The Not-Outcast

by Tijan

  It was after our hugdle that Margo pulled me aside.

  She’d been curious when she first met me, then kind and only kind after that. I felt a distinct maternal nurturing from her and there were times I didn’t know how to handle it. I loved it, but I also didn’t know if I could let myself love it. Cut told me every time I expressed those concerns to open my channels and let people into my river.

  That’s what I was doing. Who was I to exclude people from the river of love here? It was now a golden river of love.

  But I’d never seen her get serious like this. She took my hand, staring at both our hands for a moment before lifting her head. “I need to apologize to you, and it’s been a long time coming.”

  “Apologize? For what?”

  “I got a call from a personal friend of mine, who had a conversation with your father. Based on that call, I pulled Cutler into my office and I put him in an awkward position. It wasn’t the right thing to do, and even though I didn’t know what was going on, there’s been a lot of nights that took me longer to fall asleep because I realized later Deek had been pulling strings to try and control you, or try and control Cutler. I don’t know the reasons behind why he did what he did, but I do know it was wrong. It was wrong for me to put Cutler in that position, and it was wrong for your father to use personal connections how he did.”

  I opened my mouth.

  She kept going, hurrying, “And I’ve been waiting to make some calls, but yesterday I got word. I can tell you today that your father no longer has any friends within my social circle. The last one turned his back on him yesterday, so I know that your father took a deal. He’ll be getting out in ten years, but you don’t have to worry about him. Those doors will remain closed to him when and if he returns here.”

  He was technically still here. Leavenworth wasn’t far.

  I squeezed her hand gently. “Thank you for telling me that. It does mean a lot.”

  A relieved smile came over her, and she blinked quite a few times. “Thank you. Has Cutler ever talked to you about me at all?”

  I shook my head. “Just that you’re good people.”

  “I was never able to have children, and there was a time in my youth where I was in a shelter for a bit. It wasn’t long, but I was there. That time will always stick with me.”

  “Oh.” Whoa. Super smart big bad boss Margo was in a shelter? “Can I ask what kind of shelter?”

  Her smile turned sad, just the slightest bit. “It was one that my mother and I needed to be in, but again; it wasn’t for long. I’m sharing that because while I know that Cutler’s mother is here and is going to claim you as a daughter to her, if you’re with Cutler or not. I’m also hoping that you and I can somewhat have a mentor/mentee sort of relationship.” Her hand trembled, a tiny tremble. “It would mean a lot to me. We could do tea, or meet for a walk at Powell’s. Or even a weekly luncheon. You could go with me on some of my trips.”

  I was suddenly dizzy.

  Margo was—Margo was amazing.

  A lump was forming in my throat. “I’d like that.” A lot, a lot, a lot. I refrained from sharing that. I needed to be cool. I didn’t want to scare her away.

  A gentle chuckle came from her and she squeezed my hand again. “I’m looking forward to it, and also, Decking with the Tomcats is now listened to by everyone on the Mustang staff. I don’t know if Cutler’s told you, but the three of you are hilarious.”

  Well, yeah. We were some awesomesauce type of chicks.

  “I see that Alice is here. I’ll let you have your time with Cutler’s mother now.” Margo gave me another one of those soft smiles before she went over to greet them. David was coming in right behind Alice, and Dylan and Jamison, too.

  It was the head that came in after Jamison that had me gasping.

  Hunter.

  I had to take a second.

  The air suddenly swooshed around me.

  I knew Chad was coming to the game. He’d reached out to apologize. He apologized quite a few times, and he promised to steer clear at the game. I was fine with it. He moved out and he’d not been an asshole, trying to give me space ever since the police station.

  So that Not-Brother was really a not-issue anymore.

  And back to the real-brother. The very true-brother.

  He was here. I couldn’t believe he was here.

  I was definitely weaving on my feet. Swaying.

  A feather could’ve knocked me over, but then Hunter was looking, scanning, and he found me.

