From Lukov with Love

SPRING/SUMMER

“WOULD YOU STOP?” Ivan hissed at me at the same time he bumped his leg against mine under the table.

“You quit. I’m on my side, you keep your legs together.” I hit my knee against his right back, even though I had told myself I was going to be good and get through this next hour like a champ.

Because I could.

And I would.

For sure if he hadn’t sat next to me.

I wasn’t going to be the one to screw up this interview that Coach Lee had set up for us. If anyone was going to do it, it was going to be this jackass beside me. We had done pretty well since our meeting, where Lee had asked us to try and not hate each other and keep our ugly looks and words to when we were in private… or at least not in earshot of anyone else. She still hadn’t made the same mistake of leaving us alone either, so there was that.

But today was the day we really had to be on our best behavior. I thought it wouldn’t be a problem. I’d survived worse things for sixty minutes.

Then Ivan had decided to sit next to me, and I started to doubt myself. I had already been sitting at the bench in the LC’s staff break room when he had slid in. We were supposed to be waiting for the journalist or blogger or whoever she was to come over and ask us questions in preparation for the official announcement that Ivan and I were now competing together.

Except we weren’t supposed to say it was only for a season. Lee had briefed me on that yesterday. The only people that need to know that is us.

Great.

Shifting my legs so that the inside of my thighs were pressed together and not touching Satan’s so this lady wouldn’t walk in in the middle of us arguing, I looked around the empty kitchen area and tried to ignore the heat of Ivan’s body not even an inch away.

Then his lower thigh bumped into my knee. Again.

“Why are you touching me?” I whispered, barely moving my lips, eyes on the door. I didn’t trust myself to look at him.

“You’re touching me,” was his smart-ass—and stupid—response because he’d been the one to move.

I still didn’t glance at him. “Why are you sitting next to me?”

“Because I can.”

“You’re too close.”

“I’ve been closer to you.”

I side-eyed him. “Because you have to be. Go sit over there. Away from me.”

He was already watching me with those creepy clear blue eyes. “No.”

I blinked, and he blinked right back at me.

Bitch.

“Then move so I can go sit across the table.”

“No.”

I turned my head to fully get a look at him. His hair was neat and brushed over backward, without one strand out of place. Today he was wearing a sweater I recognized, in a shade of gray so light it was almost white. It made his eyes stand out… if I noticed that kind of thing. “Move,” I said.

He repeated himself.

“Move or I’ll make you move.”

That time, he shook his head.

“Why?”

“Because it’ll look better if we’re sitting together.”

I opened my mouth to tell him he was stupid, but… I closed it.

The corners of his mouth flexed a little, just a little.

I scrunched up my nose and made myself look back at the door. A minute passed. Maybe two.

Where was this lady? We had cut practice short to do this. We had barely started moving forward with training. We were doing side-by-side jumps together, and… it was going great. We moved so similarly, especially with jumps, that there were hardly any corrections for us to make. I could tell Coach Lee was pleased. I knew I was.

Ivan knocked his leg against mine out of the blue once more, making me glance back in his direction. He was making a face at me. “Stop doing that. You’re making the whole bench shake.”

What the…?

Oh. I hadn’t even realized I’d been shaking my knee. I stopped and shoved my hands under my thighs.

Then I started bouncing my heels. Where the hell was this lady? She was definitely late.

A hand came down on top of my knee. “Stop. It,” Ivan muttered in that perfectly balanced voice that was deep but not too deep, just perfectly aggravating. “I didn’t know you knew how to be nervous.”

I stopped bouncing my heels and slid him a look out of the corner of my eye, taking in that flawless complexion. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him with a single pimple, whitehead, or blackhead. Ever. Ugh. “I’m not nervous.”

He snorted so loud I turned my whole upper body toward him. He was smiling. That lean face with its microscopic pores, high cheekbones, and angular, hard jaw were all lit up. He was smiling, and he hadn’t just won a competition, and he wasn’t around his family either.

I’d never seen that before.

Who the hell was this person? His leg hit my thigh as he asked, “That’s why you won’t stop shaking your leg?”

“I’m shaking my leg because we could be practicing right now instead of waiting around,” I said, only partially believing my own bullshit. “Why are you in my business anyway? And why are you being so talkative?”

The truth was, I hadn’t been able to stop shaking some part of my body from the moment I’d woken up, knowing this interview was coming. I had no problem talking to people, but what I had a problem with was the fact that I had to answer questions and those responses would be recorded and kept forever to be judged and torn apart for the rest of history. While sitting beside Ivan. Ivan who was already getting on my nerves and no one had even started asking us questions.

No pressure.

“You’re full of shit,” he muttered back, shifting beside me so that his hip pressed against mine.

I glanced back at the door as I said, “You’re full of shit.”

He made a noise in his throat.

Another minute passed.

Maybe two or three more. And the lady still hadn’t shown up.

I was leaving when time was up. I wasn’t going to sit around and wait.

“I’ll talk if you’re worried you’ll say something wrong,” Ivan said in an almost whisper, like he didn’t want us to be overheard either.

I paused for a second at his offer, then scoffed. “I’m not worried.”

“You’re a liar,” he replied immediately.

