5. Lachlan

Ican't stop looking at her profile picture.

Emma Thornton. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that she is Keith Thornton's daughter. We've all heard the rumours, and this sudden show-up on my Insta is a bit suss at best. Is she scoping me out for professional reasons or because she is digging for info? Either way, it doesn't look good. I flick through the photos and reels and cringe.

Okay, so maybe Ibiza is too much of a party island, and drunken debauchery is not a good look on anyone. I turn my phone upside down to try to figure out what Keir took a picture of last night, but I can't figure out if it's a pair of bollocks or some kind of exotic Ibizan fruit.

Turning over in bed, hungover to fuck, I roll off the bed with a yelp and land on Keir, who, for some fucking reason, is passed out on the floor next to me.

"Huh? What?" he asks, as I clamour off him while my head bangs like the Edinburgh Tattoo.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" I growl. "You've got your own room."

He sits up and rubs his head, his blond hair all stuck up everywhere. He looks around with a yawn and scratches his balls as I get unsteadily to my feet.

"I have no idea, mate," Keir mumbles, his green eyes squinting against the morning light. "Must've been an epic night if I ended up here."

I groan, my headache making it hard to piece together last night's puzzle. "We need to get our shit together. Emma Thornton is already nosing around."

Keir's brows furrow in confusion. "Oh?"

"Keith Thornton's daughter," I explain, rubbing my temples.

"Oh, right." He murmurs. "That's… oh."

I glance at my phone again, ignoring Keir's weird behaviour. Emma's profile still taunts me from the screen. She has wild red hair, pale skin and the brightest blue eyes. It could be a filter, but after scrolling through her pics, I say she is au natural. That twat she's with is a piece of work, though. I can tell a player when I see one. Can't kid a kidder and all that shite. "We better show her we're more than a bunch of pissheads," I mumble.

Keir stands up and stretches, revealing a massive bruise on his side. "Jeez, what happened last night?"

"Fuck knows, but if the rumours are true, Keith is retiring, and Emma is taking his place before pre-season training in three months. We need to get back home and stop looking like a bunch of arseholes on a stag do."

Keir snorts. "Yes, boss." Then he grimaces and clutches his side. "Did I get in a fight?"

"Hell, if I know," I mutter, digging through my bag for the paracetamol I know is in here but is currently playing hide-and-seek. "But it looks like you got walloped good."

Keir grins through his squint. "Living the dream, eh?"

I chuckle despite my pounding head. "Living something, that's for sure."

Keir fumbles around for his phone and unlocks it, doing a bit of scrolling before he says, "Oh, right. Yeah. That lass from the last bar. She had a boyfriend. He was large."

Snorting, I glance up at the not small man flopping down on the sofa that faces the ocean view. "And you thought it was a good idea to chat her up?" I ask, shaking my head.

Keir shrugs, wincing. "In my defence, she didn't mention the boyfriend until after I bought her a drink."

I laugh and finally locate the paracetamol, passing a couple to Keir before taking some myself.

Rubbing my eyes, I try to focus through the haze of my vicious hangover. "First things first, we sort ourselves out. We've got to get a flight back home soon, so we don't look like complete numpties for the potential new boss."

Keir nods slowly, wincing as he moves. "Sounds like a plan. Coffee?"

"God, yes." I bend down and grab some clothes, tugging on yesterday's jeans and stumbling towards my tee. Picking it up from the floor, I sniff it and rear back. "Fucking hell. That reeks." I ball it up and drop-kick it onto the bag before turning to the wardrobe for a fresh shirt. "Go get cleaned up, and I'll meet you in fifteen." On second thoughts, when I catch a whiff of my pits, I pull my jeans back off and head for the shower, leaving Keir to move his arse back to his own room.

"She never followed me," Keir complains as he clearly goes looking. "Wow. That her?"

Ignoring him, I turn on the shower and step under, groaning as the hot water does little to ease my aching head. This is a shitshow. Keir and I figured we had a few weeks to just chill out on the island, try not to drink ourselves into comas, shag a few birds and be on our way back home for pre-pre-season training, but now, with Emma Thornton nosing around, it's all gone tits up. I scrub at the sticky remnants of last night's adventure clinging to my skin, trying to wash away the shame and regret.

Finished with my shower, I wrap a towel around my waist and pad back into the room. Keir's already gone, probably slinking off to his own space. I throw on some fresh clothes, grab my phone and wallet, and head out to meet him.

The hotel lobby is bustling with early risers and staff cleaning up the aftermath of last night's revelry. I spot Keir at the café corner, two steaming cups of coffee waiting on the table. He looks slightly better after a wash and change, but still rough around the edges.

"Cheers," I mutter, sinking into the chair opposite him and taking a much-needed sip of caffeine. Raising it to my lips, I catch sight of Taran Fraser sauntering along the outside of the café in swimming shorts, flip-flops, and nothing else. He is staring at his phone and hasn't seen us yet.

I hunch down as Keir frowns at me and follows my gaze.

"Ugh," he mutters and hunches down with me. "Didn't know he was here."

"Fucking cunt," I spit out at the rival team Captain strutting around our holiday space like he owns the island. "Why couldn't he head out to Majorca or something?"

"He wants to be us," Keir mutters, just as sourly.

Grimacing, I would normally agree, but last season out of the seven teams in our Highland's League, we finished sixth, and they were right behind us with one point separating us. Whatever the fuck happened to our winning streak of the previous two seasons, we did not shine our brightest this year.

And here we sit like two beer soaked arseholes when we should be back at home and in the gym.

"We've been here for two weeks. It's time to fuck off," I mutter.

"Yeah, especially if Fraser is here." Keir grumbles.

When he has passed us by, I pull out my phone and start the process of changing our return flight. As luck would have it, we get on the flight out tomorrow, so today, we just need to lie low. Maybe take a snapshot or two of us looking respectable and sober on our IGs with big ‘Heading Home' announcements or something. Yeah, that works.

For now.