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I don’t expect him to speak to me. It’s been a week of classes and he’s avoided even meeting my eyes inside the lecture hall of every single math class.

Toren scoffs. “Surprised you don’t know already.” I spin toward him, eyebrows furrowed. “I would’ve thought that would be a bedtime story from your dad.”

My dad hasn’t told me anything about Toren Kane. And I was too scared to seek him out on my own, considering I wasn’t allowed to. Still, the taunt is clear and frustrating because I can’t do anything about it.

“Believe it or not,” I snap out, “I had other things on my mind these past couple of years. Other than you.” It’s a lie. He’s a part of me, so intertwined in my soul and brain, I barely breathe without thinking of him, even when I tried not to.

“Yeah?” he asks. “I bet being Little LaBlanc really takes it out of you.”

“Toren, stop.” I grab the tight fabric of his shirt in my grip. My tone lowers a little, breaths harsh as the movement pulls us close enough that I’m drowning in his scent and his shadow. My eyes flutter. “Please.”

There’s a moment where the world seems to slow, where he seems familiar again, but I watch his face flicker, hatred replacing any softness that lingered there.

A laugh chokes out of him as he finally locks his gaze on mine, something sharper and cruel there.

“I cannot believe this is happening and I don’t know what deity I pissed off, but I’m not doing this with you.” Toren shakes his head and mumbles beneath his breath. “Let’s get this over with.”

He passes by me then and grabs all the stuff from under the left side of the bench—as if he already knows where it all is.

I want to ask if he’s done this Learn to Skate thing before. I also don’t want to talk to him.

Frustrated, tense silence wins out.

• • •

The kids love Toren.

He’s a natural with them, especially with Liam Brown, Sadie’s brother.

She’d warned me about her youngest brother. Apparently both her siblings had been part of the program, but Oliver was very talented and Max Koteskiy had moved him up into a private group. He’d offered the same thing to Liam, but the youngest wanted to “play with his friends.”

Liam is a very cute kid, with a bright smile and a missing tooth that makes a whistle sound on certain words. He hangs on every word out of Toren’s mouth but sticks closer to me, one hand in mine through the entire lesson to keep him upright.

It’s nice. I never was the best skater, but Toren had started teaching me early. My dad allowed it, but he wouldn’t let me play hockey (“too dangerous”) or figure skate (“you’ll break your leg, Lillian”).

Then again, it was difficult to hurt myself painting, and he wouldn’t let me have that either.

“You’re really good at skating,” Liam says as we head toward the boards. He insisted on staying by my side as I cleaned up the cones we used for practicing T-glides. “Not as good as my sister, but pretty good. Are you a figure skater?”

I smile down at him and shake my head. “No, I just like skating. My dad coaches hockey.”

His eyes brighten. “Like Mr. Max?”

I nod. “Does Mr. Max coach you?”

Liam shakes his head. “He coaches my brother’s team now. He says Oliver’s got protective instincts and that’s good for defense.”

There’s a throb in my chest and I can’t stop myself from glancing over my shoulder to where Toren is helping each kid over the threshold onto the carpet. Protective instincts.

My mind flashes an image of a younger Toren, maybe fourteen, standing in front of me as my dad shouts about responsibility and gratefulness. An eighteen-year-old Toren, blood pouring from a split eyebrow as he pulls someone off my body—

Shaking my head, I gather the last of the little multicolored rings and markers, holding them precariously in one hand and Liam in my other.

Max Koteskiy is back, still giving Toren the stink eye with his arms crossed, until Liam shouts for him and tries to take off on his own, and immediately face-plants onto the ice. He’s back up seconds later—clearly the kid has been taught how to fall correctly—before he’s back down again.

Toren beats me to him, grabbing both his little arms and carrying him across and over the boards to Max, Liam giggling happily the whole way.

“Everything went well then?”