Page 7

Tobie

Loud banging yanks me from sleep.

I peel my eyes open, dragging my glasses off my bedside table and slipping them onto my face. I squint at my alarm clock and tell myself I’m seeing things.

It’s Saturday morning.

Weekends are for sleeping in. For me, and I thought for students everywhere. Clearly not because someone is awake and banging on my door at eight in the morning.

Last night washes over me, and my stomach clenches.

The cheating.

The big screen humiliation.

Marc.

The bang comes again, and I get to my feet, belt on my bathrobe, and mentally prepare myself for a confrontation I’m already dreading.

I’m in PJs, and I haven’t brushed my teeth or hair. When I glimpse my reflection in the mirror beside my door, I make a face and look away, telling myself it doesn’t matter.

I take a deep breath, pull open the door, and blink when I come face to face with Reid and Javier, two of the hockey players from last night who should not remember I even exist. “Uh…”

Reid grins at me. “Morning. Can we come in?”

“How’d you find me?” I ask as they step around me.

“We knew you couldn’t be in Reynolds, or we’d have seen you.

Didn’t think you were a freshman to be in Jubilee.

So we hit up Fisher. No one knew you there, but we lucked out and bumped into a girl who knew you, so here we are in Montgomery,” Reid says as Javier sits at my desk and scans the books I have on the shelf above it.

I shouldn’t be keeping that many books up there after the last time I overloaded it and nearly broke my nose when it collapsed on top of my head.

I’m a reader of almost everything from fantasy to the classics, and I have more books packed into my room than I have space to store them.

But I will always have a special place in my heart for a romance where the heroine gets a good railing.

So, seeing Javier curiously eyeing those books makes me extremely nervous.

I’m still half asleep, so as I close my door, it takes me a second to process everything they did to track me down. “But why?”

“Revenge,” Reid says dramatically.

“ Revenge ?” I echo.

“Yep,” Reid says. “Jay and I discussed it. The fuckwit has to suffer. We intend to bring him down.”

I stare at them. “But why ?”

“My ex, Daniela, cheated,” Javier says and puts down a book he was flipping through.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” What woman would cheat on this Brazilian god?

He waves off my apology. “We were together for three years, and our breakup was nothing like what happened to you. So that must have hurt. I get it, and I intend to help. And…”

“And?” I prompt.

Reid crosses his arms as he leans against the wall next to my illustrated Bridgerton poster of Daphne and Simon. “We need someone to take the heat off us.”

I blink at him. “What?”

Shit. I’m nowhere near awake enough to be having this conversation. I rub the sleep from my eyes and straighten, hoping it’ll make me feel more awake.

“We’re heading into the championships in a few weeks. Between final assignments and practice, we’re busier than we’ve ever been. We don’t need girls flinging themselves at us like they have all season.”

“I don’t understand what that has to do with me?” I muffle a yawn.

“We need a girlfriend,” Reid declares.

Suddenly, I’m ‘ just had a double shot of espresso ’ wide awake.

I bounce my gaze between Javier and Reid. Then I look at the bed I’m not in because I’m standing, not sleeping, which means this is not a dream. “What…”

“We’re going to humiliate your ex, and you are going to be our girlfriend.”

“No one would buy that. You’re you and I… I’m me.”

Javier cocks his head as he studies me. “She hasn’t heard the rumors.”

I frown. “What rumors?”

“There’s talk of us being drafted into the same NHL team. That never happens. Ever . But it’s happening for us,” Reid explains.

I fight to keep focused. My eyes want to glaze over at this talk of sports, but this feels too important to pretend to listen. “So?”

“Have you heard about the Wolverines climbing the league over the last couple of years?” Reid asks.

I blink rapidly. “Um…”

Javier gives me a knowing look. “She’s trying not to fall asleep, Reid. Get to the point.”

I open my mouth to deny it, but it would be a lie, and I try not to do that. “Maybe you could give me the condensed version.”

Reid grins at me. “Win or lose the championship, teams have been sending scouts to watch us play since our sophomore year when Javier transferred here. The scouts have taken notice that every time all three of us are on the ice together, we make magic.”

