Mikhail also had strong opinions about Hal Nordstrom. He used one phrase whenever he referred to that particular coach. “He is piece of shit.”

Winnie had told her to keep her mouth shut and when she hadn’t, Nordstrom sued them for defamation and Winnie had settled with an undisclosed sum. When, a few years later, Nordstrom was arrested for molesting several young skaters, Grace felt vindicated. But did Winnie apologize? Just the opposite. “You could have saved me considerable money if you’d just kept your mouth shut. And he would’ve eventually been found guilty anyway.”

It was a long couple of hours before Mikhail called her back. “He is out, moya radost,” he said, his Russian for my happiness. “But he is with family in Florida. They swear on bibles he is safe and taking medicine. I’ll get this verified to my satisfaction.”

“Oh, Mikhail, what if they’re lying? Making excuses?”

“I have called police. I want they should answer me. We shall see. Are you safe?”

“I think so,” she said weakly, looking around again. “Why would he even want me now? I’m not on the ice or in the news! He shouldn’t even want me anymore!”

“Ach, I can’t know the head of a crazy man! If there is doubts, you must take steps. Call police. Or,” he said, hesitating briefly, “call Winnie. She will not abandon you.”

A nervous laugh that was almost a sob escaped her. The last thing she wanted was to be controlled by her mother again. She talked to Mikhail while she walked to the front door, put up the closed sign and locked it. They talked for just a few minutes. She learned he was in Chicago for some exhibition skating and then would be heading to Southern California, which had become his home base.

Mikhail was over sixty. He was once a competitive skater but gave that up in his early twenties, knowing he was not good enough to be great. But he had the potential to build champions and had been coaching ever since. He’d had only one brief marriage because, Is not the life for family man. Grace wasn’t quite sure how much or how little that influenced her decision to get out. What do I care? Mikhail would say. I make winners, that is what I do.

Grace wanted more. Or less, as the case may be.

“I would like to see you sometime,” she told him before hanging up.

“You have to find me,” he told her. “We would have good meal, laughs, old times. Maybe you skate for me once!”

“Maybe,” she said. “For old times only.”

“I was better making rules, telling you when you will skate and what you will do. I don’t follow so good.”

“I know this,” she said, laughing through nostalgic tears.

After they hung up, she dimmed the lights in the shop. When you’re closed, you’re closed. She didn’t have the courage to go upstairs to her loft. She had an irrational fear that he was waiting for her up there. He was really a kind of tragic, pathetic man who was completely out of reality, left in the care of an older sister who wasn’t married and promised to always guard him closely, a woman who really cared about him and was traumatized by the reality that he could possibly hurt someone.

She heard from Troy every day. If he didn’t call her after school, she called him. She’d give him till six or so, then she’d text him and ask him what he was doing after work.

In the meantime, she thought about Mikhail and she cried. The truth was, she missed skating for him. She even missed competition and the raw nerves of it. She had no regrets about leaving it—she’d accomplished everything she could and the strain was sometimes debilitating.

It was funny that the girl who was her fiercest rival, who hated her more than anyone on the circuit, an American named Fiona Temple, hadn’t ever made her mark. Fiona, who had her own posse of mean girls, spread more dirt about Grace than anyone else, making sure everyone knew that while most hardworking parents got up at four to take their kids to training and borrowed against the mortgage to pay for it, Rich Bitch Izzy’s mother put her in a town car at dawn to be delivered to the rink. Fiona, who celebrated the most when Grace walked away, hadn’t done anything significant since. She had believed the only thing that stood in the way of gold medals was Grace, yet with Grace gone China and Russia wrapped up the medals.

The pressure to stay in the competition had been fierce from all quarters, from Winnie, from her team, from her country. “You do what you have to do, but until the day comes, say nothing!” Mikhail had warned her. “Telling is losing.”

Any other coach would’ve dumped her. In her circles, winning was everything. World-famous coaches don’t waste their time on competitors who want to quit. But he stuck with her, gave her everything he had and she worked her ass off for him. Mikhail wasn’t warm and fuzzy, but he loved her like a daughter, protected her and challenged her and to this day had not abandoned her.

So she went to her last competition, the biggest in the world, angry and determined to strike one final blow for everyone who depended on her. And she took it. Took it all. She took it home by a mile. Winnie had her gold medal. Fiona hadn’t even made the cut.

The back door to the shop rattled as someone tried to get in. She nearly jumped out of her skin. She had to take a couple of deep breaths and wipe her eyes before creeping to the door to see who it was.

“Gracie, what’s wrong?” Troy said. “You’re crying.”

“Don’t ask me why, just please go upstairs and make sure no one is up there, ready to jump on us and kill us,” she said.

“What?” he asked, aghast.

“When it’s safe, we’ll talk up there. I’m not sure if I locked the door, but some days I don’t. I’ve gotten so relaxed...”

“Grace, what the hell?”

“Please,” she begged. “You’ll understand as soon as I can talk about it. I was going to explain some things anyway. Before your friends came to visit, I was going to tell you so it wouldn’t be vague anymore...but for right now, can you please check? And be very careful!”

Troy shook his head and went upstairs. He looked around her loft thoroughly, but nothing seemed out of place. He was back down in less than two minutes. “It’s okay.”

“Did you look everywhere?”

He nodded. “Even in the kitchen trash and the refrigerator. Come on.”

She clutched an envelope in her hand. When they were sitting across from each other in her tiny kitchen she started to explain. “My real name is—”

“I know,” he said.

“You know?”

“Sorry. I wasn’t going to tell you, but I can’t fake surprise. You’re all over the fucking internet, Gracie. I don’t know how you felt, how you feel, but I know who you are. And that you won it all and walked away.”

“Do you know about the rumors? That I accused a coach of inappropriate sexual behavior with a minor? That I was sued? That there were stalkers? That everyone hated me?”

He shrugged. “I got most of the facts. I don’t know how anyone could hate you. Most of all, I don’t know why it’s a secret.”

So she started at the beginning, born into figure skating, the daughter of a champion and coach, the bullying from jealous girls, pranks aimed at hurting her skating, the exhausting training and travel and no friends.