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I pin him with a serious stare. “I can still beat the shit out of people when I want to.”

He smirks. “Not sure I believe you. I think we should change it from Mitch ‘The Machine’ to Mitch ‘The Lover.’”

I flip him the bird and he laughs.

“Anyway, I just wanted you to know I like you guys together. Don’t mess this up, man.”

I tilt my chin in a nod and finally send Andie a text that we’re on the runway. Then, I lean my seat back and take a nice long nap.

* * *

I wake up to West blowing on my face. My eyes fly open and he pulls away from me just in time to avoid my fist connecting with his jaw. “Time to wake up, sleeping beauty. We’ve landed.”

Blinking a few times, I look at my watch. I can’t believe I passed out for the entire four-hour flight. Must’ve stayed up too late texting Andie last night. Great, now I’m never going to fall asleep tonight… which means I’ll probably stay up too late again… and will probably be texting Andie the entire time… again.

I stand and stretch my arms and legs, then reach up for my carry-on in the overhead compartment. We get off the plane and the team grabs their luggage and heads toward the line of SUVs sent from the hotel to taxi us. Remy, Colby, Bruce, West, and myself pile inside one of the vehicles. Once I’m settled, I pull my phone out to check it. My eyes widen in alarm when I see ten missed calls from Max, and another eight from Andie.

“What the…” I tap on Andie’s name and it rings a few times before she answers.

“Mitch. Oh my gosh,” her voice is breathless, she sounds shaken up.

I lean forward in my seat, feeling annoyed that I’m not there to help her with whatever is going on. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

“You haven’t seen the article?” Her voice sounds strangled, like she’s holding back tears.

“Article?”

“I’m texting it to you right now. Mitch, this looks so bad. I’m so sorry.” She chokes out the apology and I know she’s really crying now.

“Hey, it’s okay,” I tell her, having no clue what’s happening.

I pull the phone back and tap on the link to the article she sent me. The link takes me to the D.C. Tribune. The article is titled: Mom Takes Advantage of Hockey Bad Boy to Get Her Son to the Top.

I groan, then put the phone back to my ear. “You’ve gotta be kidding me. This is ridiculous, and completely untrue.” The guys are leaning in, whispering and trying to figure out what’s going on.

I place a hand over the lower part of my phone and whisper, “There’s a gossip article about me and Andie.”

Remy, who’s beside me, pulls his phone out and googles the article. He scrolls through, reading it and showing me all the pictures. It really does look bad. There’s a photo of me with Andie over my shoulder on that first day of practice. Another one of us standing very close to each other in a heated argument. Then, there’s another one of us at the Eagles’ game on Noah’s birthday. This one includes Noah in it too, which pisses me off. They could at least leave minors out of this.

“How the hell did they get these photos? And who took them?” I ask through gritted teeth.

“It was Steph,” she says. “There’s a video of their interview with her toward the bottom of the article.” Her voice sounds choked and I wish I was there to hold her.

I close my eyes, fighting back anger and frustration. I remember last night at the game, how mad she was and the accusations she made. Throwing a fit because she wasn’t getting enough attention. Like mother, like son, apparently.

“I can’t believe her—” I’m cut off when my phone begins to vibrate in my hand, I pull it back to see my manager trying to call me again. “Andie, can I call you back? My manager’s been trying to get ahold of me.”

“Yeah,” she sniffs. “I’ll talk to you later.”

I pause for a second, thinking of something to say to console her, but I come up short. “Okay, bye.”

She whispers goodbye and I feel like a tool for not saying something sweet to her. All I feel is anger, though not at her, but at everything else. And it’s so difficult to think when I’m angry. I let my phone go to voicemail while I breathe in for seven and out for eleven.

Max, of course, calls right back. This time I answer. “Hey.”

“I’m assuming you’ve seen the disaster?” he huffs.

I drag a hand through my hair. “Yep.”