Page 42 of Behind the Net

I could go on pretending, but why? It’s exhausting. And the fact that he remembers me is making my heart do Daisy’s excited tippy-taps against the front wall of my chest.

“I remember you,” I admit. “Of course I remember you.”

His expression stills. “You do?”

I can’t help but roll my eyes. “Jamie. Come on. You were on your way to the NHL. You were one of the popular kids. All the girls swooned over you. You were gorgeous, even back then—”

His eyebrow goes up, and there’s that look again. Teasing, focused, and determined. “You think I’m gorgeous?”

Sparks dance up my throat, and I swallow. I’m blushing. “Uh,” I say stupidly.

The corner of his mouth twitches. “You saideven back then. That means you thought I was gorgeous then, and you think I’m gorgeous now.”

My pulse beats in my ears and I can’t look away. His gaze pins me like a butterfly under glass. My lips part and close as I scramble for what to say.

Busted. I’msobusted, and now that he clearly knows I’ve had the most massive crush on him forever, it’s going to be awkward.

He leans forward with a confident, teasing smirk that makes my heart pound harder.

“I thought you were gorgeous, too,” he murmurs, looking at me in a way that makes me feel like I can’t breathe. “Even back then.”

It can’t be true. I study his eyes, searching for the lie, but come up with nothing. No one’s ever called me gorgeous except my mom, and that’s different.

Something weird is happening inside my head; I’m rapidly reconsidering everything I thought to be true.

“Oh.” The word falls from my lips, and the corner of his mouth tugs up. “Okay.” I sound dazed.

Our eyes are locked, and there’s a zing of tension between us. My stomach rolls, and for a moment, I want Jamie to be that guy, the one who makes me forget Zach ever existed.

His gaze drops to my lips, and focused hunger flares in his eyes. My nipples pinch, because I’ve never been looked at like that, and definitely not by a guy who looks like Jamie.

Predatory focus rises in his eyes, and between my legs, I clench.

It feels like we’re about to kiss.

A tiny part of me is freaking out, waving her arms around and snapping her fingers to get my attention. This is crazy, and it isn’t real. The energy in the air is heated, tense, and dangerous, and I don’t want anything to do with it. I don’t even want toimaginethat Jamie likes me.

He’ll devastate me. After Zach, I’m full of cracks. I can’t have feelings for Jamie, because if it ends like it did with Zach—which it will—I’ll smash.

I shoot to my feet, holding my guitar like a shield. “We should go to bed.”

He watches me with that look that makes my insides squirm. “Good night, Pippa.”

Leaving him in the living room, sprawled on the couch like that, I run up the stairs, back to my room, where I set my guitar in its case and climb back into bed.

My heart races while I stare out the window at the dark sky, thinking about how Jamie watched me while I played.

CHAPTER21

JAMIE

“Their first-line defenseis weak since Hammond is out with an injury,” Ward tells our defensemen a couple nights later in the dressing room. Hayden Owens and Alexei Volkov, an older defenseman, nod.

Ward continues to talk us through game strategy. The energy in the room is heightened, crackling with intensity. Even down here, we can hear the fans excited in the stands.

The Calgary Cougars are our biggest rival, and tonight is the first game against them this season.

Ward runs through the drills we practiced this week, but my mind is elsewhere.

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