Las Vegas Sidewinders: Karl (Book 3) (19 page)

“What the hell is wrong
with you?” Karl demanded, running a tired hand through his hair. “There is
nothing you can do that’s going to make me want to be with her! I wouldn’t
touch that skanky whore with
your
dick!”

Viggo
raised his eyebrows.
“You have no idea, do you?”

“No idea about what?!”

Viggo
stood up slowly,
lowering his voice as their friends and family members began milling about. “I
can’t get into this, my friend. The truth is that she scares the crap out of
me, so you should take your girl and stay far away from her.” He turned and
strolled out of the house.

“What was all that?!”
Kate demanded. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know.” Karl
looked worried. For the first time, he felt uneasy, as if something really bad
was going to happen. He didn’t know what or when, but he couldn’t shake the
idea that Therese wasn’t nearly done with him yet and it scared the hell out of
him. He could take care of himself, but he was beginning to wonder if she would
go after Kate or his family to get him to do what she wanted. This was
beginning to feel like a bad dream and he felt utterly helpless. If Therese had
found a way to spook
Viggo
, who was one of the
toughest guys Karl had ever known, there was trouble brewing. Between Therese’s
antics, his sister’s odd behavior and now this, he had a really bad feeling in
his gut.

Nothing had ever felt
as good as sleeping in her own bed, in her New York apartment, with Karl at her
side. He’d refused to leave her alone, even for a minute, after
Viggo
had left the house. He’d warned his mother that
Therese was up to something, and then taken Kate back to the hotel. They packed
and checked out, checking in to a different hotel right by the airport. They
got to the airport first thing in the morning, went through security, and then
sat at their gate for nearly four hours. Karl thought being in the airport was
the absolute safest place for them; he truly had no idea what Therese might be
up to, but he wasn’t taking any chances.

Waking up the following
morning, Kate let Karl sleep while she took a long, hot shower and then dressed
in a pair of denim shorts and a Sidewinders T-shirt. She dried her hair and put
a dash of mascara on her lashes. She finished with some lip gloss and then
prepared herself to start the day. She knew Karl was uneasy and that made her
uneasy, so she was going to meet the day head on.

When she came out of
the bathroom, the bed was empty and she found Karl in the living room on his
iPad, a cup of coffee in his hand. He smiled at her when she came out, and she
smiled back.

“Good morning,” she
said. “Anything happening online I should know about?”

He chuckled. “Not yet,
but the day is young!”

She laughed too.

“I’ve been thinking.”

“Uh-oh.”

“We should elope.”

Her mouth dropped open.
“Really? You think that will deter Therese?”

“No, it will just make
it harder for her to manipulate us. She can’t find some crazy way to blackmail
me unless I marry her… If we’re already married, it’s going to make things much
harder for her.” He rubbed his thumb across her lips. “I know you wanted a big
wedding with all our friends, but…”

“Actually I don’t!” she
said quickly.

“We won’t make an
announcement,” he said. “That way, we can use it as leverage if and when the
time comes. I hate doing it this way, but I’m kind of spooked and it’s an eerie
feeling.”

“You really think she’s
going to do something to us?”

“Did you see the way
Viggo
was acting? I’ve never seen him like that—he’s a
tough sonofabitch. For him to be acting weird, she’s gotten to him.”

“But what does that
mean?” Kate protested. “I mean, what is her goal? She wants you back, but you
don’t want her. What does she gain with all of this?”

“I don’t know.” He
looked at her. “This might sound selfish, but I can’t be dealing with this kind
of crap once hockey season starts. I can’t be looking over my shoulder every
minute, worried she’s going to post something on social media or show up with a
camera crew at a game. I can’t function that way, and after all that shit about
me leaving the NHL, the league and team management is going to be watching me.”

“So we elope and then
what?” She was frowning.

“Our assets. I don’t
know how much is in your trust fund, but I have no doubt she will try to
blackmail or extort us if possible. She’s always been all about the money.”

“I’ll go to my father
and let our family lawyers handle everything. My father is a shrewd businessman
who will chew her up and spit her out if she screws with him. What will you
do?”

Karl seemed deflated.
“People know how close I am to Drake, so I don’t know if it’s safe to ask him
to hold on to money for me.”

“Erin inherited a ton
of money when her ex died, so I think Drake and Erin are the perfect people to
trust with your money until we sort this out.”

“I’ll call them later
then.”

“Okay, well, we’re
going to have to leave New York and find somewhere else to get married because
it’s complicated here.”

“We can do it in one
day in Vegas,” he said automatically.

She groaned. “I am so
tired of being on planes!” She buried her face in his shoulder.

“I know, baby, but
since that’s my legal residence, it makes things a lot easier. Plus, if I’m
going to move all my assets around, it’ll be easier to do that with attorneys
there.”

“All right.” She sighed
heavily and got up. “You sure know how to ruin a good long engagement!” Her
eyes twinkled despite the seriousness of the situation.

“Sure seems like the
Sidewinders aren’t destined to have any big weddings,” he laughed. “Dom and
Drake both eloped, despite the wedding coming up in August, and now we’re going
to do it too.” He sounded sad.

“We can have a wedding
later on,” she reminded him gently.

“I’m just pissed she’s
forcing us to change our plans.”

“It’ll be fine.” Kate
kissed him. “As long as we have each other.”

“We definitely have
each other.”

Back in Las Vegas, Kate
succumbed to exhaustion. Between an international flight, working almost a full
24 hours to get caught up, and then another flight across the country, she was wiped
out. As soon as they get to the apartment she went straight to bed. By the time
Karl had changed into comfortable clothes, she was already softly snoring, so
he let her sleep and joined Drake and Erin in the living room.

