“What are you doing in here?” I blurt out.
“Looking for Georgia,” she says immediately. “I have a question about the charity event next week.”
The hair stands up on the back of my neck, because I know she’s lying. For one thing, there is no charity event next week. The team is traveling to Minnesota and Ottawa. And Miranda wouldn’t be standing so close to the desk if she weren’t snooping. “You,” I say in a heavy voice, “were reading the papers on her desk!”
The journalist’s lip curls. “Don’t be ridiculous! I walked in here about one second before you. I haven’t read a thing! I was looking for a sticky note to leave her a message.”
The explanation slows me down for a second. It almost makes sense, but my spidey senses are still pinging like crazy. I glance toward the hallway, hoping Georgia appears. No luck.
Miranda’s eyes narrow, and she steps away from the desk, slipping her phone into her pocket. “Whatever you’re thinking about me, just go ahead and think it. I’ve nothing to hide. I’m not the one having a top-secret relationship with Jason Castro.”
“What?” I yelp. But then I cringe. Because Jason and I are absolutely having a thing. Even if our thing is confusing the heck out of me right now. But that’s no reason to stoop to Miranda Wager’s level. I won’t lie. “It’s not top secret,” I admit. “We’re having a thing.”
“A thing? Is that what the kids are calling it these days?” Her eyes brighten. “So Daddy knows? How is your father holding up, anyway?”
“Yes, he knows.” And here I thought Miranda Wager was a real journalist. “Like I said—I don’t have anything to hide. I don’t need to sneak around like a thief.” Like you are. The unspoken words just sort of hang there in the air between us.
Miranda’s eyes narrow with anger as she realizes she hasn’t fooled me. I’ve never had a cat fight before, but today could be the day. I’ve already fought a six-foot fish, so this should be a piece of cake.
“If you’ve nothing to hide,” Miranda hisses, “maybe you’d like to make a statement?”
“About what? Jason and I? That’s not news. Nobody cares.”
“No?” She gives me an evil grin. “How do you feel about dating the league’s only Hispanic player?”
I blink. “He is?” That can’t possibly be true. And what a ridiculous question! “I…” How to shut her down? “It’s a non-issue! He’s just Jason. We don’t sit around and discuss his father’s heritage. Why would you even ask that?”
“No?” She steps around me, wearing a smug little smile. “What color is his dick?”
I literally gasp with outrage. Jason was right about Miranda. She’s a horrible human being, and a ridiculous one. “It’s rainbow-colored!” I shriek. “And it sings to me in Spanish! Are you kidding me right now?”
She laughs. “I was, actually. Later, Hockey Barbie.”
Miranda slips out the half-open door, leaving me with nothing but outrage and the sound of her heels clicking down the hallway.
I just got played. She got me off the topic! She changed it from snooping in Georgia’s office to... Jason’s penis.
My mind whirls. What was she looking for in here, anyway?
Feeling shaky with outrage, I step closer to the desk, putting myself where I found her three minutes ago. I glance around as quickly as I can, but Georgia’s office is a bit of a disaster. There are shelves over her desk lined with every kind of hockey memorabilia. There’s even a photo of my father and some other retried players at the Brooklyn ribbon-cutting ceremony three years ago.
The photos trigger something in my subconscious. Miranda was gripping her phone when I came in, and the screen was lit. Then she tucked it out of sight. Maybe she took a photo, too? Of what?
When I glance down at Georgia’s desk, I get a shock. Right there on the blotter is a print-out of an old newspaper clipping. Tragedy strikes senior class. Hockey team raises money for victim’s funeral. Jason stares up at me from the accompanying photograph. He has his arm around a beautiful, smiling girl. Melissa Skinner would have turned nineteen years old next month, reads the sad caption.
Jason’s smile, though. That’s what really grabs me. It’s so open and happy. It’s the smile of a boy who hasn’t a care in the world. I want him to smile like that again. So badly. The back of my throat burns, and my eyes get hot.
Beside the clipping is a legal pad where Georgia has scribbled: Minneapolis Center for Organ Donation, 2pm CST arrival for 2:30 photos. There’s a photographer listed and some phone numbers.
The meeting! Jason didn’t tell me it had already been scheduled. My heart drops. I asked him if it had, and he changed the subject.
I take a deep breath and try to calm down. Jason didn’t want me to know about this meeting. But now Miranda Wager has the details. She stood right here and took a photo of Georgia’s desk. I’d bet my trust fund on it.
Now she’s going to write a story about this painful part of Jason’s life. That’s just cruel. I won’t let her do it. And there isn’t much time to stop her.
I fly out of Georgia’s office and run down the hall toward the stairs.
35
Jason
“What’ll we have for lunch?” Silas asks as half a dozen of us file through the lobby.
“Anything but pizza,” I suggest.
“I was kind of thinking about pizza,” Silas confesses.
“You’re always thinking about pizza.”
“How about Chinese?” Trevi counters, opening the street door. “Georgia wants to come with us, and she is always up for Chinese.”
“Sounds good,” I say quickly, before Silas can argue.
“Is Heidi coming, too?” Trevi asks. “Where’s she going so fast?”
I’m about to ask what he means, but I spot her as I step out the door. Heidi is flying down the sidewalk, and I don’t know why. As I glance up the street, I see another woman, hand in the air, trying to hail a taxi.
The next few seconds seem to happen in slow motion. I see a Yellow Cab pull an illegal left turn off York to try to get the fare. He swings around fast. And I see Heidi suddenly leap off the curb, toward the woman, as if to catch her.
There’s a deafening squeal of brakes as the cab tries to stop in time. Bile rises up in my throat as Heidi lurches, trying to change her body’s direction. But momentum causes her to tip toward the street.
She goes down. My mouth is wide open in a silent shout, because nothing comes out.
Heidi
“What the fuck was that?” Miranda screeches. “Are you fucking insane?”
Everything is noise—the taxi brakes, the cab driver who’s standing beside the taxi, cursing at me in a language I don’t understand. There are players shouting at me from the curb, I think.
Breathless and freaked out, I pick myself up off the asphalt. There are little bits of grime imbedded in my skin. “Don’t write the story,” I wheeze. “Give me your phone.”
“You are one crazy little bitch,” Miranda says. “You don’t get to tell me what to write, even if you do have a death wish.”
“He doesn’t deserve that invasion of his privacy!” I straighten my shaky spine and look her square in the eye.
Miranda steps back, opens the cab door, and positions it between herself and me, proving that I must look as deranged as I feel. “You can’t protect him, Heidi. He’s got a fiduciary responsibility to the entire league. Financial prudence is a job requirement. Now get out of the street, you idiot.” She gets into the cab and slams the door.
Not one word Miranda just said makes any sense at all. I’m trying to play them back in my head when two strong arms lift me bodily off the street and then deposit me on the sidewalk.
“What the fuck was that?” asks a voice that’s too angry to be Jason’s. Except it is. When I turn around he’s standing there, fists clenched, eyes flashing. He looks like a bomb that’s about to go off.