Page 64 of Mistletoe Face Off

There's a pause before she says, “It's kinda late.”

What does that mean? She doesn't want to see me? Or does she really go to bed at 9:00?

“I just wanna talk to you. You seemed… different tonight. Can I come up?” I hold my breath.

After a beat, the buzzer sounds and the door pops open, and I make my way quickly up to her floor. When I get there, she's waiting at the door, and my concern that something is wrong grows into full on worry.

“What's going on, Holly? Is everything okay?”

“You'd better come in,” she replies, her face pale as she stands back for me to walk through her door.

She leads me to the living room, where she fusses, offering me a drink and a snack.

I place my hands on her shoulders. “Holly. I don’t need anything. I just need you to tell me what’s going on.”

“Let's sit down,” she says, and I take her hand in mine as we sit side by side on her sofa.

“Whatever it is, let me help you,” I say straight off the bat.

She lets out a heavy breath, her pretty face creased in worry, and my heart clenches.

I reach for her hand. “Is it Macy? Is she okay? Or your mom? Or you? Please say you’re all okay.”

“We’re all fine,” she assures me. “I… I met with someone before the team charity event.”

My first thought is it's her ex-husband. She's seen him and he’s said or done something to upset her.

What she says next me shakes me to the bone.

“Harry, I’m just going to ask you straight. Were you involved in a figure skating doping scandal when you were a teenager?”

Instantly my chest constricts painfully, my ribs squeezing like a vise around my lungs, making it impossible to draw a full breath.

Sheknows?

I swallow, playing for time. The way I see it, I've got a bunch of ways I could react. I could flat out deny the story. I could dismiss it as rumor. I could feign ignorance. But Holly’s a journalist. She can dig up whatever she wants. And besides, I want to be totally honest with this woman, just as I want her to be with me.

So in the end, I simply choose the truth. She deserves it.

“Yes,” I reply, watching her for her reaction. Her eyelids flutter like she’s been hit in the gut and she takes a sharp breath.

“So, it's true?”

“Can you explain to me why you want to know?” I ask, my head screaming at meShe's a journalist! She’s a journalist!But this is Holly, the woman I've got feelings for. The woman who gets me. The woman who brings out a side of me I haven't seen in a long, long time. Surely, whatever she's doing, for whatever reason she's asking me about this, she's got my best interests at heart.

“My boss gave me a contact and I met with him tonight before the charity event. He told me that he knows Garth Gluckman.”

I tighten my jaw at the name. “What did he say about Garth?”

“That you were involved in a doping incident at a figure skating competition when you were a teenager, and that you got disqualified because of it. Harry, is it true?”

I bow my head. “Yeah.”

“Oh.”

I look back up at her to see the pain written across her face.

“Why did you do it?” she asks.

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