Fake Skating(37)

“Coach, I swear to God—”

“Shut up and listen to me, Zeus,” he said, lowering his voice. “I’m about to go in my office and make sure those guys understand that you’re tight with Boche’s granddaughter. That doesn’t make this okay, for God’s sake, but at least it’s her.”

Her.

“Maybe the fact that you’re seeing a Boche will distract them from not only the picture that people are still whispering about, but also what we walked in on, since the two of you’ll be like goddamn hockey royalty, I don’t know,” he said, glancing toward the office. “But I like what you said about her. You dating someone more into books than parties is exactly what you need right about now.”

Dating?

Oh, shit, he thinks I’m seeing her…?

I tried deflecting with, “I was telling the truth about what you walked in on, though.”

“And I believe you,” he said, and I hoped he meant it. “But Gordy talks to everybody, and if the committee is already wondering about you, we don’t want the news he brings them to be that instead of watching game film, you were making out with a girl in the locker room. Isn’t it better if he goes back with the news that you’re dating a serious girl who just happens to be a direct descendant of Mick Fucking Boche?”

His eyes bored into me, willing me to understand the importance of what he was saying. But I didn’t want to believe it. Refused to believe. And yet, deep down, I knew that as fast and wild as the gossip had spread about that stupid picture, this was going to be much, much worse.

Shit. He’s right.

I didn’t have a choice.





CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Dani




I almost had a heart attack when I heard the tap on the front door.

It was after ten, and I was the only one in the house still awake, doing homework.

We had a massive test in calculus next week, but if I was honest with myself, I was studying to avoid thinking about my dad.

And the locker room.

And I was too emotionally exhausted to start crying again.

I half expected it to be Cassie, because she hadn’t wanted to take no for an answer when I backed out on Applebee’s, but when I looked through the window atop the door, I saw Alec peering through.

Shit shit shit, I did notwant to face him. It was bad enough that he’d seen me bawling, but the whole… thingthat followed was mortifying.

Mostly because, for a split second, I’d forgotten about everything in the world except his brown eyes and the way it felt to have him hug me again.

Idiot!

But what choice did I have? I’d been freaking out all evening, expecting a call from the superintendent telling me I’d been expelled.

I went over to the door and pulled it open, my stomach full of butterflies.

And God, there he was.

He was so tall now, so big as he looked down at me with a smirk on his mouth and amusement in those dark brown eyes.

“Wow,” he said without even saying hi. “You look hot.”

I rolled my eyes. I was wearing flannel pajama pants and a threadbare Philadelphia Eagles jersey, and my hair was still wet from the shower I’d taken twenty minutes before when I’d been too cold to concentrate.

Yes, I looked atrocious, but that wasn’t important.

“What happened after I left?” I asked, lowering my eyes to the zipper on the front of his jacket because I couldn’t bear to look directly at his face for another second.

“Can I come in?” he asked. “Because it’s a long story and your hair is going to freeze if the door stays open.”

“Oh. Sure,” I said, stepping back to hold open the door. “But my mom and grandpa are asleep, so you have to be quiet.”

“Yeah, I wasn’t planning on yelling the house down,” he said as he walked inside, and I wasn’t sure if he was joking or being a sarcastic ass.

I quietly shut the door and went into the living room, hyperaware of him following me. I didn’t know what to do with myself, so I sat down on the couch and crossed my arms over my chest.

“So what did he say? How much trouble am I in?” I asked, knowing my cheeks were bright red because it felt like my skin was on fire.

“You’re not in any trouble, actually,” he said, dropping down into the chair across from me.

“What? But he seemed really mad,” I said, confused. “And I shouldn’t have been in the locker room.”

“Okay, so let’s just say things got weird after you left. I’ve got a lot to tell you, so I need to ask—respectfully—for you to just be quiet until I’m finished. I need you to hear everything I have to say before you respond.”

This can’t be good.

“All right,” I said, grabbing one of my grandma’s flowered throw pillows and hugging it to my chest. “I’m listening.”

“So you were right—Oz was crazy pissed. He thought I brought some random girl into the locker room for… um, reasons that were not hockey-related. Like he saw—”

“I get it,” I snapped, wondering how much more mortification I could take without spontaneously combusting in shame.

“Okay, good,” he said, and it annoyed me that it looked like he wanted to laugh. “He was livid, so I had to explain that we knew each other when we were kids and that you aren’t some random girl. I explained to him who your grandpa is—”