“I gotta go,” he said regretfully. “I have to finish packing and get to the airport. I’ll talk to you next week, okay?”

“Okay.”

* * *

“Oh Remi, he’s so hot!” Emily said, looking at the newspaper photo.

“He is,” Sarah said, looking over Emily’s shoulder. “Very hot. Very…big.”

“And don’t tell me he’s just being nice to you because of the reading program,” Delise said in a dry tone. “With that look on his face, he’s not just being nice to you.”

To her surprise, Delise seemed rather intrigued by the paparazzi story. “Like, how many paparazzi were there?” she asked.

“I don’t know how many there were. It felt like a hundred.”

“Really. Wow.”

“I thought you didn’t want me to go out with him,” Remi grumbled.

“She’s just jealous,” Sarah said with a mischievous look at Delise.

“No I’m not!” Delise paused with a piece of pizza halfway to her mouth. “I guess I didn’t realize how famous he is. But I still don’t think pro athletes are really upstanding guys.”

“How can you say that!” Remi shook her head, thinking of the work Jason had done with the kids at school. Oh hell. She was defending him.

“Well, a lot of them don’t exactly have good track records. Wives beating them with golf clubs for cheating on them. Getting accused of rape. Taking performance enhancing drugs. Or other illicit drugs.”

Remi sank her teeth into her bottom lip. “Yeah. Uh…well, that’s true. But they can’t all be like that. Anyway, it wasn’t cool. It was scary.” She thought back. It really had frightened her. She couldn’t imagine that happening if she’d been out alone. Not that it would, since she was nobody, but at least with Jason there she’d felt somewhat protected. “It felt like a…a violation.”

“Oh.” Delise regarded her with sympathy. “That’s not good.”

“No.” She shook her head. “So I don’t think I’ll be seeing him again.”

“That’s good.” Delise nodded approvingly. “So what should we do? Hit a club tonight?”

Remembering the last time she’d done that and had met Jason didn’t make Remi feel much like hitting a club, but she went along with her friends, mostly to keep busy and to keep from thinking about Jason.

* * *

After the five day, three game, road trip, Jason wanted to go home and crash. But he had business stuff to attend to, laundry to do and oh, yeah, call Remi.

He wasn’t sure if he was angry or disappointed about what had happened last week after those damn photographers had descended on them. Sure he was disappointed, because he and Remi had been on their way up to his apartment for what he was sure was going to be some really hot sex. But he was angry too, angry at the paps for screwing up his night, but also annoyed at Remi for letting it get to her. It really wasn’t that big a deal, especially if you compared him to big movie stars. Half the time they’d followed him, he’d been pretty sure they were more interested in pictures of Brianne than of him.

Which reminded him—she’d left another message on his voice mail. Why, when she knew he was seeing someone else, he had no goddamn clue. He really needed to call her and have a little chat.

He sat on his couch and held his cell phone in his hand. Jesus. He had to call two women and there was nothing good about either of those calls. He hated having to tell Brianne to get lost, but really, she needed to get over it and get on with her life. And he was afraid to call Remi because he had a rock-like feeling in his gut that she was going to tell him to get lost.

Which kinda didn’t make sense, given the reason he’d broken up with Brianne was because she was getting way too serious. And here he was all freaked out because Remi didn’t want anything to do with him.

Get it over with, dude.

So he called Brianne first. Amazingly, he got through to her. He’d thought maybe she’d be on a photo shoot or something.

“Jase!” she answered breathlessly. “Hi!”

She sounded so damn happy to hear from him. He closed his eyes.

“Hey,” he said. “How are you?”

“I’m okay. I’m so glad you called!”

“Uh, yeah. Listen. You gotta stop calling me, Brianne.”

Silence.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“I miss you so much.” Shit. She sounded like she was going to cry. “Please, Jase. Can’t we just sit down and talk?”

“We did that already,” he reminded her. And hadn’t that been fun. “I’m sorry, Brianne.”

“I don’t understand! How could you find someone else already? You were seeing her before you broke up with me, weren’t you?”

“No! Christ, no.” But it was true that it hadn’t taken him long to meet someone. He’d never intended for that to happen, he’d been looking forward to being single and free, and he still wasn’t sure why he was so interested in Remi.

“Never mind,” she snapped. “Damn you, Jase.”

