Page 344 of Wrong Pucking Player

“Not sure,” Katherine admits before she tilts her head. “Where’s Winchester?”

None of us can answer as we look up at the sky, wondering where his parachute would have landed him.

“He had to have landed in this field,” I voice. “He’s done this multiple times for years. He knows where to land.”

We’re all exchanging looks before I catch onto Officer Melody and Officer Klettskarð.

The two of them wearing grave expressions.

Father notices their approach, and one look their way ignites a deep frown.

“What?” he asks them as they reach us.

With apprehensive looks, Officer Klettskarð decides to announce it.

“A body has been identified farther up the field.”

None of us say a word, only to flinch at the sound of the clown’s laughter, which has us looking at Wyatt.

His hand is still on the blinking red nose, which had to be the button that triggered the laughter and a poof of strings that shoots out from the clown’s back.

Only there’s nothing holding the strings.

“A parachute,” Katherine whispers, and all eyes are on her as we see the way her eyes fill with understanding.

“The clown laughs when you press his nose, but what shoots out of his back is a parachute that’s missing the canopy.”

We seem to get it now, but it’s Kenzie who whispers the ultimate truth.

“Jayce’s parachute didn’t have a bomb,” she reveals in defeat. “It didn’t have a parachute.”

Everyone looks my way, making me realize that if I had chosen the other parachute, maybe he would have made it to the ground.

Made it alive… and not flat as a pancake.

The sound of a gunshot makes us flinch, especially Wyatt as he takes a few steps back.

The clown not only isn’t in his gasp, but it’s a few steps away in the grass, sizzling until it actually explodes in seconds.

None of us can move out of surprise. Our eyes are glued on the burning clown. Approaching footsteps force us to look over to the culprit of the gunshot.

Jayce’s identical brother.

“Jamie,” I disclose before anyone who hasn’t met him thinks it’s Jayce.

He’s in tow with another girl, who’s carrying a vintage camera in her grasp. She has a stern expression while her short magenta locks flow with the passing wind.

“Doomed if you interfered and doomed if you didn’t,” he begins and clicks the safety of his gun back in place. “The clown would have exploded thanks to the air pressure shift upon descent. However, the only reason why it didn’t with Oscar holding it is because the key at the end is still intact.”

“The key…” Kenzie whispers. “Wait. You’re saying because Oscar took this clown out the right way, it didn’t explode when he descended?”

“Yup,” he reveals. “That and because his descent slowed rapidly because he pulled his parachute before the shift in pressure. Slowing his speed dramatically makes the switch in pressure basically unnoticeable, even to sensitive objects like that clown. I guess you can say the Saskatchewan Pincers’ goalie is a lucky man to be alive.”

We’re left speechless as Jamie slips his gun back into his holster and lights a cigarette. Taking his first inhale, he lets the puff of smoke out while glancing at the sky.

“That’s why you won, Kenzie Andrews,” he reveals. “You didn’t lose Oscar.”

Shit…

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