Page 27 of Rule 1: Never Accidentally Marry Your Teammate

He stares at me, and I reconsider my words. Maybe they sound couple-y.

“I mean—”

“Look.” Finn grabs hold of my hands. “If we tell them we didn’t plan to marry, they’ll think we did it as a joke. They already do. And that’s...”

“That would be disrespectful.”

Finn nods eagerly, his eyes wild. “I don’t want you to be sent back to the AHL.”

I blink. “You’d rather we what...pretend to be married?”

“Yes. Move into my penthouse.”

I nod. “Yeah. If you want me too—”

“I do,” Finn says, his voice desperate. “It’s spacious. We don’t have to see much of each other. I mean, no one has to know what happens there.”

I ponder his words. They don’t sit well in my stomach. “I like hanging out with you.”

A slow smile spreads over Finn’s flushed face. God, the man is handsome.

I stifle an odd urge to trace the swell of his cheeks with my fingers.

“You want to tell everyone we got married on purpose?” I ask, wondering if somehow, I’ve gotten this wrong.

“It’s the only way, Noah. Trust me.”

“I trust you.”

His eyes soften. “I know.”

“So we tell them that we fell in...” My voice trails, but he knows what I was going to say.

“Love.” The word isn’t said particularly loudly, but it booms through the elliptical room all the same, bouncing from machine to machine. “Yes. That’s what we do.”

“We just met, Finn.”

“So we fell fast. We saw each other, and I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”

“And I couldn’t stop thinking about you...” I murmur.

Heat blazes through my body, because of course he’s telling me our cover story, and of course I shouldn’t be saying something like that.

His smile is pleased.

“And remember, I have been following you for the past four years,” I say, stepping away.

His eyes round. “That long? That’s when I started.”

I nod,embarrassed.

He grins. “You’re my super fan.”

“I wanted to mention it to make it more believable. That we, um, got married so quickly.”

“I’m not just a pretty face?” He winks, and my stomach flips like those years I had figure skating lessons because I wanted to be on the ice every chance I could, even if it meant skating to sappy songs.

“That’s smart,” Finn says. “Maybe we were exchanging messages all that time, and once I realized who you were...”