Bank Shot (Lakeside Green Coyotes #2)

Chapter 1

Summer

GJ

The one thing worth knowing about me was that I didn’t underperform—not in bed and definitely not in basketball.

“Left! Left!” Nia shouted as she ran up the outdoor basketball court. It was a perfect Colorado summer—nothing like back home in Alabama, where the humidity was so heavy it felt like inhaling water. Here, it was dry. Sweat evaporated from our bare skin in the shade as quickly as it formed.

I passed the ball over to Nia, and she spun around toward Mags. All of us were on the Lakeside Green Coyotes basketball team, but when we played a pick-up game, it was every woman for herself.

After running up the court, I got myself into a spot for Nia to go for an assist. She bounced the ball my way, and I shot up an easy three. My stomach knotted when it bounced off the rim instead of going through the net. So much for easy.

The ball bounced hard on the pavement, forcing Mags to run after it before it could roll down the hill. The last time that happened, it ended up in the small creek at the bottom and completely killed the momentum—even if it was funny as hell.

“Your defense is shit, Moretti,” I said, cracking a cocky smile as Mags came back with the ball. I wasn’t about to let Mags know missing a three was enough to shake my confidence. It usually wasn’t, but this summer had been different.

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, and yours is so good. Too bad running your mouth can’t be considered a form of exercise.”

“I mean, I can name a few exercises that involve my mouth—”

“You guys are ridiculous,” Nia said, always the most levelheaded of the group. She’d never had time for the interpersonal mess, which was the exact opposite of how I liked to approach things. I didn’t care if we shared a team name and locker room: Mags Moretti was consistently a pain in my ass.

Mags put the ball in play, and we kept talking our shit. I lived for this—the feeling of being on a court, fucking around with my teammates. I refused to take my foot off anyone’s neck, way too motivated to win even in a casual pick-up game.

Gemma easily took the ball from Mags, the two of them working their way up the court.

They communicated with each other silently, understanding where the other person was going to go without needing to say anything at all.

That was what it meant to be teammates, even in a game that didn’t mean anything.

Communication, verbal and non-verbal, was key.

It helped that Gemma and Mags were essentially the same person. There was no use in separating the two of them—they always wanted to play on the same team for a pick-up game, always played their best when the other person was on the court.

I was skeptical of Gemma by association, but she was easier to be around than Mags, who seemed more interested in beefing with her teammates than working on her defensive footwork.

I stayed on Gemma while Nia rode Mags’s ass. Nia was quiet off the court but assertive and quick on it; it benefited me that Gemma and Mags were obsessed with each other because I always ended up with Nia.

Gemma lined up her shot and fired close to the basket. It hit the rim and then just barely fell in, one of our weaker shooters. Mags didn’t waste a single second running over to celebrate with her, while Nia and I brushed off the point and the game as a whole.

“Looks like it’s another win for Team Gags,” Mags said, flashing a quick middle finger in my direction in the midst of her celebration.

“I need some water, actually,” I said playfully, stepping away from the court.

As I walked away from my teammates, I forced myself to take a deep breath and push down the ridiculous feeling of disappointment brewing in me.

It was just a dumb pick-up game and winning didn’t really matter, but I’d needed a win.

My shooting, even when I was just practicing by myself, had been terrible since our team roster announcement.

Mags rolled her eyes and then jogged past me to reach the bench first. “You’re such a sore loser.”

“Dude, you fucking reek,” I said, ignoring her comment, and she flipped me off again.

Over at the bench, we dug out our bags from under the bench. The sun was hot out here—elevation and UV were high—so anything left to cook on the cement top was fair game.

Gemma laid out a towel on the bench and sat down.

Her pale skin was flushed from the heat, her short brown hair pulled back into the world’s smallest ponytail.

Even though this wasn’t a formal practice, all of us were wearing Lakeside Green University-themed items of clothing.

Our basketball program was well-funded—or at least better funded than it had been—after a few consecutive years of making it to the March Madness Tournament, we had more t-shirts and shorts and random pairs of socks than the average person knew what to do with.

“I already miss this. Colorado winters are too long,” Nia said, tilting her face up toward the sun.

She’d gotten a new and much longer sew-in recently; it was pulled into a sleek ponytail that fell down her back.

She reminded me so much of my sisters sometimes, how they were always the more feminine, more put-together versions of me.

I never viewed it as a competition—mostly because I could never be bothered to wear the dresses they liked—but it stirred up feelings a therapist would probably ask about either way.

“Best time of year,” I agreed. I’d always been a summer child—I grew up not far from the water, so it was impossible not to love it.

My happiest memories from home involved my sisters and me in the southern heat.

In the earliest summers of my life, my dad taught my sisters and me how to ride bikes and introduced me to basketball.

My mom would try to throw a fit over how sweaty and sticky and dirty we’d get running around outside all day, but could never keep up the act when she heard us giggling.

I sucked down water as we all took a beat to be on our phones, figuring out what was next.

I didn’t have much to do—the only people who stayed on campus this time of year were people who were here to work or were taking summer classes.

That was how the team always managed to find each other.

