Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
Luka
Beside me, Aleksy Volkov leaned closer, his voice pitched low enough that it disappeared beneath the hum of the conference room.
“This feels very subdued for a team everyone suddenly cares about.”
I let out a short breath that almost passed for amusement. “Everyone?”
“The skating world, then.” Aleksy tipped his chin toward the paused broadcast on the screen at the front of the room. “Though apparently that now includes half the media in Europe.”
The image showed Mila suspended above me mid-lift. It was the kind of photograph federations loved. Strong lines, clean positions, a partnership that looked unquestionable.
Aleksy folded his arms. “You see my point.”
I barely glanced at the screen. What stayed lodged in my head was a still image pulled from a clipped video, reposted, repeated.
Dean Foster, seated in a café. Not alone.
The angle wasn’t clear enough—or close enough—to identify her, but it didn’t matter. The comments had filled in the gaps quickly enough.
Girlfriend?
I closed it immediately. That didn’t help. It didn’t stop my chest from constricting either.
Where should your focus be now?
I shifted my attention back to the room.
Around us, chairs scraped against the floor while the rest of the team shifted into place.
Marek Iliev sat ramrod straight beside Anya Zalinska, both of them visibly tense beneath the weight of Olympic expectations.
Across from us, Irina Markova rested her elbows on the table, fingers pressed tightly together while Aleksy lounged beside her with studied indifference that fooled nobody who knew him well.
Mila remained motionless at my right. Most people would have missed the tension in her completely.
I didn’t.
After six years skating together, I recognized even the smallest changes in her mood—the tightening around her mouth, the stillness that became sharper whenever she sensed trouble approaching before the rest of us caught up.
Which meant she already disliked where this meeting was heading.
A throat cleared near the front of the room, and I straightened.
Sokolov watched me for a couple of seconds before smoothing his expression back into neutrality. Beside him, Director Vasiliev closed a folder and gestured toward the frozen broadcast image.
“You are being interpreted,” he said.
Nobody answered. The room settled deeper into silence.
Vasiliev’s gaze swept slowly across the six of us before returning to the screen. “People are deciding what this team represents before you have even stepped onto Olympic ice.”
Aleksy spoke without lifting his head. “They still don’t expect us to win.”
“No,” Vasiliev agreed. “They expect you to justify why winning remains possible.”
That earned a faint reaction around the table: small posture adjustments, lowered eyes, restrained tension tightening across shoulders already carrying too much pressure.
The clip restarted.
Mila and I rotated through the lift again beneath bright replay graphics while commentators dissected our timing and technical scores with clinical enthusiasm.
Every angle highlighted polish, discipline, reliability.
We had become evidence for a narrative Velkarya desperately wanted sold to the international press.
I stopped listening after a few seconds.
We could skate the program. Nobody in this room doubted that.
What worried them was what happened if we failed while the world was watching.
Mila’s fingers moved once against the tabletop beside me, barely noticeable unless you were paying close attention.
“The Team Event gives us an opportunity,” Vasiliev continued. “This country has waited a long time to establish legitimacy in Olympic figure skating. The international response so far has been favorable, but attention creates scrutiny.” His eyes sharpened. “And scrutiny creates risk.”
No words of inspiration or encouragement.
Only warning.
“We expect discipline from every athlete representing Velkarya this week,” he said. “Programs. Media appearances. Public conduct.” His gaze paused briefly on me before moving on. “And we expect nobody to lose sight of why they are here because of unnecessary distractions.”
My heart raced, and I clasped my hands beneath the table.
Cameras. Press. Expectations.
None of those explanations survived contact with the truth.
Dean Foster remained lodged stubbornly in my thoughts, long after I should have dealt with the problem.
Dean
Here we go.
The team meeting had already started sliding off the rails by the time I walked in. Conversations overlapped across the room, phones buzzed against tables, and somebody near the back laughed loudly enough to earn a halfhearted glare from one of the coaches that accomplished absolutely nothing.
It was the usual Olympic energy. Everybody acted differently once the countdown got close enough to feel it in their bones.
I dropped into the empty seat beside Noah Bennett, who sat sprawled back in his chair looking far calmer than anyone had a right to look five days before competition.
“Feels different now,” he said, eyes still on the front of the room.
“Yeah.” I glanced toward the projection screen cycling through practice schedules and media assignments. “Five days out tends to do that.”
Noah nodded. “You good?”
The answer was automatic. “I’m fine.”
