It hadn’t been a secret how heartsick seeing my dream slipping away had made me… how angry and hurt and upset I’d been. How angry and hurt and upset I still was. Honestly, part of me worried I would never get over it. I held grudges like a motherfucker. But my family had all ridden this ride with me, year after year, one up and five downs, over and over again.
Most importantly, they had all been there for me in the aftermath of me slowly trying to build up this new life I had outside of the rink, from forcing me to do little things like eating dinner with my family while all I wanted was to hole up in my room alone, to threatening me into going out with them, and guilt-tripping me into doing things I hadn’t made time for before. They had done that over and over again until it had begun to feel like second nature. All those things I hadn’t done enough of in the past, but could once I told my mom she wasn’t going to have to keep paying the astronomical fees that came with coaching because I didn’t have one anymore. He had ditched me too.
It was one thing for me to be sad and heartbroken, but I didn’t want them to feel that way too. Never again. Not if I could prevent it.
And I still wasn’t sure what I was going to do.
The selfish part of me wanted to do it. Duh.
But the other part of me, that tiny part that didn’t want to be a selfish shit, didn’t want to let these people down by turning into the person I’d been before. The one who was never around. The one who everyone thought didn’t care… probably because I hadn’t cared enough to.
Then there was the whole part of me not being sure I could handle things not working out… as much as that made me a pussy.
And the whole it-being-Ivan this deal was with.
Ivan. Ugh. I wanted it that bad that I wasn’t immediately saying no to the possibility of spending most of my days with him of all people. This was what my life had come to. Possibly spending time with that arrogant dipshit.
I really had no idea what to do, damn it.
So, for that moment… I lied. “I think it’s just my period on the way.”
“Ahh,” was Jonathan’s response, because girls being on their periods was old news after sharing a bathroom with three sisters for the first eighteen years of his life.
My mom, on the other hand, squinted a little, watching me for two moments too long. So long that I thought she was going to call me out on my shit, but right as I assumed that, she shrugged and then dropped another bomb. “So, is it true Lukov and his partner split up?”
I blinked, not sure why I was surprised.
She always knew everyone’s business. Someway, somehow.
It was James, my brother’s husband, who sucked in a loud breath first. That’s how long he’d been with Jonathan, that the name meant something. I could remember a time, many, many years ago when James hadn’t known a single thing about figure skating. But now he’d been a member of the family long enough that he knew more about the sport than I’d bet he’d ever imagined he would.
“He got rid of his partner?” Jonathan perked up, shoving his glasses up his nose, like this was the best gossip he’d heard in a while.
Mom raised her eyebrows and nodded. “From what I heard, it happened a few days ago.”
I made sure to shove a big piece of chicken into my mouth so that I wouldn’t make a face that said that’s not what happened.
Luckily, my nosey-ass brother gasped. “Hadn’t they just paired up a few years ago?” Jojo asked, aiming the question at our mom because he knew she had all the gossip.
“Uh-huh. The partner before her fell twice at the Major Prix final. They won a bronze, but with this girl he won a national title and worlds with.”
The Major Prix. Worlds. Nationals. They were three of the most prestigious competitions in the figure skating world, and only he could screw up that much in a competition and still win something. That should have reassured me that I’d be making a good choice if I accepted his offer, but all it did was make me resentful toward myself for fucking up so much that I had nothing.
“Karina didn’t tell you anything about it?” My mom turned her attention to me.
I made sure I still had chicken in my mouth while I shook my head and said with a mouthful, “She’s still in Mexico.” They knew she was in school.
“E-mail her and find out,” she urged.
I frowned. “You e-mail her and ask.”
Mom snorted like bring it on. “I will.”
“I always forget Karina is his sister,” James noted, leaning across the table. “Is he just as good looking up close, in person?”
I snickered. “No.”
Jojo snorted out, “Uh-huh,” but the tone put me on edge and had me glancing in his direction to find him leaning into James’s shoulder. He pretended like he was trying to whisper, but the idiot looked right at me as he added, “Jasmine used to always flirt with him. You should have seen it.”
I gagged on the chicken I hadn’t swallowed yet before coughing out, “The hell did you just say?”
His “ha!” made me get my middle finger ready. “Don’t even pretend. You used to always come home talking about him,” the five-foot-seven-inch man who had always been a perfect balance between a supportive older brother and an annoying pain in the ass with boundary issues claimed. “You had a thing for him. We all knew.” He looked at James and raised his eyebrows. “We knew.”
Was he fucking with me? He was fucking with me, wasn’t he? Me flirting with Ivan? Ivan?
“No,” I told him calmly, only because if I said it too aggressively they would cry bullshit. I knew how they worked. “I did not flirt with him.” And just so James knew, I emphasized it. “Ever.”
Mom made a noise that basically said, “Well.”
I swung my gaze toward her and shook my head. “No. No, I didn’t. He’s all right looking”—I only said that because, if I said he wasn’t my type, they would assume I was trying to hide something, and I wasn’t. “—but it was never like that. Not even a little bit. He’s kind of a jerk. His sister and I are friends. That’s it.”
“He wasn’t a jerk,” my mom interjected. “He’s always very polite. He’s very good with his fans. He seems like a very nice boy.” She slid me a look. “And you did like him.”
A nice boy? What the hell were they on?
Yeah, everyone did love him, and they all thought the world of him. Handsome, talented Ivan Lukov, who had won the world over as a cute, winking, cocky teenager. He knew how to play the game. I would give him that. But I had never liked him. Not ever. “Nope, no I didn’t,” I argued, shaking my head in disbelief they would be trying to claim that kind of crap. Were they for real? “You’re imagining shit. We say a sentence to each other once a month, and it’s always sarcastic and a little mean.”
“Some people might consider that foreplay—” my brother started to say before I cut him off.
I made a horrible noise again, still shaking my head. “Hell no—”
Jonathan burst out laughing. “Why’s your face turning red then, Jas?” he asked, slapping his palm over the top of my head and giving it a shake before I could jerk it out of the way.
“Shut your mouth,” I said to Jojo, thinking of a dozen different comebacks and knowing I couldn’t use any of them because they would all come out way too defensive and make me look guilty. Or, worse, I’d tell them about the offer I’d been given that morning. “I didn’t like him though. I don’t know why you two would ever even think that.”
Mom snickered. “It’s okay to admit you used to have a crush on him. There are plenty of girls around the world who have. I might have even had a little crush on him back in the day—”
Forgetting we were on opposite teams, Jojo and I both gagged.
Mom groaned. “Oh, stop. I didn’t even mean it like that!”
Of course the woman who was married to a man not even ten years older than me would have to clarify that comment. Mom wasn’t just a cougar, she was The Cougar. All other cougars hailed to her.
“I’m going to pretend you just didn’t say that so I can sleep tonight, Ma,” Jojo muttered with a borderline sick look on his face before he physically shook it off. Then he elbowed me. “You did used to talk about him a lot, Jas.”
I blinked. “I was like seventeen, and it was only because he’d been an asshole.“