Page 17 of Puck You Very Much

But that was okay. She was fine with it. She knew it wasn’t heartfelt. He didn’t truly believe his daughters had already forgotten their mother. Although sometimes, Lucy found herself trying to remember her scent…and failing.

She missed her mother too, but…life went on.Hadto move on, after three years. Her father should focus on the people who were still alive, who loved him—living, breathing people who needed him.

But he was incapable of it because, without her mother, he wasnothinganymore. At least, that’s what he believed. And the thought of being so dependent on another person that they determined your happiness…the thought that Lucy could end up as helpless and desperate as her father after the death of a partner…The thought was sobering—horrifying, even.

Surely her father was more than his marriage to her mother! He was more than merely a piece in someone else’s puzzle. It was necessary to grieve—but terrible to get so lost in grief that you could no longer function. And her father refused to go to therapy, refused to get help.

So, she and Maddie did the only thing they could do: They were there for him.

“Let’s go inside, Dad, shall we?” Lucy said softly, reaching for his elbow. “I’ll cook you something. Maybe afterward we’ll go for a walk. But first, you should shower.”

“It’s already evening. It’s too late to take a shower. And I don’t want to go for a walk. The neighbors always gawk at me.”

Yes, that was what happened when you stopped washing your hair and walked around with a photo album in your arms. “Let’s see, okay?” she said vaguely, knowing there was no point in arguing.

She accompanied him into the house, cooked, listened to more stories about her mother, and wondered if her father would simply remain unhappy until the end of his days, if he would forever believe that his life had no value without Betty James by his side.

Lucy’s phone vibrated. She pulled it out of her pocket as the pasta came to a boil on the stove.

The message was from Max. He wanted to know if she had time for a double date with his friends on Halloween.

Shaking her head, she lowered the phone.

She had told him she didn’t want a relationship, just a little fun. And a double date felt a lot like he was trying to catapult their relationship to the next level.

Lucy never went to the next level. She had never been in love or been with anyone for more than a few weeks. She dated, she slept with guys, and then she ended it. She had seen Max three times and perhaps it was time to release him back into the wild.

So she texted back:

Sorry, Max, it’s not working out between us. Hope you find what you’re looking for.

Because it definitely wasn’t her. She would never find herself in the same position as her father.

Ever.

Chapter 5

Dax knew he was damn lucky.

Not because he was rich and not because he was good-looking, although both were true. It was simply because he had a job that he loved.

He loved the ice, the sound of his blades on the cold surface, the swinging lines his skates left behind. He loved the game, the adrenaline that pumped through his body and made him feel invincible for a few moments. He loved his team, and he loved knowing that a single moment could make the difference between winning and losing.

But as much as he adored his job, if Dax were to name three things he hated about it, he could without hesitation. The answers were obvious: He hated journalists and photographers—and the people who forced him to interact with them.

He had never understood why people were more interested in his life than, say, the chimney sweep who checked their chimney once a year. Dax immediately thought of a dozen things he would like to know about that guy. Had he ever gotten stuck in a chimney? Had he ever tried to recreate the chimney sweep scene from Mary Poppins? What was that bristly thing called that they used to clean the chimney? And did he findCinderelladiscriminatory?

Dax, on the other hand, was merely a normal guy—admittedly, very athletic—who struck a puck with a simple staff almost every day in the hope of maneuvering it into a net.

As far as he was concerned, that was all people should find interesting about him. But no, they wanted to know how he spent Christmas, what he liked to eat, what qualities he liked in women, whether he crumpled or folded his toilet paper—and, of course, how he would work with Jack fucking West, as Leslie Forth continually reminded him.

“That grim expression has got to go, Temple,” the Dragon instructed him sharply. “Especially when it concerns West. He’s on your team now. He’s an ally.”

We are allies. Us against him. If we stick together, nothing will happen to us.

Unsolicited, the words entered his mind, and he squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head to get rid of them.

“I don’t know, Leslie. How am I supposed to respond to stupid press questions with a blank expression?” he replied dryly. “Because, seriously, who really ‘smiles like there’s no tomorrow’? Wouldn’t the end of the world be a reason to be sad?”

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