chapter FOURTEEN

chapter FOURTEENWhen Charlie MacKilligan came out onto the practice field that their pro team used, Finn immediately cringed.“We didn’t have anything that actually fit her?” he asked Keane.Keane turned away from the tight end he’d crushed beneath his bulk a few minutes before, and looked at the female he’d invited to their tryouts.He grimaced and admitted, “The only things that fit her were the shoulder pads and jerseys for She-wolves. But pants . . . everything was either too long or too wide or both. She’s got legs like toothpicks.”“Oy.”Carrying her ever-present tablet, Big Julie made her way over to Finn and Keane. “Who is that tiny woman?” she asked.“Charlie MacKilligan,” Keane replied. “I already told Coach about her.”“That’s the female you said you wanted me to see? Why are you so mean, Keane Malone?”“I’m not being mean. She has potential.”“To get crushed by our entire offensive line?”“You didn’t see her take on a bunch of Chinese tig—owww! Dammit, Finn! What was that for?”“For someone who never says anything, you sure have a big fucking mouth!”Julie studied the two brothers. “You guys were up to something again last night, weren’t you? You’re all covered in bruises. I swear, I have to keep all of you in dorms!”Rubbing his knee and glaring at Finn, Keane said, “Just let us show you what she can do.”“Fine.”“Hey, Charlie,” Keane called out. “Line up against those two, would you—”“Two?”“Quiet,” he barked at Julie before motioning to two of their black bear defensive linemen. “And hold ’em back, okay?”Charlie looked at the bears, then asked, “Am I supposed to call out numbers or something?”Julie quickly turned away so her back was to Charlie and whispered to Keane, “So she doesn’t know anything about football? At all?”“Don’t worry about it.”“You do know we’re a pro team, right? People usually come to us with at least a basic understanding of the fucking sport!”“I know it’s hard for you, but could you at least attempt to trust me?”“Fine!”“Okay, guys!” Keane called out. “Go!”The two bears looked at each other, and then one called out to Keane, “Are you sure? Seems kind of mean.”“Told you,” Julie muttered.“It’s just a drill. No need to crush anybody.”The two linemen got into position and Charlie mimicked them. Again, Finn cringed. She looked so tiny in comparison. Maybe in height the bears weren’t dramatically bigger, but in width . . . it was as if she was facing off against those massive redwoods you could drive a car through.Of course, Finn also couldn’t get last night out of his head so he wasn’t exactly panicked either.Julie raised her arm and motioned with her hand. One of the bears called out, “Ready! Set! Hut!”They charged forward, directly at Charlie, and she . . . stopped them. Flat palms against big, wide chests. She just stood there, holding each bear in place, while the bears sort of kept on running for a few more seconds before they realized that they weren’t going anywhere.When they did catch on and stopped moving, Charlie shoved them back. The entire team, along with the hopeful draftees, watched the two bears fly across the field and through the goalposts.Not even winded, Charlie looked at Keane, and asked, “Is that what you wanted me to do?”“Yeah,” he said, smirking. “Pretty much.”* * *Mads glared at her teammates, disgusted. “I can’t believe you went through practice with those things on.”“What did you want us to do? It was in the directions.” Streep sat by her locker, with a bath towel wrapped around her naked body, one leg crossed over the other, sparkly pink flip-flops on, and an extremely unattractive shower cap on her head. A cap that had been on her head since she’d combed that “deep conditioning masque” through her hair. Mads had actually felt bad for the lion who’d brought all those hair products over to her house for her teammates. The masque alone cost over a hundred bucks a tub. And he’d slapped tape on each bottle or tube or tub and put his own directions on them for Mads’s teammates. And then he’d been beaten up by a tiger at least twice his size for all his trouble.And harassed by a full-blood coyote that attempted to drag him under the house as some sort of meal-for-later.That seemed a little unfair despite Mads’s instinctive dislike of lions. They were the species that harassed both the animals within her. Hyena and honey badger. Although hyenas were the true enemies of lions, the badger in her did get pushed around a little should she walk by a bored pride. Of course one of the reasons the Galendotter Clan had moved to Wisconsin was that Detroit had a lot of lions that loved to slap hyenas around. The only one they didn’t fuck with was Solveig. Everyone in the neighborhood knew not to start shit with her. Whether they were full-humans, shifters, or cops . . . they all knew. But only Solveig got that kind of respect. And when Mads asked her why she got respect when no one else in the Clan did, she explained it the same way every time.