He finally looked at me then, one eyebrow lifting like he’d heard the reflex in it too clearly to buy it.
Before he could call me on it, Nathan Cole dropped into the chair on my other side hard enough to rattle the table. His water bottle hit beside my elbow with a dull crack.
“Man, the internet’s getting unbearable.”
I snorted. “Only getting?”
Nathan pointed across the room as though he was presenting evidence in court. “Every article says a different thing. One minute we’re doomed, next minute we’re guaranteed medals, then Brooke and I are either America’s sweethearts or washed-up seniors holding on for dear life.”
Noah deadpanned, “You are old by skating standards.”
Nathan clutched at his chest. “You see this abuse? This is what I endure.”
“You’re twenty-nine,” Noah replied. “Your knees probably make sounds when you stand up.”
“They absolutely do, and I deserve respect for persevering.”
That pulled a laugh out of me before Nathan leaned closer across the table.
“Seriously though, this has to be my year.” His grin faded. “Brooke already told me she’s done after these Games.”
I looked at him properly then.
Nathan usually joked through pressure, but every now and then the real weight underneath it showed through if you paid attention long enough.
“She’s sure?”
“Oh, yeah.” He rubbed at the back of his neck. “Her exact words were: Nathan, I would like to retain use of my spine before forty.”
Noah barked out a laugh.
Nathan pointed at him. “Mock me all you want, Bennett. Pair lifts are basically attempted murder with choreography.”
“Fair.”
Nathan glanced back at me. “Anyway, if this is our last shot, I’d really prefer not to screw it up.”
I raised my chin. “You won’t.”
“Look at you.” He grinned again. “Captain America confidence speech.”
“I’m serious.”
“I know.” Nathan nudged my shoulder. “And for the record, if anybody’s taking gold this year, my money’s still on you.”
“Your mom’s money too, apparently,” Noah added.
Nathan groaned dramatically. “Oh my God, my mom loves you. Dean Foster could literally fall down a staircase and she’d call it artistic.”
“That feels aggressive.”
“She means well.”
I laughed and leaned back in my chair while the room buzzed around us.
Normally this part settled me. Team meetings, schedules, familiar faces, coaches pretending not to panic while athletes burned through nervous energy in increasingly weird ways. It all reminded me I’d done this before.
Then Nathan’s eyes gleamed. “You gonna tell us who café girl was, then?”
Damn it.
Noah jerked his head in Nathan’s direction. “Café girl?”
Nathan looked delighted to become the messenger of chaos. “There are photos.”
“I hate all of you.”
“That’s not a denial,” Nathan sang. “Bro, who was she? Because she’s hot.”
“She’s my ex.”
“Seriously? OMG. Is she single? Can I have her number?”
I laughed. “Tell you what. You get a medal in the Team Event, and I’ll introduce you. But that’s all I’ll do, okay? If she likes you, great. But if she rejects you, that’s between you and God.”
Nathan held his hands up. “Fine. I get it. You’re not a pimp.” He batted his lashes. “But you could put in a good word for me, couldn’t ya? You know, tell her I’m not a serial killer.”
“If you’re all finished,” Mark Winton cut in from the front of the room, “I’d love to begin before the Opening Ceremony arrives.”
A few guilty coughs rippled through the room.
Nathan sat up straighter, though he still whispered, “Worth it.”
I elbowed him in the ribs. “Time to start thinking with the big head, dude.”
Mark waited until the noise settled before continuing.
“You’ve all seen the media coverage by now. Predictions, rankings, narratives.” He shrugged once. “None of that changes the job. We execute. Everything else comes afterward.” He made his way around the room, handing out folders.
The room steadied after that because Mark understood athletes better than most coaches ever did. Strip away the noise. Return people to the work. Keep them moving.
I let the words settle while the meeting rolled on around us: travel timing, practice ice, recovery schedules, media restrictions.
Usually that rhythm pulled me back into place.
Tonight another face kept intruding.
Blue eyes. A measured voice.
The way his face changed whenever he forgot to control it.
I stared down at the folder in front of me without reading a word.
The unsettling part wasn’t that I kept thinking about him.
It was that I no longer seemed capable of stopping.
Luka
The meeting broke apart the way federation meetings always did, efficiently, with nobody questioning the expectations that had just been handed down.
Mila rose from her chair, and I followed her into the corridor without discussion. Years of partnership had made that automatic.
For a while we walked in silence.