Nothing but sharp eyes follow every move I make, studying me with an intensity that exposes every choice I’ve ever made.
He doesn’t push through the crowd.Instead, he waits until half of them wander off and the adrenaline crash hits me hard.I’m just about to throw up right there on the fifty-yard line.
He walks over, calm and controlled, as if he has all the time in the world.He pulls a card from his coat pocket and holds it out.
“Mayfair wants you.”
That’s all he says at first.No big speeches or hard sell.Just those three words, like a damn grenade dropped in my lap.
I stare at the card.Mayfair.The dream I’d buried so deep it almost stopped hurting.
I take it, fingers slick with sweat.
“Coach will organize a time,” he says.“He’ll talk to your parents.Then we’ll lock in the details.I don’t hand out cards for nothing.You’ve got something we don’t see every day.”
And just like that, it’s real.I’m no longer a kid who nearly squandered everything.I’m wanted.Fucking Mayfair wants me.I stare at the card, at the name on it, the logo I’ve dreamed of since I was ten years old.
Then he’s gone.
Coach walks up and slaps my back so hard I nearly stumble.“Knew you had it in you, kid,” he says, voice rough.“Knew it all along.”
I nod, but I can’t speak.
All I want, more than water, or air, is to find my phone and call Sam to tell her I did it.That football’s back on the table.That I didn’t fuck it up this time.
And maybe, a part of me still hopes she’ll answer.
Chapter 26
Sam
TheenergyfromSaturdaynight still stays with me.It’s beneath my skin, buzzing from what he did.Everyone saw it in every cheer, every held breath, every eye locked on Reece.
Reece tore through that field as if it owed him blood.He didn’t hold back; he played with everything he had.Every hit and every bruise he’s still carrying, he gave it all.Every part of himself, as if the game was the only way he knew how to express himself.
And maybe I resented him a little for that.For making me feel proud when I didn’t want to be.For being that boy again—the one who gets under my skin and stays there no matter how hard I try to push him out.
I’m walking through the school gates.Lola’s next to me, talking quickly, her voice rushing over itself with something about a broken nail or her cousin’s party.I nod as if I’m listening, but I’m not.I’m somewhere else.
Back on that field.
Watching Reece lift his helmet off, sweat-drenched and breathless, eyes scanning the crowd as if he was looking for something or someone.And at that moment, I wondered if it was me—if he saw me standing there with my heart in my throat, knowing I could never hate him enough to stop caring.
I haven’t stopped thinking about it ever since—what it means that he still has the power to devastate me without laying a finger on me.
I should have been working on that damn assessment… the one Reece and I are supposed to be doing together.
But I couldn’t.
I opened the document several times, stared at the blinking cursor, tried to outline arguments, and piece together paragraphs.
I almost messaged him just to say, “Hey, can you do your half of the assessment so we don’t both fail?”But I didn’t.Because if he replied… if he even said my name, I’d cave.I’d hear that voice and forget all the reasons I’m supposed to stay mad.
So I did nothing.I just sat there all weekend, letting the silence eat away at me as the deadline approached.
“Sam.Hello.Earth to heartbreak girl.”
I blink and turn to Lola, who’s staring at me as if I’ve grown an extra head.Her brows are raised, and her lip gloss is too shiny for this early in the morning.