Most of us didn’t mind being home, but a lot of us didn’t see a reason to go back during the summer.

My sisters—Ada, Bev and Vivian—and I were all grown up now; I was the last one to graduate and the last one technically still under my parents’ care.

There wasn’t anyone waiting for me at home with ice cream to watch the sunset anymore.

“Are you guys looking forward to the new transfer?” Gemma asked. It was an innocent enough question, but it made my stomach hurt just thinking about it. I’d been doing everything in my power to avoid it.

“Who is it again?” Nia asked.

“Anna Evans,” Mags and I answered at the same time.

Nia nodded in thought, then her expression shifted when it clicked exactly who Anna Evans was. “Oh, shit,” she said.

“Yeah, she’s good. I remember playing against her last year,” Gemma said. I unfortunately did, too—she was one of the few people who could meet us shot for shot. Her team hadn’t won, but they were good enough that they’d shaken up the way we approached defense for the rest of the season.

“I can’t believe we’re at the point where people actually want to transfer here. I’m pretty sure our last transfer was literally Ellie, and she came from a school even smaller than ours,” Nia said. “We’re really becoming official.”

“And she’s actually coming here? Confirmed?

Not another university in Colorado?” I asked, partially because I was also still surprised.

I knew she was—the transfer portal was only open for so long, and announcements were a big deal.

If I googled her, I was sure an article about her transferring to Lakeside Green would be the first thing to pop up.

“No, she’s going to the other Lakeside Green University,” Mags said, like I was the dumbest person in the world. “Yes, she’s coming here.”

“We don’t need another starting point guard,” I muttered.

And it was true—we didn’t. Everyone knew I was the Lakeside Green point guard now that Theo was gone.

I didn’t want Anna here, and I wasn’t particularly thrilled when I saw the news.

I was glad Lakeside Green was being taken seriously enough for players to transfer here because they thought they’d have a better chance at getting drafted or whatever, but that was the end of it.

It didn’t mean I actually really wanted those students to transfer.

“Feeling threatened?” Mags asked, because of course she heard me.

“No.” I brushed the comment off. Obviously I didn’t care that Anna was a point guard or that she’d definitely been one of the players to watch last season.

I was also a point guard and had been one of the ones to watch last season.

It didn’t mean shit to me, no matter what my nights spent staring at the ceiling, ruminating over if I’d hold as a starting player with Anna in town, suggested.

No one—not even Mags—stated the obvious: Even if my coaches weren’t looking to replace me, they were absolutely looking to fill the void left by my best friend, Theo McCall, when she graduated.

She’d done a lot for the team and completely turned around the program in terms of bringing nationwide attention to us and bringing us to the championship

The only thing was that I was supposed to be the new Theo McCall.

I’d been training for it, working directly with Theo, learning from the best. I was supposed to be the one who everyone said was carrying the team, the person who not only was just as good as Theo, but was able to bring the Lakeside Green Coyotes all the way to the finish and bring home a ring. Even Theo hadn’t been able to do that.

My stomach knotted, but I pushed the feeling away.

Anna was good, but she wasn’t me. I had the benefit of already knowing the team and the rhythm we’d played with last year.

She’d had less time on the court than I, started in fewer games than I, and played on a lower-ranked team.

And she was coming from an Ivy League, which historically didn’t have strong basketball programs, anyway.

I didn’t have anything to worry about.

“Mags!”

All four of us looked up to see Mags’s twin sister, Leah, had pulled up to the curb.

She was sitting in her fancy ass car—their parents were fucking loaded in the way that made it hard for Mags and Leah to hide it—with her sunglasses on her face.

Most students out here—myself included—didn’t bother with keeping a car on campus because of the inconvenience, cost, and general lack of parking.

But Mags and Leah were kept humble by only being allowed to have one Benz between the two of them.

Leah was a cheerleader, so we all knew her pretty well. She’d occasionally pop into the same parties my other teammates and I would go to, always flashing her perfect white smile and wearing clothes tight to her lean dancer’s body.

Not that I noticed.

“Come on!” Leah said again, waving her arm to get Mags to hurry down to her. Mags rolled her eyes.

“What’s up her ass?” Gemma asked.

“That girl she’s seeing or whatever. I don’t know. Not my business. All I know is getting yanked around has her on her bitchiest behavior.”

“Tell her she can always call me if she needs a break from the fuckboys,” I said, mostly because I knew it would piss Mags off.

Leah was undeniably hot, and there weren’t any explicit rules against us dating cheerleaders—or siblings of our teammates—but I had enough common sense to know trying to date Mags’s sister was a battle I wouldn’t win.

“Just give me a chance, Leah! I’ll change your life! ” I shouted down toward her car.

“Never in a million years,” Mags said, warning in her voice. She turned to Gemma. “You coming?”

“Yeah.” Gemma got up, throwing her tote bag over her shoulder, and followed Mags across the court, through the grass, and then down to the curb.

“You know how to reach me if you need me,” I shouted again, my voice carrying easily down the way to her open car window.

Leah was too far for me to see her face in detail, but I thought, just maybe, I saw her lips perk up in a smile.