I Pucking Love You

by Pippa Grant

  “Well, this isn’t nearly that bad,” she finishes.

  “Not even close,” Britney agrees.

  Keely’s nodding. “It’s actually really heroic. At least, it is to me.”

  “What is?” he asks.

  I want to echo the question, because his sisters aren’t very convincing here. Whatever this is, it’s bad.

  But I also kinda don’t want to know.

  “Muffy?” a new voice says from the doorway.

  I turn, and Brianna’s standing there.

  With Steve.

  Who’s squinting at me in confusion. “Octavia?”

  “Oh, good, you made it!” Keely says, making it clear why they’re here.

  They got invited last night after I skipped Chester Green’s.

  My face erupts in flames, but unfortunately, it doesn’t take out the witnesses around me who will forever be able to swear by what happens next.

  “Who’s Octavia?” Brianna asks.

  Steve points at me. “That’s Octavia. We had a date two weeks ago.”

  I don’t look at Tyler.

  I don’t have to. I told him I was Octavia the night that he came through the Cod Pieces drive-thru.

  “Date?” he says, and I feel the chill in his words all the way through my bones.

  Brianna lifts her phone. “Forget the date. Did you really auction off your virginity to pay your medical school bills?”

  My vision narrows to a pinprick, and everything goes so silent, I’m not sure the world exists anymore beyond the weird gaspy noise that suddenly explodes in my ears.

  It’s me.

  I’m a gasp. That’s literally all I am.

  A horrified gasp.

  But is that really what I want to be? A horrified gasp living in the shadow of fear that my boyfriend, the man I love, will leave me now that it’s public knowledge how much of a fuck-up I’ve been, and that his original true love, who’s successful and undoubtedly gorgeous and coordinated and capable of not just walking in stilettos, but also of looking like she belongs on them, would take him back?

  No.

  No, it most definitely is not.

  I suck in a breath and order the inky blackness to get the fuck out of my eyeballs, and as soon as the roaring in my ears subsides, I order my knees to work too.

  “Yes,” I announce. “I tried to auction my virginity to pay for medical school. And I go on dates. I’m on dating apps. Because it’s how I find men for my clients. I cheat to find clients, because so many men are assholes. Do you know how many men I’ve met who only want to stare at my chest or tell me I should lose weight or mansplain how stupid things work? I refuse to let my very favorite people in the world be subjected to that. And if I sit down and talk to a guy as me, representing Muff Matchers, they don’t take me seriously. The one thing I succeed at is failing. I am a massive success as a failure, and I don’t care who knows. I am who I am. I do what I do. And I am so tired of feeling like that’s not enough.”

  The door’s open.

  The door to our private room is open, and the entire Sunday brunch crowd heard me.

  Brianna’s gaping.

  Steve’s confused.

  Some brunchers are whispering or giggling at the freak show. The Jaeger family are all tongue-tied.

  And Tyler—Tyler’s sitting there livid.

  Completely, one hundred percent livid.

  My heart is a punching bag and his eyes are throwing the daggers to obliterate it.

  “And you can all fuck off if you don’t like it,” I finish.

  And there you have it.

  I’m done.

  My career?

  Over.

  I cheat.

  I break the rules, representing people I’m not on dating apps so that I can screen for the good ones for women who deserve love as much as, if not more than the rest of us, and I announced it to the world while dating a hockey player whose sister-in-law is among the tabloids’ favorite subject.

  I’ll be news for exactly fourteen minutes at some point today, and everyone who matters will see it.

  People who think they matter but don’t—like Connie Bragowski—will see it and try to friend me on social media to pretend to care but really because she wants to feel superior and be in the middle of the drama, to tell people she saw it coming.

  And Tyler?

  I have no idea what I’ll do about Tyler.

  I just know that if he wants to be pissed at me for doing my job, even if I’m stretching the boundaries of how I should do my job, then he’s not the guy I thought he was.

