Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 125257 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 501(@250wpm)___ 418(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 125257 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 501(@250wpm)___ 418(@300wpm)
He rubs his palms along the denim on his thighs.
C’mon. You can do it, sweetie.
He reaches into his pocket.
My throat catches.
There’s that tiny jewelry box-shaped bulge, right there.
Yes!
It’s happening. And all I have to do is give the sign to kick off my embellishments. I tuck my chestnut strands over both ears as the music grows louder, the crowd turns wilder, and foxes fly over my head and onto the ice.
I glimpse Selena’s curls as she carries a bucket of the best bubbly, then Odin in his beret, slinking down the row with his camera and mic, and Savannah, ready for the backup stills.
“So, Remy,” Jameson begins, as he drags that box from his pocket. He curls his palm around it, and I can barely stand how fast my pulse is beating.
“Yes?” I ask, all my attention fixed on him. My cells are buzzing.
He reaches for my hand with his free one. “I wanted to let you know that I think you’re really great,” he says.
“So are you.”
“And since you love this place so much, I want to ask you a question while we’re here.”
His words echo throughout the arena. Odin must have alerted the control room to switch to his camera feed and mic. We’re live on the Jumbotron, like I’d planned.
“Ask me anything,” I say to Jameson, but for the entire arena to see. I bet he’ll be thrilled I engineered this. It’ll be so good for his brewery, and he loves his little business like it’s his pet.
Glancing at the screen where we’re twenty feet tall, he swallows roughly, then speaks again. “Will you still be friends with me?”
Wait. What? I choke back my half-formed answer to the question he hadn’t asked. “Friends?”
“Yes. Will you consciously uncouple with me?”
He opens the Made by Fable box. But inside is not a diamond ring, like the designer makes. There’s only a friendship bracelet, cheap and plastic, and it says Friends Forever on it.
My throat tightens. On the massive screen above the ice, twenty-thousand Foxes fans watch me struggle to breathe.
This is not a proposal. This is a Jumbotron dump.
2
MY FUN SIDE
LAKE
I rarely pay attention to the Jumbotron. But as I’m skating casually across the ice, scooping up another stuffed fox, something on the screen snags my interest.
I’m sure I’ve seen the guy around the arena. Right now, though, he’s triple the size he should be and annoyingly earnest as he says to a girl not-quite on screen, “I can see it. You and me, hanging out, talking about our future partners.”
What the fuck? Is some douchenozzle let’s-be-friends-ing his girlfriend for everyone to see?
I drop a couple of foxes into a big laundry cart on the ice, then stop because…I know him. He’s that jackass who works at the bar here and has somehow managed to date Remy, even though he doesn’t deserve to lick her boots. And—fuck—that’s her sharing the screen.
Remy, the chestnut-haired beauty with the upbeat smile and the snappy comebacks whenever I grouse about some event she asks us to do. Remy, my little sister’s good friend. Remy, with the lone tear slipping down her shocked face.
Is the director in the control room ever going to cut to one of the other cameras for the Jumbotron? And why doesn’t this guy on screen have the common sense to shut the fuck up?
“You could help me set up my Date Night profile,” the fuckface continues with a too-sincere smile.
I bellow toward the control room, “Cut that off.”
But the horror flick keeps playing as my new mortal enemy says, in all his pixelated gigantic assholery, “And I could help you set up yours.”
Remy’s lips part, and devastation rains down her pretty cheeks, just as a curly-haired woman arrives at her row with a bottle of champagne.
“Thanks, Selena, but—” Remy starts, and my god, she’s thanking the usher while her heart’s being broken.
This guy never deserved her.
There has to be another way to get the control room’s attention off her.
I drop a stuffed fox onto the ice in front of me, swing my stick back, and launch that baby high into the stands. A few people in the crowd cheer as I make a game of this, and one of the camera guys on the ice to capture video for the Jumbotron feed swings his lens my way. Launching another fox, then another, I do what I despise—make myself the center of attention for anything other than the game itself.
“Here’s your feel-good news clip moment,” I growl.
Apparently, whacking a fox like it’s a puck does the job because the impromptu demonstration of my stick skills replaces the douchebag’s debacle on the overhead screen.
I send one more stuffed fox sailing into the stands for good measure.
Crisis averted, but only for now. The stuffed foxes are carted off the rink, and while we line up for the face-off, I steal a glance at the second row.