“The beatdown of Jax Jamieson? I want to witness, or no one will believe it.”
Squawking has me looking over toward Hugo’s cage. Sophie’s talking to him, and I go over to her.
“He doesn’t like it,” she informs me, peering up.
“Sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do. It’s for the best.”
I turn my back as Rae comes up behind me.
“Tell me you didn’t know,” she says, her voice strangely flat.
I blink. “What are you talking about?”
But her hurt expression has my throat drying even before she says, “Harrison King is the CEO of the company that owns Echo Entertainment.”
Breath burns my lungs. “I was planning to tell you.”
“When? After the wedding so I didn’t make a scene?” Her eyes flash with pain.
“That’s not why I didn’t…” I trail off. Maybe in part that was why I didn’t tell her. “Rae, I’m sorry.”
My friend shakes her head. “I know this week hasn’t been easy for you, but I thought you had my back.”
“What’s going on?” Pen demands, crossing to me as Rae turns and heads away from us and from Harrison.
I curse through my unsteady breathing, hands clenching into fists at my sides. “I wanted this to be perfect. All our family and friends came together from all over the world.” Tears slip down my face. “We all hustle our asses off, but I wanted to put it all aside and just be about love. To celebrate how we’ve all gone through shit but we love each other and we’re here. Is that too much to ask?”
A squawking sound at my back has me whirling to see the door to Hugo’s cage is open.
The cage is empty.
I gasp. “Sophie, what did you do?”
“He didn’t like it in there.” Her pout is defensive.
Scanning the sky, I search for any sign of movement against the fading colors. “There he is!”
Hugo’s a dozen feet in the air, struggling to fly.
“Probably flying back to the cove,” the attendant weighs in. “Where his mate is.”
“So, that’s good?”
The attendant can’t keep the sadness out of her voice. “He’s not healed yet. He probably won’t survive.”
My chest aches as I watch him. I’ve spent a lot of my life feeling out of control, but I can’t come to grips with it right now.
Standing on a beach in a beautiful dress with words in my heart… and no one to say them to.
I watch Hugo flap, lurching and eventually disappearing around the trees and rocks.
No. I’m not letting this happen.
I scan the beach, my gaze landing on a jet ski.