Puck Me Harder

CHAPTER 16

BLAKE

The conference room smells like desperation and expensive coffee.

My PR team has been in crisis mode for two days. Ever since the gossip columns started multiplying. Ever since sponsors started threatening to pull out. Ever since the Forge's ownership got involved and started asking questions about what the hell is happening with their captain.

Victoria Chen is my PR agent, sharp, efficient, and currently looking at me like I'm a problem that needs solving.

She pulls up a video montage on the conference room screen. Gossip columnists talking about my "undeniable chemistry" with Elle. Social media threads analyzing every interaction between us. Reddit breakdowns of my playing style in relation to my "compromised personal life." t****k videos speculating about whether I'm "too distracted by my journalist girlfriend."

Journalist girlfriend. Like she's defined entirely by her relationship to me.

"This is spiraling," Victoria says, and her voice is calm but her expression is stressed. "We have a narrative problem. The public believes you're in a relationship with Elle Bloom. That belief is affecting sponsorships, team morale, and your personal brand. We need to get ahead of this."

"How?" I ask, even though I'm not sure I want to know the answer.

"You have three options," Victoria says, and she pulls up three bullet points on the screen.

OPTION ONE: Deny and Distance

"You issue a public statement denying any romantic involvement with Elle Bloom. You distance yourself from her completely. No proximity. No communication. The rumor dies because there's nothing to sustain it."

I'm already shaking my head.

OPTION TWO: Go Public

"You confirm the relationship. You go public. You control the narrative by being transparent. You say you met years ago, reconnected, and you're in a relationship. You frame it as a love story instead of a scandal."

"And that fixes the sponsors?" I ask.

"It contextualizes it," Victoria says. "Right now, the mystery is the problem. The secrecy makes people suspicious. Transparency would address that. You're not hiding anything. You're just a man in a relationship with a woman. Nothing scandalous about that."

I'm already shaking my head again.

OPTION THREE: Strategic Relationship

"Fake dating," Victoria says flatly. "You publicly announce that you're together. You control the narrative by being the ones who reveal the relationship before the media does. You frame it as a connection that developed during the assignment. You're transparent. You're the good guys. And after the season—after the narrative has moved on, after the sponsors are comfortable again—you quietly break up. Mutual decision. You both move on. No one gets hurt."

I stare at her.

"That's a terrible idea," I say.

"It's the cleanest solution," she counters. "It addresses all the problems at once: the rumors stop because you confirm them. The sponsors are satisfied because you're controlling the narrative. The team's reputation recovers because the story becomes about a successful relationship, not a scandal. And you and Elle get to move on without the collateral damage."

"It's fake," I say. "It's lying to the public."

"It's strategic communications," Victoria corrects. "And frankly, it's the least damaging option on the table."

She's right. She's completely right, and I hate it.

Because Option One means I have to become invisible to Elle again. I have to distance myself completely and let her suffer alone. I have to go back to ignoring her, and we both know how that ends.

Option Two means I go public with the relationship and confirm every rumor, which makes her a permanent target. It doesn't fix her career. It just makes her collateral damage official.

Option Three means I get to keep her close, get to claim her publicly, get to have the thing I've wanted my entire life to make Elle undeniably mine and then I have to throw her away at the end of the season like she was just a strategic move.

"I'm not agreeing to anything yet," I say, but Victoria is already smiling like she knows I will.

"You don't have to," she says. "But Blake, I'm going to be honest with you: Option Three is the path of least resistance. It solves the problem. It protects Elle's career by framing the relationship as something intentional and transparent rather than something scandalous. It protects the team. It protects the sponsors. And it protects you."

"It doesn't protect Elle," I say. "It just uses her."

"She's already being used by the rumor," Victoria says quietly. "Option Three just gives you control over how that happens."

She leaves the conference room and I'm alone with the three options on the screen.

I think about Elle in her hotel room. Elle telling me that what happened between us didn't mean anything. Elle protecting herself from me by denying the only real thing we've ever shared.

I think about the choice in front of me: distance, confession, or strategic deception.

And I think about the fact that all three options end with Elle destroyed in some way.

Option One: she suffers alone, career destroyed, invisible.

Option Two: she's confirmed as my girlfriend, her credibility permanently questioned, her career in tatters.

Option Three: she's my girlfriend for a season, and then I have to leave her. Again.

My phone buzzes. It's a text from an unknown number:

"Blake, this is Elle. I know you're getting PR advice. I know they're probably telling you to do something strategic. I'm telling you: don't. Whatever they're suggesting, don't. Because I can't survive you choosing strategy over me again.

—E"

I stare at the message for a long time.

She knows. Somehow, she already knows what my PR team is suggesting. And she's begging me not to do it.

But what choice do I have?

Option One destroys her through absence. Option Two destroys her through exposure. Option Three destroys her through strategic abandonment.

And Option Four—the option that isn't on the screen—is admitting that I love her enough to blow up my entire career, my entire life, everything I've built, just to keep her close.

Victoria knocks on the door and comes back in.

"Well?" she asks.

I don't answer because I'm still looking at Elle's text message, and I'm understanding that I'm about to make a choice that will determine both of our futures.

"Tell me again," I say slowly. "How exactly would Option Three work?"