I couldn’t think of a single comeback, damn it. So I settled for, “Shut up.”

The laugh that came out of him caught me off guard, and it only made me madder about the entire situation.

“What are you laughing at?” I snapped.

It only made him laugh harder. “At you. Jesus. I’ve never actually seen you so tense. I didn’t think you had it in you.”

Pulling my hands out from under my thighs, I set them on top of the table and started tapping my fingertips on it.

“Relax, Meatball,” Ivan kept on talking, sounding way too amused.

I ignored the Meatball, even though I felt myself wince. “I am relaxed,” I lied again.

“Anyone ever told you that you suck at lying? You’re not even trying.” He snickered.

Rolling my eyes, I kept my gaze on the door and slid my hands back under my thighs. I was just about to start bobbing my ankle up and down when I realized I’d start shaking all over again. It was harder than I would have expected to sit still. “Weren’t they supposed to be here at ten?”

“Yeah. It’s ten-oh-six. Give them a break,” my new partner muttered.

“I have things to do,” I explained, only partially lying. “And why isn’t Coach Lee in here with us?”

“Because she doesn’t need to be?” he replied, trying to make me feel like an idiot with his tone.

Huh.

“What kind of things do you need to go do anyway? Steal blankets from babies for fun?” God, he sounded so amused with himself. Dumbass.

“No, Satan. I don’t do that anymore,” I told him dryly.

“Push over elderly people using walkers?”

“Ha ha,” I replied, gritting out the words as I glanced at the door for like the tenth time.

“So? What are you doing after?”

I glanced at him. “Why do you care?”

“I don’t,” he replied easily, and something in my chest felt tight. I shoved it away.

“Good, you shouldn’t.”

“I still want to know.”

I glanced at him again, feeling a sneer come over my mouth and nose. “I have to get to work, nosey ass. Is that okay with you?”

His blank expression was confusing. “You have a job?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

I blinked. “Because things cost money and money doesn’t grow on trees?” I offered, still blinking.

“Ha ha,” was his dry response as he crossed his arms over his chest and gave me another one of those lazy looks that drove me crazy. “Where do you work at?”

Now that genuinely made me laugh. “Yeah, I don’t think so.”

A hint of what might have been a smile or a smirk crossed his features. “You’re not going to tell me?”

“Why? So you can show up at my job and make fun of me?” I asked.

He didn’t even try and deny he would do something like that. He just stared at me. I’d swear some muscle in his jaw twitched too.

I raised my eyebrows like see? Obviously he did, because he didn’t bother arguing over it at all. Instead, his jaw shifted to the side and then back in place before he glanced down at the table, then again at me. “What’s your deal anyway?” he asked, shifting even more so that the entire length of his side—thigh, arm, and my shoulder—were lined up alongside his. “It’s only an interview.”

It was only an interview, like he said.

But it still made me feel almost sick.

“I’ll only laugh at you a little if you tell me why they freak you out so much,” he offered, like that was some sort of consolation. He’d laugh at my fears, but just a little. Oh, okay. “So?” he egged on.

I stared right into those soul-sucking eyes and didn’t reply. He blinked, then I blinked right back. That stupid smile-smirk didn’t go anywhere, and it was that, that had me hunching over to the side to lightly dig the boniest part of my elbow to the middle of his thigh in a warning.

He didn’t flinch or move as I applied pressure. Instead, he lifted his leg to purposely press it against my bone, trying to get a reaction. “It’ll be harder to hold you later if I have a bruise on my leg,” he tried to threaten me.

“So much harder.” I rolled my eyes. “Fuck off. You could do it with bruises all over your thighs.”

He laughed, and it caught me off guard again. “Tell me what your deal is before they get here.”

“I don’t have a deal.”

“You have a problem.”

“I don’t have a problem. I’m fine.”

“I’ve never seen you so squirmy before, and I don’t know if it’s annoying or kind of cute.”

I stared up at him for using the c-word, but nothing on his face confirmed he’d said anything like that to begin with. I didn’t think he’d use the c-word on me, at least not that c-word. Cunt, maybe. Cute, no way.

“We’ll go with annoying,” he went on, still leaving that word in the open. “I’m going to keep asking you until you give me an answer.”

God. What was with all these people in my life who couldn’t and wouldn’t take no for an answer? This was the same game my mom played when she wanted something. Actually it was the same game everyone in my family played when they wanted something that I didn’t want to give them.

“Meatball.”

“You’re the annoying one. I hope you know that.” I glanced toward the doorframe again. “And don’t call me Meatball in front of the reporter person. I don’t need anyone else calling me that.”

“I won’t, if you tell me what’s wrong with you.”

“You’re an idiot.”

He let out a little puff of breath from his nose. “I won’t. Tell me.”

I sighed and rolled my eyes, not feeling like hearing about this the rest of the day—or days—if I refused to. “Look, I don’t like the media is all. I don’t like most people period. They’re always twisting and turning words around to make them controversial. And people eat that shit up. They want the drama. They want to believe all the bad things they hear.”

“So?”