  A matching smile came over him and he ignored everyone.

  He came right for me.

  The air was in slow motion, moving around me, and at that movement from him, it all hit me at once and I jerked forward.

  I couldn’t let my little brother be the one coming to me. I had to meet him halfway. Fuck that. I was rushing to meet him, and we almost collided in the middle of the box.

  My arms were around him.

  He was trying to hug the life out of me.

  He picked me up, and whoa—my brother was strong.

  His head was buried in my neck.

  I couldn’t decide where to hug him best. Around his arms. Under his arms. I wound them around his neck instead and man, oh man, oh man.

  This had been too long coming.

  Way too long.

  Hunter and I had kept in contact, but because of my new media attention and because of Deek’s charges, Natalie wanted to wait until things died down a bit before Hunter and I started our visits.

  Visits. That’s what she said, too.

  And she followed through on her dinner invitation from the Come Our Way event. She sent me an invitation two days ago for their Sunday family dinner. I thought the whole thing was ticklish to my insides. I was now the one being invited to Sunday family dinner. So not the outcast anymore.

  But Hunter.

  I was hugging him, and I pulled back once he set me on my feet. “You’ve grown two inches since I last saw you.”

  He blushed.

  Blushed!

  My little brother was blushing. “Not quite. Just an inch and three quarters.”

  Right. An inch and three quarters. I needed to get it correct next time, but I was laughing because this was all filling me up with gooey chocolate warmth inside.

  Loving life. Yes, I was.

  “Can I just say it’s about fucking time you and I are hanging out? The emails were fine and all. Texting, too, but enough is enough. I want to see my sister. And you can tell my mom I swore. I don’t care. This has been ridiculous.” He nodded toward where Jamison and Dylan were standing. Margo was introducing them to Otis, Maisie, and JJ. “But it’s been cool seeing Jamison again. I haven’t seen him since like middle school. Mom is infatuated with Alice. And a little scared of her, too, but that’s between you and me.” Then he stopped talking and he stared at me, and he had to blink a couple times, too. It was the theme for the night. “Too long, Sis. Too fucking long.”

  That lump was back and it just doubled in size.

  I was nodding and blinking my own eyes. “I know.”

  “Not again. You and me, we stick together from now on.”

  “Got it. You and me.” And a memory came back to me, so I held up my pinkie. “We’re gonna hang, right?”

  He was all serious and he wrapped his pinkie around mine. He nodded. “Hell yeah, we’re gonna hang.”

  We had a little hugdle.

  Afterwards, Alice came over and we had our own hugdle, too.

  And even more after that, I hung out with my Little Dude for the whole game.

  Mustangs won two to one.

  Cut scored both goals.

  Epilogue

  Cheyenne

  I’d like to say that we had a happily ever after, but that wasn’t true.

  We were happy. Then things were rough. Then things smoothed out again. Then they were rough, hard. There were struggles. Then smooth again. Happy. Joyous. Back to struggles. This was my life. This was our life, Cut’s
and mine, because that’s how it goes with someone who has what I have.

  Every day is a struggle.

  But I can say that we laughed. We laughed a lot.

  I can say that we loved. We loved so hard.

  I can say that we were passionate. Fuck yes. Pun intended.

  So all in all, there were good times and there were bad, but the good overshadowed the bad. The truth is, it doesn’t matter. Whatever struggles a person has, going forward, what is imperative is that they have love and support. Anyone can get through anything, or it can be less frightening, less suffering, if they have a hand in theirs. Somedays that hand will need to be held tight and some days, it’ll need to be clung to.

  Other days, a light graze was all that was needed.

  I found that. So in that way, I got my happily ever after.

  It’s been ten years. Cut’s still playing hockey. My podcast grew until it was so popular that we were having regular celebrities as guests. The highest ratings were always when it was just the three of us: Melanie, Sasha, and myself.