  And maybe this is a convenient way for him to dump me so he can go back to Gator Cranford’s sister.

  Fine.

  Whatever.

  I snag my bag off the back of my chair and march to the door.

  You know what?

  I hope he does go back to her.

  And when he does, you’re damn right I’ll take credit for that match.

  No matter how much it hurts.

  44

  Tyler

  For the second time in twelve hours, I’m watching Muffy leave me behind.

  But this time, I’m so pissed I might take a chunk out of the table with my bare hands.

  I need to follow her. I need to get up and follow her.

  But my entire body is so tense I’m positive all I’ll do is yell, and I’m just rational enough to know that yelling at Muffy right now would be a bad, bad idea.

  Why doesn’t she trust me enough to know I don’t care if she does her job, and I will literally break people if they so much as look at her wrong for any of the ways that she’s exactly perfect?

  And who the fuck made her national news?

  West drops into the seat she vacated while Brianna and what’s-his-name turn and do the one thing I’m supposed to be doing. “Breathe, Ty.”

  “I am breathing.”

  “No, you’re punishing the air with your nose and lungs, and pretty soon, it’s gonna be too bruised for the rest of us to survive.”

  I snort.

  “Oh, no, I’m going to faint dead away,” Brit says.

  Three of her kids burst into tears.

  When I turn around to glare at my siblings, four more do too.

  “Down, boy,” Allie says as she gathers two of her kids up and shushes them. “None of us think Muffy’s a failure, and you’re being an idiot if you think sitting here is going to make her come back.”

  “You do want her to come back, don’t you?” Keely says as she hands one of Brit’s kids a biscuit, which is like plugging the cry hole before it bursts.

  “I want her to come back,” Mom says. “You were happy yesterday.”

  “She’s off-limits in your show. Understand?”

  Mom rolls her eyes. “The easy targets are never the fun jokes, Tyler. You know that.”

  “So?” West says. “You going after her, or what?”

  Fuck this.

  Or what.

  I’m going after the tabloid who published her secrets, and then I’m going after every single person who’s ever made her feel small and insignificant and like a failure.

  I rise and grab my coat. “Come back for Thanksgiving,” I grunt at my family.

  I pass Staci and her family on my way out. “Whaaaa…?” she says. “I just saw Muffy, and—Tyler? Ty!”

  Not worth answering.

  Someone else will fill her in.

  Muffy’s long gone when I hit the street, which is fine with me. I’m not chasing her today.

  Not yet, anyway.

  It takes me forty minutes to get where I’m going, and I’m still fuming when I pull my car to a stop in front of the two-story house where my girlfriend grew up, behind an old beige Crown Victoria with custom plates that say BADA88.

  Hilda flings the door open before I’m halfway up the walk and steps out into the chilly morning in nothing but a baggy silk robe and mismatched animal slippers. One’s a sheep. The other’s an elephant. Her hair’s swept up like
she’s going to a ball, and she’s plastered on full-face makeup. “Tyler! That black eye looks good on you. Are you here to ask for Muffy’s hand? Because I’m not going easy on you, even though she doesn’t have any other prospects. She’s a modern woman. She doesn’t need a man to be complete.”

  “Quit making her feel like a loser,” I growl as I shove my way into the house.

  Hilda’s made-up eyebrows shoot so high they could give the ceiling a lift. “What are you talking about?”

  “Somebody calling Muffy a loser, Hilda?” an old dude in grandpa pants asks behind her. “Let me at him. I got a can of mace somewhere in my pockets.” He pats his thighs, then his butt, then reaches down the front of his pants and comes up with a can of whipped cream.

  “What the fuck?” I snarl.

  “Huh. Wrong can. That wasn’t from your fridge, Hilda. Promise. I wouldn’t steal your whipped cream. I brought my own.”

  “I’d let you have it, William,” she replies. “Have you met Tyler Jaeger? He’s boinking Muffy.”

  The old dude peers down his old man nose at me. “You making sure she gets her cookies first?”