Did this bastard just say “so” like it wasn’t a bad thing? “So, one time I said that I thought the judging system was still not correct, and they turned it around to make it seem like I thought the person that won another event didn’t deserve it. I got hate mail for months after that. Another time, I said someone had a beautiful Y-spin, and suddenly they weren’t any good at anything other than that,” I told him, remembering those two things because they had bothered me for months. And that was just a small fraction of the things that had been twisted and turned until they weren’t at all what I thought or said. I hated people for doing that kind of stuff. I really fucking did. God. “And don’t get me started on videos.”

Ivan didn’t say anything for so long, I had to glance at him. His thigh was still against mine, but he was frowning. I thought about shifting my leg away, but fuck it. He was in my space. I wasn’t going to give him anymore. His question came so unexpectedly, it surprised me. “So, you never said you thought the WHK Cup was rigged?”

Shit.

Tipping my head to the side, I glanced up at him and shrugged. “No, I said that.”

He looked down at me and made a face. “Nothing has been rigged since they changed the scoring system.”

I did know that. The scoring system had been changed when I was a kid after things had been rigged. What had once been a subjective point-system based on a “perfect” 6.0 score, had been ripped apart and reformed based on a stricter point system where each element was worth a certain amount of points; points that would be deducted if the element wasn’t performed well. It wasn’t a flawless system, but it was better.

But I’d been mad at the WHK Cup back then, and who the hell could be responsible for what came out when they were pissed as hell? “Your partner landed double-footed and you almost dropped her doing a triple twist. It was rigged.” The second sentence was a lie, but the rest of it wasn’t. I remembered the incident perfectly.

He snorted, and that time it was him who twisted his entire body to face mine. “It wasn’t rigged. Our base score was a lot higher than yours was, and she completed all of her rotations.”

I knew that, but I was going to be damned if I admitted that his program had much harder elements in it that equaled a much higher score than what my ex and I had. Plus… we hadn’t been perfect. Almost, but not. I probably remembered every single mistake I had ever done in every program ever. Some nights, it kept me up going over everything, even programs from back when I was a teenager. If I hadn’t been so cocky or if I had done just a little better…. How different could my life be if I had just lived up to my potential and not fucked up almost every single thing in my life?

“Okay, it wasn’t rigged,” I agreed, just because I would be more of an idiot if I kept trying to say that it was. By some miracle, I kept myself from smiling. “One of your people just paid off the judges. Whatever you want to call it is fine with me.”

Ivan blinked, and I blinked back at him.

The tip of his tongue touched the inside of his cheek, and his face was smooth when he said, “I won that fair and square.”

“I won third place that night, and I landed everything fine.”

He blinked again. “You landed everything fine, but your choreography was atrocious and you pulled back on your jump sequences after what’s-his-face bailed on the 3S in the event before that one. You also looked like a robot, and your partner looked like he was on the verge of throwing up the entire time.”

He had a point but….

Ivan shrugged so casually I wanted to backhand him. “Your music sucked too.”

The only sucking going on in that moment revolved around me sucking in a breath. “Excuse me. What are you? A musical genius?” I snapped.

He lifted a shoulder. “I have a better ear than you do. Don’t get mad. You’re either born with it or you aren’t.”

I would have gaped, but I didn’t want him to know that he could get that reaction out of me.

Then he kept going. “You’re out of your mind if you think I’m letting you choose the music for any of our programs.”

Now that had me turning my whole body on that bench seat to give him this “the fuck did you say” look. My knee was pretty much on top of his thigh as I leaned toward him. It wasn’t like I didn’t touch him a hundred or three hundred times a day and had for weeks by that point. I could pick him out in a crowd by smell alone, I bet. “What?”

That light pink mouth twitched for the second time that day. “You heard me. Nancy, the choreographers, and I will pick it. It’ll be perfect.” Then his mouth twitched again. “Trust me.”

I had to throw my head back and laugh. “Ha!”

“It’s okay, Jasmine. I’ve always chosen. It’s probably more important than the choreography. You want to win, don’t you?”

No shit I wanted to win, and honestly, he did have great taste in music. His arrangements always surprised me. They were good, but I wasn’t going to admit that. “There’s no ‘I’ in team, you know that?”

The son of a bitch had the nerve to wink. “But there’s an ‘I’ in winning, and if you want to win, you have to listen to me.”

I scoffed. Then I laughed, even though I didn’t want to. “That doesn’t even make sense, you idiot. And quit doing that thing with your eyes. It’s freaking me out.”

Those broad shoulders hunched up without the least bit of apology, straining at the seams of his beautiful sweater that I didn’t have to touch to know it had to be soft as hell. “Makes sense to me.”

“Because you’re a dumbass. You’re not the boss of me. We’re partners. There’s no ‘I’ in partners either.”

He winked again. “We can argue about costumes and choreography, but I’m choosing the music.”

Sheeeit.

I’d take it, but what was I going to do? Say okay? Really, I didn’t care about the music. I’d skate to anything. Now the costumes… “Remember your Chiquita Banana Mambo costume nightmare? I’m sure as hell not letting you choose the costumes without seeing them first. And I already have someone who will make mine.”

A muscle in his cheek twitched for all of a second before it stopped, and he ignored my comment about our costumes. “Who’s a national champion, world champion and Olympic champion?” he had the nerve to ask.

