I’m stretched out on a treatment table while Tiffany digs her elbow into my left hamstring. The training room smells likementhol and tape. Most normal people are asleep or making mistakes in dorm rooms. Athletes are in here getting patched together like expensive machinery.
“I am relaxed,” I say through my teeth.
“You’re threatening me with your eyebrows,” she says.
“I’m from Texas. That’s just our face.”
She snorts and presses harder. I catch my reflection in the dark window—tan legs, deep brown hair with caramel even under ugly lights, lashes still on because I was raised correctly, body all soccer curves and pageant poise. Men have been explaining what I look like to me since I was thirteen.
Beauty queen. Soccer girl. Too pretty to be mean until I open my mouth.
None of it matters. Because I have my eyes on the one man everyone else wants too.
The door swings open.
The air shifts the way it does around certain people. I look up.
Tristan.
Gray sweats. Black hoodie. White practice shirt damp at the collar. One dark lock fallen over his forehead again. He’s tall in that clean, elegant way—lean, tan, long through the body but broad enough through the shoulders that he looks carved. His duffel hangs from one hand like it weighs nothing.
He sees me immediately. His face changes in that small, unfair way. Not a full smile. Just recognition. Something warm enough to matter.
“Texas.”
“Vale.”
He drops his duffel on the next table and sits, elbows on his knees, studying my leg like it personally offended him.
“You still tight there?”
I blink. Three days ago I mentioned my left side was acting up after weights. In passing. He remembered.
“Tiffany says it’s just overuse.”
Tiffany presses harder. I hiss. Tristan’s brows pull together.
“She’s lying. That looked spiritual.”
I laugh despite myself. “It’s fine.”
“No athlete says ‘it’s fine’ and means anything but ‘I’m one weird landing from a meltdown.’”
That’s the problem with boys like Tristan. It’s not just the face or the shoulders or the way he moves like the world was built to get out of his way. It’s the attention. He notices things. Tracks soreness. Remembers when you mention something hurts. That kind of attention will ruin a girl faster than pretty eyes ever could.
And he has those too.
I cross my arms. “You offering medical opinions now, Vale?”
His mouth lifts at one corner. “No. Just calling you out.”
Tiffany strips off her gloves. “You’re done. Stretch tonight, heat not ice, and stop acting like your body isn’t attached to the rest of you.” She points at Tristan without looking. “And you. Your shoulder is one more day from becoming my problem.”
He gives her a lazy salute. “Yes, ma’am.”
She leaves us in the low hum of the room.
Tristan reaches down to retie his shoe. “You heading back?”