  Life was good.

  Cut and I married two years after he won the Stanley Cup.

  Two more years after and we fostered our first little boy. Next a little girl.

  Then siblings.

  Teenager siblings.

  We fostered a family of five children, ages ranging from seventeen to seven. There was a nineteen-year-old. He wasn’t a foster, but he lived with us. He was the sixth in that family.

  We adopted four children over the years: Rain, Emily, Brian, and Lewis.

  We adopted four dogs as well: Cutter, Chadwick, Clitty, and Sucker. Rain named Clitty. (She wants to be a medical doctor.) Emily named Sucker. (She just wants to hit things. She’ll probably go into construction.) Cutter and Chadwick came together and got their names because Cutter wouldn’t stop humping Cut’s leg. Chadwick because he was kind of a douche dog. I never thought dogs could be douches, but he was. That was the phrase around the house, ‘Don’t be a Chad.’ It was the PG version of the other one, ‘fucking Chad.’

  Come Our Way was going strong.

  Reba, Boomer, and Gail doted on all the kids and animals. Dean was still around, but I had no idea how that happened. He did another few events that weren’t cleared by everyone, and the board hadn’t been happy when I notified them about it. He got reprimanded, was asked to take a leave of absence. He came back three months later with a more ‘teamwork’ attitude. We never had an issue after that.

  He asked to use my season ticket again. I said no.

  He’s asked a few more times. I always enjoy saying no. My whole ‘setting him up’ had been a one time feat, and I was glad that I never had to do it again.

  Then we met his girlfriend and Dean’s new attitude made more sense. She was the sweetest thing. When she walked into Come Our Way, she was a child and animal whisperer. Where she went, they followed in a line. Literally.

  Her name was Sunny.

  Beep! Beep!

  I was in Melanie’s favorite place in the world, the bathroom. Since she and Cassie got married, she swears she likes it even more. It’s her new Zen place. Though, I wasn’t on the toilet. I’d already done that business. Hearing my phone’s alarm, I turned it off and looked up at the counter. I was sitting on the floor.

  The house was quiet, for once. All the kids were at Mama Alice’s house. They bought one three houses down from ours as their second home, which was really their main home since Dylan and Jamison both were living in states close to us. I didn’t understand why they kept their first home, but Mama Alice said it had something to do with not giving up any area to a Kathryn Moomoo Lady. The Etsy business was fierce.

  I was digressing because I needed to get up. I needed to look at what I didn’t want to look at, and I needed to get ready for the wedding.

  I couldn’t move.

  I had a few years until I was forty, and this was the first time I’d ever taken this test.

  I shouldn’t be nervous. I was.

  I shouldn’t be excited. I was.

  My heart was fluttering everywhere in my chest cavity.

  My palms were sweaty.

  I had to do some deep breathing exercises before I pushed myself from the floor.

  One step.

  I smoothed my hands down my pants.

  Two steps.

  I was there.

  The bathroom wasn’t that big.

  I was standing just over the counter, and—I just had to do it.

  I looked.

  The pregnancy test was right there, staring up at me. Positive.

  Holy shit.

  My legs almost gave out, and I grabbed for the counter.

  I was pregnant. We were pregnant. I didn’t know how it happened. I mean, I knew how, but we’d taken measures so I wouldn’t get pregnant. We had many conversations and I’d been torn. Cut hadn’t. He wanted a child with me, but me—I didn’t want to bring someone into the world that would suffer how I did.

  Did.

  That was the operative word, because it was better. It had been better since Cut.

  But then we got Benji. Then Amelia…and our own pregnancy talk got pushed aside.

  But another Cut.

  That’s where this test came about because the world needed another Cutler.

  My throat was tightening up and I was crying. My lips were trembling.

  I was full-out sobbing.

  I was going to have a baby, one that came from my blood and Cut’s.

  Fuck.

  Wow.

  Okay.

  Fuck.

