Page 74 of Lucky Puck

Cherry puts a hand on my arm. “No need to go into it. Sabe explained the whole problem.” She grins wide with two thumbs up. “You’re the bomb, girl.”

Marie laughs. “This kind of problem with unscrupulous women crops up now and then, but you handled yourself admirably.”

My face heats up. “Not sure about that.”

“What are you all talking about?” Evan says, turning away from his computer screen.

Henry waves a hand at him. “Never mind. Say hello to Brody Holden’s new wife, Broo—Bianca Brooks—or is it Bianca Holden now?”

I have no idea how to answer that question, but I don’t need to because Evan pops up from his seat and takes my hand, smiling right down to his eyes.

“From the Jett Agency, right?”

I nod.

“Brilliant move—I mean, congratulations on your recent nuptials.”

“Thank you.”

Cherry comes to my side—sans dog—with her arm around my shoulder again like she’s adopted me and means to protect me. Or at least that’s how it feels, and I go with it, my uneasiness melting away.

“You’re all so gracious. I was afraid I was crashing your private party.”

“Nonsense,” Henry says, and then his attention snaps to the rink below as the noise of the crowd rises up. We all gravitate to the seats overlooking the rink. The arena lights dim, and the spotlights go on as the players skate out one at a time for their introductions and take their place at the blueline.

Brody stands next to Jason Hall along with Sabien and the rest of the first line players. He’s going to be splitting ice time with Jason tonight, and I know he’s not happy about it.

After the national anthem, we settle down in the center-ice box’s seats and lean forward with our unobstructed bird's-eye view of the action.

I sit next to Cherry with Lady tucked between us and a beer in the cup holder, feeling like a princess and wishing my family and my bestie Kat could share this with me.

Cherry squeezes my hand as the players line up at center ice for the puck drop. “This is where my nerves kick in every time. How do you feel?”

I chuckle. “My nerves have been running amok since… I don’t know how long. Maybe ever since Vegas,” I admit.

“I get it,” she says quietly. “It’s a lot to get used to.”

I squelch the urge to tell her everything, to let out all my worst fears and crazy desires. The need to tell someone neutral, someone who won’t judge me, someone who will keep my secret, bubbles dangerously close to explosive levels.

But no matter what my instincts say, I don’t truly know that I can trust Cherry not to judge me and to keep my secret. Logically, I have no reason to trust her. I can’t start living on instinct, or wishful thinking, or blind trust—that would be naïve. And it never worked out for me in the past. I viciously suppress the nasty niggling fact that I may be behaving less than logical when it comes to Brody since I slept with him, knowing he--

“So tell me what happened?” Cherry rescues me from facing my lapse in logical thinking. “Sabien was light on the deets.”

I take a grateful breath. “Nora is Brody’s sister Kara’s friend, but when I walked into his—came home from shopping, I found her hanging on him and kissing him—or trying to. To Brody’s credit, he was trying to avoid her kiss.”

“Wow. In your own home—that’s beyond nervy. She deserved a slap for that.”

I shake my head. “That’s not what made me slap her.”

“No? What made you snap?”

“She made a personal comment about him,” I half mumble, realizing I can’t explain it. It’s Brody’s personal business and something he keeps to himself.

The crowd’s roar rises up and shakes the air, snapping our attention to the ice below where Sabien scored the first goal.

Cherry jumps up and down, holding my arm and shouting her lungs out as we watch the replay on the jumbotron.

“Don’t tell him I didn’t see him score,” she says breathlessly after play resumes.