I reeled back. And then couldn’t form a single fucking word. Not one other than one that started with an m, ended with an r and sounded like trucker wucker.

Until this slow smile crept over his mouth.

Then I could. “You’re such an annoying shit. God, I just want to punch you in the face sometimes. Who’s a champion? Shut the hell up.”

What did he do? How did he respond? He laughed. Ivan Lukov laughed loud.

“You probably paid the judges with your Russian mafia money,” I kept going, which earned me another laugh so loud that I almost smiled back at him. When Karina and I were way younger, I had asked her how her parents made so much money that they could live in their giant mansion, and she had said she thought they were in the mafia. They weren’t, but it still made me laugh.

“You’re such a sore loser,” he got out after a moment. “I thought I was bad, but you’ve got me beat.”

“Oh please.” I wasn’t the one who got rid of partners every time one of them failed.

But I didn’t say that.

“You probably sit in your Tesla and cry every time you wrinkle your sweaters.”

Ivan barked out another laugh that was pretty much shouted up at the ceiling.

“What are you laughing at? I’m not trying to be funny,” I said, watching him lose his shit for the first time in the more than ten years we’d known each other. The most I’d ever seen out of him was a smile or two around his family, specifically Karina.

But that was it.

I hadn’t even known he knew how to laugh…. Unless he was doing something shitty, like taking people’s souls and stuff.

“Oh, that’s nice,” a new voice piped up, nearly getting lost into the volume of Ivan being a pain in the ass.

And just like that, he stopped, the sound of his laugh replaced with silence.

We both looked toward the door at the same time. Sure enough, there was a woman standing there at the doorway holding a messenger bag in one hand and a purse in the other. “You don’t have to stop on my account,” she said, smiling.

I didn’t say anything, and neither did Ivan.

She kept her smile on her face. “I’m sorry I’m late,” she went on, without offering an explanation.

If she was expecting an “it’s okay” out of me, she wasn’t getting it. I couldn’t stand people that were late. Apparently, Ivan wasn’t a fan either, but out of the corner of my eye, I saw him bob his head. “We’re ready whenever you are to get started. We both have other engagements and can’t stay late.”

He had something to do too? Since when? He didn’t have a job. I used to think I wouldn’t have one either if I had the opportunity to stay at home, but the truth was, I’d probably go apeshit without things to do. I could barely sit still for ten minutes.

But… what the hell did Ivan have to do?

The other woman nodded and began making her way into the break room, clutching a bag in each hand. “I understand, all I need is a minute to get ready,” she said as she dropped her messenger bag on the table in between the bench seat that Ivan and I were sitting on and the chairs on the opposite side. She had to be in her mid-thirties, maybe even a little older. I never trusted guessing people’s ages because neither one of my parents looked like theirs. “Amanda Moore,” she said, thrusting a hand out in my direction first.

“Jasmine,” I responded, taking her hand and giving it a shake.

She did the same to Ivan, who said, “Ivan. Pleasure to meet you.”

Pleasure to meet you? What a suck-up. But I kept my attention forward on the lady, because as much as I wanted to shoot him a side-look, there was no way I’d be able to hide my “you’re full of shit” face.

She gave us both a tight smile before beginning to go through her bag. She pulled out a laptop, a small black device that had to be a recorder, and a small yellow notebook along with a pen. “One minute,” she said, as she opened her laptop.

Ivan’s leg touched mine underneath the table, but I didn’t look at him.

Not too long afterward, after moving things around, the woman gave us a tight smile. “Okay, I’m ready now.”

The idiot beside me touched his leg against mine once more. That time, I hit my knee against the side of his thigh at the same time I folded my hands and stuck them between my thighs out of view. I wasn’t going to be the one to break. No way. Lee wasn’t going to get the chance to give me shit.

“I already thanked Ms. Lee for reaching out to Ice News for the interview, but I wanted to thank both of you myself. When the rumors started coming in that you and Mindy weren’t going to skate together, we were wondering who would replace her,” the woman named Amanda started, her gaze shifting to Ivan’s direction as she spoke to him.

Good. I didn’t know what they thought or knew about Ivan’s situation besides that they wanted to keep the details under wraps. They could figure that out and deal with it. All I wanted was to compete.

“So,” she continued on, glancing down at her notebook for a moment. “I’m going to record this conversation, if that’s okay with both of you.”

I nodded at the same time Ivan said, “Yes.”

The woman beamed. “I have it here that you’ve been training together at the Lukov Ice Complex for the last fourteen years?” she asked me.

“Yes,” we both answered at the same time. Was he trying to answer for me?

She bobbed her head. “And, Ivan, you’ve been here since it was built twenty-one years ago?”

“Yes. Before that I lived and trained in California,” he replied, like he’d answered that question countless times in the past, maybe because he had.

The reporter switched her attention to me. “You’ve known each other since you started coming here?”

I could do this.

“No,” I answered, trying to keep from instantly thinking her questions were dumb. Wasn’t it common knowledge that Ivan had been doing this longer than I had? “He was more advanced than I was. We met about a year or two later.” She didn’t need to know we had “met” at his house instead of the LC.