  “I could just look at him and get my cookies.” Hilda fans herself.

  “I’m not here to give you your cookies.” Jesus. “Do you have any idea how much Muffy needs you to accept her for who she is without making comments about her weight or her size or her food or what you want to do to her friends? Jesus. It would be like my mother using you as all of the material for her shows. How the hell would you feel being the butt of every joke?”

  William pauses in trying to pull the cap off of the can of whipped cream.

  Hilda freezes. “What are you talking about?”

  “Muffy. Your daughter. The woman who talks tough and acts like she doesn’t care but feels like she’s never good enough and doesn’t deserve good things. That’s what I’m talking about. She needs you to be her mother, not the food police, and not some kind of twisted social influencer.”

  She’s shrinking like every word is a blow, her eyes getting shiny, and I don’t fucking care.

  I don’t. Fucking. Care.

  “I don’t want her to end up like me,” she whispers.

  “What are you talking about?” William says to her. “You’re a fox.” He turns a glare on me. “And if you’re insulting my friend Hilda here, you should know I have a criminal record and I’m not afraid to go after your bank accounts.”

  “Fuck that. I know the woman who set off the dick pic virus last year. She can hack circles around you.”

  Both of them suck in a breath.

  It pays to know the Berger twins sometimes. They move in weird, fascinating circles.

  And right now, all I care about is that those circles help me help Muffy.

  I point at Hilda. “Quit. Making. Muffy. Feel. Like. A. Failure.”

  “I don’t try to,” she says. “She does lots of good things. And she’s so pretty. And she always looks so graceful even when she’s dropping her phone in her oatmeal.”

  “Figure out how to tell her that, or you’re not coming to our wedding, and you’ll never meet our kids. Got it?”

  She gapes at me like she’s one of the fish in the aquarium Daisy got me for my last birthday.

  And suddenly all of my anger is gone.

  I don’t care what happens to Hilda.

  I care that Muffy’s okay.

  I don’t even say goodbye. I just turn and march back out of the house. But this time, I’m pulling out my phone as I go.

  Forget being mad.

  Forget Cranford. Forget my black eye. Forget my family. Forget the tabloids.

  Forget fear.

  I love Muffy.

  I fucking love Muffy. She’s my best friend. She slipped into my heart a year ago, and she’s stayed there, digging in deeper and deeper until everything that was right in front of me for so long is the only thing I could ever want, and it’s past time I got over being afraid she’ll hurt me.

  I want Muffy.

  Before I can hit Nick’s number to see if Muffy’s hiding out with Kami at his house, my phone rings with an incoming call from a number I don’t recognize.

  Normally I’d send it to voicemail, but it’s local, and I don’t think Muffy has her phone on her, and I have zero doubt she’d borrow a phone from a stranger if she wanted to reach someone.

  I hope that someone is me. “Hello?”

  “What the hell did you do to Muffy?”

  The voice. I know the voice. It’s— “Maren?”

  “She emailed her entire Muff Matchers list, confessed to finding dates for us on dating apps since she said she doesn’t have the network to do everything she wants to do for us the right way, and that she’ll understand if we all want to fire her since she’s probably getting booted for violating terms of service and won’t be able to find us matches anymore. What. The hell. Did you. Do?”

  “Where is she?”

  “One, even if I knew, I wouldn’t tell you, and two, if you hurt her, I will fucking destroy you.”

  “No need,” I mutter. “If I hurt her, I’ll destroy myself.”

  45

  Tyler

  I can’t find Muffy.

  She’s not at my place. She’s not with Kami. I talked Maren’s address out of Kami, but she wasn’t there either. Nor was she with Alina or Felicity, Ares’s wife and the fourth member of Kami’s tight-knit group of friends that Muffy’s always felt like she lives at the fringes of.

  There isn’t an official Muff Matchers office, but I swing by Cod Pieces, where the weekend manager says he hasn’t seen her and D’Angelo offers to both quit and help me look for her, and also go ninja on my ass if I hurt her.

