Chapter Two Nate
Nate Brennan had survived overtime shootouts, a broken wrist, a frozen bus ride through Ohio, and one team karaoke night that still haunted him emotionally.
He was not going to be taken down by a woman in pink shorts holding a lemonade-stained towel.
Probably.
Maybe.
The odds were unclear.
From the deck outside the snack shack, Ava Lane looked like trouble packaged in sunscreen and sarcasm.
Hair up in a messy knot. Sunglasses now perched on top of her head.
White cropped tank with pink letters that read NOT IMPRESSED, which felt less like clothing and more like a personal mission statement.
She had just smiled at him like she knew exactly where to put the knife.
And Nate, because apparently he had learned nothing from twenty-one years of being alive near women with opinions, had smiled back.
Slowly.
Like an idiot.
The deck around him was still losing its collective mind.
Tyler was chanting, “Summer Bet! Summer Bet! Summer Bet!”
Half the team had joined in.
Two campers were chanting too, which was concerning because they were eight and should have been protected from Tyler’s influence.
Ava slid the service window shut again.
The sound was soft.
The message was not.
Nate turned toward Tyler. “I’m going to throw your phone in the lake.”
Tyler held the phone to his chest. “You wouldn’t.”
“I would.”
“You love me.”
“I tolerate you because Coach said assault affects team culture.”
Tyler grinned. “Team culture is thriving.”
“Our team culture is one lawsuit in flip-flops.”
“That feels hurtful.”
“It was meant to.”
Across the deck, the Ridgeview summer staff director, Paulson, pinched the bridge of his nose.
Nate understood the feeling. Paulson had been hired to manage the Ridgeview Hockey Charity Summer Challenge, a program designed to make college athletes look generous and community-minded during the off-season.
Unfortunately, Ridgeview athletes kept acting like Ridgeview athletes.
Which meant loud, competitive, easily bored, and very bad at not turning everything into a scoreboard.
Including Nate’s personal life.
Which was supposed to be simple.
No distractions.
No drama.
No summer fling.
No late-night decisions that started with “come over” and ended with him losing sleep, focus, and possibly his dignity.
He had goals.
Serious ones.
Captaincy conversation in the fall. Better numbers. Cleaner leadership. Fewer headlines. Fewer jokes about him being the guy who could charm his way out of anything.
He was tired of charming his way out.
This summer was supposed to be the first time he did not need to.
Then Ava Lane had looked at him like she could see through every polished inch of him and find the idiot underneath.
That was a problem.
A very specific problem with brown eyes, a sharp mouth, and absolutely no fear of embarrassing him in public.
Tyler slapped him on the shoulder. “Buddy. You’re doomed.”
Nate looked at him. “You have twenty seconds to delete the poll.”
“Can’t.”
“Why not?”
“It has traction.”
“It has twelve votes.”
“Fourteen.”
“Tyler.”
“Seventeen.”
Nate snatched for the phone.
Tyler twisted away and nearly collided with a table full of children eating blue slushies.
“Language,” Paulson called automatically, even though no one had sworn yet.
“Soon,” Nate called back.
Paulson pointed at him. “Do not.”
Nate exhaled through his nose and checked his own phone.
The group chat had, in fact, become a crime scene.
RIDGEVIEW SUMMER CHALLENGE: NO MULCH 2026
TYLER: THE SUMMER BET IS LIVE. MILES: Why are we yelling?
TYLER: Nate says he has emotional discipline.
MILES: That sounds fake. BECKETT: Emotionally disciplined men don’t say “emotional discipline.” GRIFFIN: This is why we cannot have public-facing programs. TYLER: Poll is up.
MILES: Where is option four: Brennan makes direct eye contact once and ruins his own life?
BECKETT: Add it. NATE: Delete the poll. TYLER: The people have spoken.
NATE: The people are unemployed until camp starts tomorrow.
BECKETT: Snack Shack Girl has strong form.
NATE: Her name is Ava. And leave her out of it.
TYLER: Too late. Ava is officially the line judge.
GRIFFIN: We are not involving staff. TYLER: Staff involved herself when she murdered him verbally.
MILES: In her defense, it was clean. BECKETT: Respectful homicide.
TYLER: Current odds: Brennan falls first. NATE: I hate all of you.
A new message popped up.
BECKETT: Hate is a feeling. You lose.
Nate locked his phone before he replied with something Paulson would call “not ambassador material.”
The worst part was not even the poll.
The worst part was that Nate had been the one to give them her name.
Her name had come out of his mouth too fast.
Her name is Ava.
As if that mattered.
As if he had any right to defend her from a joke he was accidentally standing in the center of.
As if the first thing he had wanted, before protecting his own pride, was to make sure she did not become Snack Shack Girl to a pack of idiots with protein powder and poor impulse control.
