Page 23 of Holiday Hostilities

Reagan laughs before she reaches out to grab her phone again. Her eyes widen when she looks at the screen and then she glances down to the ice, where the guys are warming up. Her entire demeanor seems to change in an instant. “On that thought, I, um, will be right back.”

She takes off running, but I don’t get a chance to wonder about her untimely exit, because Sofia swoops into the box in a cloud of sweet perfume and warm hugs. “Liv, hi! Sorry I’m late.” She squeezes me tight, then squeezes the woman next to me. “Maddie, it’s so good to see you. I love the new haircut! How’s Gray doing?”

“He’s so good. He just started smiling. Can’t stop grinning at his daddy. It’s the cutest.”

Maddie whips out her phone to show us a picture of her baby boy. He really is adorable with his dimpled smile and big blue eyes. At the top of the screen, a notification pops up and Maddie winces. “Man, this is really blowing up.”

Sofia’s face falls. “I just saw. What was that awful woman thinking?”

“I think Reagan just went to her office to do some damage control.” Maddie bites her lower lip, then glances at my confused expression. “Reagan’s the team’s social media manager.”

“Right.”Not Aaron’s latest woman, then.But this doesn’t quite answer my questions regarding what on earth everyone is talking about. “What happened, sorry?” I don’t want to sound nosy, but my curiosity is getting the better of me. Even if thisdoeshave to do with Aaron Marino.

“Ay ay ay, you’ll not believe what’s going on with Aaron, so terrible!” Sofia says with wide eyes. Poor silly lamb, she actually likes the man, having met him in the context of “Jake’s best friend,” and not “Olivia’s torturer.”

She holds out her phone. “You’re gonna lose your mind. Check this out.”

I watch the video on the screen for a few moments before I have to clap a hand over my mouth in a vain attempt to muffle the laughter that spills from me.

Ohhhhh, this isgood.

“Wow. That’s, erm… bad,” I barely manage through my giggles as the woman in the video shamelessly cheers as a lizard chomps the head off of a cockroach named Aaron Marino.

Happy Thanksgiving to me. Because for this, I am very, very thankful.

Maddie looks at me curiously, her head tilted to one side like a little bird. “You really don’t like him, do you?”

“No, I don’t,” I say simply, not bothering to mince my words. “But don’t worry, he doesn’t like me either, so it’s a mutual kind of dislike.”

“Ah, I see,” Maddie says in a way that implies that she does not see in the least.

Sofia, meanwhile, has apparently forgotten all about the conversation at hand as she blows a million kisses in Jake’s adoring direction.

I also focus my attention on the ice. Seek out number 22 in the flurry of jerseys skating around and warming up. The next time he looks up at me, I give him a big-ass, genuine smile.

It might be exceedingly petty on my part—the childish brat in me winning out again—but I genuinely think it’s about damn time that man’s way-too-healthy ego took a hit.

Unfortunately for me, though, said ego-hit is short-lived, because within five minutes of hitting the ice, Seb Slater scores thanks to a beautiful assist from Aaron.

Ten minutes later, Perez scores with another assist from the Cyclones captain.

The second period doesn’t go as well for the guys, with Vegas scoring twice to tie up the game.

By the end of the third period, we have a nailbiter on our hands. Both teams manage to get a few good looks but don’t score, keeping the board at 2-2.

With thirty seconds to go, the crowd jumps to their feet as Aaron dekes out two of the opposing team’s defensemen to carve himself a path of opportunity. He’s a big guy—6’5, 230lbs, not that I’ve looked him up—yet he moves so fast, so fluidly, it’s practically poetry on ice.

And no, I would never admit that aloud, even over my own dead body.

He outskates the defense easily, lines up his shot, and takes fire.

Scores.

The arena erupts in a deafening roar and it takes me a moment to realize that I’m on my feet with the rest of the crowd, screaming my lungs out for AaronfrickingMarino.

As if he can hear my thoughts, he suddenly looks up at me and grins like the devil.

I stare at him, transfixed, for a glimmer of a moment, and then sit my ass down as fast as humanly possible.

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