Page 94 of Ice Princesses
“And Cecilia?” he asks quietly. And I don’t think I’ve ever seen him look so young, not since I first saw him at Worlds almost six months ago.
“Cecilia is very good at what she does,” I reply, circling around his question. “She’s not going to disappear just because you move on.”
Nina exhales softly, almost like she’s been holding that breath for a while.
“She’ll figure it out. That I can promise,” I add. “That’s what good coaches do.”
It’s not the whole truth, but it’s not a lie, either.
Rodrigo studies me for another moment, something shifting behind his eyes as he processes it.
“Okay,” he says eventually.
For a second, the room goes quiet.
Then Nina pushes off the cabinet.
“Great,” she says lightly. “Love a life-altering decision before lunch.”
Rodrigo lets out a small laugh, the tension easing just enough.
“And for the record,” she says, looking at me and pumping her eyebrows a few times, “Wisconsin is still an option if you want to pivot into curling.”
“Jesus, Nina.”
“Not happening,” Rodrigo says at the same time.
“Your loss,” she replies, and drags Rodrigo out of my office with a grin on her face.
CHAPTER 32
CECILIA
“Sandra,I understand that, but we can’t confirm anything until after?—”
I stop mid-sentence, the words slipping out of my mouth without fully connecting to anything, my attention snagging somewhere else entirely as I find myself staring at the same minuscule crack in the ceiling I’ve been looking at for the last thirty minutes without actually seeing it.
“Ceci?”
“Perdón, I’m here,” I say quickly, pushing myself upright on the bed and dragging a hand down my face like it’ll physically put me back into the conversation. “Sorry. You were saying something about travel?”
On the other end of the line, Sandra exhales in that measured, patient way she’s perfected over the years. It carries just enough weight to remind me she knows exactly when I’m not fully present.
“I was saying that if we’re going straight to Europe in September, we need to lock in the dates now,” she says. “Flights and hotels especially, but also ice time and dryland training. It’s not something we can leave until the last minute.”
“Right,” I murmur, nodding to myself like that somehow counts as engagement. I reach to the nightstand to grab my laptop but give up halfway, and instead, Rodrigo’s lazy form on the couch catches my attention.
“Cecilia.”
“I know,” I say, forcing myself to stay with her. “We can go straight from here. Colorado to… where is it again?”
“Jesus, what is wrong with you?” she blurts out, and that patient tone is nowhere to be found. “Linz. Austria.”
“Cierto.”
God. I repeat it under my breath, as if anchoring the word might help me stay in the conversation instead of slipping out of it again.
“We’ll need a few extra days of ice before that,” she continues. “Transitioning from the program there to competition training won’t be as?—”
