by Pippa Grant
Men are so cute when they get all worked up and jealous.
Serves him right for trying to buy me off. Even if he thought he was doing the right thing.
Most everyone else is just nibbling at what’s left on their plates as I dig in, so they all sit and chat about the away games in Canada last week, meeting Duncan’s family in Calgary, who got salad dressing on their shoe at lunch—weird, but okay—and the stick Duncan got from Edmonton’s enforcer.
Ares keeps eating.
Manning keeps avoiding looking at me. At least when I’m looking at him. When I’m looking away, I swear I can feel his gaze on me. And not just on my face. My nipples are so puckered they’re probably inside out, and I’m having to cross my legs and squeeze my thighs together.
Every time I hiccup, Elin glares at me as though if she puts enough concentration into it, she can slowly burn a hole through my skull and into my brain so that I die.
Or possibly she loves my brows and wants to know where I get them waxed.
But she’s going to have to say please if she wants that info. I’m polite, but I’m not easy. Especially to people who like to call me a whore.
I don’t notice the monkey’s missing until it leaps onto Ares’s shoulder as I’m pushing my plate back.
“Give. Me. Back. My. Monkey,” Elin growls.
“The monkey’s happy. Let it go,” Manning tells her.
“Loki is mine,” Elin hisses.
“This monkey belongs to no woman,” the monkey says.
I start and stare at it. Food dribbles out of Duncan’s mouth as he, too, stares at the monkey. Even Manning and Elin go wide-eyed.
Nick chokes on his noodles.
Felicity takes another bite of a dumpling.
So does Ares.
“What the fuck did you just say to me?” Elin gasps.
“Does your mother know you say fuck?” the monkey says.
Except the voice isn’t coming from the monkey.
Ares and the monkey are on my right.
The voice is coming from behind me.
Or possibly my left.
Elin, who’s at the end of the table on Ares’s other side, is going pale.
The monkey stares at her.
Manning shifts uncomfortably. Even Viktor, casually lounging on the couch six blocks away in the massive living room, lifts his head to watch with some I’m-ready-to-take-out-the-demon-monkey lurking in his see-all, know-all expression.
Nick is now choking on air like he’s having some kind of seizure.
“Does he need the Heimlich?” I ask Felicity.
“Do you have brothers?”
“Kind of. I mean, I have my sister, Joey. She’s special.”
Felicity shakes her head. “She’s probably more of a man than he is. Talking monkeys freak him out.”
“Loki, go to your room,” Elin says.
“You can call it my room if you want, but it’s really a prison, and one day the whole world will know the truth,” the monkey replies.
Viktor smothers a smile and turns back to his paper.
I glance at Felicity.
She sighs and claps Nick on the back while he continues to cough. “Are you going to live?”
“I fucking hate you,” he gasps. He’s holding his stomach, tears streaming down his face. I’m pretty sure those are laughter tears, but that coughing sounds serious.
“He’s had these spasms since he was a kid,” Felicity tells the table at large. “Happened in the mall once. One time at a neighbor’s birthday party. The time at the dentist was bad.”
“Fucking hate you,” he repeats.
“You know what?” Elin says. “Keep the monkey. I’ll get another one.” She throws her napkin on the table and gives Manning a look that suggests he’d best sleep with one eye open.
“We’ll merely rise again together,” the monkey says.
She flips off the table at large and marches down the same hallway that leads to Ares’s bedroom.
Shit damn fuck hell. So she’s sleeping close to us.
I look at Felicity again and hiccup. “I think I’m in love with you,” I whisper. If this is what city living is like, sign me up.
She grins and winks.
“Want to move in with me and Ares?” I ask. Because with Elin just across the hall, I could use someone who can make a monkey talk.
At this rate, we could get rid of Elin in hours.
And then all of Manning’s problems will be over.
“What the fuck was that?” Duncan asks as he eyes the monkey reverently.