The woman gave me a little smile. “But you’re close friends with the family, aren’t you?”

I blinked. How the hell did people know that? “Yes.”

“You were in the same classes as—” She paused and glanced at her notebook. “—Karina Lukov, Ivan’s sister. Correct?”

I nodded. Unlike Ivan, her parents hadn’t put her into figure skating until she was a lot older. She had taken dance classes instead. The only reason they put her into figure skating was because Ivan had won a gold in the junior level and she had wanted to try. You know, since her family already owned an ice rink and all. Why not? I had shaken my head the first time she told me that story.

“How long did that last?” the Amanda woman asked.

Luckily, Ivan decided to answer that question. I didn’t want to. I didn’t even want Karina being brought up into our conversation. She didn’t like having attention on her of any sort, and I respected that. “My sister stopped at fourteen. She decided to pursue other things.”

Did his voice sound weird or was it my imagination? Maybe he didn’t like talking about her either.

“But you two were best friends?” she asked me.

I nodded again and didn’t miss the funny look the woman gave me. Maybe she wanted more than one-word answers and nods, but that’s all she was getting, until I had to say more.

“This partnership is a decade in the making then?”

I froze. Don’t look at Ivan. Don’t look at Ivan. Don’t—

His knee knocked mine, and it was only because I was familiar with his voice—mostly his smart-ass voice, but whatever—that I noticed how off it sounded, almost choked, a little gravelly… weird. “You can say that,” he said slowly in that awkward voice.

I was not going to laugh. I was especially not going to laugh at this idiot. So all I did was nod. Slowly. Very slowly in agreement.

Amanda Moore’s eyes slid to my direction to see me agreeing, and a little smile came over her mouth. “I’m sure you’ve seen the video of you,” she pointed at me, “telling Ivan some things. There was so much feedback from his fans toward you after that—”

She was bringing that up, wasn’t she? Great. Now whoever didn’t know about it was going to look it up.

Shit.

“—was that simply both of you playing around then?” she kept going.

I went tense. I was pretty freaking sure that my eyes were almost bugging out of their sockets, and the fact I was pressing my lips together, probably made my face even worse. Shut up. Don’t say anything. Shut the hell up.

So I nodded. Slowly again. Feeling like I was about to burst from the lying.

Beside me, the idiot, the complete moron, hit his leg against mine again, and he said in that ragged voice that wasn’t his at all, “Yes. We play around all the time.”

Damn it. Damn it. I wasn’t going to laugh. I wasn’t going to deny. I couldn’t.

I had promised Lee that I could do this. That I could pretend we were friends.

“Jasmine is wonderful,” Ivan basically choked out, somehow not bursting into flames as he said them. “What a sense of humor.”

I had to fist my hand and dig my nails into my palm to keep from reacting. What a shit liar. Oh my God. And he gave me hell for being bad at lying.

I cleared my throat and plastered on a smile that felt like melted rubber as I said, “Ivan is great,” I pretty much spit out, going “heh” at the end, as I remembered our conversation not that long ago about having voodoo dolls of each other.

The leg beneath the table hit my knee, and it took all of my self-control to not say a single word, because obviously he was thinking something similar. Don’t laugh. Don’t choke. Keep it together. Professional. United and all that shit.

But the lies must have been evident because the reporter almost immediately frowned and glanced at Ivan—who I had no idea what kind of facial expression he had on his face because I might die if I actually looked at him—and then glanced back at me. “Is there something funny?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Ivan shake his head. “No. Nothing. We respect and admire each other a lot.”

Oh my God.

My shoulders shook for the two seconds it took to get them under control.

Respect and admire. Of all the things he could have said, he literally went there. That time, it was me that banged my leg against his beneath the table.

Something, which I was pretty sure was the back of his hand, hit my forearm under it too.

“So much respect and admiration,” I ground out, barely holding in a choke as I nodded.

“I’ve always been a big fan of Jasmine,” the idiot continued on.

“Me too,” I warbled out, trying to smile again and more than likely looking like a serial killer. “Ivan is a very likable guy.”

She gave us both a funny look for a moment before either deciding to let it go, or believing us. I didn’t care. “What are your favorite strengths of Jasmine’s skating?” the woman asked.

“Oh, you know….”

I didn’t even move my knee that time, I just kicked him. Straight-up kicked him in the shin. Not hard, but hard enough.

“She’s a tremendous athlete,” he finally got out, hitting my forearm again.

“And you, Jasmine, what drew you to want to partner up with Ivan? Other than the fact he’s the reigning world champion,” she asked.

“What more is there?” I got out with a shrug, taking the easy route, despite her comment rubbing me the wrong way.

“I know you haven’t been together very long, but if there was one thing you wanted to say to the other, as a criticism, what would it be?”

I jumped on that real quick because I didn’t trust Ivan. “Criticize this guy?” I ground out, tapping my heel against his, lightly as a warning and a reminder. “Oh, there’s nothing. Nothing at all. Everything he does is… perfect.”

I almost gagged at the effort those words took.

The smile that came over the reporter’s face was just about a beam. “That’s sweet.”

Ivan’s heel hit mine.

“And you, Ivan? What about Jasmine?”

It hit it again.

