The tension that built between the two of us since the moment I became a part of this team was finally coming to a head. And fine by me. I had no problems breaking this fucker’s nose. Especially since he had the balls to talk about Emmie like that.
“Come on now, don’t be shy. Say that again.” We had the entire locker room’s attention on us.
If he knew what was smart, he wouldn’t say anything else, but Duncan was an idiot.
“Tell me…” Duncan took another step until he was right in my face. If I wasn’t seconds from exploding, I would have found it comical that a man four inches shorter than me was picking a fight. “The pussy must have been good for it to have helped secure your spot on this team.”
I saw red.
Blinding rage set me off as I lunged for Duncan. My fist hit him square in the nose, the crack of bone only adding fuel to my anger.
My hand fisted in the front of his jersey as I shoved him back. Chairs around us fell to their sides as I slammed him against the opposite wall. I hit him again, this time in the cheek, uncaring of the blood marring my knuckles.
Hands grabbed at me, trying to pull me back and to let go of Duncan, but I was far from done with him.
“Keep my girl’s name out of your fucking mouth!” I landed one more punch before the hands gripping me yanked me backward. I fought against their hold. “You don’teverget to talk about her like that!”
Duncan slid to the floor, not a single teammate going in his direction to help. The sight of the pathetic man lying there bleeding made me stop fighting the men holding me back.
With eyes blazing, I shook off my teammates and whirled around, finding the entire staff, as well as Coach, standing in the middle of the room. I pointed to Duncan, fire in my veins. “You get him fucking gone or you lose your quarterback.”
The locker room was absolutely silent as I stormed out.
The noisefrom the crowd rang in my ears, giving me a splitting headache. Usually, it didn’t bother me, but today, it felt like nails on a chalkboard. It was the start of the second quarter, and the score was still zero to zero.
I was trying to focus on the game, but my head was still stuck in the locker room. At the things Jennings said about Emmie. My hand curled around the face guard of my helmet. He’s lucky he wasn’t in the locker room by the time I cooled down, or I would have done more to him.
I wasn’t lying when I said if Jennings wasn’t gone they’d lose their quarterback. I wasn’t staying with a team that let a player talk that way about a woman, let alonemywoman.
“Boone!” My name being yelled brought my attention back to the game. Defense was making their way off the field, now our turn to try and score.
I jogged over, slipping my helmet on as my team got in position for the play we discussed moments ago. I rolled my shoulders and stood behind my center. Thankfully, out on the field, the noise of the crowd lessened, giving my ears a small respite.
I looked out at my team, trying my hardest to get my head to focus on the here and now. Everything else could wait. It didn’t belong out here, not when being distracted could have consequences.
Taking a steadying breath, I squatted down, hands held out in front of me as I called out the play cues.Get your head in the game, Mateo.
As soon as the ball landed in my hands, I took a step back…then paused.
All of the sudden, my body just froze. Like I wasn’t in command of it. I noticed the blur of movement to my right but did nothing to move. Then a crushing force slammed into me. The hit came fast and hard, straight into my side.
My lungs emptied on impact, breath gone before I could even try to hold onto it. Pain exploded through my ribs as my body buckled. The world tilted.
One second, I was upright, the next, I was on the ground.
I tried to suck in a breath but couldn’t. A tight, crushing pressure locked around my ribs. My mouth opened, gasping for air that wouldn’t come, lungs refusing to cooperate like they’d forgotten how.
Panic flared, making the pain even worse. A broken, strangled gasp finally forced its way out. A sharp, white painshot along my side. I curled an arm around my middle, lying there while trying to get some sort of air into my lungs despite the pain.
Voices bled around me, multiple people talking all at once.
“Stay down.”
“Don’t move.”
“Mateo, can you hear me?”
I briefly registered them, but all I could focus on was dragging in breaths. All of them were shallow, and they hurt like hell.
