Page 82 of Pucking Forbidden

“Grace, breathe,” I say, trying to inject a note of calm into the rising panic. A cold knot is beginning to tighten in my own chest. “Let's not jump to the worst-case scenario yet.”

“No, Hadley, you don't understand. I know my twin brother,” Grace insists, her fingers flying across her screen as she furiously types. “Carson never ignores my texts. If he’s twenty minutes late and his phone is dead, something is seriously wrong.” She stops pacing, staring at her screen with a pale face. “That's it. I'm calling Jensen. The guys are already at the bar, so Carson should be there too.”

She pulls up Jensen’s contact, her thumb hovering over the dial button as she lets out a shaky breath.

Suddenly, Grace’s phone rings, the screen flashing Skyler.

Grace swipes it, answering so fast she nearly drops the phone. “Sky! Where the hell are you? We’ve been losing our minds…”

“There’s been a change of plans,” Skyler’s voice blares through the speaker.

She sounds breathless. Excited, almost.

Grace blinks, her brow furrowing. “What do you mean by a change of plans? We’re all sitting here in rabbit ears waiting for you!”

“We’re going to Vegas!” Skyler shrieks.

Everything in the room stops. Rylee drops a lipstick. Stacey freezes mid-champagne-sip.

“Wait, what?” Grace murmurs, her voice dripping with pure confusion. “Sky, what are you talking about? Who is 'we'?”

“Me and Carson. We’re going to the airport!” Skyler’s voice explodes through the speaker, the words tumbling out in a breathless rush of adrenaline. “Listen to me, Gracie, don't scream, but we talked about the whole massive wedding thing and the seating charts and the flowers, and we both wanted to throw up. So we’re just...we’re doing it! Tonight! We are eloping to Vegas, baby!”

She takes a massive, theatrical gasp of air before continuing at a hundred miles an hour.

“If you want to see me marry your giant idiot brother in front of an Elvis impersonator, you need to throw some shit in a bag and get your asses to the airport right fucking now!”

The room erupts into a tidal wave of screaming, laughing, and panic.

“Vegas?” Grace shrieks into the phone, her knuckles turning white around her champagne glass. “Skyler, wait…no! You can’t just buy a ticket to Nevada on Halloween night! What about a dress? What is Carson wearing, a hockey jersey? You don’t even have a veil! Tell him to turn the plane around right now, Skyler, you have to wait at least until tomorrow so I can find a tailor…”

“Oh, sorry, Grace!” Skyler exclaims in a high-pitched voice. “Gotta go!”

A loud, definitive click echoes through the speaker as the call cuts out, followed by the drone of a dial tone. Skyler had hung up.

“She hung up on me!” Grace gasps, spinning around to face us, her perfectly applied eyeliner wide with horror. “My twin brother is getting married in a casino by an Elvis impersonator and his bride is wearing whatever she packed in a carry-on!”

“How are we even supposed to get to Vegas tonight?” Rylee asks, her voice rising as she looks down at her bunny ears. “Commercial flights are going to be completely booked solid for the holiday weekend. We’ll never make it before they sprint down the aisle.”

“Hold on,” Sutton says, her usual cool composure cracking as she pulls out her phone, her fingers trembling slightly. “I think I can fix this. Let me call Jayce.”

She hits speed dial, pressing the phone to her ear and pacing a tight line across the hardwood. The second the line clicks open, Sutton loses her grip on her calm. “Jayce! Oh my God, you need to listen to me right now. Carson and Skyler are flying to Vegas to elope tonight. Skyler doesn't even have a dress, Grace is having a literal aneurysm, and we have absolutely no way to get there, and everything is a complete disaster…”

“Sutton. Breathe.” Jayce’s voice cuts through the speaker, steady, deep, and unflappable. Even through the phone, his level-headed authority acts like a physical weight, dropping the temperature in the room. “Stop pacing, sweetheart. We’ve got this.”

Sutton stops in her tracks, letting out a shaky breath. “We do?”

“Yeah, we do. Nobody panic,” Jayce commands. “Here’s what we’re going to do. I’ll call your folks right now and get their jet cleared, and I’ll get mine ready, too. We can’t leave Denver until after practice tomorrow morning. Coach will absolutely lose his mind if the whole roster goes MIA, especially with Carson already AWOL, but I can get you ladies out to Vegas tonight. Give me twenty minutes. I’ll handle the flight plans and text you the hotel info.”

Sutton blinks, a small, grateful smile softening her face. “Okay. Thank you.”

“Always, Starling. Go pack a bag. I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon,” Jayce says before hanging up to work his magic.

“Holy shit. He’s like a magician,” Rylee whispers in awe.

“Yeah, and I’m lucky to be married to him.” Sutton drops her phone into her lap and snaps back into mission mode, pointing a finger at Grace. “Okay, you heard him. We’re going. Grace, text Carson right now. Find out exactly where he and Skyler are planning to stay, and ask if they want us to book them a suite, too. It’ll be a hell of a lot better if we’re all at the same hotel so we can keep an eye on them.”

Just like that, the entire trajectory of our night flips on its head. Halloween is forgotten. Fluffy bunny ears are ripped off. We’re running on pure, unadulterated chaos.