Page 10 of Best Man
“I know, I know,” he trailed off. “I just want to make sure my baby girl is taken care of.” Truth was, Dad lovedJax and knew he was a stand-up guy. But as the wedding neared, he was growing more and more sentimental and having a hard time not letting it show.
Piper tutted. “I’mthe one that worries about you guys, remember?”
Paulina was still staring at the picture of the jet, lost in her own world. She found herself wondering about Jax’s best friend, Aleksander Nikolaev. She’d visited Piper in Dallas a few times and met a couple of Jax’s teammates, and even Niko’s sister, Katerina, but never Niko himself. Still, she wasn’t surprised to hear the Russian would rent his own jet—it sounded very “on brand” for the young and flashy superstar.
“What’s he like, anyway?” she blurted out.
“Who? Niko?” Piper gave it a moment’s thought. “He’s a great guy. Little bit of a nut, but a great guy overall.”
“A nut?”
“Yeah, you’ll see when you meet him—he’s hilarious, just a total ham, and his Russian accent makes everything that comes out of his mouth that much funnier. That’s why he draws a crowd wherever he goes. He’s always the life of the party.”
Paulina bobbed her head. She didn’t watch atonof hockey—when she watched, it was only to see how Jax was doing—but when she did, she could plainly see that Niko was popular with his teammates. And it wasn’t just because he seemed to always punch in a big goal when the team desperately needed it. No matter what the score was, Niko was always in the middle of the action, smiling and rallying everyone’s spirits on the bench.
“I bet the girls can’t get enough of him,” Paulina said. It almost went without saying. Niko was attractive in that rugged Russian way, with dark and serious features that seemed to hint at a certain danger lurking just beneath the handsome surface. Add in the fact that he was a professional hockey player—one of the verybest in the league—and ofcourseNiko was a hit with the ladies.
“OhGod, yeah,” her sister answered. “Practically every time I see him, he’s with some new girl.”
Even Mom sounded amused. “Ooh. He’s a heartbreaker.”
“You have no idea, Mom.” Piper chuckled. “And the thing is, they’re alwaysthemost beautiful girls you’ve ever seen. Like, just when you thinkhe can’t possibly find a more gorgeous girlfriend,voila,he’s got some new exotic beauty onhis arm. You’ll see what I mean when you meet his current girlfriend. She’s a supermodel from Spain. Let’s just say Niko has an eye for expensive items.”
Paulina snickered. “Hence the jet.”
“Yup. Like I said, that stunt is par for the course for Niko. But yeah, he’s a great guy.” Piper lowered her voice to share a few reluctant concerns. “He does have a little bit of a dark side to him, though.”
Mildly intrigued, Paulina’s eyebrow arched. “Dark side?”
“Yeah. Don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t happentoooften. Only enough for it to be a thing, really. But sometimes—” She sighed. “Sometimes, it’s like he goes into a shell where no one can reach him. Not even Jax can get through to him when he’s in one of those episodes. His game starts to suffer, too. That’s the only time you’ll catch him in a goal scoring drought, when he’s all moody and quiet and no one knows what’s wrong with him.”
“Huh. Strange.” Paulina took a moment to let that information percolate. After pondering it, though, she decided that even this fit in with everything else she knew about the athlete. “Actually, that makes sense, in a way.”
“How so?” Piper asked.
“You don’t get to be as good at hockey as he is without being off in a few other ways, you know? Talent has a habit of making people eccentric.”
Piper let out a soft laugh. “Yeah. Good point. And eccentric is definitely the right word for him, too.”
Paulina kept a small smile from spreading. She couldn’t say why, but she liked knowing her assessment might not be far off the mark. It was as if she understood him in some small way.
A jarring klaxon wailed from Piper’s phone. “Shoot, guys.” She silenced the alarm. “We gotta hurry up. People are going to start showing up in an hour.” Her scissors snipped furiously, a flurry of leaves and stems flying through the air as she pushed herself to work faster.
Paulina touched a hand to her sister’s back and gave her a gentle rub. “Pip, you should go get ready. We can take care of the rest. Right, guys?” she asked Mom and Dad, who agreed.
“Really? You don’t mind?” Relief filled Piper’s eyes. “But I can’t dump all this work on you—”
“That’s what your maid of honor is here for,” Paulina reassured her.
“But it’ll go so much faster if I pitch in. And I’m sure you’re dying to change into something nice, too.”
“This isyourwedding, not mine. No one expectsme to look nice. Now hurry and go clean up!”
Convinced at last, big sister set down her scissors and gave little sister a hug. “Thank yousomuch.You’re the best.” Piper thanked Mom and Dad, too, then scampered out of the barn and ran towards the house.
After a while, Paulina noticed her mom trying to hide a sneaky smile while she worked. “What? Why are you smiling, Mom?” she demanded to know, but Mom demurred, pretending it wasn’t anything worth sharing.“C’mon, tell me. What’s so funny? I want to know.”
She finally badgered her mom into submission. “It’s really nothing,” Mom began, “but I was just thinking, you sound awfully curious about this Niko character, and—”