“I’m Viking.”Mads didn’t know why being Viking would matter in modern-day Detroit, but the logic seemed to work for Solveig, if not Mads. What kept Mads safe in the old neighborhood was her game. She could go to any playground court and go up against boys older than her and not, as they put it, “shit her pants.” She didn’t say much. She didn’t start shit. She didn’t act better than anyone else. She didn’t get in anyone’s face unless she didn’t agree with a call. Otherwise, Mads was just there to play ball, and she played it well. Her great-grandmother didn’t like her hanging out in the neighborhood by herself, but the locals had nothing but good things to say about “that kid” and her “skills” before they purchased some milk and diapers, keeping Solveig’s store open during tough times. So Solveig’s complaints eventually faded away.But even better than playing on those courts back in the day was watching the older players. It was learning some of those amazing moves that made Mads one of the best players in the league, and she knew it.That’s why she took basketball so seriously. It meant the world to her. It kept her sane. It got her away from the people who hated her most—her family—and it had just bought her a house in Queens. Most importantly, it kept her and her teammates out of real trouble. Imagine if they didn’t have a playoff game to go to right now. Who knew what kind of trouble the five of them could get into? It was too horrifying even to think about!Which was why it appalled her that four of them had gone to their last-minute practice on Staten Island with shower caps on their heads in front of their other teammates like it was normal behavior. It was not normal behavior. It was embarrassing!Mads watched Streep plucking her eyebrows in a round mirror, Nelle painting her toenails to match the team colors despite no one being able to see them through her sneakers, Tock filing her claws, and Max asleep on one of the long wood benches. Because she, like Mads, could sleep through anything when she wanted to. She was even snoring.“Could you guys look any more prissy at the moment?” Mads finally accused.“We could, actually,” Nelle said. “If prissy means adorable and gorgeous.”“It doesn’t mean that.”“Did your little tiger make you feel insecure?” Streep asked, smirking.“He’s not my little tiger and no.”“You sure? I heard that he suggested women couldn’t play sports.”“That’s not what he suggested at all.”“Then what did he say?”“He said that basketball is not a sport.”Everyone in the locker room froze, and Mads could feel all eyes on her.Tock lowered the metal file and asked, “And you didn’t rip his balls off?”“Why would I do that?”“Why would you do that? Because there was that drunk kid at our senior week bonfire who suggested basketball was stupid and not really a sport, and you threw him in the bonfire.”“I didn’t throw him in the bonfire. He tripped and fell.”“After you heaved him in. Luckily, everyone was so drunk, I don’t think they remembered it was you. And what about the cheerleader in tenth grade who suggested only lesbians play basketball? You put her in a headlock and held her upside down, shaking her until she sobbed and begged you to stop.”“I didn’t like how she talked about the gay community.”Streep snorted. “My girlfriend will really appreciate your thoughts and prayers during our difficult time.”“Oh, shut up.”“And that guidance counselor who suggested you get a real job after high school rather than planning on playing basketball professionally?”“She was wrong!”“She was full-human! She had no idea about pro shifter sports teams,” Tock went on. “You actually lodged a complaint against her. For discrimination!”“It was discrimination. Against basketball! Because this is a real job!”“You almost got her fired from her real job until they understood what you were actually complaining about.”“She would have deserved it!”“And despite all that, you didn’t do anything to some tiger who said basketball isn’t a real sport?”“He plays pro football. I assume he has CTE from all that head banging, which would explain such an irrational statement.”Streep smiled. But the smile annoyed Mads because it was all warm and loving. “You like him,” she accused.“I don’t like anybody.”“Is that why we’re not friends?” Streep asked, yet again. “Just teammates?”“Oh, my God!” Tock exploded. “You really need to let that go!” With that out of her system, she grinned at Mads, and said, “And you totally like him.”