  I tell him to stay where he is and that I’ll have Muffy call him later.

  With Maren and Alina’s help, we track down a few more Muff Matchers clients, but none of them know anything about Muffy’s whereabouts.

  Not even Brianna, who was the last person to see her.

  “She kept apologizing, like she was sorry she had to find Steve this way for me, but I’m not mad, and neither is he,” she tells me on the phone before dropping her voice to add in a whisper, “I’m glad she found him, no matter how. He’s a lot nicer and more patient and interesting than any of the other guys I’ve ever tried to date. That was really nice of her to screen all those men on dating apps who pretend they’re something they’re not. It’s a service more people should offer.”

  She’s not at any of her favorite cafes.

  I can’t find Rufus in my condo, which doesn’t necessarily mean she’s gone for good—he could be hiding somewhere—but her car’s gone, and based on what I know of Muffy leaving Richmond, if she decides she wants to disappear, that’s exactly what she’ll do.

  Even if she doesn’t have her clothes with her.

  Or her phone, which I find lying in the middle of my bed.

  Fuck.

  It takes me forever, but I figure out Veda’s office number. I get her weekend answering service, convince them it’s an emergency, and they promise to immediately pass on the message that her best friend is missing.

  And I’m out of ideas.

  I’m so out of ideas that I need new ideas, so I head the one place I know I’ll find people who might be crazy enough to guess where I should check next.

  The bunny bar.

  I bang on the knocker, and the small, rectangular hatch at eye level slides open. “Password?”

  “Shaved skates.”

  “Wrong door.” The hatch slides shut, and what the hell?

  They changed the password.

  They changed the password.

  I pull up my email and flip through for a note with the new password, but I don’t have anything from the bunny bar.

  Seriously?

  I hit my text messages and pull up the thread with Athena and Cassadee. Stuck outside the bunny bar. When did the password change? Got a problem. I need help.

  I pace the street while I wait
for an answer, and it takes a lot longer than I wish it did.

  Fuck.

  I’m supposed to be at practice.

  Jesus.

  This isn’t good.

  Coach is gonna kill me. Coach is gonna kill me and make me wish Cranford had finished me off. I hit Lavoie’s number on my phone, and it goes straight to voicemail.

  Klein’s number does too.

  Shit shit shit.

  Goodbye, hockey career.

  Goodbye, woman of my dreams.

  I dial Ares last, and when his voicemail message—a single grunt—hits my ear, I spill my guts. “Ares. Fuck. I forgot it’s practice time. Muffy’s gone. Like, disappeared gone. I can’t find her, and things went to shit because all the tabloids dug into her and exposed all of her secrets and I need to find her. I need to make sure she’s okay. Fuck. Fuck. I think I love her. No. No, I know I love her. I love her, man. I fucking love her so hard I hurt, and I’m worried about her, and she left her phone at my place and no one knows where she is, and I don’t care if she hates me or blames me—I really should’ve asked Daisy to make sure the gossip rags got the message that anyone who fucked with Muffy would…would… Shit. I don’t even know what Daisy could do to them, but I know Muffy wouldn’t be exposed like this if she was hanging out with anyone else and their family. I just—I just need to know she’s okay. If you’ve seen her, let me know. And can you tell Coach—shit. Never mind. I’ll tell him myself. I can man up. This is all on me.”

  I hang up and shove my phone in my pocket, ready to turn around, get my car, and get my ass back to practice, when I realize I’m not alone.

  Athena—or is that Cassadee?—is poking her head out of the bunny bar entrance.

  Athena. Definitely Athena. It’s the boobs. “You know you’re why the password changed, right?”

  “What? Why? What did I do?”

  She rolls her eyes, then crooks her finger at me. “One chance, Jaeger. One. Chance.”

  I don’t ask questions.

  Instead, I silently follow her inside and down the stairs into the glittery silver, gold, and pink club.