20. Fallon

“Hey,” the dark-haired stranger’s voice unlocks a flood of memories that have me recalling that night at the hotel with such precision and clarity that I’m dizzy.

His eyes are pinned on me. He doesn’t move to return Kelly’s hug.

“I haven’t seen you in a few weeks,” Kelly says, keeping one arm around his waist. “How have you been?”

“I…” His words trail off, and he shakes his head, still staring at me like I’m a ghost.

Lexie squeezes my fingers so hard my knuckles ache, but it barely registers.

“Fallon?” He doesn’t say my name with the same confidence he had a month ago, and it flips my stomach upside down and fractures my lungs.

“Do you guys know each other?” Kelly asks, looking between me and the dark-haired stranger.

“Yeah,” he says at the same time I say, “Not really.”

“What a small world.” Kelly spins back to Corey.

Corey.

I know his name.

Regret is acid on my tongue as I roll the sequence of letters together, mourning I learned the detail I’ve been patiently waiting for from Kelly.

“How have you been?” Kelly asks for a second time. “How was your trip home?”

Colorado. Anna. His parents.

I know too much and not nearly enough.

His gaze flicks to me again, raking over my face as though trying to determine if I’m really here, standing in front of him at a freaking party in Oleander Springs, where we’ve both lived for the past three years. I wonder if I’ve seen him before or if we’ve passed each other in a grocery store or in traffic. Have we been at a party together, unaware that our lives were orbiting each other?

His throat moves as he swallows, taking me back to the seconds when I first wrapped my palm around his length.

He finally tears his eyes from me and looks at Kelly. “Good. How have you been?”

Kelly leans closer to him, placing a hand on his forearm, inches above his wrist.

Jealousy rages inside of me, a torrent of angry thoughts and visions about what I want to say and do to make her stop touching him—but I’m frozen. I know I couldn’t find my alter ego right now with a spotlight and megaphone.

Kelly grins. “Busy. We’re already doing doubles to prepare for the season. Becca’s nervous. We have a lot of new players on the team.” Her words aren’t an intentional dig—but they feel like one.

Corey glances at me as though sensing the shallow laceration I’m avoiding. He’s so gorgeous. More handsome than I remembered, or maybe I just didn’t allow myself to, already remiss that it would be a single night.

“Are you excited to go to the beach in a couple of weeks? Aiko’s already making lists and charts.” Kelly chuckles—a lighter, breathier sound than her usual laughs on the field. “I can’t wait. Last year was so much fun. I swear you have the most comfortable bed I’ve ever slept on.”

That damn hole in my chest spits out an ember, reminding me exactly how I’d felt when learning that Tobias was sleeping with other people. It’s not fair nor an equal comparison, but rational thoughts don’t have a space in the chaos of hurt and betrayal I’m trying to temper.

Corey’s gaze jumps to mine, but I avoid it and take a measured step back, allowing that to be the final red flag of the situation.

“We’re going to catch up with…” I direct my thumb behind me at the crowds of strangers. I don’t have a name to fill in the blank space, but they don’t need to know that.

Lexie wraps an arm around my shoulders, and we melt into the crowds, heading straight for the front door so we can escape.

“Where have you been?” Nolan asks, looking over his shoulder like the paranoid bastard he is.

I shake my head, attempting to clear it from the number of conflicting thoughts that have had me scouring every square inch of this damn house, searching for Fallon.

She’s vanished.

I knew she would.

“Lenny and I are going to get a little payback for the water balloons and the damn goats.”

On Wednesday, we walked into the facility to find three goats loose in the locker room. It was a pain in the ass to catch them and a bigger pain in the ass to contain them until we figured out what in the hell to do with them.

“Keep an eye out for anything suspicious.” Nolan claps a hand on my shoulder.

