“Actually, Yom hired me to plan everything, girl,” she bragged. “You have no idea how hard it was not to tell you.”
“Mr. Rustanov would have gone bigger, but Trish insisted that this was about as big as you could handle.” The normally all-business Rina gave Trish a fond look. “She paid attention to every detail—down to telling you he didn’t get her favorite dumplings. You have a very special best friend.”
Rina was right, and so was Trish. This was just the right amount of party for me to feel at ease. And I loved the pride shining in Rina’s eyes as she finished telling me exactly how Trish had pulled it off.
Yom, for his part, not only did a good job delegating Trish to oversee my surprise party but also letting me enjoy it.
He posted up with his team captain and my dad in the far corner of the restaurant. And though I could feel his gaze hungrily tracking me wherever I went, he held back while I hung out with my friends.
Or, at least, Ithoughthe was hanging out with my father.
“What were you and Dad talking about all night?” I asked Yom later that evening as he drove me back to the lake house—alongwith the suitcase I’d packed, thinking he was really abandoning me to go to Minneapolis alone.
“We are working on final deal points for my Minnesota Raptors contract,” he answered, turning onto the access road that led to the lake house.
“Wait… what?”
“Do not become upset,zayka,” Yom commanded in that weary way he used whenever he knew I wouldn’t agree with something he’d done for me. The tone had become increasingly familiar over the past two weeks. “I am liking this plan for us since night you introduce me to your father. Also, he is right about money and drama being much better if I am signing with Raptors.”
“I mean, maybe,” I answered as we pulled into the lake house’s long driveway. “But what if you and me don’t work out? This is a huge commitment you’re making for a girl you’ve only been officially dating for a few weeks.”
Yom killed the engine. “Girl I am dating for a few weeks in real life.”
“What?”
He turned in his seat to regard me with a somber expression. “I am only dating you short time in real life. In my head, we are together much longer than this. From very first moment I see you.”
“You mean three months ago when we met in Berlin after I fell into your lap?” I asked with a laugh, unbuckling my seatbelt.
But Yom’s expression remained completely serious. “Lydia, I am maybe loving you from first moment I see you walk into library while I am studying for Statistics.”
I narrowed my eyes. “So… after Berlin?”
Yom heaved a heavy sigh. “Zayka, you are my heart. But sometimes I am feeling that you are purposefully being confused about my answers.” He took my hand in his. “Nyet, I am of course meaning I see you in library before Berlin.”
“Wait, I didn’t think you knew I was alive before Berlin.”
“Then you are thinking wrong. I am liking you, imagining us in love relationship, since our first year of university,” he answered with a casual shrug, as if me getting the entire timeline of our relationship wrong was no big deal. Just a simple case of mistaken dates—by, like, three years.
My heart stuttered. “Why didn’t you tell me? I mean, at least approach me before Berlin?”
“I am holding myself back until after the USCA Championship,” he answered. “You are supposed to be my reward for winning the final game.”
“Really? Your reward?” I had to resist the urge to glance around. Had I, in fact, fallen into ajoseianime? Was there, like, a chibi version of me losing her shit right above my head? “So, no matter what, we were going to meet this March anyway?”
“Perhaps this April,” he admitted with a sheepish wince. “You are making me feel too shy to talk to you before. And maybe it is taking courage I do not have yet to approach you. Also... I am not knowing your name. In my head, I called you Library Girl.”
My stomach fluttered. “I kind of like that,” I said, grinning. “Could we…?”
“No,zayka.” Yom’s voice became stern. “You are my bunny now—not girlfriend only in imagination.”
His refusal to switch up pet names brought me back to my original suspicion. “You, Yom Rustanov, were too shy to talk to me, Lydia Carrington, a girl whose name someone with your resources could’ve easily found out?”
“This is valid question,” he said, almost to himself. “Why am I acting like scaredy-ass punk, as your lesbian friend, Trish, would call it, for three years when I am always knowing what I want?”
He considered his past behavior with a thoughtful frown. “I am having very serious hockey career to consider. Maybe I am knowing from start that when you and I are finally happening, I will not be able to think on anything else but you. Maybe I am already knowing how dangerous it will be if I let myself approach you. That you will become more than distraction. But obsession.”
He said this all with such a casual tone—almost scientific. I found myself frowning back at him.
