Page 44 of Diary from an Inked Throne

Dear Diary,

I came back from the dead. The welcoming committee was surprisingly hostile.

Istopped the car in front of the ice rink and peered through the windshield. “What the hell is going on in there?”

Lynx’s confusion was as evident as mine was. “There are people everywhere. Is there a game on today or something?”

I shrugged. “I have absolutely no idea.”

Guilt settled on Lynx’s face. “Me neither.”

I sat back in my seat, the leather creaking beneath me, and I sighed heavily. “We’re really great at running this team, aren’t we?”

Lynx grimaced and pulled his Saint View Vipers baseball cap down on his head. “In our defense, there wasn’t much we could do while your old man had us locked up in a church basement.”

“And the six weeks since? Where we just left Saint View to search for James?”

Lynx shrugged one shoulder. “This team was the last thing on my mind.”

Mine too. It all seemed stupid and superficial when there was a tiny baby who needed us a lot more than a team full of pretty average hockey players who really would have been better suited to beer league than trying to make it into the pros.

I pulled the handle on my door. “Come on. Let’s go face the music and see what’s left of our team.”

Lynx followed suit, and we both slammed our doors behind us. We crossed the parking lot and slipped inside the doors to the rink.

It was like going from the silence of a church to the middle of a packed arena full of screaming fans. The wall of noise was instant, all of it directed at the rink staff who stood in front of the reception area, shouting that nobody was getting in and everyone needed to leave.

“The Vipers’ performance has gone downhill lately.”

“Don’t the players want to address their rivalry with Providence and the drama during the last game?”

“The longer they don’t talk about it, the more fans want to know what’s going on.”

“Fucking reporters,” I muttered, recognizing the mob for what it was and wishing I’d worn one of the baseball caps Lynx was hiding beneath. But they really weren’t my style.

So when attention turned our way, I was left completely unprotected.

The man closest to me did a double take and then shouted, “Holy shit! Luca Guerra?”

Suddenly, every set of eyes in the room was on me, and the wall of noise that had originally all been questions about the team, now became questions about me.

Ones I sure as hell didn’t have any interest in answering. A reporter shoved a microphone in my face, and I pushed him away roughly, trying to get through the crowd to the doors that separated the reception area and kept in the chilly air the rink needed to stay frozen.

Lynx moved to my side, shoving people out of the way like he was my bodyguard.

It probably would have made me laugh at any other time, but I was wholly unprepared for people asking how I wasn’t dead, where I’d been, and what the hell was going on.

I’d had none of this out on the road with Lynx, and I hadn’t even considered this could happen once I returned.

The staff recognized us, and though they looked just as surprised as the reporters, they moved in to help, ushering us past the doors, closing and locking them behind us.

I stood on the other side of the glass, which did little to hold back the noise of the crowd, all of them shouting questions they had no business asking.

I wasn’t telling the world shit. They didn’t need to know someone had held me, Dax, and Lynx captive, or that they’d been too spineless to show their face the entire time we’d been held down there. Lynx and I were supposed to be dead right now, and my father had told the world I was.

I still didn’t know who the dead body they’d found in my car was. Probably some chump off the streets who’d paid to drive my car after they’d put a bag over my head and forced me into a van.

Poor fucker. Probably thought he was having the time of his life, driving around my sports car, only for it to explode into a gigantic ball of flame.