And she hung up.

He slowly closed up his phone. Yeah, that had gone well.

On to the next call. Of course Remi was at school. He glanced at his watch. It should be her lunch time, so he might catch her. And he did.

“Hi,” she said, not sounding nearly as enthused to hear from him as Brianne had. Dammit.

They made the usual small talk and then he said, “Can I see you tonight?”

She sighed. “I don’t think so, Jason. This isn’t really going to work.”

Well, he’d seen that coming. He leaned back into his couch. He wasn’t going to be like Brianne, all heartbroken and chasing after her. He had some pride. With his insides burning, eyes closed, he said, “I figured you’d say that. Okay.” He paused, not sure what else to day. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow. At school.”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Bye, Remi.”

And again he closed up his phone. Then he threw it, hard, across the room.

* * *

It wasn’t that easy. Despite her conviction that they were from different worlds and her resolve that they shouldn’t see each other again, when he showed up at school on Wednesday, looking all big and handsome and—dammit—a little sad, she went all soft and warm and shaky inside. She couldn’t take her eyes off him as he worked with the kids, and more than once their glances collided, then skittered away.

When most of the kids had left and Ryan as usual hung back to talk about hockey, Jason quietly said, “Here.” And he slipped Ryan an envelope. Remi frowned.

Ryan opened it and peered inside, then looked up at Jason open-mouthed. “Are these tickets to one of your games?”

“Yeah. There’s three. For your mom and your brother too.”

A huge smile broke out on Ryan’s face. “Holy…I mean, wow. Thank you! I can’t believe this! I’ve never been to a real, live hockey game!”

Jason grinned and Ryan dashed out, no doubt excited to get home and share the news.

Remi’s heart tilted and warmth curled inside her. She smiled, but shook her head as their eyes met, alone now in the classroom. “All the other kids are going to be upset that they didn’t get tickets.”

His eyebrows drew down. “Damn. I didn’t think of that. I just thought…he’s been doing so well and when he said they couldn’t afford to go to a game…” He shook his head. “Shit. Sometimes I don’t think things through.”

Her throat got a little tight.

“Remi.”

He walked toward her, then stood there, gazing at her.

“The paparazzi are really not that big a deal,” he said.

“It scared me,” she said. Although now that she’d had some time to digest it and put in perspective, it actually didn’t seem so bad.

He went to a crouch in front of her where she sat, frowning, and took her hands. “Scared you?”

“Yes.” She swallowed. “I’m just not used to that.”

“They wouldn’t hurt you.”

“Remember Princess Diana?”

His eyebrows flew up. “Jesus. I’m hardly in the same class as Princess Diana. They don’t chase me around like that.”

She blew out a breath. “I know.” She paused. “Once again, Jason, that just showed that I’m not the right kind of girl for you. I don’t live in that kind of world.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” He stared at her. “That doesn’t matter. You’re smart and beautiful. I’m the one scared spitless of you. Your brains and education.”

Her heart tightened painfully. “What?” Was that true? She gazed back at him searchingly.

He dropped his gaze and shook his head. “Never mind.”

She touched her hand to his cheek, rough with beard stubble. “Oh, Jason.”

He looked at her hopefully. “So can we go out again?”

She surrendered to it. To the feelings swelling inside her, big and soft and warm. To him and his boyish charm.

“Saturday. We’ll go do something fun.” His mouth curved appealingly. “Just fun. Right?”

She sighed. “Okay.”

* * *

“Dress warm.” Jason had just arrived at her place Saturday afternoon for their date.

“Where are we going?”

“Navy Pier.”

“Navy Pier! I haven’t been there in years!”

“I’ve only been there once. It was fun.”

“Okay. Sounds crazy, but okay.”

“You should know by now, I am crazy. It’s all about fun, baby, right?”

She laughed. “Right. Let me go put on another sweater.”

She returned to her bedroom and exchanged the long-sleeved baby doll top she wore for a black turtleneck sweater. She eyed Jason when she returned to the living room. Instead of his usual leather jacket, he wore a ski jacket with a fleece lining, so she chose her black puffer jacket and looped a long black and gray scarf around her neck. She pushed aside her black high-heeled boots and pulled out her sheepskin-lined Ugg boots. Then she peered into her purse to make sure she had gloves.