Even watching closely, I can barely tell Felicity’s making the monkey talk. If the sound weren’t coming sort of from her direction, I’d have no clue. “What do you mean, what the fuck was that? What the fuck are you? You think just because my brothers and sisters don’t talk, we’re not evolved? Because we don’t tear down trees to build houses and pollute the air with gas engines? Who’s evolved now, fucker?”
A silence descends around the table.
Nick finally stops coughing. He wipes his eyes and reaches for his water glass. “Okay, Lucy,” he says. “You’re such a fucking downer.”
“Lucy is not a downer. Harold is.” Felicity grabs a fortune cookie, cracks it open, and hands the fortune to Nick. “Here. I obviously got yours.”
He looks at it and shoots her the bird.
“What’s it say?” Duncan asks.
“Your dick is a masterpiece to be worshipped by thousands of women worldwide,” Nick replies.
Clearly he got Manning’s fortune. I glance at His Highness, who’s watching me. Electricity sparks across the table, and I swear to dog, he just silently told me he wants to eat my pussy until it weeps for mercy.
I fan myself and hiccup and I’m pretty sure my pussy just wept anyway. Happy tears. Dammit.
“What’s it really say?” Duncan says.
“Beware the ego, for what pride giveth, karma taketh away,” Felicity answers.
Except it’s not Felicity.
It’s Felicity sounding like a grumpy old man without moving her lips.
This is fucking awesome.
“Holy shit,” Duncan says, clearly catching on. “Whoa. Murphy. Your sister is hot.”
Loki throws an egg roll at him.
“Good monkey,” Nick says.
The monkey screeches. He and Ares share a fist bump. Ares angles a look at Felicity, who goes slightly pink. Then he points at me, and the monkey offers me a fist. I laugh with total glee, because how often do you get to fist bump a monkey?
I feel a heavy weight between my shoulder blades and look back to find Manning watching me.
Watching us.
A shiver dances down each vertebra in my spine.
He pulls a fortune cookie from the pile and shifts his attention to unwrapping it and cracking it open.
A cloud dampens his smile as he reads his fortune.
He tosses it down and rises. “Poker tonight, gentlemen and my lady?” he says to Felicity. “Let’s clear the table then.”
Before I can move, Felicity leans across the table and reads his fortune aloud. “If you haven’t got your family, you haven’t got anything.”
Way to twist the knife, cookie.
He’s halfway to the kitchen with a stack of empty cartons, but I see his shoulders hitch.
“We need a Catan rematch,” Duncan announces. “You play, Felicity?”
“I don’t play. I rule it.”
“How about you, Gracie? You in?”
I clap my hands. “I love Catan.”
Manning eyeballs me. Ares slides a look at me and shakes his head.
So Joey warned him that I’m a horrible player and probably threatened to pluck his nose hairs out if he lets me lose.
Whatever.
I’m not playing to win.
Until it comes to getting Manning out of his betrothal. That’s the only game I care about.
And I’m going to win it too.
I don’t kno
w how yet, but I will. Because my baby deserves to know her father.
18
Manning
Though I’m sufficiently recovered from yesterday morning’s mead hangover post-Catan game, and our subsequent demolition of Anaheim last night, I’m still in a bloody foul mood.
I keep picturing Gracie stretching, yawning, and showing the entire table her belly button stud two nights ago, pecking Ares on the cheek, and announcing she was going to bed.
In Ares’s room.
Where she’s sleeping every night since he fucking invited her to live with us for a week.
Like yesterday, he avoids me during drills and sits across the dressing room for team meeting. I concentrate on Coach’s analysis of Minnesota’s defense before tomorrow night’s game, because hockey is the only thing in my life that I can control, and I need to keep my head on straight on the ice.
It’s entirely possible I’ll be in need of a fallback career plan next year, seeing as I’m apparently desperate to ruin the crown my family has held for generations.
