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Sawyer looks to Owen, my best friend Emily’s husband and Sawyer’s teammate on the hockey team. Emily and Owen are witnesses today, along with Sawyer’s other Toronto Titans teammates Hendrix, who’s holding back his laughter, and Griffin, who’s about eighty percent responsible for this whole debacle (more on that later).
Owen hands a ring to Sawyer, who then takes my left hand and slips it on my finger at the judge’s instruction.
His voice is so low, I can hardly hear him as he mumbles, “With this ring, I thee wed.”
I don’t know how he’s going to sell this marriage for a whole year if he can’t even be bothered to speak up.
I want to roll my eyes so hard right now. But I resist and take the other ring Owen has in his outstretched hand.
Sawyer sucks in a breath as I take his left hand in mine. It’s so warm and incredibly heavy. Sturdy and strong. Sawyer has worker’s hands, as if he’s spent his summers laboring in the fields, harvesting stuff from the land. Building fences. Tilling soil. And maybe milking cows, I dunno.
Thoughts of those same hands hot on my skin race through my mind. How his large palms pressed against me—thumb to fingertip, stretched across my entire back, covering every inch. How his other hand squeezed my soft parts like I was a ball of sourdough begging to be buttered up.
Well, maybe Iwasbegging just a little in the heat of the moment. I can’t remember. I can only remember his hot whiskey breath and the deep rumble of appreciation when he kissed me. It purred from his chest like the motor of a race car. I could feel it down to my toes. Sometimes, when I lie in bed at night, I still feel it. Then I take my pillow, and punch it repeatedly, pretending it’s his face.
This ring in my hand is a giant metal shackle—its weight evident as I let it linger at the tip of Sawyer’s finger.
Why did I ever agree to this? Am I that desperate? Yes, I suppose I am. And that makes me so angry, I’m ready to bite someone.
With a sharp inhale, I say the words. “With this ring, I thee wed.” Then I shove the ring over his knuckle with all the pent-up rage and force I’m feeling right now. I may have broken skin.
He barely winces but there’s something in his eyes that seems to say,“Wanna spar with me, wife? Bring it on.”
Oh, husband of mine. You wait. I’m just getting started.
“Before you marry a person, you should first make them use a computer withslow internet to see who they really are.”
— WILL FERRELL
2
SAWYER
Six days earlier
Owen didn’t say why he wants to meet me at the Crowned Loon, but I could go for a cold beer so I agreed. It doesn’t take much to get me out of the house these days.
I’m a simple guy. As our team captain, Owen will probably lecture me about drinking so close to the beginning of the season. That’s part of his job, I guess. Last season, he’d get on my case from time to time. He’d nag at me for going out after games, the drinking, the fights…the women.
But if he’s going to be so uptight about boozing, he shouldn’t invite me to a bar—because we all know The Crowned Loon isn’t where you go for good food. Except maybe the wings. I’m definitely ordering the wings.
He mentioned something about having the afternoon free while his wife Emily helps her friend with apartment hunting. I know of only one single, apartment-dwelling friend of Emily’s and that’s Maggie. The pint-sized firecracker.
Maggie. The kickass queen of sass who had me wrapped around her pretty little finger at Owen’s wedding.
Maggie. The only woman to ever live rent-free in my head.
Oh the irony, considering she’s apartment hunting today.
That woman. That maddening, intoxicating, sultry goddess of my dreams. The very thought of her haunts me—and it kills me that I can’t have her. She’s my Roman Empire.
Keeping my distance has proven to be a challenge, to say the least. It means avoiding gatherings where I know she’ll be. I’ve turned down more than a few invitations this summer, simply because the sight of Maggie in a strappy sundress messes with my head. At least that’s what I imagine she wears to Owen’s barbecues. He recently bought a new home in the posh Bridle Path neighborhood, and suddenly he’s become Mister Garden Party.
Yes, the house is enormous, but not big enough for both me and Maggie.Sheis too much.Sheis larger than life.Sheis everywhere all at once.
And surprisingly, she’s also here today at The Crowned Loon.
Just my luck.
