Fake Skating(45)

And he was missing the passenger mirror.

I didn’t care about cars, but I would’ve thought someone as slick and smooth as “Zeus” would drive something monster-sized that he called a chickmobile or something.

“Don’t judge Burrito,” he said as I opened the passenger door. “She isn’t pretty, but she’s reliable.”

“It’s more than I’ve got, so no judgment,” I said. There hadn’t been a reason for me to get my license at Ramstein, so I was still like a middle schooler with no wheels and no prospects.

“Good morning, Dani,” I heard, and when I turned, I saw Benji standing beside his running Maserati in his driveway, smiling.

“Oh, hey, Ben,” I said, uncomfortable after what had happened the night before.

“Hey, there, Benji,” Alec said, giving my neighbor a total dickish smirk. “Do all the Cadets have douchebag cars, or is it just you?”

“We can’t all drive pieces of shit held together by duct tape, bro.”

“I’m not your bro, asshole,” Alec said before climbing into the car and slamming the door.

Neither of us spoke as he backed out of the driveway, and I was stunned for a second to hear “Dopamine” playing in his car because I loved that song. As far as I knew, it wasn’t a radio hit, so did that mean, like… Did he like it too?

Focus, Dani!

I scrambled to get my words together to ease whatever tension was rolling off Alec thanks to Benji, but also because I’d come up with my own demands for this “fake dating” situation.

I opened my mouth to start when he said, “By the way—are you okay?”

I looked over at his profile while he kept his eyes on the road, having zero idea what he was talking about. “What?”

He shot me a look for a brief second, his dark eyes moving over my face before he went back to the road. “Whatever the colonel did to make you upset yesterday—are you good now?”

Oh.

“Um, yeah, I suppose,” I said with a shrug, because I was shocked that he was asking. “He’s just being… y’know, Dad, I guess.”

Alec looked at me like he understood, but before he could derail me further with unexpected concern, I jumped in.“So listen. I’ve been thinking about your proposition, and I have a counteroffer.”

“Oh?” He glanced over again, and my face must’ve been intimidating or something, because he said, “Oh God.”

“Yes, you probably should call out to him.”

I’d barely slept at all last night because I couldn’t stop thinking about the way Alec said people would for sure find out about what the coaches had walked in on in the locker room.

If that was true, I was screwed.

Because, since Alec was this big popular guy that half the girls in the school wanted to date, a rumor about me being withhim in the locker room was going to get me a lot of hate.

So the game of pretend was absolutely necessary if I was going to stand a chance at not becoming a pariah.

But I was only going to feel safe if he did it my way.

“Here’s the thing. As much as I don’t want to do this, I feel like there’s no way for me to not do it.”

He looked surprised. “Really? You’re seriously going to help me?”

“This isn’t for you,” I said, making sure he knew I wasn’t at his fake-girlfriend beck and call. “The sad reality is that I’m going to be part of a rumor now. People are probably already gossiping about what they think was going on in the locker room.”

“Yeah, probably,” he agreed, which made my stomach drop.

I didn’t want it to be true.

“So, to your point last night, I’d much prefer them to think that we are childhood sweethearts who reconnected, as opposed to me being cast as the new girl who’s canoodling with hockey players in the locker room in her very first week.”

“Did you seriously just say ‘canoodling’?” he said with a smirk.

“Whatever—you get my point. Can you please focus here?”

“Fine,” he said. “So you’re saying the game of pretend works for you, too, then?”

“Yeah, but I’m going to need something more,” I said, nervous because there was a good chance he was going to refuse.

“What is it?” he asked, turning onto the street where the school was.

Which meant I needed to speak quickly.

“Well, we can still be super casual, but I’m going to need this fake relationship to last until I say it’s over,” I said, then quickly added, “Not as a power trip thing, but I just need—”

“You really areobsessed with me,” he said with another smart-ass half smile, and I was glad he was joking.

It was good he was feeling funny.

“No, no, but I need you to agree to this,” I said. “I want to have the final say in the breakup timeline. I want you to agree to stay with me until I say so, even if that keeps us together for a long time. Like, even… until graduation.”

He made a noise like he thought I was kidding before he slowed at the stoplight and turned his full attention to me. “You want to be my fake girlfriend for three months?”

“I don’t wantthat, ew,” I said defensively, “but it might be necessary.”