Page 87 of Lose to Win: Lost Trilogy: Part 3
“You bet,” is all she says before turning around and leaving the room.
I let go of Emily’s hand to bring the piece of paper closer to my face.
“This is amazing, Em,” I tell her. “There’s actually a little human being inside of you. Fucking wild, right?”
“It is,” she snorts through laughter and tears. “I need to tell you that…”
I put a hand up and cut her off because I have a feeling she is about to start talking about the paternity of this baby. I don’t want to know. I will love him no matter what, and it will be my name on his birth certificate no matter what. Why spoil all that with a couple of words, right?
“Hey,” I just think of asking. “What the hell did you have in your sweater earlier at the house?”
“What do you mean?” She is wiping at her face now as she tries to recompose herself.
“When you swung it at Kenny, he went down. What did you have wrapped in it?”
“Oh,” she finally understands what I’m asking. Her hand goes to the pocket of the wrap like thing she put back on right before we left there. I stare in disbelief when I see what she pulls out.
“Jesus, babe.”
“When you left the other night, you gave it to me. I wasn’t ready to leave it in the room, so I took it downstairs with me. It made me feel closer to you somehow.”
The emotion in her voice is making me tear up as well.
“You know how it all went after that, so it just stayed with me.”
I stare at the hockey puck I gave her before I left to blow up Bricks and Snake on that road in the middle of nowhere. I wanted her to have it, just in case. I never expected that she’d have to use it for anything.
“I think it just hit him in the right spot when I swinged,” she explains. “Not like I was gonna kill him with it or anything…”
I put my head back and laugh until I can’t laugh anymore. It is true when they say that no matter how much you try to follow a certain path, it all comes full circle at some point. Sometimes it’s good, other times not so much.
I take the puck from her hand and stare at it. The message Bran Karslberg wrote on it so many years ago is still there. Maybe a little faded, but not too bad. The fucker had the good markers. I smile at the reminder and wonder if he ever thought of me over the years. I guess I could reach out, but he’s a big hockey star now. I doubt he’d even give me a glance.
The tip of my index finger goes over the indentation left by the bullet that was supposed to kill me.
“You know what’s funny?” I realize with a start.
“What?” Emily’s hand goes up and down my arm in a calming way.
“According to what Kenny said earlier, I stayed alive for all these years after joining the club only because your father worked out a deal for them to keep me alive.”
“It’s like he took care of you for me for all these years.”
It takes me a few seconds to realize that Emily stopped touching me. I look at her and see her face buried in her hands, her shoulders moving up and down as she cries quietly.
“I killed a man tonight,” she whispers in between sobs. “He is dead because of me, Puck.”
The shock is just hitting her. It makes me think back to my first kill and how badly it got to me. And then, she goes on to shock me.
“And all I can think of is how happy I am that he is gone. I don’t care through what means. I don’t care that it was my finger who pulled the trigger,” she sobs. “I only care that we are all alive and healthy.”
“Babe.” I drop to the bed and curl my body around hers. “For all these years, I thought this puck was my lucky charm.”
“It’s not?” she mumbles when I push it back into her hands.
“It’s yours now,” I smirk at her. “I’m switching my luck to you.”
“I don’t understand,” she shakes her head in confusion.
