Page 37 of Faking It with my Hockey Crush

“Do you speak the language?” I ask curiously.

She smiles and shakes her head.

“Non ne hai bisogno. La tua straordinaria bellezza parla per te.”

She gasps and her eyes widen in delight “What did you just say?”

“That with the cost of my education, my father would’ve killed me if I didn’t at least pick something up,” I lie.

That’s not what I said at all, but she’s not ready to hear the truth. In fact, I’m not sure I am, either.

We’re standing on the upstairs landing, looking out over the estate with a view of the frozen lake, when I suddenly say, “Hey, you want to go ice-skating?”

Emma smirks at me like I’m joking.

“I’m being serious.”

“There’s no way your boots would fit me,” she says.

“Not the ones I wear now, but the ones I had as a kid would. I still have them.”

“What about your knee?”

“My physiotherapist tells me that exercise is good for strengthening my strained ligament.” I smirk.

She laughs then, and so, we end up on the ice.

She’s never been ice-skating before, so I keep a tight hold of her hand as she steps onto the ice with wobbling legs and terror in her eyes.

“That’s it. You’ve got it,” I encourage, even though she’s moving at a snail’s pace.

“How on Earth do you fly around the ice at that speed?” she gasps. “It’s like walking on polished marble.”

“Practice.” I grin. “Hours and hours and hours of practice.”

She’s holding on to me like her life depends on it, but as the minutes pass, Emma starts to gain enough confidence to stand up a little straighter.

“Nice,” I say, trying to be as encouraging as I can.

“Oh, come on. There are kids that can do better than this,” she says, deriding herself.

“Sure there are, but then, kids are fearless. That’s why they start your training when you’re young.”

Half an hour later, her grip has lessened, and she’s actually lifting her feet up to glide instead of shuffling along. Her cheeks are rosy red, a light stream of condensation trickles from her mouth, and her brows are still furrowed together as she concentrates, but she’s making progress.

“You know,” I say softly as we circle the lake, “I really appreciate everything you’re doing. All of this—the craziness, the attention.”

Emma’s gaze softens, and her grip on me loosens just a little. “Hey, I signed up for this, remember?” she says, a hint of that familiar humor flickering in her voice. “And, surprisingly, it’s been… fun. Sometimes awkward”—she grins—“but mostly fun.”

After a little while, we move to the middle of the lake, and I bring us to a stop. I’m sure Emma could do with a break, given that skating is taking up a lot of her concentration. For a minute, we gaze over the expanse of the estate, but while Emma’s taking in the view, my heart is doing something completely different.

If I had to describe it, I would say it was a mixture of warmth and gratitude, but beneath that, deeper down, there is something unfamiliar. It scares me a little bit, and I’m not even sure I want to examine it too closely.

“It really is beautiful here,” Emma says whimsically.

“It is. I don’t appreciate it half as much as I should,” I reply.

I gaze down at her, and there’s that feeling again.

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