Rodrigo grins. “Told you.”
“Go hydrate,” I tell him, and he pushes off without complaint, humming to himself as he rejoins the rotation.
Isabella stays beside me, arms folded loosely as she leans back against the boards again, and for a moment we simply watch the ice, the noise filling the space without demanding anything from either of us.
“It’s strange,” I say eventually, keeping my eyes forward, “how different things can look when you’re only seeing the result.”
She nods immediately. “It usually is.”
I push off to the center of the rink, letting the noise andmovement reclaim me. It’s easy to confuse what looks effortless with what has been rehearsed into silence.
Watching Isabella earlier, hearing her talk about her parents with that same calm, I understand now that what I read as confidence was actually something built under pressure, refined until it stopped showing its seams.
I skate a wide arc back to Rodrigo, aware that I’ve been guilty of the same thing. Flattening people into something simple because it’s easier than holding the truth.
CHAPTER 14
ISABELLA
“Isabella, dear.”
The door opens without a knock, even though this is my office, and they do not belong here. Everything here is mine—the role I have at this facility, the foundation, the work—but the air when my parents are around shifts the same way it did when I was sixteen and they stepped rink-side before a free skate. Lake Jasper Training Center is the only place that feels fully mine, and even here, they make it feel smaller the second they walk in.
My father enters first. Navy blazer and no tie. Casual with the ease powerful men have when they expect to be obeyed. My mother follows, immaculate and bright-eyed, scanning the room as though she’s assessing the potential of it.
Nina is leaning against the credenza, arms folded, pretending to scroll on her phone. She looks up once, meets my eyes, and says nothing. Anchor, not shield.
“Princess. Hi, Nina,” my mother says warmly, as casuallyas one would say to their daughter when they’re meeting for Sunday brunch and not about to negotiate control. “We were in the neighborhood.”
“Colorado is not a neighborhood,” Nina mumbles, and I hope to everything that is holy that our parents didn’t hear her. It’s the people pleaser in me, who inevitably comes out when they are around.
“Hi, Mom,” I say, closing my laptop slowly instead of snapping it shut like I want to. “You could have called.”
My father glances at the stack of files on my desk. Rodrigo’s performance breakdown is visible, his name in bold at the top of the page.
“We did call,” he says mildly. “You didn’t answer.”
I hold his gaze. “I’ve been working.”
A small silence settles. It’s familiar territory. They don’t like being reminded that my work is no longer theirs to direct, even if I’ve given as little details as possible of what I’m up to these days.
My mother moves closer, fingertips brushing the edge of the desk. “We watched your broadcast,” she says. “The boy from Argentina.”
“Rodrigo,” I reply evenly.
“Yes, him.” She smiles. “You were very… passionate.”
I know what she means. That I let too much through and I didn’t mask the admiration in my commentary. My tone suggested what I’ve been saying to them for years about access, infrastructure, what talent looks like when it’s underfunded. I stepped as close to criticism of the sport and the ways of working without outright naming it.
“That’s my job.”
“No,” my father corrects softly. “Your job is influence. We’ve talked about this before.”
Nina’s thumb stills on her screen, and I swear I can hear her eye roll.
My mother continues before I can respond. “Armand mentioned you’re building something with this boy. Some sort of developmental residency program here. You didn’t think to include us?”
It only took a few minutes before it showed up.