* * *Keane watched Max’s boyfriend reach over his shoulder, snatch the ball thrown by the quarterback out of the air and keep running. A defense tackle came at him, arms outstretched to bring him down, but the jaguar slipped past him like lightning, then sped past a lion linebacker into the end zone.It wasn’t easy to impress Keane, but he was almost impressed. The house cat moved with some grace and unbelievable speed considering he wasn’t a cheetah and hadn’t played football in quite a few years. But unlike the cheetahs, Max’s boyfriend could take a solid hit when he couldn’t make it past the defensive line, and he wasn’t afraid to tackle guys bigger than him if he was trying to get the ball away from them.More important, their new quarterback seemed to already have a rapport with . . . what was his name again? He couldn’t keep calling the cat Max’s boyfriend. Eventually that was going to annoy him. Especially when Keane kept yelling it across the field. “Hey! Max’s boyfriend! Come here!”Julie gasped beside him and Keane turned to see that a group of bears and lions had tackled Charlie during a drill.“What the fuck?” he demanded of his coach.“I didn’t tell them to do that!” Julie started over to the males and females who’d gotten tired of being tossed around by a hybrid badger who couldn’t even shift. They must have quietly decided to gang up on MacKilligan. But Keane realized what a bad idea that turned out to be when a fellow She-lion flew past Julie’s head and Keane yanked her out of the way of a grizzly tumbling past like a fast-moving boulder rolling down a hill.With his mouth open, he watched Charlie toss off all those bears and cats until she was able to stand up and brush herself off. She didn’t even look annoyed. Instead, she tried to take off her helmet but it got caught in her curls and she began to yelp. One of the team’s African-American She-wolves ran over to help her get her hair untangled and they had a moment of friendly laughter discussing the helmet and their hair. He didn’t care so he didn’t really pay attention.“Okay,” Julie said, facing him. “How do I hire her? I must have her.”“That’s going to be tricky.”“Why?”“She has another job. An insane life. And the bears in her neighborhood expect her to bake.”“Get high?”“No. Actually bake. Food.”“Oh! Does she work at a bakery? Is her job to bake?”“No. From what I can tell, her job is to kill. Bad guys. She’s not a murderer or anything. Not my definition of a murderer anyway.”Julie pushed her mesh cap emblazoned with the team logo away from her forehead so she could scratch her scalp, bury her head in her hands, and sigh long and deep before lifting her head and looking into his eyes. Finally, after all that, she asked him, “Why . . . why do you make my life so hard?”“I honestly don’t try to do it. It just happens. But I will say this . . . you’re not the only one who has made that accusation. My brothers say the same thing about me all the time.”* * *They waited for their team to be announced so they could run out with their coach. Unlike the shifter hockey teams, they didn’t announce each team member individually. Something Mads appreciated. She didn’t need all that. A bullshit nickname and stats about how many times she’d been put in timeouts or how many fistfights she’d had or the number of artery surgeries she’d endured.Basketball was basketball. It wasn’t about all that unnecessary drama. It was about the sport and athleticism. Which was all she cared about.Coach Fitzgerald walked up and down the line of her team, looking them over one last time. She stopped next to Mads.“Hey.”“Hey,” Mads replied, constantly moving. She wouldn’t stop moving until the last buzzer sounded.“I need you and Max to be the assholes tonight.”Mads nodded without even looking at her coach.“This team has a lot of great shooters, but they’re arrogant, with short tempers. Fuck with them.”Mads smiled. “Got it.”Coach patted her shoulder. “That’s my angry badger.”The announcer began his introduction of their team: the Wisconsin Butchers. Coach moved to the front of the line and waited for the explosion of yellow and white lights. When it came, she ran out and the team jogged out after her. Mads went into her “zone.” It was the space where she ignored all the applause, the cheering, and the hate, and focused on nothing but her team, the other team, the ball, and the net. For the next four quarters, nothing else mattered.There were a lot of lions on the other team, meaning the players mowed their opponents down like tanks, then exploded with sudden speed toward the basket. The few cheetahs and She-tigers that were also on the team dashed around with ease, slamming the ball into the net so confidently it could be painful