Authors: Jennifer Comeaux
The announcer piped up, and I gritted my teeth, bracing myself for the numbers. We’d done everything besides the lasso lift well, so there was hope we’d still be ahead of Stephanie and Josh in the standings.
The score appeared below our faces on the monitor, and my shoulders relaxed. We’d maintained our position in the standings, though by a small margin. Mark and I hugged again, and Em put her arm around me as we walked backstage.
“You really held it together after the lift,” she said. “You guys haven’t missed one like that in a long time.”
“It shocked me for a second, and then I knew I had to get my butt in gear. I didn’t want to give you any reason to doubt my focus.”
“I could see your determination from the start. I wasn’t worried at all.”
I slowed and fiddled with the zipper of my jacket. “What um… what happened with Josh and Stephanie?”
Em’s mouth turned down. “Josh fell on both jumps.”
“Oh.” The sinking feeling I’d had earlier returned.
The federation’s media coordinator ushered Mark and me to the waiting journalists, and I caught a glimpse of Josh speaking to a newspaper reporter. His expression was still grim. Had he fallen because his mind was on other things? When we’d talked that afternoon, he’d seemed just as determined as I was to overcome the outside distractions.
I didn’t see him again until I got on the bus and noticed he and Stephanie sat ten rows apart. Josh was staring out the window, and I hesitated in the aisle, not sure if I should bother him. When I had a bad skate, I preferred to stew alone.
I started to move past his row, but he turned and said, “Hey.”
“Hey.” I stopped and pointed to the empty seat. “Can I…”
“Yeah. Sure.”
I stowed my bag in the row across from us and held my breath as Mark came down the aisle. He gave us a long look but kept walking.
“Rough night,” I said.
“Steph thinks I screwed up on purpose to get back at her.”
“She can’t be serious.”
“Oh, she’s serious. You know, because I don’t have any pride in my skating, and I would throw both of us under the bus for revenge.” His voice was laced with anger.
“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”
He propped his elbow up on the window and pushed his fingers through his hair. “My timing was just off on both jumps. It’s frustrating because I’d been so consistent lately.”
“Em and Sergei will help you fix it,” I said as I touched his thigh.
He covered my hand with his. “What happened on the lift?”
“Our grip just slipped a little and we lost it.”
“You skated great otherwise.” He rested his head against the seat and turned so he faced me. “You were so damn beautiful out there.”
All the frustration had left his eyes, and he looked at me like I was the most gorgeous thing he’d ever seen. He quickened my pulse faster than any workout could.
“I really wanna kiss you,” I whispered.
His lips eased into a smile. “I have no objections.”
Even though the bus was dark, we were hidden between the seats, and no one sat around us, I felt a little weird about engaging in PDA there. We were still competitors, both coming off less-than-stellar performances.
“After dinner,” I said.
He held his chest as if he’d been shot. “Kicking a guy while he’s down.”
“What’s an hour or two when you waited eight years to kiss me the first time?”
“But now that I know how freaking incredible it feels, I want it all day, every day.” He leaned closer to me.
I gave his leg a squeeze. “I promise it’ll be worth the wait.”
“You won’t consider the fact I have to endure dinner with Steph and my mom? Don’t I deserve something good before the torture?”
“Why don’t you have dinner with me and my parents?”
He sat up straighter. “You’re sure that’s okay?”
“Of course. They want to get to know you better. The only thing is… will your mom be mad if you ditch her?”
He shrugged. “It’s not like we have tons to talk about.”
“Then we’d love for you to join us.”
He smiled and angled toward me, and I placed my finger on his lips. “Later.”
****
I popped the key into my door and found Liza sitting on her bed with a room service tray. I rolled my bag next to the TV armoire and pitched my jacket onto my bed.
“Why aren’t you having dinner with your mom?” I asked.
Liza poked at her salad. “She was making me crazy.”
“Uh-oh.”
“She thinks she knows everything I’m feeling because she used to compete like ten million years ago. She doesn’t get that I’m not her.”
“I’d stay and eat with you, but I have to meet my parents and Josh.”
Her eyes lit up. “Aww, he’s having dinner with you?”