“A criticism? Jasmine is… too nice.”

The woman blinked at the same time I did. “Too nice?” she asked, not even offending me because really? That’s what he was going to go with?

I glanced at him at the same time he was nodding. “Yes. Too nice.”

She probably wasn’t even expecting the “huh” that came out of her mouth because it came out so swiftly. I looked over at her and blinked. Then she blinked too… like she couldn’t believe that had slipped out of her mouth.

Bitch.

Maybe I wasn’t the warmest, cuddliest person in the world, but I was nice.

Or as my mom would say, “when I wanted to be.” But that was my mom. She had earned my love and deserved it. She could say whatever she wanted to me.

“What do you think about your old partner and Mary McDonald announcing they’re competing this season?” she asked out of nowhere.

Just the mention of my “old partner” and then bitch-ass Mary McDonald afterward ruined everything about the day so far. Just like that. My whole body tensed.

Then Ivan kicked me. Literally kicked me.

But it snapped me out of it. It only took me a second to get my thoughts together and say, “I don’t think anything about it.” Maybe I should have said, I wished them luck or the best or something, but I wasn’t that good of a person.

“Is it true you haven’t spoken to him since your last season together?”

I wasn’t going to count the one night I had called him drunk and upset right after he’d ditched me. He hadn’t answered, but I had taken advantage of it. I was pretty sure I had called him a weak little pussy bitch, but… I wasn’t positive. All I knew was that I didn’t regret anything that had come out of my mouth. Whatever it had been, he deserved.

“No, we haven’t.”

“Is it true that he sent you a text message to tell you?” she had the nerve to ask about the rumor that had been circling for some reason I didn’t understand. I had never brought it up to anyone other than my family, so I knew it hadn’t come from me.

Plus, the truth was… he hadn’t told me. Period. I’d found out when he’d announced Mary and him were taking the next season off to train together. That’s how I’d found out. From an article. Two days after we had started our planned one-month break.

Spineless bitch.

“Can we talk about Jasmine and me instead? I thought Coach Lee had mentioned that we didn’t want to talk about our partners in the past,” Ivan cut in suddenly, his tone that snooty shit one that I usually hated.

…until then.

The woman’s face went pink, and she nodded quickly. “Yes, sure.” But she didn’t apologize for bringing up a topic that they had already told her not to. I hadn’t known they had done that, but I appreciated it. A lot more than I thought. “What are your expectations for the season?” the woman continued with, not missing a beat.

“We’re going to do well,” Ivan answered, almost immediately. “Better than well.”

“What do you mean by that?”

The heat and muscle of his thigh fully rested against mine, but I didn’t move. “That means I don’t expect this season to go differently than any other season.”

The woman’s eyes went wide. “You think so?”

I was watching him as he did his slow nod. “I know so.”

“You’re not taking the season off?”

Little did she know we only had a season together. I didn’t have time to spare.

“No.”

“You’re that confident?” she asked with a smirk of amusement on her face, like she loved his confidence. Ugh.

“Yes,” Ivan answered immediately.

She tipped her head to the side like “okay” and glanced at me. “What do you think? Is it possible?”

Maybe normally I would have made a joke, but she had already insulted me more than I deserved. So I didn’t. “I think Ivan is one of the best competitors in this sport. I think I’ve already learned a lot from him, and I’m going to keep learning a lot from him.”

Damn, that sounded good. Even I almost believed it.

“But you think it’s possible to skip through a learning period?”

“Yes.” At least I could hope. But no one ever believed someone who sounded hesitant.

Her eyes narrowed. “Do you think you’ll be able to get over the nerves that have plagued you in the past?”

She was back at it again with the condescending shit that fast? Goddamn.

Be better. Be better. Be better. You can do it.

I could do it. I just didn’t want to.

“I think that I have a partner I can rely on, so I have less to stress out about,” I said slowly, watching her eye to eye as I said it so she knew I wasn’t going to pretend like she was being polite when she sure as fuck wasn’t.

“So you think your issues in the past are because of—”

Ivan’s hand sliced through the air. “Can we focus on Jasmine and me instead?” He blinked. “Please.”

“I didn’t—”

“It’s my fault,” I said quickly. “I shouldn’t have said that. I don’t know if I’ll be able to get over my nerves, but I feel more confident with myself than I have in the past, and I think part of that is because of Ivan’s history and record. I’m hoping he’ll rub off on me.” Bitch.

The woman made a face like she didn’t believe me… but glanced back at her questions. “Okay. We can change the subject and move on to something else. What about a twenty-questions-type game?” She flicked her eyes toward Ivan. “If that’s agreeable.”

I blinked, but beside me Ivan answered, in an almost hesitant voice, “Okay.”

“It’ll be fun,” she added, like she was trying to convince us this wouldn’t be torture.

I probably had a different view on what she thought was fun, but okay. As long as the questions didn’t involve Paul and his bitch-ass partner, or me being a screwup, I could take it. I nodded.

She smiled. “You haven’t been partners together very long, but since you’ve known each other for a while, it should be fun.”

Ivan kicked me.

And I kicked him right back.

Because it was one thing to pretend like we could put up with each other, but it was a totally different thing for us to “know each other.”