to watch.And yeah, sure, Max might not seem to care about any of this until she was actually at the game and in the moment, but that wasn’t really true. Every day, she sent out videos of other teams’ games. How she got those videos, no one knew or asked. Shifter games were not supposed to be filmed for a myriad of reasons. But Max had them. Even better, the videos focused on the team they would be facing in the next playoff. They’d been watching videos of these players for a couple of weeks.So when that She-tiger who liked to do those three-point shots sent a ball to the basket, Mads was there to jump up and slap it away. Then she grinned. Or smirked. Or snarled. Or glared. Or whatever else she knew would annoy the particular player she was trying to irritate. Max had sent a list to the team titled “Facial Expressions That Will Piss Off This Team’s Best Players.”It was working really well, too. She knew that when one of the She-lions body-checked her right into the middle of the audience when she was about to make her own three-point shot. Not because she had to make such a show-off shot, but because she could.“Are you okay?” she heard someone ask as they lifted her up over the crowd and got her back to the court. But Mads was too angry to answer or notice who it was. She barely managed to choke back a hysterical laugh. She swallowed, closed her eyes. She would not allow herself to lose it during a playoff game. Besides, her team had already retaliated, with Max wrapped around the head and neck of the She-lion who’d body-checked Mads. The rest of the team was engaged in a general fistfight. But the refs were already stepping in and pulling people apart. The She-lion was out of the game, although they had to pry Max away from her; some of the She-lion’s hair dragged out by the fistful. That led to roaring. She-lions complained about the vanity of their males, but the females could be just as bad about their hair.With the drama over, Mads was given three unguarded free throws.Tock came over to her and handed her a towel with the team logo on it. Mads wiped the sweat from her face and especially her eyes, which gave her a few precious seconds to put her boiling rage back where it belonged—buried deep down in her soul where all her resentments and disappointments lived.Blowing out a breath, she handed the towel back to her teammate and walked to the free-throw line. The ref tossed her the ball and Mads began to dribble, carefully lining up her shot until something broke through her usual intense focus.Low roaring that she felt in her fingertips.She could usually block out roaring with ease . . . so why was she unable to block it this time?Holding the ball, she looked over her shoulder, her gaze quickly scanning the crowd until it came to rest on a large group. They were all in matching football jerseys and hats, some of them chanting her name over and over. But it was the trio of tigers roaring at four male lions decked out in the other team’s gear that really threw her off.“Oh, my God,” she whispered to herself. “What is happening?”* * *Finn had been heading to the lockers when Keane grabbed him by his shoulder pads and yanked him toward Charlie and Julie.“I need you to do some of that fast talking you’re famous for,” Keane had told him.“That is not what I’m famous for.”“Whatever it is you do, do it.”His brother had pushed him toward the two females, and immediately he regretted not fighting his brother off.“I’m not sure being in the same place every day at the same time is a good idea,” Charlie was calmly explaining to Julie. “Lots of people try to kill me.”“And . . . why is that?”Charlie shrugged. “It’s mostly because of my father. Because he’s done something stupid. Or because my family has stolen something. Or someone’s forced me to kill—”“Okay!” Finn quickly stepped between the two females, taking the team jersey off Julie’s shoulder. “Why don’t you let me handle it from here, Julie?”“I’m not sure that’s such a good—”“It’ll be fine. Great for the team! We already love her.”“We do?” one of his teammates asked, which was dumb because it just got him a helmet to the head from Shay.“Of course! Go on, Coach. We’ll take it from here. You guys can work out all the details later.”“All right, but—hey!” she barked when Keane pushed Julie toward the rest of the coaching squad several feet away, allowing the entire defensive line and Shay to surround Charlie.“Are you sure about this?” Charlie asked.“You did great in the tryouts,” Shay reminded her.“I guess, but . . . what position?”“Defensive end,” Keane told her. “You’ll be working with Finn. That way he’ll be able to help train you since you have no idea what you’re doing.”Charlie looked up at Finn for a few seconds. Then the rest of the line.