Chapter 10
Tessa
Ten minutes later, someone pounds on the door like she’s trying to knock it off the hinges.
“Méndez! Open up! Emergency!”
Zoe doesn’t move.
“I’ll get it,” I say.
Iris bursts in like a hurricane. Hair wild. Pajamas. Bare feet.
“Jesus, did you sleep together?” she blurts, then freezes when she sees me in underwear, covered only by a T-shirt and no bra.
“I just got here,” I snap.
“Oh. Okay. Whew.” She exhales like she survived a car crash. “But also, it’s fine, okay? Do whatever you want, we're cool here—” Then she whips back to why she came. “Anyway. Have you seen all the crap they posted on social media?”
“Iris, now is not the time, we already saw it and—”
“Shut up for a second. I’m thinking,” she cuts in, pressing her right hand to her chin like she’s about to deliver a TED Talk. “Okay. This is big. But not impossible.”
“What do you mean?” Zoe asks from the bed.
“I’m going to ruin their lives.” Iris pulls her phone out of her pajama pocket.
“Virtually, obviously. I’ve got material, Méndez.
I’ve got a lot of material. Photos and videos saved from the whole damn week.
Multiple videos of the boss under the shade canopy, with the bottle, with me right next to him fanning him like he’s an Egyptian pharaoh. ”
“You recorded all that?” Zoe says.
“Of course. It’s my private Boss Content Collection. I wish I could bottle the smell of his hair.”
Zoe sits up fast.
“You really have videos where it shows you were there?”
“I have videos where it shows I’m right there next to him. Shade, water, sunscreen three times. I even sing him a lullaby I make up on the spot, and it’s pretty bad, but it works.” Iris pauses for air like she’s been sprinting. “I’ve got everything.”
“And what do we do with it?” Zoe asks.
“Post it,” Iris says, flashing a wide grin. “Post it and watch that vulture ex-husband of yours choke on his own words.”
**
Half an hour later, we’re in Iris’s room.
It’s a wreck. Clothes everywhere. Empty water bottles on the floor. A pair of black underwear hanging off a chair.
“Not mine,” Iris says fast. “I had company last night. Don’t judge me.”
“I didn’t say anything,” I remind her, holding up my hands.
“Your face says plenty,” she jokes, dropping onto her bed with her phone. “Okay. Let’s see what we’ve got. Actually, I had it ready to post the second you gave me the mom seal of approval. I even wrote captions.”
She scrolls through videos.
Wesley under the shade canopy. Iris beside him with a magazine. A water bottle sitting next to the car seat.
Caption: “The boss supervising training. Still not impressed by this team’s rondos.”
Another video. Iris fanning him.
“Ninety degrees and the boss stays cool. Royal privileges.”
Another. Iris adjusting his little hat so the sun doesn’t hit him.
“Sunscreen reapplied. Hydration on point. The boss lives better than me. So unfair. Also he smells amazing. Pure heaven.”
“You literally have hours of footage,” I say, stunned.
Right then, there’s a knock and Tina walks in sobbing, full-body shaking.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I swear. I didn’t want— it was a joke— I didn’t think— I messed up so bad…”
“Hey. Focus and stop crying,” Iris orders, grabbing her by the arm and hauling her into the room. “Do you have videos, photos? Anything you shot before the picture?”
“No. I just took that one—”
“Okay. Then you’re going to record something now.”
“What?”
“A video explaining what really happened. That I was there. That it was a joke. That they took the photo out of context. All of it.”
Tina stares at her with scared baby-deer eyes.
“What if that makes it worse?”
“I don’t see how it can get worse,” Iris says, shrugging as she presses her phone into Tina’s hand. “It’s already pretty fucked. You record your part. I record mine. And we bury those vultures. Got it? Then we ask in the team chat for everyone to check their phones for any other photos and videos.”
Tina nods. Slow. Still crying.
“Alright then,” Iris says. “Let’s make history.”
**
Iris’s video is forty-seven seconds.
She sits on her bed. Hair down. No makeup. Clearly just woke up. At least we convince her to put on a club hoodie instead of filming in pajamas.
She looks straight into the camera.
“Okay, vultures and internet haters. I’m going to explain this one time.
That photo is out of context. I was there.
Sitting next to him. Watching him. With water, with shade, with sunscreen, with everything a baby needs.
Wesley is the most cared-for baby on this damn planet because he has his mom and thirty-two other adoptive moms if you count the players and staff.
Yes, even Hades, sorry, Diana, helps and she even made a spreadsheet. ”
She pauses just a second.
“Anyone who uses a child to hurt his mother is trash. Here’s your proof. See? That’s me. With the boss. Doing my job as honorary aunt. Statement over. Go screw off somewhere else. If anyone wants to hurt Zoe, she has to step over my dead body first. And we're cool.”
Iris posts it to her million-plus followers.
In ten minutes it hits forty thousand likes and more supportive comments than we can count.
**
Tina’s is different.
