Chapter 30

Giselle

“The hell’s happened to you?”

Coach Bailey gave me a wild-eyed look, skating to my side as I sat quietly on the ice where I’d fallen, just… staring straight ahead. She knelt to my level.

“Are you sick? You look awful.”

“Just fine,” I said, voice low. She pursed her lips, before she sighed, looking up at where Jordan skated over to my side.

“Girlfriend problems?” Coach said, and Jordan sighed.

“Definitely.” Jordan dropped down to sit on the ice next to me, a hand on my back. “What happened?”

This was the exact opposite of what I needed right now. The less I thought about Primrose, the better. The less I thought about Andrea, about Zachary, about… about the way my heart still ached thinking of Primrose… I just needed to skate. “Nothing,” I said, pushing up to my feet. “Sorry. Just mind wandering today… I’m still good to practice.”

“Not like that, you’re not,” Coach said, moving in front of me. “You’re going to injure yourself before tomorrow.”

Tomorrow? I wanted to laugh. Tomorrow was a lost cause anyway. Not like anyone would be there cheering for me anyway. The one person I wanted to watch me—I wasn’t even supposed to want her there anyway. I was just debasing myself at this point.

“You’re still going to compete tomorrow,” she said, folding her arms. I looked away. Coach always could read minds.

“I’ll skate more carefully.”

“You’ve wiped out twice already. Not even on the consecutive axels. If your head isn’t in the game, you’ve lost before you put your skates on.”

“They’re already on.”

Coach didn’t even react. Even Jordan just gave me a look. I turned away.

“Sorry, Coach. I’ll focus…”

She put a hand on my shoulder. “You’re just going to hurt yourself. I’m unilaterally deciding to move this. The others will practice now, and I’ll see you at seven tonight, and we’re going to practice then. In the meantime, you go address whatever’s getting you like this, and I promise you will feel so much better and not knock your teeth out on the ice.”

“Coach is right,” Jordan said. “I mean, she always is.”

“Including when I tell you to practice,” Coach said, not missing a beat. Jordan scowled at her. I sighed.

“So I’m getting kicked out.”

“Yup.” It was Jordan to answer, patting a hand on my back. “C’mon, baby, let’s move.”

“Please… let’s go the rest of our respective lifespans without you ever calling me baby again.”

“Okay, then we’re going to go get Primrose to call you that instead, because I’m sure whatever’s going on is all in your head.” She ushered me along back to the entrance, and—honestly, I kind of needed someone to just walk me places right now. My mind was miles and miles away, and I went mechanically along with her, out to the vestibule, where I got to go rote through the motions, clean my skates, untie them, fuss with the laces, pack them away in my bag.

Jordan watched me quietly the whole time, but her being quiet never lasted forever. Or more than five minutes.

“So?” she said. “What happened? You two had a fight?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“If you don’t deal with this, we’re not going anywhere in the competition. We know I’m not pulling off any wins.”

I sighed. “Isn’t that weaponized incompetence?”

“Well, yeah.”

I rubbed my hand over my face, not even caring what it did to my makeup right now.

Maybe I did need to talk about it. If they were going to do this to me—spend an entire year pulling this elaborate scheme just to make me feel bad about myself—the least I could do was make fools of them for it. Was rise above it and be better than that. Because either I was a hopeless fool or they were, and I… well, I already thought I was hopeless, so I wasn’t following that thought any further.

“I’ll be all right,” I said, my voice scratchy and dry, and I pushed myself up to my feet. “I just need to… just have to talk to her. Maybe it’s all just a big misunderstanding.”

“Misunderstanding what? What happened?”

I looked away. It was so humiliating, I felt like I’d rather wrench my own teeth out than say it, but… but that was what they wanted, right? For me to be ashamed and embarrassed and keep it to myself, hide in my own shame. “Ah, you know,” I said, trying to sound casual. “Primrose was just trying to get something from me and the whole thing was an act, so mostly I just feel like a loser for getting led on that easily.”

“What?” Jordan scowled. “There’s no way that’s true. I sat here with her and watched her gaze at you like you were the best thing in the universe. Girl is into you.”

I didn’t want to talk about this… I felt like I’d be sick. I hoisted my bag up on my shoulder, starting for the exit. “It’s whatever. It was just a week. I’m just embarrassed, is all… be all better by tonight.”

“I’m sure you will, once you’ve talked to her,” she called after me. “Clear everything up, kiss and make up. Just don’t get so distracted with her you forget to come back and practice!”

Didn’t even have it in me to call her out for telling me to practice. Dammit, I was just… tired. Like everything had gotten drained out of me.

