Page 2 of The Fall

Max skates off ahead of me, doing his normal laps around the rink. I follow behind a little slower, easing my muscles into it. It’s early morning, so everyone on the ice is here to practice. We rarely have the ice to ourselves, but at least when it’s this early, we don’t have to worry about dodging people who can barely skate.

Once I pick up speed, I add in my twizzles. Max comes up next to me, copying my movements as we move into backward crossovers with extensions. With ice dance, we have to be very in sync with each other and our movements. There’s been a few weeks off after the last season ended, so we’re working on getting back into the swing of things.

“Who do you think it’s going to be?” Max asks before he spins away from me.

I skate to catch up with him. “I don’t know, but I feel like Coach is being super cryptic about it, which makes me think it’s someone we know.”

“You think it’s someone we don’t like?” he asks.

“I have no clue. I hope she wouldn’t do that to us.”

This time, I spin away from him, but he catches up to me with a smile on his face.

“How are you so calm about this?” I ask.

“I dunno. I trust Coach Tati, I guess. She knows we want to go to the Olympics. I don’t think she’d hook us up with someone she doesn’t think will help us.” He circles around me before adding, “And you’re still my partner. I’m not worried about anything as long as you’re by my side.”

I smile at him. Max has become one of my best friends. We’re together almost all day, every day, so it’s hard not to become friends after all that time. Our schedules are brutal. We’re exhausted most days, and it’s nice to be able to be myself around him. He doesn’t care if I’m short with him or in a mood. He’s fine if we sit in silence most of the time. I couldn’t ask for a better partner, and I know he’s right. As long as we’re together, we’ll be fine. We’re going to the Olympics together. We have to.

Once we’re warmed, I glance over to see Coach Tati waving for us to come over. My heart races when I see who’s next to her. The one man I never expected or wanted to see at this rink.

“Is that…?” Max starts to ask as he trails off.

“I think so?”

“He’s not…”

“No. No way.”

It can’t be him. He can’t be our coach. Tati wouldn’t do that to me.

“Come on, Sav. Let’s get this over with.” Max grabs my hand and skates me toward the exit, where Coach Tati is standing with him.

“Maxim, Savannah, I want you to meet your new coach.”

Logan Sokolov.

She doesn’t even have to say his name. I know who he is. Everyone knows who he is. He’s a two-time Olympic gold medalist and an amazing skater. He’s also a world-class jerk.

I know this because he is the sole reason I fractured my ankle before a championship competition three years ago that stopped us from going to the Olympics last time. We had to withdraw from the competition because I was in so much pain, and he didn’t even care. He had to have seen me fall. Everyone else saw it. But he said nothing. Just skated off with his partner like nothing had happened. Like he didn’t cause it.

“This is Logan Sokolov,” Tati says after I’ve already gone through every reason in my head that he absolutely cannot be our coach.

Logan’s icy blue eyes meet mine, and I think I might actually snarl at him. He narrows his gaze but says nothing.

Max squeezes my hand in an attempt to calm me down. After all these years, he still doesn’t understand that I’m not touchy-feely like he is. I actually don’t like to be touched most of the time, but I let him do it because I know he needs it.

“Logan. I’m Max.”

Logan breaks his stare away from me and nods at Max. “Nice to meet you, Max.”

“And this is Savannah,” Max says on my behalf since I’m still in shock, and anything that comes out of my mouth right now will not be friendly.

Logan’s eyes come back to me. “Savannah,” he says, like he’s tasting my name in his mouth. I don’t like him saying my name. I don’t like him being in my rink. And I sure as hell don’t like him being my new coach.

Coach Tati clears her throat. “Why don’t we all go sit down and get to know each other?”

Tati and Logan go first, while Max and I follow them down the hallway.