Chapter 15
Iris
Nine goals in four weeks. Three assists. Zero cards. Zero late arrivals to practice. Zero party photos on Instagram. Zero sleepless nights.
Hades calls me in after Wednesday practice, and when I walk into her office, I'm convinced she's about to chew me out for something I don't know I've done yet.
That's how it works on this team. Hades calls, you sweat, Hades talks, you try to breathe.
It doesn't hit me as hard, but some of my teammates dread it.
“Good month,” she says when I sit down.
I wait for the second part. The “but.” The “however.” The raised eyebrow that precedes destruction.
It doesn't come.
“That's it?” I ask.
“That's it.”
“Okay, this is scarier than when you yell at me. You've spent two years screaming, and now you just say good month and go quiet. Are you sick? Is this a trap? Because I know you've been watching tape on a certain player… Don't tell me you signed her and you're not renewing me…”
“Vance. Take the compliment and get out of my office.”
“Yes, boss. I'm out. We're cool.”
“Don't call me boss.”
“Yes, Coach. Oh, and just so you know… that player isn't coming. She's never leaving her club. Zero chance, okay? I'm sure of it.”
“Get out, Iris! Your extension was signed yesterday. Better terms. They'll send it to your agent tomorrow,” she adds.
***
That night, there's a team dinner with sponsors at a downtown restaurant. It's one of those events where I smile, shake hands, and let people tell me they love my goals while I calculate how long until I can leave for a real party.
Paula is standing at the back of the room talking to Tessa.
She looks my way, smiles, and then Sloane Hicks appears.
Former U-21 national team teammate, now a sports commentator.
Killer smile, short hair, swimmer's shoulders.
Since I've known her, we've hooked up a few times, the last one three years ago at a federation party.
Nothing serious. One night. End of story.
We both know the rules, and we know what we want.
She looks me up and down without hiding it and bites her lower lip before pulling me into a hug.
“I've read about your mystery girlfriend. Is it real?”
“It's real,” I confirm.
“Too bad,” she teases, smiling, her hand resting on my waist longer than it needs to.
I play along for a couple more minutes. I do my thing. Iris Vance being Iris Vance: charismatic, approachable, a little flirty with everyone because that's who I am, that's who I've always been.
But Paula's face changes completely.
A face that breaks my heart when I see it.
“That woman was just a former U-21 teammate from years ago. Nothing more,” I tell her the second we get in the car.
“I didn't ask about her.”
“Yeah, well, I saw your face, and you looked like you wanted to murder her. We're just friends.”
She stays quiet. Drives.
“Paula.”
“What.”
“It was nothing, okay? We talked for two minutes,” I insist.
“I know.”
“Then why are you pissed?”
“I'm not pissed.”
I drop it. The light changes. Paula drives, eyes fixed on the road.
I look out the window and feel something I've never felt before: that my behavior can hurt another person.
I never thought about the emotional consequences, because there was never anyone who cared enough to get upset. Now there is.
“Paula.”
“Yeah?”
“You're jealous, but I'm sorry. I mean it.”
Paula says nothing. But her right hand leaves the wheel for a second, finds mine. Squeezes. Lets go. Returns to the wheel.
***
The next day we go for a run. It's a habit of mine. On days off from practice, I like jogging through a park nearby. Lucky for me Paula is in great shape, because she never complains. The first few times I tried to leave her behind, but she keeps my pace without breaking a sweat.
We follow the usual route. I put on my headphones, hit the playlist that gets me going, and we head down the avenue, turn into the park, and loop around the lake. Just under four miles.
Around the two-and-a-half-mile mark, while I'm thinking that the new sneakers my sponsor sent me pinch a little, we pass the coffee shop where I buy coffee on Wednesdays. A man is sitting on a wooden bench. Brown hair. Thick-framed glasses. Looking at his phone.
I keep running, but a minute later I turn my head.
The man looks up from his phone. Looks at me. Two seconds. Looks back down.