That actually sounds interesting. I perk up. “Really?”

Javier nods. “The last time the Wolverines won the championship was seventy years ago. Now, everyone is saying it’s ours to win.”

Wow, that sounds like a big deal. I’d heard they were doing well, but not that well. No wonder Marc was talking about hockey more than usual.

“I don’t understand what that has to do with me,” I say.

“ You are going to be our fake girlfriend. We’re so in synch on the ice, everyone will buy it,” Javier says.

I blink at him. “Dating the same girl?”

“ Sharing her, if you will,” Reid says softly.

I look at my bed when I start sweating under my bathrobe.

“Why do you keep doing that?” Javier asks.

“Just making sure I’m not dreaming this,” I mutter. “I’m not in my bed, so this must be happening.”

Reid laughs. “It’s definitely happening. And the people who don’t believe it soon will. Once they’ve seen us together around campus, they’ll buy in to us sharing you.”

Something strange happens to my insides when he—they—say they will share me.

One girl shared by three hot hockey stars.

Wait.

“But Caleb…”

Javier lifts his shoulder in a half-shrug. “Ah. Caleb doesn’t need a girlfriend the way we do. He needs a distraction.”

“A distraction?” I echo.

Me?

Reid crosses his arms. “On game day, it’s just him, the team, our opponents, and the ice. That’s it. Now, that focus isn’t just when he’s on the ice. It’s all the time. That’s not good for his ability to play well or his mental health. We need you to remind him a world exists outside of hockey.”

“I can’t do that,” I whisper.

“You can because you already did,” Javier says, eyeing me closely. “The Caleb we know would have told you to get checked out by a doctor, nudged you out of the door, and returned to the ice ASAP.”

Reid leans toward me. “ This Caleb checked your head himself, stopped practicing to hear about your night of hell, and reminded us to tell you that you need to get your head checked out by a doctor. Have you done that yet?”

I blink at him. “Done what?”

Reid motions to my head. “Had your head looked at?”

“No. I’m fine.” Leaving my dorm today isn’t happening. Not for all the money in the world.

“Get it checked out.” Javier picks up a neon yellow Post-it notepad and a pen from my desk, writing something down on the pad.

“What are you doing?” I’m leaning toward him when Reid clears his throat.

Reid flicks his gaze down. I do the same and blush at how badly my robe is gaping. I might not have much in the boob department, but I have a dodgy top button and just enough boob to pop out if I’m not careful. I belt up. “Thanks.”

He nods. “Were those squirrels?”

“And acorns.”

He smiles at me. “Cute.”

I’d thought he would laugh. I’m a twenty-two-year-old college senior, and my favorite PJs have little squirrels and acorns on them.

“My number,” Javier says, setting the notepad and pen on my desk and getting to his feet. “If you want payback, call, and we can help each other out.”

“And if I want to get back together with him?” I don’t, but I’m curious about their response.

Reid smiles at me. “You deserve better than a guy who would treat you like that, Tobie Myers.”

They leave me alone with an unexpected offer, a phone number, my confused feelings, and I don’t know what to do about any of it.

When my phone vibrates, I pick it up and immediately break out in a cold sweat.

Marc

We need to talk.

I know this conversation has to happen, but a sick churn starts in my belly, and I’d love nothing more than to hide under my bed.

I can’t.

Not about this.

Face-to-face confrontation is hard. Text is easier. We are not having this conversation in public where people will see me ugly cry. He’s coming to me.

I type out my response.

Me

We can talk in the common room on my floor.

An hour later, I’m showered, dressed in sweats and a hoodie, and hanging out in the common room on my floor as I wait for Marc to show up. Luckily, with it being a Saturday, the girls on my floor are either out at the mall or sleeping off a Friday night hangover, so I have the room to myself.

Yes, we could have this conversation in my room, but I don’t want him in there again.

We had sex in my bed, and he told me he loved me numerous times there.

I didn’t want a place I regard as my sanctuary to be where I have confirmation that my boyfriend of six years has been sleeping with another woman.