“Okay,” the woman went on, glancing at her laptop.

I snuck a look at Ivan, but he was already watching me.

What the fuck? I mouthed.

The man I’d never even seen get flustered, shrugged. Guess, he mouthed back.

“Okay, I’ve got a good one,” she announced, totally oblivious to us wondering how the hell we were about to get through this as she had her eyes on the screen as she typed something. “What is Ivan’s favorite color?”

I glanced at Ivan and made a face. “Black,” I answered, but mouthed like your heart.

He rolled his eyes.

“Is that true?” the other woman asked, moving her gaze from the computer back to us.

“I don’t have a favorite color,” Ivan answered.

“What is Jasmine’s favorite?” she asked.

He glanced at me at the same time the woman looked away, “Red.” Then added like the blood of the children you eat.

I was not going to laugh.

I was not going to laugh.

Especially not when he looked so pleased with his fucking self. Idiot. Asshole.

Then he had the nerve to wink, and I had to force myself to look back at the woman instead. I kicked him after half a second.

“Did he get it right?” she asked me, glancing over.

I shook my head. “Nope. It’s pink.”

“Pink?” he croaked beside me.

I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye. “Yeah. Why is that so weird?”

“It’s just….” He blinked, then blinked some more. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you wear pink.”

Why the hell would he notice or pay attention to what I wore? I wondered. “I don’t. It’s still my favorite color though.”

His forehead wrinkled, but all he said was “Oh.”

Which offended me. “It’s kinda fun,” I explained, probably a little harshly.

All he said was his “Oh” again.

“Ivan’s favorite jump?” the woman continued on.

That was easy. “The triple Lutz.”

“That’s right,” the man beside me agreed.

“Jasmine’s favorite?”

Ivan didn’t hesitate. “Easy. The 3L.”

“Can we expect to see some triple Lutzes in the future?” Amanda asked.

We glanced at each other, and I said, “Yeah,” at the same time Ivan said, “Yes.”

She nodded as she looked at her screen. “Ivan’s favorite food?”

I mouthed butthole to him, but actually said, “Escargot” for no reason other than it sounded fancy.

There wasn’t a moment for him to hold back a choke. What he also did was hit his leg against mine. “No.”

“No?”

“No,” he insisted. “Why would you think that? No.”

I pressed my lips together and shrugged.

“Pizza.”

I glanced at the body beside mine. His sweater was chunky but not that chunky. There was no body fat on him. He was all elegant, rock-solid muscle on long arms and long legs. It wasn’t a body that knew pizza.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he said, using the same tone of voice that I had probably used on him when he didn’t believe me that I liked pink.

“What kind of pizza?” I asked, half expecting him to say it was some fat-free shit.

He blinked at me, and I swore for one second that he could read my mind. “Plain old pepperoni.”

It was my turn to say “Oh.”

And he knew what it meant, because he raised his eyebrows.

“What is Jasmine’s favorite food?”

The idiot beside me didn’t miss a beat. “Chocolate cake.”

How the hell did he know that?

“Is that true?” the other woman asked.

I was trying not to look at him like he was crazy for knowing that, and somehow I managed to nod. He had probably guessed since it was Karina’s favorite too.

“If Ivan wasn’t a figure skater, what else would he do?”

I had to pause. Ivan not being a figure skater? I couldn’t imagine that being a possibility in any alternate universe. From what Karina had told me when we had been teenagers, he’d been skating since he was three. His grandfather had taken him to an ice rink, and it had been love at first sight. It had become his entire life. She had told me once he’d never even had a girlfriend. There had been a couple of girls he’d gone out with back in the day but nothing serious. Not when there was something else he loved more.

I got it. I really did.

Not that I’d ever admit how much we had in common, but I understood. I’d had a couple of short-term boyfriends but nothing serious, and that had been years ago. One of them had been the guy I’d chosen to finally lose my virginity to in the backseat of his SUV when I was nineteen, and the other had been a baseball player that had been like me: way too focused on his career. Every other guy I’d gone out with had all been one date and one date only.

Nothing and nobody would ever come between my dreams and me.

And imagining Ivan not owning the ice wasn’t a reality I could picture, because he was the same as I was. Just evil. Well, annoying and evil.

“I can’t see him doing anything else,” I made myself respond honestly, unfortunately.

Beside me, even he shrugged like he had no idea what else he would do either.

Amanda must have seen that because she then asked, “What about Jasmine?”

There was no hesitation before his reply. “There’s nothing else.”

“There isn’t anything else,” I confirmed, letting the reminder that there wasn’t a plan B for me, go. I freaked out about that enough. I didn’t need to think about that reality more than I already did. I glanced at Ivan to find him looking at me with a smug expression on his stupid, perfect face.

Then the fucker mouthed the Grim Reaper.

I didn’t even bother rolling my eyes.

“If Ivan could meet one person living or dead, who would it be?” she asked.

I wanted to say Jeffrey Dahmer, but Amanda was looking at me, so instead, I went with “Jesus.”

There was a pause and a “Correct.”

I kept my smirk to myself. He was so full of shit.

“What about Jasmine?”

I glanced at him, watching as he made a thoughtful expression before answering. “Stephen King.”