  Wow.

  Okay.

  And repeat because… you guessed it. Fuoway. My new word.

  Whoa.

  A small knock before, “Shine?”

  Shine.

  If we had a little girl, her middle name was going to be Shine. If we had a boy, Cutler. I was making the decision now.

  “Cheyenne? Babe?” He was getting a bit more concerned now. “You’ve been in there a while, but we gotta go if we’re going to make pictures in time.”

  Right. Because we were going to Hendrix and Sasha’s wedding. Finally, their wedding because those two dumbasses took forever to get hitched. They kept getting together, breaking up, getting together, breaking up. I was sensing a pattern with Sasha, but then Hendrix almost died from a car accident and Sasha declared he wasn’t allowed to die without her. They got engaged the next day.

  Morbid.

  “Hey.”

  The door opened and he stuck his head inside.

  I moved, blocking the test, and I smiled.

  His eyes narrowed. “You’ve been crying, but you’re smiling at me. You’re giving me that smile.”

  I was giving him that wide smile, the one I gave him every time I was going to tell him we were about to foster another child or rescue an animal.

  His eyebrows pulled in, lowering. “No. We already have a full house.”

  I was scared. Of course I was scared, but I had faith, and hope, and love, and I really only needed his love to know we’d get through anything.

  He was shaking his head now. “Seriously. Come on. Shine. No way. We just found a home for the pet raccoon.”

  Oh, crap. I forgot about Rocket One.

  And about that phone call I got today. He didn’t know that we had Rocket Deuce coming.

  I’d tell him later.

  “Cheyenne. Come on.”

  He was breaking.

  Now.

  Now was the time to tell him.

  I swallowed my lump that was nerves and happiness and I breathed out. “I didn’t get a phone call for this.”

  He relaxed.

  “But…” I reached behind me, grabbing the test. My hand closed around it. “I got a test.”

  I showed it to him.

  He stared at it, his eyes wide and he jerked his head up. “You’re—”

  I nodded. “I am.”

  Ten years.

  But it’s been so much longer than
that when I first fell in love with Cutler Ryder.

  “Fuck, Shine.” He swept me up, his hand grabbing my neck, and his mouth was over mine. “Fuck.”

  My legs wrapped around his, but then he turned me around, his hands going to my pants.

  His eyes were dark, smoldering. Hungry.

  His hands were rough. Needing.

  Now wasn’t the time to talk.

  His pants were pulled down. Mine.

  He nudged my legs apart, and he lined up.

  No one was home.

  We needed to leave.

  Still.

  “Put your hands on the mirror.”

  A thrill raced through me.

  We needed this more.

  His voice was low and raw, and as our eyes held in the mirror, he thrust inside of me.

  I lied. We so had a happily ever after.

  We had a second one before getting to Sasha and Hendrix’s wedding.

  And we had another one before we both had to give our best man and matron of honor speeches. Though, I shared mine with Melanie.

  Almost nine months later

  Hunter Jamison Dylan Ryder was born.

  All three uncles were his godfathers.

  Alice was now Grandmama Alice.

  Melanie was now Auntie Mel.

  Sasha was still Sasha.

  We lived happily ever after.

  For realster real.

  Go to www.tijansbooks.com for a

  Decking with the Tomcats podcast transcript!

  Acknowledgments

  I first wrote Cheyenne under a different name for an anthology. It was the prologue, and I never intended to include it with the actual book.

  That changed halfway through the book. I felt it was needed, and the name changed for me as well.

  The thing with my books and writing, the characters tend to take over and I meant for this book to be more hockey-focused. It is hockey-focused, but Cheyenne’s struggles began to grow and grow.

  I knew they were always there from the first time I wrote her prologue, and I felt them. But every single time I started to write this book, they became more and more pronounced to the point where I felt like I was Cheyenne. It was a trip, but I went with it and I truly tried to put on the keyboard what she wanted me to write.