We’re released to lunch. We often eat together at a team favorite restaurant not far from Mink Arena on home days off, and they’ve grown accustomed to Viktor insisting on watching my food be prepared. Ares lingers in the back of the pack on the short walk while I push in front.
With Viktor nearby, of course.
After lunch, I’ll head back to my prison to prepare for this evening’s party. Gracie was baking after some early errand when we left for morning skate, and Elin had once again happily taken my credit card for another shopping spree. It doesn’t escape my notice that the very money that should be going toward repaying her father is going toward purchasing her heaven only knows how many more unnecessary pairs of shoes. That should come out of what the kingdom owes her father.
“Bro, check this out,” Lavoie says to Murphy. He flashes something that looks like a cookie with something dark smeared across the top. “When Skovel gets up to take a piss, I’m putting this on his plate.”
“What the fuck? Is that your dick?”
Lavoie giggles like a girl. “Fuck, yeah. Look at that monster.”
“Put that shit away. I see your dick enough. And if you show that to my sister, I’ll fucking kill you. She’s vulnerable right now. Understood?”
The only thing even remotely vulnerable about Murphy’s sister is her ability to lose gracefully.
“So you mean she’s easy?” Lavoie says.
Murphy tries to deck him, which Lavoie easily avoids. He lifts the cookie again. “There’s this company online. I got a stock photo of grandma pussy and ordered that too. It’s going in his gym bag so he can pull it out when he gets home. His wife is gonna think he’s fucking an eighty-year-old cougar.”
I suddenly miss my brothers so hard my chest aches, because this is exactly the type of infantile shit we’d pull on each other.
We arrive at the restaurant and are seated. While we wait for our food, I pull up a text thread with Colden. He’s probably heading to dinner soon.
Manning: Sheep good for you today?
Colden: Far rather have sheep than live with two impossible women.
Manning: At least do me the favor of meeting Ares before you insult his womanhood. You might find you like him.
Colden: You’re a twisted little fucker.
Manning: Miss you too, your royal grouchiness.
Before he replies, a new text message pops up.
Gracie: Is this party tonight a costume party? Elin invited me.
Prickles of unease dance across my chest and arms. Elin invited Gracie to the party? This is almost definitely a trap, probably intended to make Gracie feel inferior, unsophisticated, and poor.
I’m about to text her back when Skovel suddenly roars and leaps up from the table two seats down.
Unfortunately, he takes the entire table with him, sending salt shakers and water glasses and wrapped silverware flying. Ares gets a vase of flowers dumped in his lap. Klein, our second-string goalie, steps back onto a ketchup bottle and sends sticky red liquid shooting all over our defensive coach’s trousers. A red blown-glass candle holder crashes to the ground and shatters.
Managers and servers come running.
“There’s a dick on that cookie,” Skovel announces as he points at a pile of confectionary treats smushed by heaven only knows how many pounds of hockey player across the table.
A mother four tables over drops her phone from taking pictures of us and clamps her hands over her toddler’s ears.
A toddler.
With adorable brown hair and big brown eyes and chubby cheeks.
Another wave of emotion crashes through me.
I want to know my child. I want to see him discover the world. Kick a ball for the first time. Say mama. Teach him to hold a hockey stick. Let him ride a sheep through the palace hallways.
Fuck.
I jerk my head at Viktor, because we’re leaving.
“Yeah, this little company in Goat’s Tit, Alabama,” Lavoie is whispering to Murphy. “Goat’s Tit. Home of dick cookies. Isn’t that fucking hilarious?”
My feet stop of their own accord, and I look at him.
He grins.
“Goat’s Tit,” he says again. “I’m going there someday. Just to take a picture with the sign.”
“Does the sign say Goat’s Tit, Home of Dick Cookies?” Murphy asks.
“Nah, bro. Saw it on the postage meter. Return address is some post office box in Huntsville, but look. I took a picture.”
I linger long enough to look over his shoulder.
Sure enough, there it is.
Goat’s Tit, Alabama.
Right there on the meter mark.
