“You’re not sleeping together?”

Sharon tugged on her hair and looked embarrassed. “I can’t believe we’re having this conversation. I haven’t even told my sister about this, and I tell her everything.”

“We’re meeting under a crisis situation. Like two strangers sitting next to each other on a doomed airplane.” Another chorus of groans erupted from the nearby skyboxes, and Phoebe flinched. “Your secret’s safe with me. To tell you the truth, I’m a little envious. At least you’ll never have to be afraid that he only wants you for sex.”

“I suppose you’re right. And to be honest, I haven’t encouraged him at all. He’s the most exciting man I’ve ever known, but I can’t seem to relax with him. It’s complicated.”

Phoebe recalled Ron’s saying that Sharon had been in the next skybox, the one the Stars used as an overflow for visiting VIPs. Sharon’s suitor was obviously someone with a high profile, and she couldn’t resist a gentle probe. “I haven’t heard any unusual gossip, so you and your Greek god must be keeping this quiet.”

“The local press had a field day with his divorce, so we’ve been careful about appearing together in public. This is the first game I’ve attended. As a matter of fact, there have been more rumors about the two of you than about us. Your friendship seems to mean a lot to him.”

Phoebe looked at her quizzically, and then everything inside her went still. Wild cheering broke out in the skyboxes, but she didn’t hear it. She didn’t hear anything except the clamoring of her own heart.

Sharon failed to notice that anything was wrong. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that Dan never mentioned me to you.”

“No. No, he didn’t.” Her voice seemed to be coming from a great distance.

“He’s a private person in a lot of ways. I’m not putting myself down when I say this—really, I’m not. But I just can’t figure out what he sees in me.”

Phoebe could figure it out. Sharon Anderson was the sweet, down-to-earth girl a man fell in love with and married. Phoebe was the sexy bimbo a man fucked and forgot.

Another round of cheering broke out. She didn’t know how they got back into the skybox or how she managed to stumble through her halftime interview. Luckily, the wild cheering during the third and fourth quarters made conversation for the remainder of the game impossible. By the time it was over, she was barely able to register the Stars’ decisive 2410 victory over the Bills.

On the two televisions suspended from the ceiling, the commentator explained how it had happened. “The Bills began to lose their momentum during the second quarter, and they never regained it. You can’t make that many critical mistakes against a team as talented and well coached as the Stars. This team has improved so much over the season. No doubt about it. The Stars are this season’s Cinderella team.”

Meanwhile, the Cinderella team’s owner had been left with a broken heart and a glass slipper that had shattered into a million pieces. Hours later, as she stood at her bedroom window, her eyes swollen and her chest aching, she wondered how she was going to find the courage to go on. She had suffered a betrayal so deep and wrenching that she felt as if she had been ripped apart. For the first time in her life, she had dared to hope that she was worthy of love, only to discover, once again, that she was wrong.