“You really think it’s a good idea for me to play against guys built like all of you?”Keane’s entire face expressed his disbelief before he reminded her, “You put a grizzly through a wall.”“You told me to stop the guy with the ball.”Taking the jersey from Finn, Keane placed it over Charlie’s shoulder. “You’ll be fine.”“Any plans for the night?” Finn asked Charlie as she looked her new jersey over.“I figured I’d suck up the pain and go see Max play. It is a game . . . of some kind.”“Not a basketball fan?”“Not really. But that could be because everyone at my school kept expecting me to play. You know . . . because I’m Black. So I went out of my way not to like it.” She pointed at the training field. “But I like this. It allows me to release all my rage and aggression,” she said with complete calm.“Have a lot of rage, do you?”“Yes. It’s my father’s fault.”“You say that a lot. That things are your father’s fault.”“That’s my father’s fault, too. That I say that a lot. You want to come with me to the game?” she suddenly asked. “Mads will be playing.”“So?”“You like her.”“No, I don’t.”“Of course you do. Don’t be an idiot.”“I’m not an idiot. And even if I did like her, that doesn’t mean she likes me.”“Really?”“Yeah. Really.” Finn let out an annoyed grunt. “You’re not one of those girls, are you?”“Pardon?”“The kind that’s always trying to fix up a single guy? Because that’s going to really get on my nerves.”“First off, I have never been, nor will I ever be, any kind of one of those girls. Do you know why? Because I actually have shit to do. Always have, always will. Second, if you want to go through life alone and bitter because you’re afraid to make a move on probably the only female on this planet who could ever put up with your annoying ass . . . that’s on you. I was just trying to help a Mongolian brother out.”“Again, she may not like me.”“Really? Because I heard you said something remarkably shitty about her precious basketball earlier today.”“All I said was—”“He told her basketball was not a real sport,” Shay pointed out.“That’s what you told her?” Charlie said with a harsh laugh.“Well, it’s not really.”“And you still have your skin?”“It’s not that big a deal.”“Tell that to the guy she shoved into a bonfire.”“What?”“Yeah. It was their senior week. You know, at the end of high school. She’d been dating the guy for, like, two months. He was drunk . . . well, everybody was drunk. He said something stupid about basketball and he ended up in the bonfire. Luckily Tock got him out pretty fast, because the rest of them were laughing so hard, they didn’t even try, so he was only a little charred. But Mads almost didn’t graduate. Luckily, I’d already had some dealings with the principal over Max and a cheerleader incident . . . so I was able to handle it. But yeah . . . she does not take the mocking of basketball well. So you still walking around with both your balls . . . that means she likes ya.”Charlie was silent a moment before she added, “I get it, though. Basketball was her escape from a shitty life and a shitty family. That’s why she’s so protective of it and her friends.”“Now you’re making me feel bad.”“How cute! I didn’t think cats could feel things.”“That’s very nice.”Charlie laughed and pulled her new jersey over her head. It was huge; hung to her knees. “Classy! Okay. Come on. Let’s go see my sister torture girls way bigger than her . . . and Finn’s new girlfriend that he already insulted.”“I was just being honest.”“Don’t be honest. Or you’ll be alone a lot.”“We’re tigers. We’re supposed to be solitary.”“You know, all you cats say that, but the cats I’ve met lately . . . you’re always hanging around somebody. And you three”—she motioned to Finn and his brothers—“you live with each other, your baby brother, your sister, and your mother. And have rude aunts who visit. How solitary is that? You might as well have a girlfriend. It’ll make you look less pathetic when you’re living with your mother.”Charlie motioned to the entire defensive line. “Why don’t we all go? That way Finn won’t look disgustingly desperate and we can all bond as a team. Won’t that be nice?”She gave them all a big smile and started walking toward the exit, stopping to grab her backpack and motion to the rest of them. One of the grizzlies grabbed Finn’s arm and growled, “I want to hate her . . . but I just can’t. Why can’t I? I can usually hate anybody! I’m a grizzly!”“I don’t know. There’s just something about her.”“And even after all that sweating for the last few hours . . . why does she smell like cake and cookies?”They trooped up a couple of floors to one of the arenas and, because there were seats available and they were on a pro team, they were allowed to go in for free. As soon as they sat down with hot dogs, popcorn, and beer, Finn was immediately annoyed.