The Game Changer

by Lana Ferguson

“Jack is biased,” I laugh. “Etienne was nice.” His frown deepens, and some hopeless part of me wants it to be jealousy that has him looking so sour, as silly as that is. Maybe that’s what leads me to say, “Plus, he was really hot. Dirty talk is ten times better in French.”

“Listen, I know raw batter is bad, but sometimes being bad is worth it.” I mm exaggeratedly. “Life is short, or as the French say, ‘la vie est trop courte pour boire du mauvais vin.’ ”

Baking, ink, and full-blown smiles? They’re going to be paying me workers’ comp after this for stress-related injuries. I don’t realize I’m just standing there gawking like an idiot until I hear Ava quietly saying my name, a gentle way of telling me to snap the hell out of it.

“You have a tattoo?” I beam back at him. “Sure do.” “What is it?” “A better question would be: Where is it?” I wink, and I notice a slight flush of color at his cheekbones. Wow. Okay. I like that reaction.

but at least I can give him back a fraction of the discomfort he’s caused me in my young life. It’s only fair, I think.

Maybe some distance is the best answer. It’s not like I have to hang out with Ian again anytime soon. Some time to get my head in order would probably be just the thing to figure my shit out and stop acting ridiculous.

His cheek dimples with his smile, so similar to Lila’s it’s uncanny. Not that I’m thinking about Lila. Not that I’ve been actively forcing myself not to think of her all week.

The mention of Lila makes me pause; I haven’t spoken to her since she texted me the night after we filmed the episode earlier in the week, even though I’ve wanted to.

My mind inadvertently goes back to that moment during filming—as it has unfortunately done several times in the last few days—of her small hand in mine as she stood impossibly close, watching me lick some batter I can’t even remember the taste of from her spoon.

He turns his phone so I can read, met with an article that has a glaring caption above a picture of Lila holding that damned spoon up to my mouth, my eyes boring into hers with an intensity I hadn’t even realized I’d had and hers meeting mine with an equal amount of interest. We look…Well.

“DelIan. It’s not the worst one I’ve ever heard, but regardless, the internet is all abuzz about the possibility of hockey’s ‘bad boy’ being in a relationship with his childhood friend. I mean, they call her the ‘darling of baking.’ What a shit show.”

On the one hand, the fact that the internet is talking about anything else but my history with Mei is fantastic, but on the other… To exploit Lila like that? It feels…wrong.

Friends. It feels like a complicated word, even though it should be simple. Friends don’t think about each other the way I haven’t been able to make myself stop thinking about Lila since I saw her again.

“Once everyone starts to see you playing for us again, once they remember what you can do for Boston, they won’t give a shit about your love life.” “That’s the idea,” Leilani adds confidently.

Just be friends. Just like you would otherwise. It sounds so simple. And it really should be. It is, I tell myself. Fuck, I think with a groan. Jack is going to be a pain in the ass about this.

“Did you read any of the, ah, posts?” “Yep. Loved the one that had a poll on how long it would take you to put a bun in my oven. Very on topic.” Ian’s eyes bulge, and for a second, he looks a little pale, and I laugh harder without meaning to.

That forlorn expression is gone now, and in its place is a warm smile that I know too well. It’s half the reason I was so obsessed with him. It’s hard not to be, when he smiles like that.

“Well, I was very grateful that someone had my back,” he says softly. I nod, feeling my cheeks heat. I don’t say that I’ll always have his back, because it sounds lame even in my head.

“You barely have jokes at all anymore, from what I’ve seen,” I tease. “But when you did, I do remember them being kind of dumb.” “Brat,” he huffs. My stomach twists again. You have no right to be turned on by that, I tell my nether region. Down, girl.

“Maybe you need practice,” he murmurs. Memories of stupid dares and foot races and a dozen more childish things that used to fill our days flash through my mind, and I lean in, smirking. “You don’t want to play that game with me, Ian. You’ll lose.”

“Nothing makes me uncomfortable. You’d tap out way before I did.” I feel my lips curl, daydreams about paying Ian back a little for years of clueless feeding into my silly wants bouncing around in my head. Because one thing is for certain, I am not that little kid anymore. Ian has no idea who he’s dealing with.

“You wanna tell us about this situation with you and Baker’s sister?” “You know damn well there’s not actually a situation.” “That’s what you and Jack are singing, but seems like a waste to me. Dee is hot.”

It’s been less than twenty-four hours since Lila and I agreed to our little PR endeavor, and even though I know there’s nothing real about this thing we’re doing, I still feel a tiny flutter in my stomach at seeing her so soon. Like I haven’t had enough time to properly figure out how I’m going to approach the whole thing.

She winks at me, and for reasons beyond me, I feel the innocent gesture as if she reached out and touched me. Me suddenly acting nervous around her just because we made a formal agreement to spark some rumors makes no sense.

