“Mm-hm.”
The sound carried exactly enough skepticism to make my mother laugh. “Ignore him. You’ve spent two straight weeks under Olympic pressure.”
I hadn’t lied. Exhaustion sat deep in my bones. But underneath it ran another current entirely, one that kept tightening every time my phone buzzed in my pocket.
Luka.
Every time it wasn’t him, I tried not to be disappointed.
“Are we interrupting your plans?”
I blinked. “What?”
Dad’s lips twitched. “What your mom istryingto ask is if there’s someone waiting for you. You know, back at the Olympic Village?”
Heat climbed up the back of my neck. “There’s nobody waiting.”
It wasn’t technically a lie. Luka wasn’t sitting in my room right now counting minutes, but hewasthere in every other way that mattered.
My mom exchanged a quick glance with my dad before looking back at me, her eyes sparkling. “Oh, there definitelyissomeone.”
Before I could get a word out, Dad interjected, “We notice stuff like that. We’re observant. Comes with being a parent.”
“And you’ve spent the entire evening looking at your phone every six minutes,” Mom added.
“I have media obligations.”
“Mm-hm,” both of them said simultaneously.
God.
I leaned back in my chair with a groan while they laughed together, and the familiar warmth between them hit me hard. Thirty years together and they still looked at each other like high school sweethearts.
I almost told them, about Luka, about all of it. I could practically feel the words on the tip of my tongue.
Okay, thereissomeone.
I’m in love with him.
Then fear followed immediately behind the impulse. Not of them, though. I didn’t think they would stop loving me. The fear sat somewhere farther ahead, tangled up with Luka and his federation and the brutal reality waiting for him outside these stolen Olympic weeks. Saying it aloud would make it real in a way that couldn’t be pulled back afterward, and Luka already carried enough risk without me adding to it recklessly.
So I smiled and let the conversation move on.
Then my phone buzzed, and I grabbed it, my pulse picking up.
Claire: OMG you were amazing. I was crying when they put that medal around your neck. Think we can meet before you leave Milan?
I smiled as I typed.Another coffee? Definite possibility.
I’ve got tickets to the exhibition gala. If you hear someone screaming when you hit the ice, that’ll be me.
Mom’s cough snapped me back. “Now I’m really getting the feeling we’re interrupting your social life.”
I chuckled. “That was Claire again. She was there tonight.”
Dad beamed. “Claire Tyson? Your mom said you two had caught up.” There was a hopeful gleam in his eye, and I knew exactly what it meant.
“No, Dad, we are not getting back together.”
