Total pages in book: 118
Estimated words: 113072 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 565(@200wpm)___ 452(@250wpm)___ 377(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113072 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 565(@200wpm)___ 452(@250wpm)___ 377(@300wpm)
“Um…” I think for a second. “There’s a flower arrangement by the elevator. How about a rose between your teeth?”
He snaps his fingers. “Genius! Let’s do it.”
Chapter 42
In the morning, there’s a team brunch before we leave for the airport. Darcy and I make sure to eat at the top of the hour, before the hockey players have cleared out the bacon and waffles.
As I chase the last bits of maple syrup around with my fork, Chase winks at me over the rim of his coffee cup. It warms me up inside, even if I left his bed only an hour ago.
“You two are so cute,” Darcy whispers.
“Shush.”
“I very much enjoyed having the room to myself last night so that I could flip aimlessly through Netflix alone,” she chirps. “My only complaint is that I don’t hear enough details from you.”
“You want details? Fine.”
Her blue eyes light up. “My body is ready.”
“Well, Chase and I enjoy the same things together now as we did ten years ago,” I tell her. “We ordered the spinach and artichoke dip with extra pita bread, the fish tacos, and ice cream for dessert.”
She kicks me under the table. “If you’re not going to give me the good details, you can at least give me that book you finished on the flight out here—the one with the sexy werewolves.”
“Fine,” I say, pushing back my chair. “It’s all yours. Let me get it out of my suitcase before I forget.”
We bus our plates and then head into the adjacent luggage room. I find my bag, tilt it onto the floor, and start to unzip it.
The first thing that hits me is a strange scent—earthy and wrong. My hand hovers above the half-open bag, stopping only inches from… What is that thing? It’s black and narrow. Textured. It almost looks like…
The thing moves. And Darcy and I let out shrieks that happen in stereo.
Half a dozen hockey players swivel their heads to look at us.
“Oh my God!” Darcy wheezes. “There’s a… a…”
“Snake,” I say, taking a step backward. “In my bag.”
“No fucking way,” O’Connell says, leaning down. “You’re kidding, right? Because…” Then the snake pokes its head through the opening, and O’Connell makes a panicked squeak, as if all the air has been punched out of his bravado at once.
“Buddy, you okay?” Weber asks.
Then the snake makes a break for it, slithering with shocking speed over Weber’s foot, and all hell breaks loose. The room is suddenly filled with exclamations that range from stunned laughter to outright fear.
The ruckus draws other players and hotel staff into the room, which only increases the chaos. At one point I think I see O’Connell trying to scale Tremaine like a tree, but it all happens so fast.
All I know is that the snake disappears beneath a baseboard heater and that hockey players are loud when there’s a reptile slinking around at their feet.
“SILENCE!” shouts Nolan Sharp from the doorway.
The room falls instantly still.
“Did someone really put a motherfucking snake in Coach Carson’s bag? Or did I hear wrong from about five hundred yards away?”
“Yes, they did,” Darcy says shakily. “Which is just a horrible thing to do to Zoe.”
“And to the snake,” Weber adds. “Dude did not look happy.”
“Enough of this bullshit!” Sharp yells, turning his favorite shade of red. “Which of you dumbasses thinks this is funny?”
Heads swivel, as if the culprit is actually going to reveal himself.
But then I hear a voice say, “I saw him.”
We all turn at once to see a small older man in a porter’s uniform.
“What’s that?” Sharp booms. “Speak up, sir.”
“I saw someone with a cardboard carrier.” The porter sizes the box in the air with his hands. “Funny-shaped thing with air holes. I thought, What’s in that box?”
“Well?” the boss demands. “Don’t keep us in suspense. A hundred bucks if you can point him out now.”
The man frowns. Then he looks around the room, squinting in turn at each hockey player.
I forget to breathe. And he seems to make it all the way around the room without spotting his target.
“Shit,” Darcy whispers.
Suddenly, the man lifts a hand and points. “You! It was you! Different jacket, but I saw you.”
I crank my neck so I can see where he’s pointing, as the room makes a collective gasp.
“Go fuck yourself,” Aiden Sharp says from the corner. “That’s a goddamn lie.”
Then he leaps over someone’s luggage like an Olympic hurdler and runs from the room.
The Legends’ jet is an hour late taking off from Vancouver.
And when we take off, we do so without Nolan Sharp or his son. They were last seen screaming at each other on the sidewalk outside the hotel, with Aiden proclaiming his outraged innocence and Sharp vowing to murder him in cold blood for being a “disgrace of a goddamn son.”
Sadly, Darcy was also kept behind to support her boss through his unscheduled afternoon in Vancouver. And while I fly back without her, she texts me periodic updates.