“Cupcake played great,” Jankowski coos. “Oh,” Jack snorts. “I actually just decided I am going to like this whole thing between you guys.” I roll my eyes. “So happy everyone’s on board.”

“You’d better get used to it,” Lila hums. She leans over the railing, hanging between my arms—which are reaching up, hands clasped there—and extends her arm until her finger closes in on my nose, giving it a boop. “We’re the talk of the town, Cupcake.”

Her blush deepens, her teeth pressing against her lower lip, accentuating the fullness of it and drawing my eye for a second longer than is appropriate.

“Total pushover,” she affirms. “I could play you like a fiddle, Ian Chase.” I don’t tell her I have a sneaking suspicion that she still could, if she wanted. “That right?” “One hundred percent, Cupcake.”

“I told you not to play this game with me,” she says coyly. “You’ll lose.” With the slight tremor that runs down my spine with the weight of her against me, I have to admit she makes a solid argument.

Suddenly, she gives my hair a sharp tug that I feel all the way down in my balls, and I only have about four seconds to form a solid “What the fuck was that?” thought before thudding footsteps and Jack’s shouting voice blast through whatever the hell just happened.

“Okay, okay, that’s enough canoodling,” he grouses. “It’s weird as fuck.” He crouches and offers a hand out when I finally manage to tear my gaze away from a still-smug-looking Lila, watching as sh...

Seriously, what the fuck, Ian? “Save the touchy shit for public spaces,” Jack huffs. I frown. “This is a public space.”

I hear him muttering something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like: fucking weird, and I have a feeling he would be losing his shit on me if he knew the weird thoughts I’m having right now.

It takes me a second to realize this is directed at me, and I manage to nod dumbly as I try to remember how to make words while the sensation of her tugging on my hair still racks through my body.

She wiggles her fingers at us, looking breezy and unbothered like she didn’t just leave me with weird thoughts and even weirder feelings about them.

“Gonna be weird as fuck watching you two pretend to be into each other.” He makes a gagging sound. “Training camp can’t be over fast enough.” I’m nodding, again, because I’m still only half listening, and again, searching every corner of my brain…I can’t find any shared irritation to this situation to match his.

Even if I did make the all-star team, even if I visited every other day—I’d still be a disappointment somehow.

I cover my mouth with my hand, my palm pressing into my smile as I picture the teasing tilt of her mouth as she typed it. Amazingly, all the bitter feelings that had been threatening to consume me dissipate in the wake of that imagined smile.

My lips curl in a smile at the image of my massive hockey player tumbling on the ice because of some tiny little boy. Well, not my hockey player, but whatever.

“Yeah, yeah, I heard the PR spiel.” He leans in close, pinching my cheek. “Hasn’t stopped the big guy from glaring at me for the last sixty seconds.” Sanchez is already skating off when I whip my head back to where Ian was working with Kyle, catching his eyes on me for only a second before he tears them away.

“I know we weren’t in here long, but I remember how lonely it was. That feeling like no one was coming for you. Fuck, like no one wanted you. I just figured if I could distract them from that for a day…” I shrug, feeling embarrassed myself now under his scrutiny. “I don’t know. It just felt right.”

“It really is amazing,” he says, actual reverence in his tone that makes me feel like I’m flying a little bit. “But you always were.”

“Are you trying to one-up me, Lila?” “I’m just playing the part, Cupcake,” I answer sweetly.

His hand envelops mine suddenly, yanking me closer so that he can lean in, his lips brushing my ear and causing me to shudder. “Two can play that game, brat.” “Fuck,” I say on a stuttered exhale, and I feel Ian tense against me.

“Don’t be sorry, okay? I just hate the idea of you thinking about this shit. I can take everyone else thinking I’m garbage, but not you.”

My fingers are gentle against her chin, and there’s a serious expression on my face that is completely at war with the soft one she wears, and the entire scene as a whole is…It’s fucking believable, is what it is. It sure as hell doesn’t look like just two friends. And we hadn’t even been trying.

I still feel that urge to be close to her, to protect her, to make her laugh, and when she was a child, that felt totally natural, but with the woman she’s become…something about it feels different now. Which leaves me all sorts of confused.

Because there isn’t enough confusion in my life right now, of course Jack and Lila’s aunt has invited us all to dinner tonight, meaning that I will have to sit across a table from the woman who’s causing chaos in my head in a home that always felt more mine than my own—all while pretending I’m not slowly unraveling.

Hell, I’m just aware of her, period. That’s definitely different from the last time I was here.

“Always hoped you two would get married,” she says offhandedly, like it’s not the equivalent of dropping an atom bomb into the conversation. “Then I could have all of you as my kids.” “Aunt Bea,” Lila hisses, her face flushing. “Seriously?”