Fake Skating(111)

“So.” A buzz started in my body from head to toe, like I’d just been switched on. “She asked you to come in here and talk to me. Why?”

“Why do you think?” he said as if I was an idiot.

“But she walked away,” I said, confused because her texts definitely made it seem like she was worried about me. “She’s done.”

He shrugged. “Is she?”

Isn’t she?“But she said—”

“Sometimes people don’t mean what they say,” he interrupted. “Did she look like she meant it, dipshit?”

“Geez, Mick, I don’t know,” I said, offhandedly wondering how the hell this bizarre conversation with Mick Boche could be happening.

And also—no, she didn’t look like she meant it.

She’d cried while she told me she needed a break.

“And sometimes people do things they don’t wantto do. That they feel like they have to do.”

“Can you stop with the code and just tell me?” I said, because it was obvious Mick knew something that I didn’t.

“Maybe you should ask her.”

Should I? It seemed like a bad idea.

I should just let it go; I’d already swallowed every bit of my pride when I begged the other day.

I’d be a pathetic moron to open it up again.

Mick’s phone chirped again, and he cursed, glaring at me like this was somehow my fault.

“What’d she say?” I asked.

He looked down at the message. “She said, ‘What did he say? Does he seem okay?’?”

“Where is she?” I asked.

I realized she had to be nearby. “Where is she, Mick?”

“I don’t know,” he said, but he pointed his head toward the door.

“She’s in the hallway?”

The old guy just shrugged.

“Collins!” I yelled. “Get your ass in here!”

Mick looked over at me, and I swear to God he gave me a nod, like he approved.

“Dani Collins!” I hollered even louder.

“It’s about damn time,” Mick said, almost smiling.

A second later, Dani came running into the room—literally stopping short when she saw Mick, looking bored, and me sitting there with the Charleston Chew in my hand.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, looking like she wasn’t sure what was going on, which was fair since I’d just screamed bloody murder in a hospital. “Are you okay?”

Her hair was piled on top of her head, that mass of golden curls, but her brown eyes were red and puffy behind those big glasses, her face blotchy like she’d been crying.

“Why did you send him in here?” I asked, my eyes tracking over the sadness on her face, trying to reconcile it with everything else that didn’t add up.

I could only come up with one thing that made sense here—please let Mick be right—and I wanted it so fucking badly.

“I didn’t,” she lied, clearing her throat and glancing at her grandpa.

Who shrugged and raised his eyebrows.

“Don’t lie to me, Collins,” I said, but I wasn’t pissed.

At all.

I was… on edge.

Suddenly thrumming, on fire, alive.

Again, could be the painkillers.

“I’m not,” she lied again.

“Mick, do you think I could talk to your lying granddaughter alone for a minute?” I asked, my eyes staying trained on her as she blinked faster, like she was trying to come up with an escape plan.

“No, Grandp—”

Without a word, Mick walked past her and exited the room.

I was really growing fond of that guy.

“Um, what’s up?” she asked quietly, crossing her arms over her chest and gnawing on her lip, looking downright jumpy.

“For starters, would you mind coming closer so everyone outside the door doesn’t hear me?”

More fast blinking and a nod. “Sure.”

She walked over, turning me on in that fucking Southview jersey and pressing play on ROLE MODEL in my brain, and she stopped beside my bed.

I’m sorry, but I’m deeply still in love



“Now tell me why you made him come talk to me,” I said. “And don’t lie.”

In love with you



Her eyebrows crinkled together and she cleared her throat. Her voice was barely there when she said, “You’re my friend, and I knew how stressed you were about everything. So, as your friend, I thought it might help to hear from someone who knows—”

“What about the Charleston Chew?”

I stared her down, trying to read her mind as she avoided meeting my eyes. I could tell she didn’t want me to know something, but dammit—I was going to make her tell me.

She shrugged and said, “I mean, you probably haven’t eaten since—”

“Can you please just be honest with me?” I said in frustration, needing her to open up. “I could die in surgery, Dani, so stop fucking lying.”





CHAPTER FORTY-NINE Dani




“What?”

I looked at him, propped up in the hospital bed wearing a blue gown and his glasses, and the tears were back because what the hell did that mean? I’d been pacing around the ER waiting room for hours, trying not to cry while worrying and missing him and regretting and overthinking, and now this?