Fake Dating The Enemy Forward

I stepped through the employee entrance of the Detroit Thunder's practice facility and inhaled so deeply my lungs burned. Home. Or it was about to be. I smoothed the front of my cream cashmere sweater I was yet to get used to. My oversized hoodies I used to hide inside will do me no good here. I never imagined it was possible to spend two hours on hair, at least not for someone like me. I used to scrape my hair into a limp ponytail because I was too ashamed of how mousy and thin it looked. It took two minutes, tops. Everything was different now. I looked like someone else. I was someone else. Someone I liked very much. No one from Western Michigan would recognize me. No one would look at me and see the girl who ate lunch alone in the library, who flinched at every hallway whisper, who learned to make herself small because that was the only way to survive. I was Riley Bennett 2.0, and I was here. The Thunder's new social media coordinator. A real shot at doing what I loved for a professional hockey team. And okay. Fine. Maybe I'd also applied because Kent Harlow played for this team. I'd watched every single one of his games last season, every post-game interview and behind-the-scenes clip. I memorized the way he said "we just gotta stay humble" in that soft Michigan drawl that made my stomach flip. That poster of him on my dorm wall was the only thing that got me through the worst semester of my life. But that was ancient history. Kent didn't know I existed back then, and he definitely wouldn't recognize me now. Which was perfect. Because this time, I was walking into his world as someone worth noticing. Not the invisible girl. As Riley. *** The front office was sleek and modern. I clutched my leather portfolio and smiled at the receptionist, who barely looked up from her phone. "Hello, I’m Riley Bennett. The new social media hire. I have a meeting with Marisol Vega." She waved me toward a hallway. "Third door on the left." I didn't allow the dismissal sting. I was used to being dismissed. The difference was, now I had the power to make people look twice. Marisol Vega turned out to be a compact woman in her forties with a sharp bob and an even sharper smile. She shook my hand like she was testing my grip strength. "Riley. Welcome to the Thunder. You come highly recommended." "Thank you. I'm really excited to be here." "Good. Because we need the energy." She slid a tablet across her desk. "You know about the incident, I assume." The incident. Everyone on hockey social media knew about it. Three months ago, a locker-room video went viral—players partying, someone saying something they shouldn't have, the whole thing blowing up into a PR nightmare that cost the Thunder their previous social media director and about forty thousand followers. "I know," I said carefully. "And I have ideas for rebuilding." "Go on." "For starters, we create fun, humanizing content. It could be in the form of short player clips—behind-the-scenes moments, personality highlights. Not the polished press conference answers. Real moments.” I took a deep breath and continued. “Thirty-second to one-minute clips. Each player gets a 'day in the life' or 'this or that' segment. Light, funny, shareable. We lean into the chaos, not away from it. Show them as people, not just athletes." Marisol was quiet. Then she smiled, and it reached her eyes. "I like it. Start with the new acquisitions. We've got media day tomorrow, but I want you to shadow today. Get a feel for the facility, the players, the energy." My heart hammered. "Shadowing today? Like, with the players?" "Relax, Bennett. They're just hockey players. Mostly." She stood. "Derek from PR will give you a quick tour. Then you're on your own. Don't make me regret this." "I won't," I promised, and I meant it. *** Derek was lanky, twenty-something, with a Bluetooth earpiece he never used and a habit of walking too fast. He rattled off names and room assignments—training rooms, nutrition center, video analysis suite, the massive weight room where I caught glimpses of players in Thunder navy and gold. My pulse kicked up with every doorway. I was here. Walking in the same halls as professional hockey players, as Kent Harlow, I looked good, and I felt good and nothing could ruin this. Nothing. "—and this is the media lounge," Derek said, pushing open double doors. "Players hang here between sessions. Sometimes we do interviews, sometimes it's just—" He trailed off. I'd stopped walking. Because across the lounge, standing by the espresso machine with a paper cup in one hand, laughing at something someone said, was Kent Harlow. Kent. He was even more beautiful in person. Golden-brown hair, sun-kissed skin, that easy, open smile that had carried me through so many dark nights. He wore a fitted gray Thunder T-shirt and joggers that hung low on his hips, and when he laughed again, his whole face lit up. My mouth went dry. Every carefully constructed brick of my new confidence wobbled. Say something. You're a professional. Act like one. But I couldn't move. I was twenty-two and standing ten feet away from the boy who'd been my secret lighthouse for four years, and I was suddenly seventeen again, shy and awkward and desperately hoping he wouldn't look my way. Then he did. His hazel eyes landed on me, and his smile faltered for