Chapter 1
The viral clip replayed on Emma's laptop for the fifth time, the ESPN lower-third graphic flashing beneath the frame like it was branded into her retinas.
Yesterday, Tim "Smitty" Smith had looked straight into a camera and said it.
Yeah. The rumor's true. I'm dating the captain's sister.
He hadn't laughed. Hadn't hedged. Hadn't even blinked.
And now it was everywhere.
But the clip that started it all wasn't even him.
It was Johnny Halston, mid-interview, still in practice gear, hair damp from the rink lights. A reporter off camera tossed the question like a joke.
"Johnny, be honest. Who on the team would you not let date your sister?"
The locker room behind him went quiet in that way only cameras can cause. A few guys smirked. Someone muttered something under their breath.
Johnny huffed a laugh and shook his head.
"Smitty. Absolutely not Smitty."
The room erupted.
The clip cut there in most reposts. Freeze frame. Zoom on Johnny's grin. Captioned with things like TEAMMATE DRAMA? and CAPTAIN CALLS OUT SMITTY.
But the extended version, Emma had found that one too, showed Smitty in the background.
Still. Watching.
Not laughing.
Not denying it.
And then twenty-four hours later, standing at a podium after practice with media circled around him, he'd said it himself.
"Rumor's true. I'm dating the captain's sister."
No clarification.
No timeline.
No permission.
Emma's stomach twisted.
He hadn't asked her.
They weren't dating.
They weren't anything.
And yet the internet had already decided they were a love story.
Fan accounts had dug up old photos of her at games. Someone had clipped footage of her hugging Tim after a playoff win and captioned it: Future sister-in-law?
Her phone buzzed again. Another notification.
Another tag.
Another opinion about her life.
She scrubbed a hand over her face and replayed Smitty's press conference one more time, pausing on his expression.
He didn't look smug.
He didn't look reckless.
He looked certain.
Like this had been a decision.
A deliberate one.
Emma stared at the screen.
At the quiet steadiness in his face.
At the moment he had changed her life with one sentence.
The problem?
He hadn't just made the decision.
He'd made it for both of them.