She cries as she talks, but she holds it together. She explains the context of the photo, how Iris is right there, how the whole team runs shifts to watch the baby every minute of the day. She says Zoe is a wonderful mother and how much she supports the new players. It isn’t long, but it hits hard.
Five minutes later, Lucía shares Iris’s video with the caption: “My team. My family.”
One by one, the whole team posts something. Even Hades.
Comments pour in by the thousands, even from people who know nothing about women’s soccer.
“Iris Vance for president”
“That’s a real team”
“Protect mothers. She’s an example”
“Somebody give that blonde a medal. What’s her name? Iris Vance?”
Morning training gets canceled. We cram into Iris’s room, put on music, and the whole team takes turns holding Wesley. Zoe gets more hugs and encouragement than if she’d won the World Cup final.
**
By ten p.m., Wesley finally falls asleep. With all the chaos, there’s no way earlier. For him, today is a party. For his mom, not so much.
I sit with Zoe on her bed, both of us propped against the headboard, our shoulders touching.
It’s been a brutal day. The silence gives it away. The way neither of us has the energy to pretend any of this is normal.
“Not even a full week of preseason and this is already insane,” Zoe says, voice tired.
“We'll spend the rest of the days together,” I say before I think.
“What?”
“I mean it,” I tell her.
“We can’t, Tess. After the photo, if… if Nate finds out about us—”
“How would he find out?”
“Tessa, you’re in my room. At ten at night. In your underwear.”
“Half the team already thinks we’re sleeping together,” I say.
Zoe turns toward me fast. Opens her mouth. Closes it. Opens it again, but no words come out.
“What did you just say?”
“Iris told me this morning,” I admit, shrugging. “Apparently there’s a bet and everything.”
“A bet?”
“Lucía says we’ve been hooking up since Seattle. Jade says it was on the plane. Iris says nothing’s happened yet but it’s a matter of days.” I lift a brow. “This morning she thought she lost the bet.”
“Jesus,” Zoe breathes.
“The team keeps secrets, Zoe. They’ve spent a week taking turns with Wesley. Today they went to war for you online.” I squeeze her fingers. “They’re not going to sell you out over gossip.”
“But your job—”
“Sara handles your rehab. Officially, I don’t make any solo decisions about your case. Everything’s documented. Diana’s orders.”
Zoe studies me for a beat.
“Why are you so calm?” she asks. “This morning you were as scared as I was.”
“Because this morning I thought you were alone.” My voice drops. “And you aren’t. Not even close.” I take her hand fully and press it between mine.
“And you?” she asks.
“Me what?”
“Are you alone?”
“I’ve been alone for seven years,” I say, and the words scrape on the way out. “Seven years of running. City to city. Team to team. Telling myself it’s ambition, it’s my career, it’s me chasing the top of my field, it’s what I’m supposed to do.”
“And it wasn’t?”
“It was fear,” I say. “Fear of this. Of you. Of what I feel when I’m with you.”
“Tessa…”
“I’m tired of running. I’m tired of being scared.” My throat tightens. “I’m tired of waking up every morning thinking about you without you next to me.”
“And now?” Zoe asks, quiet.
“Now I stay. No matter what. I stay.” I nod like I have to nail the words down. “And if I can stay in the middle of an internet scandal, a custody lawsuit, and a possible ethics complaint against me… imagine what I can do when things get calm.”
Zoe lets out a short laugh and rolls her eyes.
“You’re an idiot,” she says, looking at our tangled fingers.
“Probably.”
“This doesn’t leave this room until Yvonne gives the okay. Deal?”
“Deal.”
“And if tomorrow you regret it…” She hesitates, like she doesn’t want to keep going. “You tell me. But you don’t disappear. You just tell me and we talk.”
I turn to her and cradle her face, brushing my thumbs over her cheekbones.
“This time I don’t disappear. If I get scared, I tell you. But I don’t run.”
We go quiet, like we’re both sitting with what just happened.
Then she kisses me.
It isn’t like the kiss on the training field. It isn’t stolen, and it isn’t impulsive. It isn’t urgent or wild.
It’s a choice.
She leans in slow and I meet her halfway. Her teeth catch my lower lip with a soft bite. Her hands tangle in my hair.
When we part, she rests her forehead against mine and my heart pounds so hard I swear the whole team can hear it through hotel walls.
“This is crazy,” she whispers.
Wesley makes a small noise in the crib. A little protest, probably dreaming about the circus this week has become. We both laugh, and Zoe gets up and settles him between us.
“Tonight,” she says, shrugging, “just sleep.”
“Just sleep,” I repeat like an idiot.
“Seven years apart,” she murmurs.
“Seven years.”
“We’re idiots.”
Wesley opens his eyes, stares at me for one surprised second, reaches out, and grabs my nose.
“I think he likes me,” I whisper, stroking his cheek.
“His mom does too,” Zoe says, and she blows me a kiss.
Then she smiles, Wes falls asleep, and I close my eyes.
I listen to their breathing, and as sleep pulls me under, I think this isn’t perfect, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything.