Page 86 of Conrad

“What?” She lowered the fist. “Okay, no video. I just thought?—”

“What are you talking about?”

She recoiled. Glanced past him, then frowned and shot her voice low. “I’m talking about you and Penelope Pepper. And your agreement to . . . you know.” She whispered the last words.

“No, I don’t know. Our agreement—wait.” He frowned. “Is this about my coaching EmPowerPlay? I thought that was Coach Jace’s idea, not Penny’s?—”

“Cute. You’re calling her Penny. I like it. I’ll use that?—”

“For what?” He didn’t mean to roar, but—“What are you talking about?”

“Your fake relationship. Sheesh.” She had lifted her hand to get him to lower his voice. “What did you think I was talking about?”

He stared at her, trying to sort the words through his head. “Fake . . . what?”

She stepped up to him, her voice even lower. “You know—you pretend to date her and she pretends to date you, and you use each other’s fame to grow your followers?”

Even with the full sentence, he didn’t grasp it.

Not for a full five seconds. Then, “It’sfake?”

Oh . . . oh no.Because her mouth opened, and he winced, and now his heart really thundered inside him, the room nearly spinning?—

“Conrad—I thought . . . oh no. I thought you knew. I mean—yes, I was supposed to ask you, but you didn’t go to the last game, and I haven’t been to practice and . . . Conrad?”

He pushed past her, already wearing his jacket, his keys in his pocket, and ignored her as she called out his name.

Then he thundered out into the night, to the stars and the chill and the open air and the truth.

Penelope had been playing her own spectacular game. And clearly was every bit the pro.

Talk about playing like a first grader.What. an.idiot.

And then, because he didn’t know what else to do and it was better than throwing his brand-new phone, he pulled it out, opened his imported contact list, and deftly blocked Penelope Pepper from his life.

* * *

She should have stayed at the game.

Penny turned off the post-game radio show and sat in the silence of the parking lot at Theodore Wirth Park, the looming beach house quiet and cold under the stars. Snow blanketed the playground, and the ice of the frozen lake spread out ahead of her, dark yet glistening under the moonlight.

She shivered. Oh, she should have waited for Conrad. The memory of his embrace as she’d stared at her charred garage swept through her, settled. It was probably what had pushed her to go to the game today when she’d gotten his direct message through her Instagram account. She might have ignored it—it’d felt weird that he hadn’t texted her—but then again, he hadn’t found his phone after the accident, so maybe he didn’t have a new one yet.

Her father had secured a new phone for her, her data transferred, her phone number intact, and all of her contacts imported. And of course, her GPS locator app installed.

The locator also worked on the car he’d loaned her, a super inconspicuous Audi A8, so there was that.

She should probably thank him instead of feeling stalked.

Instead, she’d let herself settle on the memory of Conrad trying to protect her at the cabin. It only added to the sense that . . . this might be real. He’d certainly been excited to see her at the game, grinning at her like it might just be him and her, not a show for the entire world.

And then he’d gone out and scored a goal.

Her phone buzzed, and she lifted it. Not Conrad, of course.

Holden Walsh.

Holden

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