Chapter 3
LUCY
“Ihate him, I hate him, I hate him, I hate him so much,” I said as I stomped into Mason and Leslie’s condo later that day.
“That’s a lot of ‘I hate him’s,” Leslie said with a laugh from where she sat on Mason’s lap.
Mason looked amused. But then Mason always looked amused when it came to me.
I’d overheard him once tell Leslie that, even though he didn’t like that I was a bad—and sometimes dangerous—influence on her (i.e.
, slightly reckless gorge jumping), he also appreciated that I’d influenced her to accept her feelings for him.
So I was allowed to remain in her life “with supervision.”
Leslie and I both said fuck it to supervision though. He might be a little bit of a stalker, but if Leslie wanted it, she got it—and she wanted to be friends with me.
Mason also knew all about Coach, and my previous crush on Coach, and my current hatred for Coach.
“You know,” Mason said as he stroked a hand through Leslie’s hair, “I once hated someone too. So much so, I lashed out at her for it.”
“Like by coming in my ballet shoes?” Leslie asked pointedly.
He tugged on her hair. “Something like that.”
“Well, as fun as it would be to desecrate something that’s important to Coach, I don’t think I want to come all over his whistle. Although…” I waved the idea away. “No, I’ll find better ways to torture him.”
“Like?” Leslie looked intrigued.
“Oh, I don’t know,” I said, as I mentally made a list of Ways to Make Blake Samson, He Who Never Loses His Shit, Lose His Shit.
“I could show up to practice naked. I could take over the sound system and play Sabrina Carpenter—he hates Sabrina Carpenter. I could write ‘Coach Samson Has A Tiny Penis’ on the rink…can you write on ice? How do you dye ice?”
Mason opened his mouth to answer but I waved him off, on a roll. “I could fill his office with chickens. I could spend a practice teaching all of you the dance to ‘Texas Hold ’Em.’ I glanced at Mason. “Can you dance?”
He shrugged. “Probably.”
“I’d like to see that,” Leslie said.
“I’ll give you a show later,” he promised, kissing her, and I tried not to be distracted by my own yearning.
Not because I wanted Mason. Far from it.
Because I wanted someone in my life to look at me the way he looked at her, like she meant everything.
Like if she asked him to set the world on fire, he’d immediately find a match.
No one in my life had ever looked at me like I mattered to them, much less like I mattered more than anything or anyone else.
When I let myself feel it, it was really fucking lonely… which is why I didn’t.
And wouldn’t right now.
Instead, I pulled out my phone and started typing up my list of ways to break Blake Samson and his tight grasp on his control, because if he was going to make me be at his beck and call for the rest of the season, if he was going to take away my freedom, I was going to make him regret it.