I didn’t wait for the woman to ask me if it was true, and instead frowned as I asked, “Why?”

“He wrote your favorite book.”

I blinked.

“Misery.”

He wouldn’t know I didn’t really read. I borrowed audiobooks from the library, but that was as crazy as I got. But I couldn’t correct him, so all I did was nod and say, “Uh-huh.” I’d look it up later or ask my mom’s husband. He read a lot.

Amanda had a funny look on her face, but she kept going. “What would Ivan enjoy more, books or magazines?”

“Magazines.”

“What about Jasmine?”

Ivan snickered. “Picture books.”

I blinked at him, feeling something ugly and defensive in my chest. “Why picture books?” I asked him, the ugliness growing inside of me as I prepared for the worst.

He grinned. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you read anything. My sister usually reads everything off menus to you.”

If I blushed, I had a feeling everything from my belly button up would have been red as fuck at his comment. Karina did always read things off for me. I didn’t even have to ask her to do it, she just always had. I didn’t feel shame in having her do it because she didn’t do it out of pity but because it was faster than me having to take my time and read it.

But I had never noticed that someone else was paying attention, judging me and making his own assumptions for it. He wasn’t the first person, but…

I didn’t like it. Not at all.

I swallowed and tore my eyes back to Amanda, giving her a tight expression as I shrugged. “I like audio books,” I corrected.

“Me too,” she agreed quickly.

There was nothing for me to be embarrassed about, I told myself for about the millionth time since I was four. I had come a long way. There was nothing shameful about having a learning disability. Nothing at all. It had taken me a lot of work to get as good as I had at reading… but it still took me too long; that was just the only part that frustrated me. I didn’t love reading because it took me too long. I didn’t love number sequences either. I learned by listening and by doing. I wasn’t stupid.

And I sure as hell didn’t like Ivan of all people making a joke about it.

I didn’t like it so much that I didn’t look at him again after that. Not for the next twenty minutes, when I barely answered with only one word if I could get away with it. I let Ivan direct the conversation and answer almost everything. She stayed away from more questions about my ex and kept it easy.

At one point, Ivan hit his leg against mine twice, but I didn’t hit him back. I didn’t feel like it.

When the time was over and my phone beeped, telling me the hour we had set aside for the interview was over, Ivan got up, hitting his elbow against mine so I could do the same. And I did. But I didn’t glance at him as I did it. And I hated that too.

“It was nice meeting you,” Ivan said, shaking her hand.

I just nodded and took her hand too. “Thank you,” I muttered, sounding like an asshole, but I didn’t even care.

I never expected Karina to ever tell anyone I had trouble with… things. Once, my mom had even suggested that I tell everyone I had a learning disability, but I had told her no. No because I didn’t want anyone to pity me. I’d gotten that enough when I was younger and they had figured out why I had such a hard time learning my alphabet, then reading and writing. I had never let my own family baby me over it. My mom used to say I would rather stay up all night than ask anyone for help.

Ivan shuffled out of the bench, and I followed right after him, except when he stopped at the side of the table, I went completely around him and headed toward the door and out. My hand instantly went to my wrist, and I gave my bracelet a spin. There is nothing to be mad at. He didn’t call you dumb. He didn’t say you couldn’t read.

He was just messing with you. The same way you were messing with him, and he didn’t complain or cry about it. Don’t be dumb. Don’t be all sensitive and shit. You’ve heard worse.

And I had.

So why was I so damn mad, and maybe the tiniest bit… hurt?

“Meat—Jasmine,” Ivan’s familiar voice called out from somewhere behind me.

I didn’t stop because I was on a schedule, not because I was running away from him. “I’ve got to get to work,” I replied over my shoulder, not slowing down.

“Hold up a second.”

Raising my right hand, taking in the big red R on it; I winced and waved it anyway. “I’ll see you this afternoon,” I said before turning down the hall leading to the changing room. I darted inside because I really had to get to work, not because I was avoiding whatever the hell was going to come out of Ivan’s mouth.

God, I was such a weak shit.

Why hadn’t I just talked to him?

Luckily, there was only one other person in the changing room right then, and she and I just glanced at each other, but that was it. Opening my locker, I grabbed my bag and pulled out my clothes for work, deodorant, makeup, and baby wipes. But it was the blinking green light on my cell phone screen that made me pause. I grabbed my phone and unlocked it to find that I had two texts waiting for me.

One was from my dad.

Dad: Sent you a msg last week. I’m coming in September. Hope I get to see you.

That weird feeling I’d gotten back in the break room went through my upper body again, but I shoved it all away. I typed in OK and hit send, feeling just a little guilty I hadn’t sent anything longer. But then I scrolled up and saw that my last message from him had been four months ago, and suddenly, I didn’t feel so bad.

Then I checked my next message, and saw it was from my mom.

Mom: Good luck with your interview. Don’t fidget, make faces, or roll your eyes if there’s a camera. Don’t cuss either.

That brought a little smile to my face that replaced the ache, and I typed back, To late…

Not even thirty seconds later, as I was fishing for my socks and work shoes, my phone vibrated with another message from my mom.

Mom: I don’t know you.