“Lucien, I’m so happy to meet you.” She leans in to hug me.
“Great to meet you, too, Kimmie.”
She beams at Talia. “Girl, you totally traded up. He is delicious.”
Coach mutters something under his breath. I stand up so I’m beside Talia. She takes my hand.
“He’s pretty great,” she agrees.
There’s a commotion on the other end of the boat, and we all turn to look.
“No, sir,” one of the boat’s crew members says to Kyle.
Kyle shakes his head, looking disgusted. Audra is trying to lead him somewhere, and he’s not happy about it.
Kimmie turns to us and says, “They’re telling him not to vomit over the side of the boat. He got some on the boat and the captain is not happy.”
When Kyle glances at our group, his gaze stops on me. He squints and I can read his lips as he says, “What the hell is he doing here?”
He looks pissed. I knew he would be. I keep my expression neutral. Talia gently squeezes my hand.
“Here we go,” she says softly as Kyle shakes off Audra’s arm and stomps over to us.
Coach Turner gets up and stands on my other side, leaning over to speak in my ear.
“If he starts something, you finish it.”
“I will.”
Kyle stumbles and comes to a stop, swallowing. I hope he’s swallowing his own puke. After a couple seconds, he resumes his trek over to us.
“What the hell is he doing here?” He fires the question at Talia.
“He’s my date. Didn’t Audra tell you?”
Kyle looks over his shoulder at Audra, whose expression is horrified.
“Kyle, what are you doing?” she whisper-hisses. “Everyone’s looking.”
“You did this on purpose,” he says to me, seething.
It’s Coach Turner who steps in.
“Kyle, Lucien is on my team. It’s how he and Talia met. If you have a problem with him being here, you can address it with me. Privately.”
“Yes.” Audra puts both hands on his shoulders, trying to move him away from us. “Privately.” She lets out a loud, fake laugh. “You hockey players. Always fighting!”
Kyle’s resisting Audra’s efforts to move him, looking between me and his future father-in-law. He wants to rush me so fucking badly. Other than games, we haven’t seen each other since right after he threw me and the rest of our team under the bus. Everything imploded after that. I got traded.
I let go of Talia’s hand and put my arm around her instead, stroking my thumb over her bare shoulder. Macintire’s expression darkens. Talia leans against me, and just when I think Macintire’s going to say fuck it and throw a punch, he does something else instead.
He bends down and pukes again, orange vomit landing on Audra’s strappy little shoes and perfectly manicured feet. There’s a collective gasp, someone pulling out a camera phone to take a photo.
“Sorry, babe,” Kyle says weakly. “I couldn’t help it.”
Audra is about to blow. Her face is red and she keeps opening her mouth and closing it again. She looks like a fish lying on a shoreline.
“Ma’am, let us help you with this,” one of the boat’s crew members says.
