Epilogue
DARBY
Ireally didn’t think Henrik would insist we leave Vegas immediately. Silly me. He’s barking orders and throwing me over his shoulder. Already headed to the car.
None of us have unpacked much of anything. I hope Ren’s not disappointed after all the effort he put into getting us a nice dog-friendly room. Poor Andy. I’m pretty sure he was hoping to bring us breakfast himself in the morning.
In a whirlwind of throwing bags into the rental, I snag Leland’s arm. “Are you okay flying at night?”
“It’s no big deal. I’m rated for night flight. I’ll just need to put in an updated flight plan.”
“You’re not too tired to fly back so quickly?”
His eyes soften and he lightly strokes my cheek. “Never. Especially if we’re taking you home.”
“Besides, I’ll pester him enough to ensure he stays awake,” Ren says as he slides behind the steering wheel.
Henrik keeps my hand in a crushing grip all the way back to the airport, as if he’s afraid I’m going to change my mind.
Leland grabs Skadi’s leash, Ren the bags, and Henrik carries me to the plane.
This time, he buckles in beside me and Skadi’s in the back.
Curled up on the seat, her nose tucked beneath her fluffy tail, she’s dosing in minutes.
No doubt already dreaming of snow.
I really try my best to stay awake, but Henrik radiates waves of heat like an oven. I conk out just as quickly as my dog, barely rousing when he tucks my face against him and carries me toward the car. A blast of cold makes me burrow deeper against his throat.
What was I thinking, coming back to frigid snow and wind?
Oh, yeah. I open my mouth against his throat, tasting his skin. I was thinking about this.
“Where to?” Ren asks softly.
“Your place’s closer,” Henrik replies. “Thanks a million, Lee. I owe you.”
“It’s the least I could do after all the help you’ve given me over the years.”
“She’ll want you close, so join us as soon as you get the Cessna tucked away for the night.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to butt in.”
“Yes.” Yawning, I lift my head. “I’m sure.”
Henrik keeps me on his lap for the short car ride.
Torture. Feeling his rock-hard thighs beneath me.
His heat. Strength. His arms around me. I unbutton his shirt a couple of notches, but he’s wearing a T-shirt underneath.
So I can’t rub my face against his chest hairs.
I growl with frustration, and I feel his lips curl against my hair.
“Patience, babe. We’re almost there.”
“What the fuck,” Ren mutters, breaking through some of my sleepy sensual haze. I lift my head to see what’s going on. “Doyle’s car’s here.”
“I didn’t tell him we were headed back,” Henrik says. “Did you?”
“Nope.”
The lights are on as we walk in. Henrik sets me down on my feet in front of him, wrapping both arms around me. But it’s not his house, so he lets Ren take the lead.
Doyle’s sitting on the sectional, facing the door, in the opposite corner from where Henrik and I had been so…
cozy. He’s got one arm across the back of the couch, and one leg crossed over the other.
It should’ve been a casual pose, but there’s a hard glint in his eyes.
His lips are in a flat, harsh slash. His jaws tense.
Ren crosses his arms over his chest in a very Mighty Zon pose. “Doyle. I see you’ve made yourself at home. Is there a problem?”
“Yeah. There is.”
When he doesn’t elaborate, Ren walks through the living room and picks up the bowl on the floor he set out for Skadi. He dumps it in the sink and runs fresh water for her. She immediately laps up water noisily in the strained silence.
Ren laughs. “Can I get anyone else a drink?”
“I’ll take a beer.” Henrik loosens his arms, takes my hand, and walks me deeper into the house, sitting me down on the sectional.
But he doesn’t sit himself. He looms in front of me like a bodyguard.
I don’t have to see his face to know he’s glaring at Doyle.
Daring him to say something offensive so he has a reason to beat his ass. “Babe, do you want anything to drink?”
“No, thanks,” I whisper.
