Page 67 of Pivot Point

A glow of affection lit in my chest. I bobbed up to give him a quick kiss. “I’m awfully happy I did too.”

While we’d talked, the pair right before us had gone on. They were just wrapping up their routine, but as I watched them strike their ending pose, I found my own niggling doubts had waned.

Jasper and I really had created something special, and there was nothing I wanted more than to show it off in all its glory for the audience around us.

The announcer called out our names, and Jasper tugged me toward the ice. We skated into the middle of the rink.

Jasper aimed one more smile at me. “Okay, Punk. Let’s show them how it’s done.”

As we assumed our opening position, I felt like I was made for this moment. The audience went silent, all their attention on Jasper and me.

Then, at the back of the arena among the logos for the event’s various sponsors, a new banner unfurled before my eyes. A white sheet with red paint blazoned across it in the shape of a broken rose.

The picture was crude but unmistakable. My heart lurched.

It had to be Haggard’s doing. He’d set up that banner here to taunt me—he washere, in the arena, probably right now to watch my reaction.

Through the flare of panic, my jaw set. Niko’s words about how much I’d faced off against came back to me.

My men and I had overcome an entire crew of Devil’s Dozen people. If this one psycho thought he was going to faze me, he was delusional as well.

The chill of fear melted in the wake of my anger—and a renewed surge of determination.

The music swept through the arena, and Jasper and I launched ourselves into motion.

The music carried us as if we were propelled by an ocean current. I caught Jasper’s gaze as we whirled around each other and saw the same fierce certainty in his expression that’d steadied me.

He was in this to win just as much as I was. We had each other, and nothing was going to hold us back.

The melody flowed through me, and the routine became a blur. Jump, spin, lift. Every motion perfectly timed, the two of us in sync as if we had one body.

The poignant joy of the song wound through me and lifted my spirits. I let it play out in every tiny gesture of my hands while it shone in my face.

This was what skating was all about. We were spreading that joy to the hundreds of watching figures in the stands, transporting them to another place of our design.

Then it was time for the new combination.

Jasper’s hands grasped mine. I whipped into the air over his head, finding my balance in his hold without a single wobble. The faces around us raced by with our rotation, and the music buoyed me even higher.

When Jasper propelled me up a second time, I whirled around with a sensation of perfect freedom. The air seemed to hold me up as my body spun, and my foot hit the ice at the perfect angle as if drawn by a magnet.

As my skates hissed across the rink with my landing, triumph swelled in my chest. Applause and cheers echoed from all around us. I had to hold back a victorious grin that wouldn’t quite have matched the mood we were still trying to convey.

Take that, everyone who’d ever thought they could steal this moment away from me.

We swept through the rest of the routine hitting every mark and struck our ending pose with the last note of the song in one final dramatic touch. The roar of the crowd washed over us, and I finally released my grin.

Jasper beamed back at me, clasping my hand and thrusting it higher over our heads before we gave a quick bow.

As we skated back to the stands, my pulse thrummed in my veins. Niko grabbed us both in a hug, and shouts of congratulations carried from the seats around us. The energy coursing through the crowd after our performance exhilarated me.

But nothing mattered unless the judges had gotten caught up in our performance too. Had we done enough? Had they seen everything we’d meant to conjure with the routine?

The announcer took the scoresheet they handed over. He paused before leaning toward the mic, and my heart almost stopped.

“The score for Luna Garcia and Jasper St. Pierre is one hundred thirty-six point two seven.”

Another thunderous cheer rose up through the stands. My jaw dropped.

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