Chapter 5 Mads
Mads
Ibroke her bed, and I do not regret it in the slightest.
The Rites demand follow-through, and if I stop now, the guys will smell weakness from a mile away.
I’ve got to keep it going, keep her on her toes, even if half my brain is already thinking of ways to worship her as opposed to constantly pissing her off.
The other half? It’s too busy thinking about how every setup could double as an excuse to be near her, to get under her skin in the kind of way that keeps me there permanently.
I haven’t decided yet if I’m going to fix it while she’s in class and pretend I’m a hero or work my way toward convincing her to sleep with me.
I can see positives to both options. One gets me back on her good side. The other gets her in my bed with me quicker. Both are appealing. Both require a plan.
Right now, though, it’s too early to be scheming.
The sky is still dark when I step onto the field.
The lights overhead buzz to life as I jog toward the goal box, breath fogging in the air.
It’s starting to feel more like autumn in the mornings.
The ground’s damp, the air is cooler, and the stretch from my spine down to my calves burns in that way I crave when I’m still half asleep.
Autumn mornings here always carry that edge—wet earth, lingering drizzle, the kind of chill that seeps through layers if you stand still too long. I pull my gloves tight and settle into warm-ups with the rest of the team.
Eli fires a shot from the penalty line. I should have blocked it. I move too slowly. The ball clips my hand and rolls in.
“You good?” he calls.
“Yeah.” I shake it off and reset. “Just getting started.”
I drop into position again, adjusting my stance, knees bent, feet spread just enough to keep me grounded. My gloves are damp with morning dew, the sting from Eli’s shot still buzzing in my fingers. I rotate my wrist once, more for focus than recovery.
The grass is still slick this early. Not an excuse, but it doesn’t help.
Neither does the fact that my brain is running diagnostics on whether Blake’s awake, whether she slept okay, or whether she’s still mad about the bed.
I picture her sitting up with her hair stuck out in every direction, glaring at her mattress from across the room.
It’s a ridiculous thought, but I can’t get it out of my head. I can’t get her out of my head.
Colin lines up next. He doesn’t wait for a signal, just slams the ball low and hard to the left. I drop too late again. The ball thuds into the back of the net, and I curse under my breath.
“Easy money,” he says, loud enough for the whole field. Then, just to twist the knife, he adds, “Captain can’t even cover near the post. Good thing the rest of us know how to finish.”
I grit my teeth, swallowing the retort that wants to come out, because that’s the thing about Colin. He doesn’t care if he pisses me off. He wants me to snap. And half the time, I want to give him exactly what he’s asking for, but I’m not in the mood to deal with his smart ass today.
Focus.
I bounce on the balls of my feet, roll my shoulders. Breathe in through my nose.
There’s a faint blue creeping in over the tree line. Cooler mornings hit hardest before sunrise—cold air sharp in your lungs, fingers going numb under your gloves. I should be locked in, reading their angles, anticipating their movements. But I’m off by just enough to continue to punish myself.
Luca doesn’t say anything until the third miss. Then he crosses his arms and stares me down. “Get your head on, Keller.”
“I’m fine,” I mutter, but even I don’t sound convinced.
I’m not fine. I can’t stop thinking about her.
It’s pathetic how far gone I am. Half my brain’s always occupied with what she’d taste like if she’d just let me close enough, and the other half is busy pretending I’m not already in too deep.
I wipe the back of my glove across my forehead. My pulse is steady, but wrong. Too even, too forced, like my body’s faking a calm it doesn’t feel. I’m reacting too slowly, misjudging footwork I’ve drilled a thousand times.
Every part of me feels off balance. The net feels bigger. My timing’s off. Every movement feels wrong in a way that makes me question my muscle memory.
I try to focus on the drills, but my thoughts keep drifting.
To the towel she wore last night. Barely tucked, slipping just enough to make me insane. Water dripped down the fronts of her thighs while she stood there, glaring at me.
To the way she bent over, yanking her mattress around the room, cursing under her breath while I got a front-row seat to the show.
To the little smirk on her face when she beat me. Tossed her final throw, declared herself the winner, and told me to take the couch like she hadn’t just driven me halfway out of my mind.
And yeah, I left.
But not before I memorized every inch of her.
And not before I seriously considered crawling back in there just to see what she'd do if I asked her—no, begged her—to move over and let me lie down next to her.
I stretch my arms over my head and roll out my shoulders. I miss the next save by a full second.
“Jesus, man,” Colin mutters. “What the fuck? Did you not sleep?”
“Worse,” Luca says under his breath. “He’s thinking about a girl.”
“Aren’t we fucking all?” Colin mutters.
“No,” Luca laughs. “I’m not.”
Colin just gives him a no shit, Sherlock look and turns back to me.“Get it the fuck together.”
I ignore them and dive for the next ball. I get my fingertips on it this time. Not enough to deflect it, of course.
Fuck.
Practice finally winds down, the sky pale and golden behind the concession stand. The girls will be out soon. I shower fast and towel-dry my hair with the kind of half-effort that leaves it sticking up in all directions. I don’t care.
Because as soon as I step out of the locker room, I know I’ll see her. Coming down the path to the field. Messy bun. Jaw set. Probably already annoyed with me about something.
And I can’t wait.
But she doesn’t come down with the rest of the team.
The girls trickle in—tired faces, duffle bags slung low, water bottles tucked under arms—but no Blake. No flash of blue hair. No glare thrown in my direction.
I hang back near the edge of the walkway, trying not to look like I’m waiting. Luca jogs past me and raises an eyebrow. “You’re not subtle.”
“She’s not here.” My face scrunches.
“Maybe she’s avoiding you.”
That possibility is very real.
I check my phone, like maybe she texted.
As if she would.
Nothing. I scroll. Refresh. Try to call her. Still nothing.
She overslept. Has to be. She probably stayed up too late plotting how to poison me and get away with it.
Whatever the reason, the second Coach Carmichael notices she’s missing, the finger’s getting pointed at me. I know how this works. We’re two days into this cohabitation disaster, and I’ve already got the blame-to-innocence ratio of a convicted felon.
“She’s not answering?” Luca asks.
“No.” I rub the back of my neck, suddenly too aware of the way the cool air bites into my damp shirt. “She’s never late.”
That’s the part that throws me off. Blake isn’t predictable in a calm, grounded kind of way, but she shows up. She gets shit done. It’s one of the many things I love about her.
She doesn’t miss practice, and she doesn’t sleep through alarms, and if she did, she’d still storm onto the field pissed and swearing with a protein bar between her teeth and two boots that probably don’t match.
I glance back toward the path.
And I start to worry. Not a lot. Just a flicker.
Because something about this doesn’t sit right. And I’ve got a really bad feeling that if she’s not on this field in the next five minutes, I’m going to end up sprinting across campus like some panicked boyfriend cliché.
Which I’m not.
Yet.