me when I hopped on the cross-country bus to Seattle while he waved at me from the bus depot.
Why lie? Why not just tell me the truth?
The thread between us didn’t sing, magnetic and energized. Now, it felt like it had been dragged through my chest with a 12-gauge needle, chewing and sawing away at my heart.
Time blurred and I stopped listening. Sometime later, Rye stood. They must’ve called his name. He squeezed my shoulder and glanced back at me with guilt-ridden eyes before buttoning his suit jacket and walking up to accept the crystal statuette and plaque.
I clapped robotically, giving Nora her own clap to celebrate this moment.
Crystal awards glinted in the lights. Players in their well-fitted suits, at least better than any other high schooler might have, sat with their families while everything crumbled around me.
Then it was time to stand. It must’ve been over. People milled around the room, but all I could hear was the blood surging in my ears.
Rye watched me, his gaze so razor sharp that I expected to see thin lines of red across my skin.
He pressed a hand to the small of my back. “Let’s go.”
The unbearable urge to demand answers lost against the survival instinct to not cause a scene and plan for whatever came next. I searched for an emergency exit, not wanting to cross this ballroom and get any closer to Mason.
Rye was close behind me, hovering. Had this been what he expected?
“Lilah!” Zoe’s happy chirp broke through the flood of voices layered on top of each other.
Her little arms wrapped around my waist and she pressed her face against my side.
“Your dress is so pretty. Why weren’t you sitting with us?
” Her accusatory pout tapped little cracks into my blown-glass fragile heart.
On wobbly legs, I crouched down and took her small hands.
“Your dress is beautiful too.” The words caught in my throat.
I’d started to think of her like a little sister.
One who actually wanted to be around me and looked up to me.
The cute, curious glint in her eye always brought out a smile.
This time though, each breath splintered me a little more.
My eyes burned and I suppressed the trembling that felt like it was shaking me apart cell by cell.
Zoe tugged me forward, and I dug my heels in, but the movement of people behind me had me stumbling forward.
Mason was thankfully far away, but I caught myself on another body.
I looked up and recoiled.
Mason’s father glowered down at me, dissecting me with eyes that never blinked.
“Zoe, go to Mason.”
She faltered for a second, her bright gaze darting from me to him before she shrunk back. “Yes, Dyadya.”
Her fingers slipped from my grasp and then I was alone. All alone in a room packed with people.
Mr. Petrov hooked his hand under my arm and guided me toward the coat check area that was abandoned since the warm spring weather had turned to humid summer heat.
Completely off kilter, I didn’t run and scream like I should’ve. I was frozen, brain locked, unable to process how my life had collapsed in the last hour.
He blocked my exit and stared at me with a harsh look. “You tried to sway my son.”
“I never did,” I choked out.
“You tried to get him to follow you like a house-trained dog.”
“Mason can make his own choices. All I ever wanted was for him to be happy.”
“Happy.” He bit into the word and I flinched. “His happiness is on the ice when he wins, not from a silly girl.” His inspecting gaze rolled over me like steel rods, oppressive and searing. “But if you’re happy to be good like Alena, then perhaps this would work.”
What could work? I stared over his shoulder looking for a rescue. Someone—anyone. Rye had disappeared. And Mason…my brain misfired. No, Mason had abandoned me already.
I was truly alone.
I’d been waiting for the switch to flick. I’d tried to keep myself from all the dreamy-eyed visions of the future. I’d trusted him.
“You may accompany him to Rhode Island since you have been such a distraction. I will rent an apartment for you both and you will keep him from out-of-control behavior. Yes. This would work.” He folded his arms over his chest as if he’d just decided that completely rewriting my future to be a stay-at-home girlfriend for Mason was an excellent idea.
“I’m going to medical school. Mason can do whatever the hell he wants in Rhode Island.”
“You will go nowhere if you do not have a scholarship. And your grades are currently being investigated, are they not, Ms. Wait-list Acceptance?”
Fists clenched at my sides, humiliation and rage burned though me. This man had lurked in the shadows, controlling Mason’s life.
And I’d been swept into his malignant, festering orbit.
“I haven’t done anything wrong.”
His patronizing look slammed into me. “As if that matters.”
Bile brushed the back of my throat.
“So your big plan is that I go to Rhode Island to keep Mason out of trouble and forget all about my future.”
“You keep him from partying, not to say when he’s on the road he won’t find other distractions, but in his day-to-day he will practice, go to school, and you cook and clean and keep him happy.”
Horrifying, acrid bitterness coated the back of my tongue.
“Other distractions.”
“Of course.” His chuckle hit like a slap.
“The only reason I am making you this offer now is because I know he is not so smitten that he does not enjoy the pleasure of others, but the chase can also be a distraction. Do not worry, once he is no longer so infatuated with you, I will pay you a sum for your assistance.” By assistance, he meant serving as Mason’s bed warmer until he got bored of me.
This time the bile wasn’t so easy to hold back. I should’ve puked right on his bespoke suit. Instead, with strength I didn’t know I had, I shoved him with all my might and fled back into the room still full of people.