Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Lauren
I stood in the center of my disaster of a kitchen and asked myself for the zillionth time: why had I decided to renovate my house while I was trying to get my business off the ground?
I had started four months ago, right after I closed on this charming fixer-upper in Riverbrook.
Owning a home had been a goal of mine for as long as I could remember.
While I played professionally, I resisted the urge to put down roots because I might have been traded out at any minute.
Even when I started working as an agent at The Mallinson Group, I bided my time.
I was looking for something special, a house that spoke to me, and when I found it, I knew why.
It looked like the house I lived in until the age of twelve when my mother died and my father was imprisoned.
Of course I couldn’t afford the actual house I grew up in, a gorgeous Lincoln Park mansion that was worth close to two million these days.
But this one gave me the same feeling once I spotted it—a two-level brownstone with high ceilings, exposed brickwork, and in need of a shit-ton of TLC.
The owner lived in Italy and had just inherited it from his grandmother, so he was looking for a quick sale.
Then the work began. Floors ripped up, walls caved in, cabinets torn down.
The plumber had hooked up the kitchen sink last week, so at least I had that.
This month, I was working on painting. Gunnar had come over every weekend to help since I bought it, so I wasn’t completely alone.
I’d hinted to Thad that it would be a fun thing to do together, but he didn’t see it that way: that’s why we have contractors, babe.
Of course, he didn’t have the connection to it that I did.
Thad preferred a hassle-free living space, and I couldn’t fault him for that.
This morning, I wouldn’t have minded something similar. Not just a hassle-free space, but a hassle-free life.
I stepped over a hole in the floor and turned on the Keurig. No life-affirming light greeted me, which meant the kitchen fuse needed to be fixed. Again. Something screwy had occurred with the electrics when we tore out the walls.
It tasted better when someone else made it anyway.
Standing in line at the coffee shop, I felt someone touch my shoulder. I turned to find Franky.
“Lo—hi.”
“Oh, hi, Franks.” I gave her a hug. “How are you?”
“Well. Just on a cinnamon roll run. I barely spoke with you at the Cup Day party. How have you been?”
“Oh, fine. Busy. Trying to load up my stable of clients. All that jazz.”
Franky stared at me with those all-seeing eyes. “And Thad? How’s he?”
Had Jason spilled about Thad’s imminent proposal or worse, my secret marriage?
“He’s fine. He’s in Dubai for work.” I could have—should have—told him about Alexei before he left, but Nazarov’s arrival at the Cup Day party had thrown me. Thad had placed the players on a pedestal and I worried how the news might bruise his ego. “He’s gone for a week.”
“That should give you the time you need.”
“Oh? For what?”
She smiled serenely. “To go on that date with your husband.”
Shit.
We took a seat at a table in the back. I kept my eye on the door in case anyone I knew came in, though me having coffee with one of my book club gals, the partner of my oldest pal, and a semi-close friend shouldn’t be considered weird.
Yet I was jumpy, probably because of the conversational subject matter.
“What do you know?”
Franky took a sip of her Jasmine tea. “You, Nazarov, marriage, blackmail. The story has it all.”
I put my face in my hands.
“I’m sorry, Lo. I don’t mean to make fun, and if he’s threatening you in some way, then I’m happy to intervene or get Jason involved.”
I removed my hands. “He’s not threatening me. Well, he’s threatening to tell Thad, so I suppose he is. But to be fair, I don’t think he’d do it. It’s just the Russian’s version of banter. How did you find out?”
“The baby monitor. I was having a lie down in my room because I needed a break from the hordes. I shouldn’t have listened.”
It meant that Jason hadn’t blabbed which was no small thing, I supposed.
“So you got the gist.”
“The bare facts. Are you comfortable telling me what happened?” She nudged her cinnamon roll over an inch, a curiously endearing gesture. “And just so you know, this will remain between us unless I feel that your health or mental well-being are in danger.”
God, I loved Franky. She was so damn serious, but she was also a grown-up. Working with so many younger athletes—jocks of all ages, to be fair—I sometimes forgot what it was like to associate with mature and responsible adults.
“So Alexei and I go way back. College. But I’m guessing you know that.
We had a very brief thing, that was over in a flash.
Left things kind of awkward. We’ve run into each other over the years, but I’ve done my best to ignore him.
There’s always been this residual tension between us. ” I was rambling.
“Sexual?”
“Well, I think he’s hot. That’s something I can say, objectively.”
“And subjectively?”
I broke off a piece of the cinnamon roll and put it in my mouth while I considered a response.
“Like I said, there’s always been this frisson of tension between us.
Sexual, if you prefer.” I moved on quickly.
“But emotionally, we haven’t been on the same wavelength.
He basically told me back in the day that we would be better off as friends. And we haven’t talked since.”
