“It’s been fun, Talon.” I try to smile at him, but my eyes wander right on by everything else and land on Bohdan.
One leg kicked up against the glass railing surrounding the balcony, hands shoved into the pockets of his suit pants. Black jacket stretching across perfect shoulders, the top three buttons of his white dress shirt undone, one wave of hair curling down and hiding the scar. He angles his head. “Zlatícko. You look beautiful.”
“Thank you,” I murmur, brushing out invisible wrinkles in the front of my dress when Bohdan kicks off the railing to hold my chair out for me.
“You’re welcome, Sloany.” Talon grins, tapping my shoulder affectionately before pulling out his chair.
“She wasn’t thanking you.” Jay runs a hand through his hair, sending the ebony strands falling every which way.
Talon shrugs one shoulder, reaching across the table and pouring a too-full glass of scotch from a crystal decanter. “She should be. No retirement river cruise, no getting absolutely dicked—”
“Do not finish that fucking sentence.” Bohdan cuts a glare at Talon, brushing his fingers along the stretch of my shoulder before he tucks my chair in and takes the seat beside me, a hand resting across my thigh.
“Well.” Talon waves him off before knocking his fist against the table and raising his glass of scotch, the amber liquid sparkling beyond the intricate crystal detailing. “The retirement river cruise is officially coming to an end.”
“Not a river,” Tia mutters, ripping a bread roll in half and attacking it with a butter knife.
“What a shame.” Jay raises his brows before emptying his wine and grabbing the bottle on the table to refill it.
“I personally think it’s been very enjoyable.” Talon bothers to look affronted for two seconds before he turns to Bohdan, grin catlike. “Bohdan, did you have a good time? Maybe you’d like to give a toast. Anything you want to thank me for?”
Bohdan shrugs, the corners of his lips turning down, but I can tell by the way his left cheek twitches that he’s fighting a smile. “No, I’m good.”
Talon scoffs, leaning back in his chair, waving the glass of scotch around again. “Shay might want to rethink that whole mental health sports thing. Like pulling fucking teeth trying to get you to talk.”
I blink.
Bohdan stills, hand suspended midair as he reaches halfway across the table for his glass of water. The other tightens against my thigh.
I shift, turning to face him, almost preternaturally slow and still.
I think I’m back in the horror movie we stumbled into when I saw Bohdan for the first time on the gangway.
Thereissomething in the room with us, and it never left.
A breeze lifts off the ocean. Stars wink in the sky above us. But I don’t notice them. I blink again. “What mental health sports thing?”
Talon doesn’t notice anything either. He gestures to Bohdan, the cuff links on his tux catching under the moonlight. “Networkwants to make Bohdan the face of athletes’ mental health. Imagine him, on TV? Talking about his feelings?”
“No,” I say quietly. “I can’t.”
Bohdan runs a hand down his face before palming his jaw with a slow shake of his head.
“You’re going to what? Host an entire show?” I push back from the table with shaky hands and an even shakier heart. “When you couldn’t even talk to me?”
“Sloan—” he starts, grabbing the edges of my chair like he’s going to try to drag me closer to him.
I dig my heels into the ground, childlike. “Don’t.”
He presses his eyes closed and flashes his palms in the air before pushing his own chair back.
“Oh ... no.” Talon cringes, tugging on the ends of his hair before straightening his bow tie.
Jay groans into his fist. “Jesus Christ, Talon. You can’t keep your mouth shut to save your fucking life.”
“What did you do?” Tia asks, but she’s not looking at her brother, she’s looking at Bohdan.
Told you, my brain exhales, sympathetic and scornful all at once.What have you ever mattered?