Ren strolls back in with two beer bottles and hands one to Henrik. He stands on the other side, giving me a narrow slit to see through but making it clear they’re together. United. Both protecting me. Ren didn’t offer Doyle a drink, either. Making it clear he’s the uninvited guest right now.
My heart’s pounding with anxiety. I keep my hands clenched together on my lap.
“I’m surprised your phone’s not blowing up,” Doyle finally says.
“It might be.” Ren shrugs. “I silenced it for the trip.”
“Maybe you should take a look.”
Ignoring his veiled suggestion, Ren asks, “How’d you know we were headed back?”
“I looked up the flight log. I wanted to be the first to see your face.”
“Well, here I am.” Grinning, Ren spreads his hands out beside him. “I didn’t know you’d miss me so much. Do you want a hug?”
Doyle clenches his jaws so hard I honestly worry he’s going to crack a tooth. Dropping his foot so both feet are on the floor, he leans forward, his hands fisted. “You honestly don’t know?”
“Know what?”
“Why’d you come back so quickly?”
Ren shrugs. “Darby wanted to come home. So we left.”
“You didn’t marry her while you were in Vegas, did you?”
Henrik lets out a low warning rumble. “Careful. That’s my fiancée you’re talking about.”
“Yours? I thought you said ours to the crowd outside The Bellagio.”
“I did.”
Wait. My heart pounds even harder. How could he possibly know what Henrik said hours away in Vegas when he wasn’t even there?
Doyle picks up the television remote and turns it on.
For a moment, I think he’s going to say we made the news somehow, but it’s a YouTube video. Shaky, just a random person recording on their phone. There we are, the four of us and Skadi, standing in front of the magnificent fountains.
“Who’s the lady?” It’s close enough it sounds like the person filming asks the question.
Henrik replies, “Our fiancée.”
“Yeah, that’s us,” Ren says. “So what?”
“Just keep watching,” Doyle says.
The video clip from Vegas pauses but the main video continues playing. The same person’s voice says, “We’ve seen her someplace, right? Doesn’t she look familiar?”
The video switches to a darker shot of glistening ice at night with the band playing on their Ice stage. I’m on my knees between Ren and Henrik. The image freezes with Ren’s mouth locked to mine. He’s holding the hockey mask in front of us to block part of the shot.
“Same woman,” the man says. “It’s dark, but I know it’s her.
It’s them.” The still shot zooms in on Ren’s face.
The edge of his hood has slipped back enough to show the three from the thirteen and part of the swoosh of snow—that I now know is his team’s logo.
“Ice Vessel is actually S?ren Gustafson, the Hotshot center, number thirteen formerly of the Colorado Blizzard. Which makes our bass guitarist Henrik Zondag, his former teammate and goalie, number thirty-three. Honestly, from his size alone, we should’ve recognized the Mighty Zon immediately. ”
Doyle hits pause. “I can’t believe you’d pull such a stupid publicity stunt, especially without telling me first. But you knew I wouldn’t approve it, so you did what you always do. You selfishly took your shot.”
Ren shakes his head. “It wasn’t planned. The concierge wanted a jersey and some pictures. One thing led to another.”
“I told you having her on the show was a stupid risk, but you had to do it anyway. You’ve destroyed everything.”
“Say what now? Nothing’s destroyed. It’s one crackpot on the Internet who thinks he’s connected the dots of some mythical conspiracy theory to prove who we are. If we ignore it—”
“He’s not some random crackpot! His video’s going viral. You can’t ignore hundreds of thousands of views!”
“Dude. That’s awesome for the band. We’ve never gone viral before.”
Doyle bellows, “I don’t want to be viral!”
Henrik doesn’t say a word, but he flexes, puffing up his chest and shoulders.
Doyle immediately drops his volume. “I told you from the beginning. No one could know. But the Hotshot has to be the fucking star. Always. You can’t even go to Vegas without drawing a goddamned crowd in the middle of December!”
