Chapter 13
AERYN
For the first time since I met Gage Rider fifteen years ago, I don’t know who the hell he is.
When Logan called us from the draft to say he’d been chosen by the Aces, he put Gage on the phone, saying, “They’re taking Rider too! Say hello to Gage!” I said, “Hello, Gage,” and that felt right.
When Logan bought out the first row at center ice for their debut game in the NHL—both rookies called up on the same day—he dragged Gage over to the glass before the game and shouted, “Wish us luck!” I wished them luck, and that was right too.
When Logan and Gage moved into the Beach Avenue house, Da ordered me to come down from New York, telling me to set up a kitchen for “the boys” and make them their first meal.
I asked Gage his favorite, and I made lasagna instead of Granny’s lamb stew, which is what Logan would have named—another thing so right I never thought to question my decision.
I flirted with Gage every time I came to visit.
I took him up on his offer, when he caught me with my hand down my pants.
I stayed in Atlantic City for all of winter break, instead of heading back to my apartment and my classmates and my life in New York.
I let him tie me up. Gag me. Blindfold me. Break me and put me back together and leave me begging for more, more, more.
All those things were right. They were what I wanted. What I needed. How I fit Gage Rider into my life.
But I don’t know what to do with the man who just raged into the locker room now. I don’t know how to reach him. How to keep him.
It seems like such a simple thing: Skate with me to the center of the ice. He put on his first skates when he was three. There’s a room filled with equipment back there; there must be forty pairs just his size. He’s fit. He’s capable. God knows he has the stamina of a firefighter.
But he won’t do it.
Can’t do it?
It doesn’t matter anymore.
I turn my back on the rink and make my way down the tunnel.
The locker room looks like a tornado swept through.
Three benches stand on end, leaning against walls where someone—Gage—threw them.
A floor-to-ceiling mirror is destroyed, a star of shattered glass bursting from the center, slammed by Gage’s fist or his head or one of the benches he tossed.
The announcements on the team bulletin board are shredded into confetti.
None of that matters.
What matters is the locker in the middle of the wall. The trampled sweater with the number 23. The broken shelf, hanging by one bent nail. The skates collapsed like burst balloons, blades buried in the floor.
The photos look like they’ve been thrown against the wall. Both frames are shattered. The team pic is bent almost in half.
It’s just stuff. Nothing that matters. Logan isn’t buried here. His memory will live on, even without the locker-room shrine.
But his ruined locker tells me what I need to do. It’s time to go back to Chicago. To forget about Atlantic City, about New York, about Gallagher Samson and restaurants and Kynk. That part of my life is over now. Forever.
I’m Aeryn Reardon. It’s time for me to go home.
I sink onto the one bench still standing in its proper place.
Da’s pilot is supposed to fetch me from Teterboro before dawn tomorrow. I might as well call him now. Tell him to file new flight plans. Fly me from Atlantic City to home. He can do it tonight, and we’ll both have all of Christmas Day with our families.
My phone feels too heavy in my hand, like someone swapped my usual mobile for a lead brick. I stare at the screen for longer than I should. It takes forever for me to remember that I correspond with the pilot by text; that’s how we schedule our travel.
I pull up the last message I sent, confirming my plans for tomorrow. I tap the number, then the bright blue icon that launches a call.
One ring.
Two.
It’s Christmas Eve; we must be getting close to midnight. Of course the pilot isn’t answering.
Three rings.
A fourth.
Voicemail picks up, and I swallow before I start my message. “My plans have changed, and I’m heading back to Chicago as soon as possible. But I’m no longer leaving from New York. I’m heading back from—”
“Aeryn.”
It’s Gage’s voice, behind me. I choke off my message to the pilot.
“Hang up,” Gage says.
My phone feels frozen in my hand.
“You can call him back in a minute,” Gage says. “Just let me say something first. Please…”
He circles the bench like he’s crossing a minefield to stand in front of me. As my fingers start to tremble, Gage Rider sinks to his knees.