CHAPTER ELEVEN

Hannah and Zach were so relieved to be able to dance without photographers and fans around them that they didn't even stop to question why they were suddenly being left alone. They were completely lost in their own world until Jackie and Alex appeared to tell them it was time to go if they were going to be awake for their flight tomorrow. They turned to get James and finally noticed what had taken everyone's interest.

"What the hell?"… "When did this start" … "Did anyone see this before now?"

The four were standing there shouting questions, none of them sure what to do next.

"We better all go over there and dance him out the door!" shouted Jackie, taking off to get her skater. The other three followed, still unsure exactly what the plan was.

Zach grabbed a beer off a random tray and walked up to James with it. "Hey man, let's go shoot some pool ", he said, handing James the newly acquired beverage. The others all grabbed a drink and headed toward the pool tables as well.

Alex or Zach must have grabbed a manager immediately, because the minute they walked into the table room, it was blocked off so that they could have some privacy.

"What the hell, man? People are already questioning you and Alexandra and you dancing with everyone in the bar is not helping matters!" Zach shouted, getting in James' face.

"Well, it's not like I could hang out with anyone I came with. If I'd known team night was going to turn into date night, I would have just stayed home and saved us all the trouble!"

"This is going to be all over the place tomorrow. James, you're going to have to call Alexandra and get her to come to Nationals if there's any hope of this team not becoming a media nightmare", said Alex.

Before James could agree or disagree, they were interrupted by a ringing. Hannah looked in her purse and saw it was Zach's Blackberry.

"Zach can tell her himself", she said, throwing his phone at him and marching out the back door.

"Seriously, man? And I was just starting to trust your sorry ass!" James shouted, taking off behind Hannah.

"Talk to her, then fix the rest of this," said Alex. He put his arm around Jackie and they headed out the back door to the car, too.

Zach sat down to answer the phone, knowing his team would be gone and a different car waiting when he went outside.

"About time you called back. Please tell me you booked a flight to Minnesota for tomorrow?"

"Yes, I should get to the hotel about the time you guys do."

"Well, at least there's some good news. I'll call you when we get to the hotel so I can brief you on everything that's been going on. There's going to be a lot of damage control to do tomorrow."

"You have no idea. I'll see you tomorrow." As Alexandra hung up with Zach, she thought about the damage control she had to do on a personal level, and cried herself to sleep.

Zach, too, was thinking about his personal damage control. He knew he had to smooth things over with James. It felt weird trying to save his exes relationship, but it was something he knew he should do. And Hannah? Well, he didn't even know if there was a relationship to save. Or if what they had was worth saving. Maybe he just needed to stay away from dating skaters. It clearly wasn't an easy thing to do. It would be a lot easier to walk away from her if she wasn't so infectious. A gorgeous girl with brains and a heart? Yeah, good luck finding another one of those!

When the other four got back to the house, Hannah and James both marched inside and straight up to their rooms, making it clear neither had a desire to talk to anyone. Jackie really wanted to talk to her cousin, but knew it was better to leave her alone.

"We were crazy to think we'd get out of town without another incident happening," she said to Alex as she walked in the room.

"Didn't see anything like this happening, though."

"I don't even know exactly what's going on. I mean, I know that James was dancing and that's going turn into something it wasn't. I'm used to the media making something out of nothing, but the way James and Hannah acted about a phone call? That's so out of character of Hannah, and even James."

"Under normal circumstance, yeah. But you put everything together, and I'm not surprised by the way either of them reacted. Hannah's last relationship ended up with her here and her ex engaged to the girl he was cheating on her with. James, he's got all kinds of reasons going on. He's skating without his girlfriend for the first time ever, which is weird enough for him. Add the fact that he's working with a guy Alexandra was with until he left her like she's left James. So yeah, he's a big ball of mess right now. Do you not remember how we were at that age? And we didn't even have half this going on?"

"Yeah, you just had skanky fiancé."

"And you were an uptight prude."

"Well, if we're keeping up the terrible traditions of love and drama on the ice, everyone will make up just fine before we hit the ice. At least that's what I'm crossing my fingers on. Oh, and counting on our PR firm to make happen."

"Pretty sure our fees for your team just went up," he joked, pulling Jackie into bed with him.

Zach was not surprised that no one was up waiting for him when he got to the house. He'd really hoped to be able to talk to Alex, but knew he would be with Jackie or Hannah. On the way back, Zach had tried to call Hannah, but she was ignoring all his calls and texts. He knew better than to try and talk to James; that was going to be Alexandra's first job tomorrow. Hopefully Alexandra would still want to talk to James after the pictures taken only a few hours ago were posted on the internet and who knows where else. He hadn't told her about them at the bar in case anyone was close enough to hear him, and when he'd tried to call her from the car to tell her, her phone had already been cut off for the evening. And the chances of her actually checking her voicemail were slim to none.

Zach had been through two serious relationships in the public eye, and quite a few flings. He knew that having the media involved made things so much harder. They wanted to turn nothing into a big something. And with Alexandra and James, they had more than nothing to work with.

He had never once doubted that Alexandra loved him, but seeing her with James he understood that while she loved him, she was not madly in love with him. The way she looked at James, well, you just knew she had never and would never look at anyone the same again. It was the same way Alex and Jackie looked at each other, even after their divorce. Zach had always hoped to find someone to look at like that, and vice-versa. The fact that the other two couples involved in this bizarre partnership had so much trying to keep them apart made him realize that it was very likely Hannah would never be that girl for him. And that's the thought that cost him a peaceful night's sleep. He was still thinking about it when his alarm went off.

He really wanted to hit snooze, but knew they all had a plane to catch. After convincing himself to roll out of bed, he double checked that everything was packed and headed downstairs. Seeing the team was not something he wanted to start his morning off with, but it had to be done. Everyone looked up when he walked in the kitchen, but no one said a word. Zach grabbed a juice and breakfast bar and headed to eat on the porch, away from the awkward silence he was sure he had caused. He was surprised when Hannah followed him.

"Look, Zach, I'm sorry. I overreacted last night. I have no right to question what you do or get mad because another girl is calling you. And you have every right to call Alexandra; she's part of the team you represent."

"You really don't need to apologize, Hannah, it was a natural reaction."

"Not for me, it's not. I guess with everything that happened with Jackson, I went overboard with my thoughts."

"That's totally understandable. Between your recent break-up and all that's going on with the team, maybe we were just fooling ourselves with thinking we could try and start a relationship right now."

Hannah tried not to let the hurt show as she swallowed the lump that was forming in her throat. "I could agree more; there's just too much going on for us to try and make it work right now."

"I'm glad you agree; I still want to hang out and be friend, though."

"Oh, totally. Well, glad we got that out of the way; I better go make sure my stuff's all packed," she said, trying to escape the patio as quick as possible.

Watching her walk away, Zach was more than a little disappointed that she had been so quick to agree that they call things off before even starting.