“Even our crowds are better.”“I agree,” Keane muttered between sips of beer.Finn glared at some male lions a few rows down. They wore the other team’s color and were cheering loudly, forcing Finn to announce equally loudly, “I hate male lions.”“Me, too.”“Yeah,” Shay nodded. “They’re the worst.”Half their defensive line glared at the brothers. “Hey!” one of their male lion teammates barked.“We mean you, but . . .” Finn began. “Nah. We just mean you, too.”“Wow,” another lion teammate gasped, pointing at the honey badgers. “Look at their hair. It’s fabulous!”“Look how it glows under the lights.”“I bet I know which conditioner they used.”“Dude, you’ve gotta tell me. I absolutely need that stuff.”“This is also why we hate you,” Finn pointed out.“They’re really good,” Keane said, gesturing to the court with his hot dog made out of wild boar.It was the whole group out there. Mads, Max, Nelle, Streep, and Tock. And it was interesting to watch them work as a team under the bright arena lights, doing something that didn’t involve. . . you know . . . mass killing.What was especially fascinating was how much smaller they were than the other team. They were currently playing against two lions, a cheetah, a mountain lion, and a jaguar. But the badgers had fast hands and even faster feet, keeping the ball in play and away from the other team with surprising ease. An ease their opponents didn’t really appreciate.He glanced up at the scoreboard and saw that they were in the third quarter with Mads’s team twenty points ahead. He smirked at the team name. Full-humans seemed to use either animal names or names that managed to piss off an entire race of people. But shifters went with honest names. For Mads’s team, it was the Wisconsin Butchers. Not exactly subtle, but truthful.Finn heard the crowd roar and looked back at the court. Mads had the ball and was heading to the basket. A She-lion was blocking the hoop, and when Mads got near she tried to steal the ball. That’s when Mads, still in motion, performed an amazing three-sixty spin and passed the ball to Max. The badger, whose ponytailed hair was now a vibrant pink, caught the ball, zipped past a startled cheetah, and slammed it into the net. It was stunning.The other team got the ball and, during a pass, Mads quickly stole it and started back to her team’s hoop. That’s when the She-lion body-checked Mads so hard she flew . . . right at him.“Oh, shit!” Finn dropped his beer and half-eaten hot dog and raised his hands, catching the flying badger hybrid before she could slam her ass into his face and rearrange his nose.“Look at you,” Keane said, something like pride in his voice, “acting like a wide receiver.”“Are you okay?” Finn asked the back of Mads’s head.She let out a weird barking laugh that made most of his team rear back. Except the lion males. All those manes turned toward her and fangs were bared.Deciding to get her back to the court as quickly as possible, Finn passed her down across the crowd, who eagerly helped, until she was back on the floor. By then she seemed calmer, as did the rest of his defensive line. Probably because they were all distracted by the fight happening between the two teams because of that personal foul. Especially Max, who’d attacked the offending She-lion by wrapping herself around the female and punching her repeatedly in the head.The male lions wearing the opposing team colors must have been from the She-lion’s Pride because they began roaring at Max. Feeling strongly that—for once—the honey badger had a true reason to strike first in this fight, Finn politely asked those particular cats to “Shut the fuck up!”The lion males looked back at Finn’s defensive line, which included lion males from other Prides, and the angry roars began. Because that’s what cats did when they were angry. The bears, however, kept eating. And so did Max’s boyfriend, Zé, who’d tagged along with them to the game. As a jaguar, he should instinctively want to jump in with the lions and roar his little house cat heart out, but nope. He’d just kept eating and, occasionally, yelling out, “Get that bitch, baby!”Now, the fight was being broken up, and Mads was getting some free throws. Still, Finn and his teammates didn’t stop roaring because the other lions didn’t stop roaring. At least they didn’t stop until they all heard a bellowed, “Hey!”Startled, the cats turned their collective attention to the court floor, where Mads stood holding the basketball and glaring at them.