He sank onto the couch
and rested his head against the back, closing his eyes. He’d never been so
stressed in all of his life. He felt like he was constantly on alert, waiting
for something bad to happen. Though they had the Sidewinders’ PR department and
Kate’s assistant Lana constantly scouring social media for any mention of Kate,
Karl, or anyone in their close circle of friends, they had come up empty so
far. He was hoping Therese had just given up, but he highly doubted it.

Karl started when he
felt Erin’s fingers kneading his shoulders. He opened his eyes. “You don’t have
to do that.”

“Sure I do—that’s a
best-friend-in-law’s job,” she said lightly.

“You’re pregnant,” he
protested.

She rolled her eyes.
“And that makes me…helpless? Useless?”

He chuckled. “Fine. But
if your husband kicks my ass, it’s all on you.”

Drake wasn’t paying any
attention to them. He had his eyes glued to his phone and he was frowning. “So
your buddy
Viggo
deleted his Twitter account.”

“What?” Karl looked
over at him.

“I started a phony
account and followed everyone that I could think of—the twins, Therese, your
SHL buddies, etc. Since last night,
Viggo’s
account
disappeared.”

Karl sat up. “That’s
weird—he’s the king of social media. He lives out loud on Twitter.”

“Yeah.” Drake was deep
in thought. “And your sister tweeted something about this being a shitty day a
few hours ago.”

Karl reached for his
phone and searched through the numbers until he came to
Viggo’s
.
Pausing, he tried to think of an excuse for calling, but he just went ahead and
hit the button without coming up with anything. It was 7:00 in the morning in
Sweden, so
Viggo
was probably asleep, but he didn’t
care. He waited as it rang four times, five, six… Finally, he heard his
friend’s sleepy voice on the other end.

“What the hell, man?
It’s early!”

“I need to talk to
you,” Karl said quietly.

“Now?”

“Yeah, now. I need you
to tell me what you meant when you left my mom’s house that night.”

Viggo
was quiet, sheets
rustling in the background.

“
Viggo
,
this is my life we’re talking about. What is it that you can’t tell me? You
think I don’t know you’re bisexual? We lived together for four years!”

Viggo
coughed. “Christ,
Karl. You knew?”

“Of course I knew! You
think it changes anything? I don’t care who you sleep with. I do care about you
keeping secrets that affect me and the people I care about.”

“Look, I did something
that you’re not going to like and I just…” His voice faded. “Your sister and
I—”

“You’re worried I’ll be
mad you slept with my sister?” Karl demanded incredulously. “It was consensual,
right?”

Viggo
didn’t respond and
Karl let out a growl. “Fuck! Did you
rape
my sister?!”

“Of course not!”
Viggo
snapped back. “She was willing, it’s just…”

“God dammit, just spit
it out!”

“She didn’t know it was
taped. And it wasn’t just her. There were three of us.”

“You, her and another
guy?” Karl forced himself to remain calm. Emilie was an adult; if she wanted to
have threesomes, there was nothing he could say about that. He’d had a few
himself, but he’d never taped anything and it was always him and two women.

“Yeah. Therese taped
it.” He swallowed hard.

Karl squinted his eyes
trying to figure out why this was important. “So there’s a tape of you and my
sister and another guy having sex? All right, it’s kind of nasty to me, but I’m
assuming Emilie was of age when this happened?”

“Yeah, of course! It
was only about six months ago.”

“Again, not something I
want to hear about my sister, but in the grand scheme of things, it’s not the
end of the world. What am I missing?”

“It’s kind of…nasty?
You know, a lot of stuff goes on in the bedroom that people shouldn’t see,
people like, your parents.”

Karl groaned. “Again,
that stuff is embarrassing and stupid, but really doesn’t affect me and Kate.
What part of this video should I be worried about?”

“The part where Therese
uses it to make Emilie do things she doesn’t want to do.”

“Why does
Em
care if the video is released? How bad is it? Sex tapes
get out all the time, and frankly, other than our parents dying of embarrassment,
what is she ashamed of? It’s not illegal.”

Viggo
sighed. “We did bad
stuff.”

“Define bad stuff!”
Karl was losing his patience.

“Drugs,
items
,
each other—it’s not some lame missionary position fuck tape!”

Karl didn’t say anything
for a long time as he drummed his fingers on the couch. “Is that everything?”
he asked finally. “The sex tape—is that all Therese has?”

“I don’t know,” he said
quietly. “That’s all of
my
involvement, but I think there’s more stuff
on
Em
.”

“More sex tapes?”

“I think she’s selling
her.”

“
Selling her?!”
Karl nearly shot off the couch.

“She makes
Em
do bad things with men, on tape, and they pay Therese
for getting
Em
to do them.
Em
does it in exchange for Therese not showing anyone the videos. I tried to talk
to her a few nights ago, but she wouldn’t, said it was my fault she wound up in
this mess.”

“Fuck.” Karl tried to
think. “Okay, all of that aside, I still don’t get how any of this is going to
get me to marry Therese. She can release the tape—it’s disgusting, but it’s
legal and you’re all of age. You and
Em
will be
embarrassed but I have people that can make it go away.”

“I don’t know what else
she has up her sleeve,”
Viggo
spoke quietly. “That’s
all I know, man. I swear. I tried to get
Em
to talk to
you, to come clean, but she said she couldn’t, that she would disappoint you.”