Then he turns on Henrik. “And you let him! You’re supposed to drag him home and smack him when he starts running his mouth, not smile for some stupid groupies and brag about passing around your new—”
Henrik takes a step toward him and Doyle shuts his mouth. Though he stands up and slams the remote down on the coffee table so hard the batteries pop out.
I flinch, covering my mouth, hoping I didn’t cry out. Skadi’s claws skitter on the floor, and she slips between the two men to jump on my lap.
“Get out,” Henrik whispers in an awful, terrible voice. “While you can still walk.”
I’m not sure if Doyle was going to say girlfriend, fiancée, or something more derogatory. Until he stomps past me toward the door with an ugly sneer on his lips.
I know exactly what he was going to say. His sneer says it all.
Whore.
DOYLE
Puck bunny.
I didn’t have to say it out loud to seal my fate.
Henrik knows exactly what I was going to say, and he’s not a forgiving sort of man. Even if his girl really is only here to scratch an itch with a couple of former professional players and then skedaddles back to Denver. Even if she breaks his goddamned heart. He won’t thank me later.
Even worse, I compounded that sin by losing my temper.
I never want to hear that kind of fragile, scared sound come out of any woman’s mouth ever again.
I think about some asshole making Alyssa flinch like that. Making her scared. And I wish Henrik had lost his temper too, even with his girl watching. Then I could have some kind of absolution to ease the guilt, because he should’ve knocked me out.
But I’ve got nothing now. I deserve nothing.
I’m surprised to meet Leland on a snowmobile headed toward Ren’s. Poor man’s been used hard today, back and forth to Vegas. Denver yesterday on top of the show. So why isn’t he tucking into bed for some shuteye?
I move over to the edge of the narrow road and wait for him to stop before rolling my window down.
“I’m surprised to see you out this way,” he says. “Is something wrong? Is Alyssa okay?”
At least he asked. Though to be fair, I ripped Ren a new asshole before he could think about anything else. “She’s knuckling through finals this week, and I can pick her up on the 13th. Then she’ll be home for three full weeks.”
“That’s great.”
The snowmobile idles in the silence while I try to find the words to explain myself. Finally, I just say, “I fucked up.”
“She knows you love her—”
I shake my head. “Not with the kid. With Henrik.” Then I grudgingly add, “And Ren.”
“You’ve got a lot on your mind.”
“No excuse. Just warning you. I may not be welcome in Mooseville any longer.”
His initial chuckle dies off as he sees the look on my face. “What did you do?”
“I thought Ren set up that publicity stunt in Vegas. Our anonymity is busted all to hell, man. Someone recognized the girl and put two and two together from the show. It’s over.”
“What’s over?”
“The band. Then I said some not nice things about the girl, and Henrik told me to leave while I could still walk. If she wasn’t there watching, he’d probably have broken me in half over his knee.”
“It doesn’t have to be over. So what if people know—”
Shaking my head, I grip the steering wheel so hard it creaks. “You don’t get it.”
“So explain it to me, and I’ll help you explain it to them.”
I force myself to let up my fierce grip. Breathe deeply. In. Out. Before I answer him. “Ren had a contractual obligation with me to keep the band a secret. He broke it. It’s over. I don’t work with people I can’t trust.”
“So you’re going to get a lawyer involved?”
His calm, sensible reply startles me. “I honestly haven’t thought that far ahead.”
“If you’re going to put a contract above our friendship, then you’d better get the best damned attorney on the planet.”
So calm yet cold. I search his face, trying to find the easygoing go-between he’s always been. Then I make the connection like the crackpot on the Internet. “You’re into her too.”
“Damned straight. She’s not only gorgeous but she’s got a heart of gold. Which you’d know if you spent five minutes talking to her instead of leaping to unfounded conclusions based on Ren’s past.”
I force out a laugh. “Don’t tell me she’s your fiancée too.”
He tips his head slightly to the side. “Don’t know. I haven’t asked her. Yet.”
Then he revs the snowmobile and drives on toward Ren’s house.
Fucking hell.
I really have lost everything.