“It’s nice not having to sneak around anymore.”
My phone dinged, and I quickly read the text. “My mom said they got a table already, so I’d better go.”
“Tell your boyfriend I said hi,” Liza said as I opened the door.
I smiled as I always did whenever I thought of Josh as my boyfriend. I started down the hall, and my smile flew away when I saw Mrs. Tucker exiting her room. Making a speedy pivot, I tried to race back to my room, but she called my name. I slowly turned around and approached her.
“Hi,” I said.
She was wearing stiletto boots, so she had a big height advantage over me in my fake UGGs. It gave her the opportunity to look down on me literally and figuratively.
“So, you’re dating my son,” she said.
She sounded as pleased by that as someone talking about a natural disaster.
“Yes… I am.”
“And what do you hope to gain from this?”
I wrinkled my forehead. “What do I hope to
gain
?”
“This is obviously not going to be a long-term relationship, so I’m concerned you’re using Josh for your own competitive advantage.”
Didn’t I just have this conversation?
Oh, yeah, with Mark, who thought Josh was using
ME.
We were being smothered with paranoia from all sides.
“I would never take advantage of Josh’s feelings for me,” I said. “I care about him a great deal.”
She tilted her head slightly to the side as if that helped her get a better angle to scrutinize me. “You can’t blame me for worrying. Josh is very sensitive, very thoughtful. He doesn’t open up to people easily.”
“Maybe he doesn’t open up to people because his family never made him comfortable with doing so.”
Her eyes narrowed in the same way Stephanie’s always did when she was pissed. She took a step forward and towered over me even more.
Why did I have to open my big mouth?
“Who do you think you are? You don’t know a damn thing about my relationship with my son.”
I know he feels like you’re from two different planets.
I moved backward to regain my personal space.
Don’t you dare say that out loud. You’ve already dug your grave deep enough.
“You’re right. I… I don’t know you. I just know what Josh has… expressed… to me…” My mouth dried up as Cruella stared me down harder.
“I’m sure you think you’re an expert because you’ve known him what, a few months? Well, I can play that game, too. I can tell you what I’ve learned about you in the few minutes I’ve spoken to you. You have no manners and no class, and I’ll be glad when Josh comes home and leaves you behind where you belong.”
She left me standing in the hallway, my heart pounding. I’d had slim hope before of her accepting me, but that hope was now obliterated. Tears misted my vision, and I shook my head and blotted the corners of my eyes with my fingers. I wasn’t going to let that woman make me cry. It was what she wanted — to make me feel like I had no place in Josh’s life.
I sniffed back the tears and took a deep breath, but I knew the truth. Her words wouldn’t have gotten to me if I wasn’t already terrified. Terrified that exactly what she wanted was indeed going to happen.
Chapter Eighteen
“Only three weeks until show time.” Em clapped her hands, ending the giggles of the novice skaters on the ice. “Let’s get serious.”
Josh joined me on the first row of the bleachers and pulled on his skates. “Em’s cracking the whip today?”
“The kids are having a little too much fun with the props,” I said.
“It’s hard to believe Christmas is in a month. It seemed so far away when we started rehearsals.”
I stared at the ice, where Em fumbled with two giant candy canes. Christmas was coming too fast, too soon. Once the holidays passed, we’d be staring down the barrel that was nationals.
“I can’t wait to give you your Christmas present,” Josh said.
I snapped out of my daze. “You have my present already?”
“I don’t have it in my possession, but I have it picked out.” He grinned like an excited little boy with a secret.
“Can I get a hint? Let’s play twenty questions!”
“Nope. You’re not getting any hints.”
“Not even a tiny little one?”
“My lips are sealed.”
“Hmm…” I leaned close to his ear. “I bet I can make those lips do whatever I want later tonight.”
His eyes widened. “I need to hear more about these plans.”
“We should do something after my shift. It’s the first weekend we don’t have to lie about where we are.”
“Why don’t we go to my house? We can listen to music, I can play for you…” He tapped his fingers along my thigh as if it was a piano.
“Won’t Stephanie be there?”
