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At breakfast the team spreads out across the hotel restaurant, and I sit at the end of the table working on my laptop and half an ear on the noise.

Down the table, Aiden's on the phone with Harper, not even lowering his voice. Not only is she the coach’s daughter, she’s the team physical therapist and also his fiance. No, babe, I already booked it. Because you said you liked the little one by the water. A pause, and then he laughs, soft, the whole hard captain of him gone gentle over a woman. Yeah. Love you too.

He hangs up like it's nothing. Like it's easy. Like you're just allowed to have that, in front of the whole team, a person who's yours and says so.

I look down the table at Jax, laughing at something Ryker said, easy in his own skin, and I understand with a cold, quiet certainty that somewhere in the last 2 months I diverted off my own plan.

Whatever this is with Jax, it doesn't end with a phone call about a place by the water. It ends. That's the whole design of it.

Back upstairs, Jax slips through the adjoining door and folds down onto the edge of my bed, and pulls me into his side like it's the most natural thing in the world.

"Noah caught me in the gym this morning." He scrubs a hand over his face. "Just looks at me and goes, she's a good one, Hunter."

"That's it?"

"No." He looks at me then, and there's no grin anywhere on him. "He goes, she's not a road-trip fling. She's not a puck bunny. Don't you dare make her one."

"And what did you say?"

He holds my eyes. "I told him you're the real deal. The realest thing I've got."

Real.

The word lands in my chest like a grenade, because he doesn't know he just handed me the one thing I can't survive. Hope.

I planned for the sex. What I didn't plan for is this, the wanting more, the wanting real.

Wanting is dangerous.

I understand that I'm so far over my head.

In two days I'll put on his jersey number and sell the whole world our fake love story.

I used to be so good at pretending.

I'm starting to forget how.

Chapter 9: Jax

I’ve deflected enough. Margot and I agreed to tell Cade today since we’re going public at the next big game.

"Do I know her?"

I keep my voice level while my heart ratchets up. Across from me, Margot is listening.

"Yeah, man. You do. It's Margot."

The silence on the line is the kind that used to mean a fight was one word away.

"My Margot." Every degree of warmth has drained out of Cade's voice. "My little sister Margot?"

"It's a work thing." I turn my back on her face, because I can’t lie to Cade and look at her at the same time.

"The league’s using both of us. She's rehabbing my image, the league's main sponsor wants me to have a wholesome image. No more viral posts on my relationships. So Margot and I are going to play a couple for the cameras. It's staged. It's her job. Till the deal is signed."

The lie tastes like a mouthguard, rubber and old blood.

A long breath on his end. I can see him exactly in my mind.