Page 20 of Center Ice
“Who are we hiding this from, exactly? Is there really no one who knows I’m Graham’s dad?”
“Jules knows. That’s it.”
“I think Lauren suspects, too,” he says.
“Because of our conversation at her house the other night?” I’d kind of forgotten Lauren witnessed that whole thing.
“Yeah. After you left, she was asking me how I knew you. You knew exactly what I meant when I asked Graham how old he is, and I’m pretty sure Lauren at least suspects why I was asking.”
“She’s become one of my closest friends,” I say, then tell him about how Lauren and her twins moved to Boston last winter, and how Jules and I became friends with her as we renovated her new house, and how she ended up dating my brother. “I want to tell her the truth, but I don’t wantherto have to lie to my brother in order to keep our secret.”
Jameson finding out would add a whole other layer of complexity, and our situation is already complicated enough. Drew and I need time to figure this out ourselves before anyone else gets involved.
“Has she asked you about it?”
“Not yet. But if you show up to that hockey practice, she sure as shit will be asking questions.” And if she starts asking questions, I don’t know how I’ll lie to her—so it’s best if she’s not asking them.
“She’ll be there?”
“She and the girls usually come to watch the Saturday morning practices. A bunch of five-year-olds learning to play hockey is always highly entertaining, and her twins love being at the rink. Jameson is teaching them to skate, actually.” I love seeing this side of my brother—the protective, nurturing side that he tried so hard to hide for so many years.
“We almost always have games Friday or Saturday, so the chances of me ever being at a Saturday morning practice are slim. But I’ll follow your lead on whatever you want to do about telling Jameson and Lauren,” Drew says.
“I guess for now I can ask Lauren not to ask any questions so that I don’t have to lie to her, or ask her to lie to my brother?”
Drew half-laughs, half-snorts. “So you mean, you’re going to tell her without telling her.”
“I don’t know what other choice I have.” I sigh as the waiter sets our drinks on the table, then continues on to the next table because we haven’t even opened our menus yet. “Family is…complicated.”
He stares at me with a look I can’t decipher, and I can feel the heat creeping into my cheeks under his gaze. Finally, one corner of his lips turns up, but he’s not looking at me with amusement. It looks more like…pride?
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
Chapter Ten
DREW
Idon’t know how I’m looking at her, so I’m not sure how to answer her question. Instead, I continue to stare at her as her cheeks get pinker until she looks like one of those 1940s pin-up girls with flawless porcelain skin and rosy cheeks and lips.
Finally, I admit, “I’m just taking it all in, and I’m impressed.”
“Impressed?” She asks the question like she doesn’t understand why I’m using the word in this situation.
“Yeah, you’ve just managed to accomplish so much in the past six years—your architecture degree, starting a business, raising our child. I’m in awe…like always.”
“What do you mean,like always?” She sounds both confused and even a little defensive, then she looks down at the charcuterie tray and adds some meat, cheese, and olives to her plate, like she’d rather do anything other than meet my eye while asking me this question.
“I mean, even in college, you just kind of…had your shit together? You were smart and self-assured, and you didn’t take any of my crap. I couldn’t even flirt with you, because you shut me down every time. We both knew you were way too good for me.”
A laugh bursts out of her, and it’s a relief to see her smiling. I’ve always loved the way her defined cheekbones reveal dimples when she smiles.
“Drew,” she says, after laughing for longer than I’d expect. “We did notbothknow that.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, taking a sip of my beer and wishing I could sit here drinking and talking to her all night.
“I mean, you were freaking un-touch-able in college. A shameless flirt, sure. But I was not your type. At all. And we both knewthat.”
“You weren’t my type,” I admit. “Which is what I liked about you. Fake girls who were only interested in me because I played hockey got old after a while.”
