Page 66 of Secret Pucking Unicorn

“You heard me,” Sophie takes the last step down, losing the slight height advantage she had to stand toe-to-toe with Miranda.

“The entire team heard you, you banshee, but I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

Miranda’s accent is no gentle Irish lilt. It is a full-blown brogue.

“You sleep with Declan, freak out because you’re a witch, and dump him. You refuse to speak to him. He punches the wall and breaks his hand. It’s all your fault.” Sophie jabs Miranda in the breastbone and, with her wolf shifter strength, pushes her back.

I surge to my feet, wanting to catch Miranda in my arms, hold her, shelter her from pain, but a wall of plexiglass separates us. “I’m the idiot who punched the wall. That’s not Miranda’s fault.”

Miranda turns to me. “Why?”

I want to tell her because she broke my heart, and I was frustrated. Sophie isn’t wrong in her facts, but she’s got it all wrong somehow.

“Because you’re a heartless bitch,” Sophie screams.

“That’s enough,” Coach bellows. Carter is in the tunnel next to where the girls are, and he’s not separated from them by plexiglass like I am. He reaches out an arm and hooks Miranda around the waist and pulls her over the wall. She yelps in surprise.

Coach comes up behind them. “Miranda, go back to your office, please.”

Tears spill down her cheeks, and she looks stricken. With a tight nod, she takes off down the tunnel, Carter following her. I reach, with my broken hand, to open the gate to follow too.

Coach stops me. “Sit your ass down, Mac. Miss Mackenzie, you are a guest at this practice. If you can’t control yourself, you will need to leave. We don’t allow fighting on the ice or in the stands.”

He turns toward the ice. “Bedard, run drills with the coaches.”

To me, he says, “Stay here while I handle this.” He points a finger at Sophie. “Simmer down.”

He’s lucky Sophie isn’t more in touch with her witchy side because he’d have turned into a toad in that moment if she could have managed it. Instead, he walks down the tunnel toward the locker room and his office while typing on his phone.

I look up at the stands where Ma, Doreen, and Daphne are sitting. Daphne is rubbing her belly and looking at her phone. Coach is probably texting her about this shit show. Doreen is looking down at me with a hint of a smirk on her ruby red lips. She’s a beautiful woman. My teammates have been checking her out even though she’s old enough to be their mother. She does nothing but repulse me. She’s like a beautiful red apple full of worms. You don’t know it’s rotten until you bite into it, but then it’s too late. Miranda will always be lovelier than her. It hits me in a flash. She is jealous of Miranda. Her own daughter. She’s like the evil queen in an animated film. She has to be the fairest of them all.

When I look at it through that lens, everything makes sense. I’m living a fucked-up version of Snow White and my friends are a bunch of hockey-playing dwarves. I start to rise from the bench, but something compels me to look back at my mother. She gives me an almost imperceptible shake of her head and the words, “Trust me,” echo in my brain. I turn back toward the ice and nod. To anyone else, it will look like I’m reacting to something on the ice, but I know Ma knows the nod is for her.

Doreen watches practice for a few minutes but soon leaves. Carter comes back on the ice and comes to the bench to grab water.

“This is a clusterfuck, man,” he says. “Something’s not right.”

“Carter, are you joining us today?” Coach asks.

He rolls his eyes and skates away. He’s right. Something is terribly wrong, and it’s not limited to timing passes. But the fact he sees it too doesn’t make me feel any better. Practice continues, and Ma comes down to talk to me before leaving.

“Declan, I know things look bleak now, but we will figure out what is going on.”

I look over Ma’s shoulder to where Sophie is talking with Daphne. She seems calmer.

“Sophie is being weird, too,” I say. “There’s something going on with both of them. They’d have spats now and then as girls, but Sophie has a vicious edge to her I’ve never seen before.”

“We will sort this out, but you need to control yourself. Trust me. Pushing Miranda isn’t going to do any good.”

I give a tight nod and try to swallow the lump in my throat. I have never felt more helpless in my life. How many times must have Miranda felt like this? Every time she had to switch schools and try to make new friends and adapt. I want her to have security, I want to give her roots. But I can’t tie her down. She has to choose. Please let her choose to stay with me.

Ma leaves, and Coach joins me on the bench. We watch the plays unfold on the ice for a few minutes before Coach speaks.

“Mac, we can’t have scenes like this happening. We can’t have you losing control and doing dumbass stuff like punching walls and trying to push your way into hotel rooms. I know you have feelings for Randi?—”

“I love her.”

“Okay, you love her. But we can’t have this kind of drama. It’s disruptive to the team. If you two can’t get your shit together, Randi is going to have to go. She’s become my friend over the years from hanging around Kennie, but the team has to come first. They’re my responsibility.”

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