Goat’s Tit only has one bakery.
Owned and run by the mother of my unborn child.
Who just happened to have an odd printer in her office.
Isn’t that an interesting coincidence?
19
Gracie
I’m smoothing a hand over the massively protruding belly beneath my white tank and new red plaid button-up when honey badger announces an incoming text message from Ares.
When she doesn’t offer to read it, I grab my phone.
Ah.
It’s a gif of a car flying off a ramp and into the back end of a garbage truck.
I tilt my head, watch it again, and then forward it to Joey asking for translation.
My phone rings immediately with a call from her. “Hey,” I say.
“You okay?”
She sounds ready to fly up here and kick some ass if I hint anything at all isn’t as it should be. “I think I feel sorry for Elin.”
There’s silence on the other end of the line. You know the silence. The are you being a dumbass? kind of silence.
“She has this model of a brain on her dresser in her room,” I tell Joey. “And a copy of Neuroscience Magazine next to this really awkward picture of this old balding dude in a weird tux hugging her at some formal event.”
More silence, and it’s not hard to picture my sister pursing her lips to keep from telling me to get to the point, even though half the point is that I got up the nerve to go snooping in her room and I successfully navigated a shopping trip this morning without feeling like a total hick after touring Copper Valley solo yesterday, even if I didn’t get to go watch Manning and Ares’s hockey game in person.
Seriously, I feel like a rock star. And this being a tourist thing could get addictive.
“I don’t think she has many friends. And it might be because she’s a spoiled rotten waste of oxygen, or it might be because she’s spent her whole life being taught how to be a princess but not being taught how to be a person.”
Even more silence. This time I wait while I flop back on the bed and stare the four hundred feet up to the ceiling. I get tired easily these days, which seems crazy considering the baby’s about the size of a blueberry, but the pregnancy book I was listening to while I baked this morning says hormones will basically m
ake me a crazy exhausted person for the next several weeks until the second trimester, when I’ll be a crazy exhausted person because I’ll start having to pee all the time and deal with watching my perky boobs droop.
And according to this author, it’s a serious injustice to make the peeing start in the second trimester considering the baby still won’t be all that big or heavy on my bladder, but that’s the injustice of pregnancy for you.
I might need to find a different pregnancy audiobook. And a room with lower ceilings, because it really is weird to contemplate that there could be an entire other floor between me and the fancy-schmancy double-layered tray ceiling with its slate trim. And did I mention there’s a gas fireplace and sitting area here? In the bedroom?
If Manning sold this penthouse, he could buy Goat’s Tit. The whole town. Seriously.
“Are you having second thoughts about saving Manning from his engagement?” Joey asks.
Crap, I forgot I was on the phone. “No. There’s too much baggage between them. They’d need like four years’ worth of sessions with Ginny Jo to even begin to work out their issues and ever be anything but miserable together. It’s like if you told me I had to marry Blake McMichaels. And if he was a total selfish ram’s ass.”
“Who?”
“Blake. Jock supremo at Goat’s Tit High while I was in high school? One of the guys you threatened with castration if he looked at me wrong? Sure, he was handsome and strong and knew his manners, he didn’t really get my ovens firing. He was way too into muscle cars and hunting and flirting with Ms. Kenderson.”
“Ms. Kenderson?”
“My senior year government studies teacher.”
“This isn’t going anywhere good, is it?”
“I’m just saying, sometimes knowing people’s histories makes them less attractive. Because it’s one thing to think it’s funny and possibly adorable in a juvenile way that a high school senior had a crush on a 22-year-old new teacher from the big city—that never went anywhere, by the way, because she was actually dating Principal Mead—but it’s another to watch the awkward show play out day in and day out. So maybe Elin’s actually quite charming when she’s not being forced to marry a guy who might’ve, I don’t know, made booger sculptures and went into way too many details about the technical aspects of hockey sticks. Not that I want her to ever be my child’s stepmother, of course.”