That was new.
Nate did not love new.
New was how plans got wrecked.
Tyler leaned into his shoulder and dropped his voice. “Real talk.”
“No.”
“I think she likes you.”
Nate stared at the closed service window. “She threatened me with customer service.”
“Exactly.”
“That is not affection.”
“It is in your demographic.”
“My demographic?”
“Women who think you’re annoying but continue talking to you.”
Nate glanced at him. “That is not a demographic.”
“That is your entire dating history.”
“I don’t have a dating history. I have unfortunate rumors created by people with too much Wi-Fi.”
Tyler made a face. “Bro.”
“What?”
“Never say that again.”
Nate took a sip of lemonade. It was too sweet and already watered down. He drank it anyway because Ava had made it, which was possibly the weakest thing he had done since smiling at her like she had handed him a dare.
He needed to reset.
Fast.
He looked toward the snack shack. Through the glass, Ava was helping a woman with three kids choose between pretzels and popsicles. She moved quickly. Efficiently. No wasted motion. She smiled at the kids, but it was different from the smile she had aimed at him.
Softer.
Real.
One little girl pointed at Ava’s shirt and said something.
Ava looked down at the NOT IMPRESSED letters and shrugged dramatically.
The kid laughed.
Ava laughed too.
Nate’s chest did something weird and quiet.
No.
Absolutely not.
He looked away.
Tyler noticed because Tyler was a parasite with eyebrows.
“Oh my gosh.”
Nate kept his eyes on the lake. “Don’t.”
“You looked.”
“I have eyes.”
“You looked fond.”
“I looked geographically.”
“Geographically?”
“She is located over there.”
“That’s the worst defense I’ve ever heard.”
Nate turned to him. “You have never defended anything. You once claimed a broken hotel lamp was ‘pre-broken in spirit.’”
“It was.”
“It was not.”
“It lacked structural confidence.”
Nate almost laughed.
Almost.
Then Paulson approached with the expression of a man about to attempt order in an environment that did not respect it.
“Gentlemen,” Paulson said.
Tyler straightened. “Sir.”
“Do not sir me after standing on a chair and creating an unapproved romantic gambling situation in front of minors.”
Tyler nodded solemnly. “That’s fair.”
Paulson looked at Nate. “Brennan.”
Nate lifted both hands. “I did not create the bet.”
“No,” Paulson said. “But you are somehow always near the center of things I later have to explain in emails.”
“That feels statistically unfair.”
“It is historically accurate.”
A few guys snickered.
Paulson held up his clipboard. “We have sponsors coming Saturday. Local press may stop by next week. The university wants this challenge to look fun, charitable, and controlled.”
“Two out of three,” Beckett called from behind them.
Paulson did not blink. “Mr. Wilder, I have already placed your name in a separate folder.”
Beckett saluted with a mozzarella stick he had acquired from somewhere despite the snack shack not selling them.
Nate did not ask.
Paulson continued. “There will be no public harassment of lake staff, no inappropriate bets involving staff, and no viral incidents involving emotionally unavailable forwards.”
Tyler coughed.
Nate glared.
Paulson’s eyes narrowed. “Is that clear?”
“Yes,” Nate said.
“Completely,” Tyler said.
“Deeply,” Beckett said.
Paulson looked exhausted. “I hate that answer most.”
He walked away.
For exactly three seconds, everyone behaved.
Then Tyler whispered, “So private bet?”
Nate shoved him backward with one hand.
Tyler laughed.
The lake stretched out behind them, gold in the late-afternoon sun. Boats cut slow white lines across the water. Kids in Ridgeview jerseys chased each other near the volleyball court. Parents sat under umbrellas. String lights hung over the deck even though it was too early for them to glow.
It should have felt easy.
Summer usually felt easy to Nate.
He was good at summer.
Good at laughing. Good at showing up. Good at being the guy people wanted around. He could talk to donors, teach kids how to tape a stick, flirt with someone’s older sister just enough to make her laugh and not enough to get in trouble. He knew how to be charming in public.
He did not know what to do with someone who looked at charm and treated it like a coupon for something she did not plan to buy.
Ava Lane was not impressed.
Which should have been fine.
It was fine.
Nate took another sip of lemonade.
It was not fine.
“Brennan!” one of the campers yelled from the lower deck.
Nate looked over.
The little boy from earlier, Eli, maybe? Ethan? No, Evan. Evan with the grip issue, stood near the mini shooting tarp they had set up beside the railing. He held his stick in both hands and pointed toward the target holes.
“Can you watch?”
Nate’s mood shifted automatically.
Kids were easier than adults. They wanted clear things. Help with a shot. A high five. Someone to notice when they improved by an inch.