This conversation is happening in the common room with a large wooden dining table and cozy, brightly-colored sectional sofas in front of a television hung on the wall.

As I wait, I pace from the dining table to the sofas, then to the window overlooking the quad, biting my already bitten nails to the quick as nerves eat me alive.

A small sound pulls my gaze from the window.

Marc stands in the doorway, hands stuffed in his pockets. He’s handsome, as usual, in blue jeans and a cream-colored sweater. His expression is one I’ve never seen before—closed off and so serious—and my heart clenches.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” he says.

I cross the room to pick up the glass of water I poured to take my thyroid meds. If I drink from it, I’ll choke, so I hold it for something to do, conscious I should be screaming at him or demanding answers. Yet I look at him, and I just want to cry.

“Do you love her?” The words slip out before I can swallow them.

It’s not the question I should want answered first, but it’s the one I need. It’s stupid to hope the answer is yes. If he fell in love and couldn’t bring himself to tell me, it would still hurt, but not half as much as knowing he was screwing behind my back for the sake of it.

He shrugs. “I don’t know.”

He doesn’t know?

“Do you love me?”

His pause is even longer, and it breaks my heart when he says, “I don’t know that either.”

Surely, that’s something you know, right? I understand confusion about liking or not liking someone, depending on if they’d done something to piss you off that day. But love and hate? Those are pretty clear-cut, at least in my mind.

“I mean, you’re there,” he says vaguely.

“I’m there ?”

“We’ve been together for a while,” he says, making me wish he had stuck with vague.

I struggle to believe how, in a few short words, he’s reduced me to a pair of old slippers. The girl he was with must be brand new Uggs, fresh from the store.

“Did you sleep with her?”

Marc stares down at me.

The longer he doesn’t answer, the more I hate myself for asking at all.

“More than once?”

“I’m not sure you want me to answer that, Tobie.”

“Because it’s been going on for a while, right?” My smile is bitter. “So long you were perfectly comfortable taking her to a hockey game.”

He says nothing.

“You don’t know if you love her, but you wanted to sleep with her and throw away six years with me, right?”

“Tobie…” He takes a step forward.

I step back, my fingers freezing as I curl them around the glass in my hand.

And I realize he hasn’t really answered any of my questions. That’s become a recent habit of his. Because it’s something he picked up while studying for his LSATs, and lawyers dodge direct questions, or he doesn’t care enough to give me the answers I need.

Now, more than ever, I hate that about him. Maybe I just hate him.

“Get out,” I say quietly.

He steps around the table, and I do something so un-Tobie I don’t even recognize myself. I throw my glass at his head.

He ducks, cursing as the glass smashes against the wall.

I don’t see it shatter. My eyes are full of tears.

By the time I’ve wiped away my tears, I’m alone.

He left.

I turn back to the window overlooking the quad. I’m still standing there as Marc walks away from my dorm and a blonde-haired woman approaches him.

I can’t see her face, but the bright platinum is familiar.

She was outside my dorm.

He actually told her to meet him right here.

The sound of laughter and footsteps in the hallway propels me into action.

I quickly clean up the water and broken glass and return to my room, closing the door behind me and locking it. And I stand there, staring at nothing as tears roll down my cheeks.

I can’t bring myself to leave this room.

Not now.

Maybe not ever.

But I have to. Because if Marc was sleeping with another girl, and he was sleeping with me at the same time, how can I know if he was using a condom with her? I’m on birth control, and we used condoms most of the time, but we didn’t always.

I need to get myself checked out.

My gaze lands on the Post-it Note on my desk. I’m wearing my glasses, so I should be able to read Javier’s number on it from here, yet everything is blurry.

Brushing the tears from my cheeks, I unplug my fully charged cell phone and pick up the Post-it pad, dialing the number on it.

It rings twice. “Yeah?”

My fingers tighten around my phone. “I want revenge. I want it to be public, and I want him on his knees.”

Is it weird that I can tell Javier is smiling when he says, “We’ll be over at six.”