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Cade scrolls. "Two million. It went up while we were still standing there hugging." He scrolls more, and his ears go red. "People are commenting."

I take the phone at the next light because I have to, and Margot reads over my shoulder, and it's a wall of strangers losing their minds.

nobody FAKES that man's face. the "manufactured romance" article is the fake.

WAIT. that's Cade Callahan. Boston's Callahan. is the reformed bad boy dating his best friend's SISTER.

brother's best friend + he fell first + an AIRPORT CHASE.

i’m deceased, plan my funeral the DROPPED BOARDING PASS on the floor is priceless.

so the "team fixer faked a romance" scoop is aging like milk, huh

Margot laughs. "It's turning."

"No, it turned. It now has eleven million views. Reyes's story is getting buried under a stranger's shot of us crying. There’s even a video."

"Is nothing sacred." Cade slumps against the back seat and glares out the window. "Eleven million strangers just watched me cry. I'm an enforcer. I have a reputation. My teammates are going to run this on the jumbotron with sad music."

Margot turns around, to look at her brother. “Cade, come on, your teammates love you, and they’re always so nice to me when I visit you. If anything they’re crying with joy.”

"And at least we got a keepsake." I toss the phone back to him. "I’ll frame the moment and put it on my mantle."

Cade leans in between the seats. So he can look at me and Margot. "Real talk. You two do not kill this penalty by hiding, because hiding is the whole reason you're here. We went viral. So what's the play, Hunter?"

"Not my place." Margot's thumbs are already flying, the crisis brain firing up straight through the tears. "There are photographers parked outside my building." She looks at me. "Yours?"

"Nobody knows my real address. I bought the place under an LLC named after Cade's worst nickname on purpose. No one’s found me yet."

"Which nickname?" Cade leans forward.

"You don't want to know."

"It's Sir Falls a Lot. From the peewee tournament. Isn't it?"

"It is Sir Falls-a-Lot."

Cade and I laugh but Margot is too deep in damage control to notice.

We spread out at my place, laptops on the island, Cade sprawled on the couch fielding texts from half of Boston, Margot in full command mode.

"This is where we are." She doesn't look up. "That photo did in two hours what I couldn't have spun in two weeks. The story flipped on its own. So we don't fight it. We tell the truth and we let it ride." She finally lifts her eyes to me, and there's a question underneath she isn't asking out loud.

I take her hand. "Callahan, spin it, but don’t make me sound noble. I was a coward. Put that in. People forgive a reformed bad boy coward. They don't trust a saint."

Her eyes get teary. "That's actually really good copy."

"I learn from the best."

Cade stands up, and I feel it coming before he says it, the shift, he’s got his own team to get back to.

"I gotta go. Coach left me a few voicemails, one of which is just him laughing at me." He pulls his jacket on and wraps Margot up long and hard, murmuring something into her hair that makes her laugh and swat him.

Then he turns to me, and for a second neither of us knows what to do with our hands.

"We good?" I make myself ask it.

"Getting there." He grabs my hand and hauls me into the half-hug and claps my back. "You lied to me. That's a game misconduct, you're gonna sit in the box on that one a while." He pulls back, and there's no anger in it, and what's left is the guy who's had my back since we were kids. "Take care of my sister, or I put that jumbotron photo of you sobbing on every screen in the league. With captions."