The rift between the men’s soccer team and ours existed long before we started at Camden. Hurt feelings about the cost of our stadium and facility, the training equipment we have access to, not to mention the broader array of gear and trainers poisoned the well years ago. But last summer, a soccer player was moved to our floor, and he made it his mission to torment Nolan for weeks before Nolan finally retaliated. Things only got worse when the soccer team said something offensive to Hadley last year.

My phone vibrates with a message as Nolan tucks his shoulders in and discreetly makes his way out the back door. My heart races faster than my thoughts. I’ve sent Fallon half a dozen texts, hoping to find out where she is so we can talk.

Fallon: I’m sorry. I can’t meet tomorrow. This complicates things. I need some time to process everything.

Me: I don’t understand. Doesn’t this make it all easier? I was worried you might live on the other side of the damn state.

She doesn’t respond.

“Hey. What are you doing here?” Palmer asks as I descend the stairs that lead into Nolan’s basement.

I nearly didn’t come. I knew they’d ask why I was here instead of my date with Fallon, as I’d told them, but being alone right now is the definition of hell. My thoughts are all too loud and persistent. I need a distraction, so I stop thinking about Anna and where in the hell Fallon is.

Except I know where she is.

She’s a floor below me where the rest of the women’s soccer team resides.

“We had to reschedule,” I say.

Palmer searches my face, waiting for me to say more. “But everything’s good?”

I nod.

Grey grips a two-by-four and looks at the area partitioned off to be the living room. “You’re sure you don’t want this a little bigger?”

“That’s a question I never hear,” Palmer quips.

Nolan shakes his head. “I won’t even be living here come this time next year.”

Grey gives him a pointed look. “But Hadley will.”

“Fuck that,” Palmer says, clapping a hand on Nolan’s shoulder. “He’s going to buy a mansion next to Hudson and Mila’s parents for Hadley to live in.”

Nolan snickers.

“Do you think you’ll buy a house here?” Hudson asks, genuine interest in his tone.

Nolan shrugs. “Hadley’s family is in Vegas, so unless I get picked up by the Panthers, I don’t know that I’ll be coming back here much after she graduates.”

Our impending reality—one that has us leaving here in eleven short months—darkens my already bleak mood.

“Just expand it by an extra foot,” Grey says. “Who knows what will happen.”

We spend the afternoon measuring and drawing up plans none of us are qualified to do but somehow manage to figure out together, like everything else we’ve faced over the past three years.

We finish framing the small living room and doorway, as well as the master closet and where everything will go in the bathroom before Katie, Nolan’s sister, calls us upstairs where pizzas and breadsticks wait for us.

“Just to be clear,” Katie says. “You’re only allowed to continue being a living room ornament until Hadley returns. No longer. And I’m only doing this because Hadley’s one of my best friends. If you idiots can’t get this done by then, you’re going back to the dorm along with all your shit.” She eyes the living room where Nolan’s bed and belongings currently reside.

Behind her, Hannah, their other roommate, muffles a laugh. “And by this, she means we love the big gesture, Nolan, and we’ll help in any way we can.”

“There you are,” Palmer says, coming into the gym to start our Monday, just like we do every damn week. “Where in the hell have you been?”

I glance up from the treadmill and pull out one of my earbuds. “I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d get an early start.”

He shakes his head. “Can we tuck that overachieving hair back into place? When you wake up early during preseason, you take that extra hour and go get doughnuts. You don’t show up at the gym and give Hudson horrible ideas that will make us want to disown you.”

I try to smirk, but my mood is plagued with doubts. I haven’t managed to escape my shitty mood since Fallon disappeared Saturday night.

Palmer narrows his eyes. The asshole sees right through me. “What happened?” he asks. “Is everything okay with Anna?”

I nod and sprint faster, trying to outrun my damn thoughts.

Palmer reaches over and hits the off button on the treadmill, slowing the machine so fast my legs protest and my knees nearly buckle.

“What happened with Fallon?” He asks.

I grab the towel off the handle and swipe it across my brow as I release a heavy sigh. “She was at the party Saturday.”

He looks at me below arched brows. “You invited her?”

