Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 21 - Chapitre 30

Zane doesn't text back all week.I stop checking as much by Thursday. Not because I stop caring. Because checking and finding nothing every single time starts to feel worse than not checking at all.Friday night the whole school piles into the East Rivers arena for the game against Brookline Prep, some out of conference match that wouldn't normally matter much except everyone wants to see if Maddox can actually play with his ribs still healing. I'm there because I'm on the squad and skipping isn't an option, not because I care how it goes.The bleachers are packed. Rita's in the front row in a jersey with his number on the back, screaming loud enough that people two sections over can probably hear her name his stats. I keep my eyes on the ice and try not to look at her.Maddox skates out during warmups and the crowd loses it, chanting his name, clapping like he's already won something just by showing up. He does look better than he did in the hospital. Still moves a little stiff on hi

My thumb hovers over the screen for a solid ten seconds before I make myself set the phone back down, face first, like ignoring it will somehow make my heart rate go back to normal.It buzzes again almost immediately.Zane: i know you're awake. i can practically hear you overthinking from hereI bite back a smile, which is stupid, because there is nothing about tonight that should be making me smile. He almost kissed me. Then he didn't. Then he left without explaining either half of that. I have every right to ignore him.Zane: cold shower treat you wellI roll my eyes at the ceiling and don't respond, mostly out of spite, partly because I genuinely don't trust myself to type anything that doesn't give away exactly how much I've been thinking about him for the last two hours.Zane: playing hard to get now?Zane: cuteI still don't answer. I set the phone face down again, arms crossed over my chest like that's going to stop the ridiculous amount of butterflies currently wrecking my sto

Chapter Twenty-Five - Go, East Kings"That's more like it." He lets go of the door and walks back in. He's too close to me. "For now," Maddox says, "you're going to be by my side. Publicly. Convincingly. However long I decide this needs to last.""That's not an answer. That's a life sentence.""Take it or leave it." He shrugs, entirely too comfortable with himself. "Or I start talking."I don't have a choice, and we both know it. "Fine.""Good girl." He says it just to needle me, and it works, my jaw clenching so hard it aches.I get ready in silence after that, yanking my cheer uniform on with more force than necessary, hair pulled back tight, face carefully blank by the time I turn around. Maddox is still lounging near my desk, phone already out, scrolling like none of this cost him anything at all."Come here." He waves me over, already angling the phone for a photo before I can protest."Absolutely not.""Ava."I cross the room and stand beside him, forcing my face into something

My hands are still shaking a little by the time I pull into my driveway, throat tender under my fingers even though there's nothing to actually see there yet, no mark, no bruise, just the phantom pressure of his hand still lingering like a memory I can't shake off.I sit in the car for a full minute before I trust myself to walk inside without my face giving anything away."There she is." My dad's in the kitchen when I walk in, tie already loosened, going through mail at the counter. "How was school?""Fine." I keep my voice light, dropping my bag by the stairs. "Long. I'm exhausted.""Maddox invited you to watch him practise?""Yeah.""Good kid." He says it without looking up, and I have to bite back the urge to laugh, or maybe scream, at how wrong that sentence is. "You two seem good lately. Your mother's thrilled.""Yeah. We're good."My mom comes down a minute later, already in her robe, hair wrapped, holding her phone out toward me before I've even said hello. "Look what I found.

Chapter Twenty Nine - PigtailsI call Ashley, phone pressed to my ear while I pace a hole into my carpet."Okay, you need to sit down for this," I say the second she picks up."I'm literally already sitting down. What's wrong?""My mom just told me I have to do a photoshoot. With Zane."There's a pause. "Zane. As in Zane Volkov. As in the actual captain of West Rivers, our biggest rival, the guy your entire school currently has beef with, that Zane?""That's the one.""Ava.""I know.""What photoshoot?""The Volkov Beauty campaign. The one I turned down months ago , which Rita is supposed to do." I flop back onto my bed, staring at the ceiling. "His mom set it up. Apparently she thinks we're fighting about something and decided the solution is forcing us to stand in front of a camera together.""Are you fighting about something? i know your parensts are friends and you guys hate each other but why woud they do anything about it now ?""That's not the point right now.""It's a little b