Franky eyed me. “Yet here you are. Married.”
I tutted, annoyed all over again. “About nine months ago, I was meeting a client in Vegas. Nazarov and I ran into each other at the hotel and suddenly it was easy between us, easier than it had been in years. We didn’t address anything deep, yet it felt like forgiveness.
Like we had matured enough to be able to acknowledge we were kids back then and mistakes were made.
We went for a walk down the Strip. More drinks, more talking.
It was great. I mean, really nice. And then we got married. ”
Franky’s eyes went wide. “Just like that?”
I filled her in on the pertinent details.
Franky bit her lip. “Then you met Thad.”
“Yes! After the marriage I didn’t know had happened.
I swear, if I thought that I was married, there’s no way I would have tested Landon’s app or started dating another man.
I wouldn’t have spent the last eight months in a relationship that might be going somewhere.
” I lowered my voice. “Thad’s planning to propose to me any day now. I found a ring.”
“Oh, wow! That’s wonderful news.”
“It would be if I didn’t already have a husband, Franks.”
“Yes, I can see how that might be problematic. So you need a divorce.”
“Hell yeah, but Ass-arov won’t sign off unless I go on a date.
Some bullshit about responding to the universe, but I can work around that.
” I shoved another sliver of cinnamon roll into my mouth.
Its spiral shape reminded me of a snail shell, which might have been why Franky was a fan.
“More important, he has Volkov in his back pocket.”
“Volkov?”
“This Russian kid at Minnesota. Like a post-Soviet version of Conor Kershaw.”
“That good?”
Conor was the youngest son of retired Rebels captain, Theo Kershaw, and was currently playing for the Detroit Motors. He was going to be huge, but I thought Arkady would eventually surpass him.
“Yep. Nazarov has an in with him.” I pushed out a breath. “I need that kid on my roster. I’ve lost a few clients.”
“Every new business has teething problems. Is it that bad?”
This morning, one of my oldest clients, a women’s hockey player, had gone back to TMG. Becca claimed to be unhappy with her re-up and was blaming me for not fighting hard enough for her. Fucking Gen Zs!
“I need a big score. I thought the Rebels’ Cup win would give me more cachet, but until the glow-up effects of that start showing in the trades, I’m not going to attract any new talent and am at risk of losing what I have.
” I had hoped to be a home for female athletes, but even they were electing to stick with the bigger name agencies instead of shooting their shot with a fledgling outfit like mine.
Franky pursed her lips.
“What? Tell me what you think and give it to me straight.”
“Well, I didn’t spend much time with Alexei, but I did notice he couldn’t take his eyes off you at the party, even while he held my daughter who tends to be an attention hog.”
The last thing I needed to be reminded of was how hot Nazarov had looked holding Cammi. Not only that, the co-mingled scent of them together, his cedar and spice, her brand new baby smell, had sent my ovaries into a DEFCON countdown.
Franky was still laying out her case like she was defending a thesis.
“And he sought you out in the house. Has it occurred to you that he might want to remain married because he realizes that he made a mistake all those years ago, but he’s too emotionally stunted to tell you straight?
Perhaps you’re blinded by your history together.
I know all about holding onto preconceptions or letting past hurts dictate the potential for happiness. ”
I grasped her hand and squeezed it. “Franks, believe me when I say I have not been holding a torch for Alexei Nazarov for years, hoping he’d finally realize the error of his ways and come running back to me.
We were never a thing in the first place, it was all my imagination.
” How could I explain that I wasn’t girlfriend material for a hockey superstar?
I knew my lane and straying out of it in Vegas told me all I needed to know.
The man had to be drunk to be with me. This was not how true, respectful relationships started, but it was certainly a way for them to end.
“But he obviously has an agenda, Lo.”
I had my suspicions. “Listen, I work with a lot of athletes, and there comes a time when they realize they need to delete their dating apps, hang up the condoms, and start getting serious about their legacy. The personal one. You ever hear of the taxicab theory?”
She shook her head.
“Basically, according to the oracles on Sex and the City, men are like taxis. They stay available until they’re ready to play house, and then whoever they happen to meet after they have this epiphany is the lucky gal.”
“Are you saying he doesn’t care who he married, because he was just ready to pull the trigger?”
I snickered. “Yep. I suspect Nazarov is feeling left behind seeing all his cohort—Jason included—settling down.” I was about as sure of this theory as the internet when it was reported that a woman had fallen off the side of a boat and her husband “saw it happen.”
“And I understand where he’s coming from. That’s why I’m getting serious with Thad.”
“As soon as you eighty-six the husband you don’t want.”
I pointed at her. “Now you get it.”
She pushed back her glasses. “Okay. Time to date your husband so you can jump start that divorce.”