“She attends Camden. She’s on the fucking women’s soccer team.”

He turns in the direction of the dorm as though seeing through the multiple walls here at Bia Stadium and finding her on the third floor. “Here?”

I nod.

“I’m so damn confused. You didn’t know she attends Camden?”

I shake my head.

“I thought you’ve been talking for weeks?”

“We have, but…” I take another deep breath through my nose, preparing to be ridiculed by my best friend for the inane details of our arrangement. “She assumed I was just looking to hook up again, and she wasn’t looking for a relationship. Hell, I wasn’t looking for a relationship. So it was just talking at first. We were supposed to tell each other where we lived and all the personal shit when we saw each other.”

“Damn. Talk about a small world. So what happened? Did you talk to her?”

I shake my head again. “You know Kelly Michaels?”

Palmer nods. “The chick who’s been trying to suck your balls for the past year? Yeah, I know her.”

“Fallon was with her, and?—”

“Oh shit.” Palmer grimaces.

I nod. “Fallon took off and sent me a text canceling Sunday.”

“Just tell Fallon that you’re not interested in Kelly.”

“I doubt it’s that simple.”

“Not to punch you in a bruised rib, but you asked Evelyn out before Hudson did.”

I wipe the towel across my face again, wishing we could all put that memory six feet under. “It was hardly a date, and I barely knew Evelyn.”

Before Palmer can counter, other guys from the team stream into the gym.

I throw myself into practice, leading the lowerclassmen until I have to take off for my media class.

Camden hires a communications and consulting firm every summer that works with our team, educating newcomers and reminding the upperclassmen of approved ways to avoid interviews and to brush off commenting if and when someone from the media approaches us. They hammer into us what we’re supposed to share, are expected to share, and, most importantly, what we’re not allowed to share. Still, I needed a class to fit into my summer schedule, and this bullshit course was my only option. It’s required for all athletes, and I’ve pushed it off until now.

The class is filled with other student-athletes, but there’s one who catches my full attention. Fallon is sitting at the back of the class, eating something while she types on her damn phone.

I should give her the time and space she requested, but instead, I find myself sliding into the empty seat next to her. “I”m glad to see your phone’s not broken.”

Fallon stares at me with those endless blue eyes like she doesn’t know whether to sink below her desk or run. “What are you doing here?”

“We need to talk.”

Her shoulders sag under the same invisible weight I feel in my chest.

I lean closer, breathing in the traces of coffee and the lingering scent of grapefruit I tasted on her skin. God, she smells amazing.

Her racing pulse is visible in her neck. I want to place my lips over the point and trace over it with my tongue to see if it will go faster or possibly slower.

“Kelly and I are friends. Only friends. Nothing has ever happened or existed between us,” I tell her.

I wait for relief to relax her brow, but instead, the words make her look even more conflicted. “Except that award for most comfortable bed, she so graciously gave you.”

I shake my head. “She and two other girls passed out in my bed, and I slept in another room. Alone.” It was a year ago, so it shouldn’t matter if I was with someone else or not, but I feel the need to clarify this point and ensure I’m not just looking to get in her pants.

Fallon’s eyes shift between mine, and I read the same exhaustion on her features I noted in my reflection this morning. “I don’t want to get in the middle of—” The classroom door slams shut, making her jump. Her phone slips off the side of her desk, and before she can grab it, I do.

Our professor stares at the closed door. “I guess I need to call maintenance,” he says, righting his glasses as he moves to the front of the class. “Welcome to Media Training. I’m Professor Gaines. Please take a moment to select a partner. This will be the person you’ll be conducting your interviews with, so pick someone reliable and someone you’re comfortable with because otherwise, you’ll be responsible for doing the work alone.”

Perry, a guy on the team whom Nolan has tucked securely under his wing because he discovered the loophole that allowed him to move out and meet Hadley, turns in his seat to look at me. “You want to pair up?”

“Sorry, I can’t. Fallon’s my partner.”