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The recording that escaped
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2026-11-07 23:11:56
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Fake Dating My Hockey Neighbor Two people, Two motives
Chapter 40: Two People, Two Motives*Sloane*I told everyone I wasn't nervous.I told Tessa. I told my reflection. I told the cup of coffee in my hand, which was shaking a little, and I told it twice.The standards review was set for ten o'clock Monday morning, in a small conference room with a long table and no windows. It was the kind of room built for hard conversations. Someone had put a plant in the corner, probably to make it feel friendlier. It hadn't worked."Okay," Tessa said, sliding a folder across the desk. "Let's go through it one more time."We'd been at it since seven. She'd brought bagels, and I hadn't touched mine.I opened the folder and laid everything out, in order, the way my first editor had taught me. The anonymous email that had started it all. The scan of the place card, with the five words in that small, hurried handwriting. A picture of the photograph, photographed on my kitchen table, with a ruler beside it. Every message to and from building management.
Fake Dating My Hockey Neighbor The wrong kind of distraction
Chapter 39: The Wrong Kind of Distraction*Rhys*Sloane told me my face was irritating at four o'clock.By eight, a hundred commentators had told me worse.The sports channels had been talking about nothing else for three days. *Can Calloway keep the room? Is the captain cracking? What does the new girlfriend mean for his focus?* One man in a bow tie said the C on my chest looked "a little heavy lately." I'd turned the TV off and stood in my kitchen, breathing slowly, until the urge to throw it out the window passed.Then there was Nolan Pierce.His post already had four million views. He'd followed it with an interview, a podcast, and a long, lazy grin on the cover of a magazine. Every time someone put a microphone near him, he found a new way to say it. *Too busy being a boyfriend.*I'd wanted to answer. God knew how bad I'd wanted to reply to him. That night, twelve minutes after he'd called, Evan had shown up at my door in sweatpants and one sock. He'd held out his hand without
Fake Dating My Hockey Neighbor The first thing I regretted noticing
Chapter 38: The First Thing I Regretted Noticing*Sloane*By morning, the clip had one point two million views.I knew because Marcus sent me the number at 6:04 a.m., followed by seven exclamation points and a string of tiny fireworks. I knew because Tessa sent me the same number at 6:07 with the single word *WHY.* I knew because a stranger on the subway held up her phone, pointed at the screen, then at my face, and mouthed, *Oh my gosh.*I'd had worse weeks. I just couldn't remember when.The standards office still hadn't called. My editor had stopped meeting my eyes. A new batch of records had landed on my desk, and every page seemed to say *wait.* And on top of all of that, I was supposed to spend Thursday afternoon in a team arena, smiling for photographers.Marcus called it a "small media event." I called it a hostage situation with snacks.---It was held in a side room of the arena, with a banner on one wall, a table of sad little sandwiches, and four photographers who looked
Fake Dating My Hockey Neighbor Love according to the contract
Chapter 37: Love, According to the Contract*Sloane*The next day, I had a meeting with Marcus concerning a media shoot which I didn't want to attend. But Marcus reminded me, it was all part of the contract. Immediately I got there, Marcus handed me a sheet of paper like it was a birthday card."Just a few friendly questions," he said. "For the sponsor's social media. A short video. Ten minutes, tops."I read the first line, and my eyes started to twitch.*Has Rhys changed your life?*I read the second.*Are you thinking about moving in together?*I read the third, then the fourth, and then I put the paper down very gently, because I didn't trust my hands."No.""They're only suggestions.""Marcus, I live across the hall from the man. We already share a wall. If I moved in, I'd have to *cross* it.""The audience likes to imagine what might happen next.""The audience can imagine whatever it wants. Without me in it ..""Sloane, that's impossible….""It says here, in the contract, in
Fake Dating My Hockey Neighbor The recording that escaped
Chapter 36: The Recording That Escaped*Sloane*The sender hadn't written to me again,after the last email. I checked every morning anyway. I opened the inbox before I'd even brushed my teeth, scrolled past the junk, and looked for that string of random letters. Nothing. *I wanted you to ask questions. Someone else wanted you to stop.* Those two lines had sat at the top of my saved folder for days, like a coin I couldn't spend.My editor had read them and said nothing for a full minute. Then she'd forwarded them to standards, told me not to reply, and told me not to try to trace them myself. I'd obeyed but It felt like holding my breath underwater.I couldn't just stand and do nothing. The review itself had begun. On Monday, I handed over a binder. On Tuesday, they'd asked for more. Meanwhile, the luncheon had gone out into the world, along with a hockey player named Nolan Pierce, who'd decided I was the reason Rhys couldn't skate. I'd seen the post. I'd seen the circled photogra
Fake Dating My Hockey Neighbor The weight of c
Chapter 35: The Weight of the C*Rhys*The stitched *C* on my chest felt heavier than usual.I'd never been a man who thought much about it. It was a letter. A piece of cloth. But that morning at practice, it sat on my jersey like a weight, and every time I breathed, I felt it press against my ribs.Everything was coming apart at once.The publicity mess. Damian's smile in the sponsor lounge. My father's name, back in the papers like a ghost somebody had dug up. I kept trying to take control of one thing, then another, and none of it would hold still.And the guys could tell.I knew they could. I'd seen it in the way they moved around me, the quick glances, the lowered voices in the locker room. I'd always been the one who kept things steady. Now I was the thing everyone watched.---Isaac Cole was the one who broke first.He was twenty-one, tall and quick, with a heavy shot and a big, open face that hid nothing. Jace to everyone since juniors, because a teammate had once mixed up hi
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