The fake-humble attitude had always been his dad’s go-to—but Shelby didn’t know any better. For her, he’d always be the great David Petrov, king of the ice and holder of multiple scoring records.

“I know who you are, sir.” She shook his hand. “I’m Shelby Blanton.”

“With The Biscuit?” His dad’s eyes lit up with what would look like sincerity to someone who didn’t know him better. “Wow. That site is great. Huge fan.”

She nearly melted into a puddle right there. “That means a lot.”

“Well, I know you guys have a flight to catch. Good to see you again.” He turned to Shelby. “Wonderful to finally put a gorgeous face with a kickass site. Keep up the good work.”

Then he walked away down the tunnel—in the direction of the reporters, of course. No doubt, he’d pull his usual no-comment routine that always seemed to drive up interest.

“So you guys are talking again?” she asked, practically beaming with hope. “Oh, thank God. I was so worried. He seems like he’s really making an effort to fix things.”

“Yeah,” Ian said, grinding out the word through clenched teeth. “He’s quite a guy.”

Years of training, of knowing that to tell the truth about his dad would only mean more scrutiny from the press, more second-guessing of his every move, and more ridiculous think pieces purporting to be a deep dive into his private life, kept him from saying more.

All he was, sometimes all it seemed he would ever be, was a reflection of his dad. It was easier to keep it on lockdown, to let the world believe the lie—especially when it came to Shelby, because letting her see that part of his life, that would be admitting too much about him and about how he felt about her.

…

A half hour into the flight back home and Shelby had run out of small talk. It didn’t help that Ian had gone back into cabin grunt mode. Sitting next to him, she searched for anything to maybe draw the moment out a little more. As soon as they were wheels down in Harbor City, everything changed. No more dinners. No more ice-skating. No more devouring a midnight bowl of room service ice cream while sitting naked in the bed.

She wasn’t ready for that yet.

The anticipation of landing had her fiddling with her six-year chip, rubbing the pad of her thumb over the plastic ridges to ground herself to the here and now. In a moment of desperation, she grabbed hold of the first thing she could think of that they hadn’t talked about so far. “So that’s pretty cool about your dad coming to see you guys.”

The muscle in Ian’s jaw twitched as he continued to look out the team jet’s window.