“What the fuck are you doing?” she asked.When no one else said anything and he sensed the arena crowd was waiting for him to reply, he finally mumbled, “Protecting your honor?”It was weak, but it was honestly the best he had at the moment.He heard Keane snort next to him, so he slammed his elbow into his brother’s side, enjoying the resulting grunt of pain.“Oh, my God, you’re all so full of shit!” Mads barked. “Now cut it out! I’m working here!” The lion males sporting the opposing team’s colors lowered their heads to laugh but Mads snapped her fingers at them and snarled, “You, too.”“Or what?” one of the males asked.Mads took a step closer. “Do you like your knees where they are?” she asked.Confused, the lions looked down at their legs, at each other, then back at Mads.“Uh . . . yeah,” one of them finally said.“Then cut it out!” she spat in a voice ten octaves lower than Finn had ever heard. Mads’s blue eyes had also turned completely black. It was freaky and disturbing, and all the male lions jerked back in their seats.Not exactly the kind of basketball-star-against-fan interaction one saw on national TV, to be discussed and analyzed to death on social media for the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours. No. This was definitely a shifter-only kind of thing.Finn liked it. In football, he didn’t get this close to his fans until after the games.Mads walked back to the free-throw line. She closed her eyes, took a couple of deep breaths. Her team began cheering for her again and the crowd loyal to the Butchers joined in. Those who hated them comfortably booed or tried to distract her. But there was no more male-cat-on-male-cat roaring.One after another, Mads nailed each of those free throws, earning her team three extra points with a shocking amount of ease. After that, she was back in the game until the end of the quarter.“Still think she’s not a real athlete?” asked Charlie, who was sitting in the row right in front of Finn.“That’s not what I said!”“That’s how she’s going to remember it.”“Why should she remember that when it’s not what I said?”“You know how girls are. We’re very sensitive.”“No, you’re not! You’re the least sensitive people I know!”“You know what?” Charlie turned around, resting her knees on the seat and leaning toward Finn. He didn’t like it. “To apologize for your egregious rudeness—”“It was not egreg—”“—you should get some nice flowers from the florist on the first floor and go with the team when they celebrate their win.”“They haven’t won yet.”“They will. And you should be ready to go with them. They usually have a dinner or something.”“They have another quarter left. Anything can happen.”“So you don’t want to go to dinner with her?”“I didn’t say that either.”“Then get the flowers. An interesting arrangement. Nothing boring you’d give your grandmother. And take a shower. You guys are all funky.”“You think you smell like roses?”“I know I do. One, because I’m a girl. I’ll never smell as bad as a male. And two, because the hair product I’m currently using smells like roses, even when I’m sweating. So eff-you.” She pointed at Keane. “And lend him your SUV.”“It’s his SUV. My hood is still fucked up from where Mads landed on it last night. It looks like I wrapped it around a telephone pole. Sort of.”“We mostly bent it back,” Finn admitted. “Enough to drive it home. But it still needs a lot of work.”“Good. See? There we go.” She motioned for Finn to leave by flicking the fingers of both hands.“You’re really bossy,” Finn pointed out.Charlie laughed as she turned back around in her seat and sat down again. “You think I was being bossy? Ask Max how bossy she thinks I am.”* * *When those last few seconds were on the clock, and the Butchers were far ahead in points, they really could have just played a straight game until time ran out. But they were rude honey badgers. So, instead, they played what Mads could only call a really mean game of keep away. They just passed the ball to each other in the most outrageous and ludicrous ways they could think of until, with only three seconds left on the clock, they passed the ball to Nelle. She turned to take her shot and ended up facing a six-two She-tiger who had no intention of letting that happen.Nelle didn’t let anyone get in her way, and shifter sports leagues had unusual rules. Which meant she was allowed to climb that She-tiger like she was climbing an old oak. Once she was on the tiger’s shoulders, Nelle launched herself off and slammed the ball into the basket, hanging from the rim for a few seconds before she let go.The buzzer went off a split second later and the crowd jumped to its feet. Mads and her team charged at each other, realizing they’d not only won the game, but were headed to the championships. Their ultimate goal for the year. They crashed into one another with Max ending up in Mads’s arms, her legs around her waist. Tock had Nelle on her shoulders and Streep hanging off her hip. The rest of the team surrounded them, chanting the team call, “Butch-er! Butch-er! Kill! Kill! Kill!”Max had written the call years ago. Until the badgers arrived, the Butchers had no team call.After their opponents grudgingly shook their hands, the team returned to the locker room. There was more singing and dancing and chanting until the coach called for quiet.