“We’ll be in my room.” He dropped his voice. “With the door locked.”
I smiled and lifted one eyebrow. “Trying to lure me into your bedroom. Maybe there is a little bad boy in you.”
He gazed at me with the look he always gave me right before he kissed me — the one where his eyes flashed to my mouth then settled deep into mine. My lips parted on instinct, and I took in a small breath.
“Court!” Em called out.
We both jerked our heads toward the ice and fidgeted as though we’d been caught doing something questionable. Em and Sergei didn’t have a problem with us dating, but they probably didn’t want us being obvious about it at the rink. We’d done a good job since being back from Skate America, so one momentary slip should be excused.
“Can you put these in the storage room for me?” Em passed the candy canes over the boards.
When I returned from storing the props, Mark and Stephanie had arrived with their standard surly faces for rehearsal. We all got on the ice, and Em clicked on the music. After we went through the motions of the opening, we split into pairs, and Josh and I were all smiles. Even after a month of practicing with him, I still tingled every time he took my hand for our duet.
We swept into the waltz, and I marveled again how natural I felt following Josh’s lead. He was so light on his feet, and it carried over to me, making me feel like I was breezing over the ice with no effort. As we soared through the spirals, I closed my eyes, focusing solely on the sensation of flying in Josh’s arms. After spending almost my entire life on the ice, I hadn’t thought it was possible to discover a new spark, but I was living it every time Josh and I skated together.
We came out of the spirals and stroked hand-in-hand to set up for the rotational lift. Mark and Stephanie were a blur as we sped past them. I curled my arm around Josh’s neck, pressing myself up as he lifted my outstretched legs, but something felt off. We were going too fast, and I’d shifted my weight back too far. I couldn’t stop my momentum, and I fell backward, taking Josh down with me. He grabbed my waist before we slammed into the ice, shielding me with his body from the hard blow.
“Are you okay?” I asked as I rolled off him.
“Yeah, my butt got most of it.” He winced when he stood up with me.
I noticed a few spots of red on the ice and looked at his scraped elbow. “You’re bleeding.”
“What the hell, man?” Mark shouted as he and Stephanie came to a stop in front of us, kicking up a spray of ice. “You trying to kill my partner?”
“It was my fault,” I said.
Mark ignored me and got into Josh’s face. “If you wanna show off and do a damn lift, you need to keep her friggin safe!”
Josh gave him a cold stare. “Like you did at Skate America?”
I sucked in a breath as Mark’s eyes grew darker.
Oh,
Josh…
“Screw you,” Mark growled, taking a threatening step toward him. “I’ve always protected her.”
“Stop!” I moved between them and shoved both their puffed-out chests.
Em skated over and added to my blockade between Mark and Josh. “Alright, boys, settle down.”
“Yeah, get over yourself, Mark,” Stephanie said. “Like you’re the perfect partner. You’ve almost taken me down a couple times.”
“That was your fault. You were too busy bitching to pay attention to where you were going.”
“For the love of…” Em threw her head back and closed her eyes.
I waited for her to start audibly praying for us to cooperate. Instead she took two deep breaths and opened her eyes.
“Are you guys okay?” she asked Josh and me.
“He needs a Band-Aid,” I said.
“There’s some in my jacket on the bleachers,” she said.
Josh skated toward the boards, and I followed him. We walked gingerly on our blades across the mat, and I watched Josh wipe his arm with a towel and tear open the bandage.
“You didn’t have to egg on Mark like that,” I said.
“He shouldn’t have been in my face.”
“I know. He’s just… he’s just looking out for me.”
Josh pressed the bandage down hard on his elbow. “Does he really think I’d try to hurt you?”
I looked over at Mark, who was drifting solo around the ice. “I don’t think so. He’s being overprotective because of our situation.”
“Well, he needs to chill. I would never let anything happen to you.”
I smiled a little. “You shed some blood for me today.”
He glanced at his arm and then rested his gaze solidly on me. “I’d do a lot more than that to protect you.”
We weren’t skating together at the moment, but I got the same tingly feeling I’d had on the ice. And all the responses I wanted to give him would have to wait until later.