He looked lit from the inside and terrified of how much it mattered.
Roman caught him near the bench while the others peeled away.
I was close enough to hear without meaning to.
“You running practice now?” Roman asked.
Jace pulled off his gloves. “Jealous?”
“Concerned.”
“About my leadership potential?”
“About whatever makes you look like you’re waiting for a grade from the principal.”
Jace’s face shut down too fast. “Don’t start.”
“I’m already started.”
“Then stop.”
Roman’s eyes moved to me, then back to him. He said something too low for me to catch. Jace shook his head once and walked toward the tunnel.
Roman stayed where he was for a second.
I had a meeting in twenty minutes. I used sixteen of them pretending not to think about that look.
The rest of the day did not improve.
Olivia texted from Dallas during lunch.
Hope your problem player is less of a problem today.
I stared at the message longer than necessary.
He’s working, I typed back.
That was safe. That was true.
Her reply came with a small heart. Good. You sound better when you have something to fix.
It should have made me smile.
Instead, it exposed something hollow.
Across the building, I passed Tessa outside the media room as she adjusted the schedule with one hand and held a coffee in the other.
“Holloway’s girlfriend is here for the afternoon content piece,” she said.
I stopped walking.
Only for a fraction of a second. Tessa noticed anyway because Tessa noticed weather changes in other people’s blood pressure.
“Vanessa?” I asked, because pretending I did not know her name would be pathetic.
“She’s early. Very polished. Very aware of lighting. She asked if Jace was still in treatment.”
“And?”