I walked straight on ahead out the doors, one foot in front of the other. Primrose had one class today, and I knew exactly where it was, and my feet carried me, head down, listening to the sound of cheerful conversation and birdsong from every direction like it was mocking me.

There really was something deeply wrong with me. I needed to stop having feelings for people. It only ever ended up breaking and humiliating me.

I sat at the courtyard in front of the Dechamps Building, looking at my phone but not really even seeing anything, shielding my eyes against the sun just so I could keep an eye on the clock, wait out the class Primrose was in. Every part of me wanted to run, to bolt, to hide away and never have to see her again, but… I just needed answers. Anything. Not knowing was more painful than anything.

When the clock hit noon and I heard movement from inside, doors opening, students chattering, I bit down on a sick feeling like I’d throw up. I hadn’t seen Primrose since she was having a breakdown over something. Was it about this? Was it about something else in her life that I didn’t get to know about, because I was an outsider, a… a target?

When the crowd of students pushed out through the door, I spotted her there in the middle of the crowd—I’d have spotted her anywhere, hopeless as I was. She kept her gaze straight ahead, a vacant look in her eyes, walking like she was the only one there and everyone around her existed in some far-off realm. I felt like she was in that far-off realm, too.

I stood up, forcing myself to move towards her, and whatever had her so vacant and steely kept her so occupied that she didn’t notice me coming until I spoke, next to her.

“Primrose.”

She jolted, whirling on me, eyes wide—flipped right to the opposite end of the spectrum, her whole body language screaming high alert, a hundred emotions on her face. “Giselle… hey. Is everything…” She winced. I watched her with my stomach sinking, sitting dangerously in that quiet for too long before I nodded her in the other direction.

“Can I talk to you privately?”

She pursed her lips, and she nodded. Not a word. I just wanted to hear her say something—say anything—tell me this was all a bad dream. I missed hearing her laugh.

I led her to the other side of the building, empty right now, under the building’s overhang and next to where the stream ran in the shade of a row of trees, and I sank against the edge of a low stone wall, staring down at the water. Primrose stood next to me, quiet, the murmuring stream the only sound in the world.

I had to say something—say everything—but I couldn’t. Didn’t know how. Finally, it was Primrose who spoke.

“Andrea talked to you.”

There it was. I shattered, sinking into the wreckage of it. I put a hand over my face, sighing deeply. “So, what’d they offer you for my case?”

She sank against the wall next to me, kicking her foot up against it, looking down, hands in her pockets. “Nothing. Just… don’t really have a choice when they tell me my next job.”

“But you do, though, don’t you?” I said, my voice bitter, sharp, needling. “And you made the choice.”

“Well…” She hunched her shoulders. “Guess so.”

Please.I needed her to say anything else. To tell me it was all wrong, to tell me Andrea was lying, to tell me none of it was ever… “So that’s it?”

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “I wish it wasn’t like this… wish things could have gone differently.”

“Don’t tell me that,” I said, my voice thick. “You’re the one who did this.”

She squeezed her eyes shut. I sighed, hard, heavy.

“So what? All of it was a lie?”

“It wasn’t to me…” She shook her head. “But I doubt you want to hear that right now.”

“What, are you going to say the same thing Andrea did? You started out trying to screw me over but then you took a liking to me?”

She dragged a hand over her face, sighing deeply into it. “Zachary’s in bed with a rival company to your father’s. Ross Kent and his firm.”

It felt like I’d been bullet-punched in the chest. I reeled. “What?”

“Kent’s the one who wanted this. They’ve been leading Zachary on with promises of favor… Zach wanted me to get intel on your family and screw you over before the competition tomorrow. Kent’s got a kid competing too, and they just wanted to mess with your family, I think.”

“What…” My voice trembled, and I stood rigid, sickness turning in my gut. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Just to be careful, okay?” She looked away. “Zachary’s probably still going to be digging. Kents too. I, uh… wasn’t able to get any intel after all, so you’re safe for now, but…”

“Primrose, please, stop,” I said, pinching my brow. My head was spinning. “I don’t want to hear this.”

“Sorry,” she said, giving me the most crushingly sad smile as she pushed away from the wall, turning back in the other direction. “I’ll, uh… I’ll go now. I’m sorry I… I’m really, really—” She shook her head, her back to me, shoulders hunched. “Forget it. Goodbye.”

I needed to say something, anything. But there was nothing I could say. What on earth could have possibly fixed anything right now?

I watched her go, and despite my best judgment, despite my best efforts, she took every piece of my heart with her. Alone, I sank back against the wall, dragging down along the coarse concrete, sinking to a seat on the pavers, and I watched my hands shake before I turned my eyes up to the sky, watching the tree branches rustle in the wind and thin, streaky clouds snake past overhead.