CHAPTER FOUR

L uke

I didn’t think I would ever walk away from Sebastian Archer, but his words about me still ring in my head.

They ring in my head as I walk to the arena, ignoring the ringing of my phone.

They ring in my head as I walk to the locker room, ignoring the new ringing of my phone.

They ring in my head as I see my agent...

Fuck.

I whirl around, but I’m too late.

“Hawthorne,” Nate says. “Conference Room. Now.”

I hope I imagined his somber face and that he really wants an autograph for a niece or nephew or something.

He doesn’t.

“Did you apply to be the new Mr. Right?” Nate asks me.

“Well—”

Technically I didn’t apply, but I don’t want to admit that Troy applied on my behalf. Not until I know Nate’s reaction.

Besides, Troy never would have applied for me to be on that show if it wasn’t my absolute favorite, something I’m also not eager to share with my manager.

Nate is in his thirties and has all the worldliness that comes with it.

“You need to talk to me before you do those things. I don’t like being blindsided.”

“I’m sorry.” Maybe I should have called him yesterday. Maybe I should have done something besides pace my apartment, waiting for Troy to come back from whatever hookup he had, before finally giving up and lifting until my racing thoughts slowed against the concentration of counting reps and I showered and crept into bed.

He wasn’t supposed to have said those things about me.

I wanted to congratulate him on how far he came. I wanted to talk to him about his success. I wanted to watch him smile, not see fear enter his eyes.

Does he not remember me? But then, I haven’t changed my name. I’m still Luke Hawthorne, just like I was in Ashcove, just like the most cursory glance at my Blizzards web page and wikipedia article would show.

“ Seeking Mr. Right wants you to be their Mr. Right,” Nate continues, unaware of the uneven beating of my heart. “They expect you to start soon. The good thing is, it’s not a bad idea, and Daniela agrees with me. You should have told me in advance. I could have prepared your application for you.”

“You want me to do it?” I stare at him.

He stares back, his gray-speckled eyebrows moving upward. “Yeah.”

“I, um, thought you were going to yell at me.”

His eyes narrow. “I’ve never yelled at you.”

My skin heats. Maybe I’ve accidentally revealed too much about myself. He’s my agent, not the therapist the team brings in to talk to us, as if they’re worried we’ll burden our coaches or trainers instead, and they’ll go soft on us when they need to work us, work us, work us.

“Right. It was an exaggeration. A figure of speech.” The words tumble from me, then I lean back, my manner cool, like we’ve been trained to do for promotional photographs.

“Anyway. Yeah, Blizzards management is cool with it.”

“Seriously? Hockey keeps me pretty busy.”

Nate shrugs. “The producers will work around it.”

“But how am I supposed to find true love if I’m busy all the time?”

“Boston looks the same at 4 PM as at 10 PM in the winter. The main question is—do you want to find true love?”

I draw back.

Nate’s lips swerve upward, and his eyes are dancing like he’s two-hours into an open bar. “Because I’m pretty sure that’s not how reality TV dating works.”

“But it, um, might.”

“It gives you good exposure, and between both of us, I think the team management is eager to remind its audience that most of the hockey players are raging heterosexuals, since they’ve somehow managed to end up with four gay men on a team of twenty.”

He laughs, and I hope he doesn’t expect me to laugh back.

Something tightens in my chest. Something I don’t want to dwell on. Something I would prefer not to examine.

The air thins, fewer oxygen molecules floating on each particle. I clench and unclench my fingers, hidden by the conference room table.

A knock sounds on the door, and Nate smiles.

“Ah, they’re here.” He strides toward the door, then opens it, shooting his tough-guy smile, the kind he probably gives people when he tells them he’s absolutely inexperienced at poker, right before he’s going to fleece them.

Sebastian and the petite blonde he was with last night enter the room.