a fraction of a second before widening into something friendly and open. "Hey," he said, lifting his cup. "New face. You must be the social media person Marisol was talking about." His voice. Deeper than on TV. Rougher. It slid over my skin like velvet and sandpaper, and I had to stop myself from shivering. "Riley," I managed, stepping forward with a hand I prayed wasn't shaking. "Riley Bennett. I'm really excited to be here." Smooth. So smooth. Kent just grinned and shook my hand, his grip warm and firm and brief. "Kent Harlow. Welcome to the Thunder. Try not to let these guys scare you off. We're mostly harmless." "Mostly?" "Well. There's Jan." He nodded toward the hallway I'd just come from, something amused but unreadable in his tone. "He's new too. Signed last week. You'll meet him soon enough. Good luck with that." I laughed, and it sounded almost normal. Kent squeezed my shoulder as he passed and disappeared down the hall with his sunshine smile. My whole body went electric I stood there, heart pounding, trying to remember how to be a functional human being. That happened. That actually happened, and you didn't die, and he smiled at you, and— "Riley Bennett?" The voice came from behind me. Deep. Smooth. With a hint of something rough underneath. I knew him. I knew the sound of that voice, even though I'd only heard it a handful of times in college—usually from across a crowded party, usually saying something cruel or careless or so effortlessly confident it made me want to disappear onto the floor. I turned. And the world stopped. He was leaning against the door frame, arms crossed, watching me with dark eyes that held no warmth and no welcome. Tall—taller than Kent, broader in the shoulders. His dark hair, slightly too long, pushed back from a face of sharp angles and shadowed jaw. His lips pressed into a line. Jax Callahan. I folded my hands into fists as a wave of memories I wished would stay forgotten hit me. Western Michigan. Senior year. The party I never should have gone to. The whispers that followed me for months. No. No, no, no. He couldn't be here. This was the Detroit Thunder. I'd checked the roster. I'd checked, and he wasn't there. Wait, Jax? Signed last week. Kent had said that. New acquisition. Oh God. It was him. Shit. Jax's eyes flicked over me and something shifted in his expression. Something I couldn't read. Could he have recognized me? No. Impossible. I looked nothing like the girl he'd known. "Jax Callahan," he said, pushing off the door frame and extending a hand. "New forward. You must be the social media girl." His voice was professional. Completely neutral. Like he'd never seen me before in his life. I stared at his hand. My own hand felt disconnected from my body, heavy and numb. I forced myself to reach out, forced my fingers to close around his, forced my voice to work. "Riley Bennett. Social media coordinator." His grip was warm. Firm. He held on a second longer than necessary, and I felt the rough calluses on his palm. "So," he said, and there was the faintest edge to his voice now. "You're the one Marisol hired to fix our image." "Fix is a strong word," I managed, proud of how steady I sounded. "I prefer 'rebrand.'" One corner of his mouth lifted. "I like that. It means you’ve got big plans for us, Riley Bennett?" Hearing my full name in his mouth sent a shiver down my spine. "Short player clips," I said, automatic, rehearsed. "Fun, humanizing content. Behind-the-scenes moments. I was actually thinking of starting with the new guys. Get fans invested in the fresh faces." Jax's dark eyes held mine, and for a long moment, neither of us spoke. The surrounding lounge faded into white noise until there was only Jax Callahan and the ghost of every terrible memory I'd tried to bury. Then he smiled. It didn't reach his eye. "Perfect," he said, like a challenge. "You can start with me." He stepped closer—just one step, but it felt like the walls were closing in—and dropped his voice to something low and intimate that no one else could hear. "Don't worry, Riley. I'll make sure it's memorable." A jolt went through me. He said my name like he knew something I didn't. Then he walked past me and my breath hitched against my will. He disappeared down the hall without looking back. I stood frozen in the middle of the media lounge like a mannequin, my heart hammering so hard I was sure everyone in the building could hear it. I forced myself to breathe. In through the nose, out through the mouth, the way my therapist had taught me back when panic attacks kept me from leaving my apartment. Maybe I was imagining things and the trauma of seeing him again had twisted a normal interaction into something sinister. I needed some air. The employee exit was twenty feet ahead. I kept my chin up, my portfolio pressed flat against my chest like a shield. I made it to the hallway before my lungs remembered how to work properly. Then I heard them. Two players, rounding the corner from the weight room, voices low and unhurried. "Callahan's still not unpacked, you know. Boxes just sitting there." "Guy never stays anywhere long enough to bother." A short laugh. "Wonder how long he'll last." They passed without looking at me. I pushed through the exit and stood in the cold Detroit air, breathing. He never stays anywhere. Good, I thought. Maybe there was hope.