“I just want to say how proud I am of my girls! It was a hard fight, but we’ve done it again! The Wisconsin Butchers have made it into the championships!”There was more applauding and cheering for another minute or two. Then the coach said, “Now, you ladies get showered up and pretty and dinner tonight is on me!”Mads turned to her locker, happily stripped off her sweaty uniform, and wrapped a big towel around her body. That’s when Streep handed her a white jar.“What’s this?”“Some of that conditioner I used.”“I am not going out tonight with a shower cap on my head.”“You don’t have to. My hair was singed. Twenty minutes tops for you. But you really need this.”“Why?”“Do you want to look good tonight or not? Especially next to us.” Streep turned and flicked her ponytail in Mads’s face.Deciding it was just easier to use the damn conditioner, Mads got in the shower, washed her hair, and combed in the conditioner. While it sat in her hair, she had time to kill, so she shaved her legs before washing everything else. When the twenty minutes were up, Mads rinsed her hair and walked out. She dried off quickly and went to the bar area that had been set up with blow-dryers and curling irons and a makeup section. Mads doubted she’d find the same thing in any of the men’s locker rooms but she didn’t care. She hated walking around with wet hair. It made her look like death.She blew her hair out, even hit it with the straightening iron a little bit, and to her disgust . . . Streep was right. Her hair looked amazing.Mads didn’t bother with makeup because she never did. It just wasn’t her thing. Once she was done with her hair, she went back to her locker and got changed into a black sleeveless shirt, black jeans, and black boots. She would pick up her dirty clothes the next day since she planned to have a good time tonight with her . . .Turning around, Mads quickly realized she was the only one in the locker room. Why was she the only one in the locker room? She was the fastest dresser on the team besides Max, who always dressed like she was running from the cops.Grabbing her backpack, she walked out of the locker room and right into Finn Malone.“Hey.”“Hey.” She looked past him. “Have you seen the rest of the team?”“They’re not here? I thought I was going out to dinner with all of you to celebrate your win.” He frowned. “You did win, right?”“Of course, we won. Wait . . . you were at the game, right? Why don’t you know we won?”“Charlie told me I needed a shower. And to get you these.” He shoved a bouquet of flowers in her face. “Congrats on your win.”She snatched the flowers out of his hand. “Those assholes!”“They’re just flowers.”“Not the flowers. This. This is a date.”“We’re on a date?”“We are now. They set us up.”“Oh. Okay.” Finn nodded. “So where do you want to go eat?”“Where do I want . . . ?” Mads wanted to tear the flowers apart and throw them in Finn’s face but they were so pretty, she simply didn’t have the heart. Instead she asked, “Aren’t you annoyed?”“No. I’m hungry. I’m very hungry. I had to drop my hot-dog earlier when that She-lion body-checked you, and defensive line tryouts were a lot of work because Charlie was just tossing everybody around. So after I eat, I might be annoyed. But right now, I’m just hungry. Besides, we should celebrate your amazing ability to be a real asshole on the court. Even Keane was impressed.”Mads smiled before she could stop herself. “It was part of our game strategy for this particular team. That level of dickish-ness is not always necessary.”“It was great. Seeing you slap that ball away from the net constantly. It was irritating the hell out of the other team.” He motioned toward the exit with a jerk of his head. “Come on. Let’s go celebrate your win.”“Okay. But I’m going to yell at them later.”“Fair enough.”Together, they walked down the hall. And, as they neared the exit where some fans were holding up photos of Mads for her to sign, Finn said, “Your hair looks great, by the way.”“Thanks. I used that lion’s recommended conditioner.”Finn stopped walking and just let out a small, annoyed roar.“What?” Mads asked.“I just hate those fucking male lions.”“Because they’re pains in the ass? Or because their hair always looks so good?”“Honestly? Both!”