My blood goes cold. Eight blocks. Eight fucking blocks. Brown hair, thick-framed glasses, the coffee shop where I buy coffee every Wednesday. It could be anyone.
Or it could be Derek Linden.
I speed up. Paula notices. She pulls even with me.
“You okay?” she asks, grabbing my elbow.
“Yes. No. I don't know. There's a guy on the bench by the coffee shop.”
“Keep running. Don't stop,” she orders.
We keep going. My legs shake, and it's not from the effort. When we get to the apartment, Paula lets me in and goes back out.
“Where are you going?”
“To check the bench. Don't move.”
“What if it's him?”
“I hope it is,” she says, and locks the door behind her.
I wait twenty minutes, and I think they're the longest twenty minutes of my life. I sit on the kitchen floor with my back against the wall, sneakers still on, heart in my throat, holding a knife. I don't know why. The door is locked. But I do it anyway.
“The bench was empty. I checked the street. Nothing,” she tells me when she comes back.
“Do you think it was him, or did I imagine it?” I ask. The last thing I need is to start seeing threats that aren't there.
Paula crouches down to my level.
“What matters is you reacted right. You told me. You didn't stop. You didn't approach him. You did exactly what you were supposed to.”
“Shit,” I sigh. “Eight blocks.”
“Eight blocks,” she repeats. “But I'm with you. I'm not leaving you alone.”
***
That night I cook.
I don't plan it. I just do it. And it's weird, not something I usually do, but it's better than thinking about a man with thick-framed glasses sitting on a bench a few blocks from my house.
Pasta with tomato sauce. Lucía's recipe. Fresh basil I bought at the grocery store yesterday. I've lit candles. I've pulled my sneakers out from under the couch. I've put the dirty clothes in the hamper. I've basically turned my apartment into a livable space. Almost a home.
Paula walks out of her room and stares.
“You cooked?”
“Sit down. Trust me, I'm not going to poison you,” I joke, pointing at the dining table.
Over dinner, we talk about everything and nothing. Small things. Trying not to mention the stalker with the thick-framed glasses who's taking up too much space in my head. We talk like a normal couple eating dinner at home.
“What happens when the contract ends?” I say, because it's something I've wanted to ask for a while and haven't had the guts.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, one day this is over. The threat or whatever, the protection, the contract. You know. You won't have to spend every hour with me anymore. What happens then?”
“I like Seattle,” she says.
“Seattle is big. That doesn't answer my question.”
“I don't know. Something near a park with a lake. Like this apartment, for example. If you want…”
“And Mama Celo?”
“My grandma is healthy and has a house in El Paso. She'd visit,” she explains, like it's obvious.
“Oh man, I love your grandma. Any woman who sends you thirty-second voice notes of just laughing at two in the morning is my kind of person.”
“And you? Is this the part where you tell me you're not ready to live with someone?” she asks, half joking, half serious.
“I wouldn't live with someone like me, but if you're willing to try, go for it. I won't be the one to stop you,” I joke. “Seriously though, it's hard for me to say this, but yeah, I'd like you to stay. Live with me,” I admit, taking her hand. “I'd really like that.”
Later, while we're doing the dishes, the question comes out before I can think.
“Have you ever wanted kids?”
Paula freezes, hands full of suds, and stares at me.
“Okay, okay. Sorry. That's too much. You know how I get. Forget it. We're good. Let's talk about soccer.”
“Yes,” she says.
“Yes… let's talk about soccer?”
“Yes, I've always wanted kids. I want them. I don't know when or how. But yes. I'm very sure. I love kids,” she says, and I don't know why, but I think I'm shaking.
It's weird. She's got suds up to her wrists, she's telling me she wants kids in the middle of our kitchen on a Saturday night, and it's the most romantic thing anyone's ever said to me.
“I want them too,” I say. “I don't know if I'll be a good mom. I'm late to everything, and I curse in front of children. But I want it. I've known since the first time I held Wesley.”
“You'll be an incredible mother, Iris. I have zero doubt,” she tells me, and gives me a small kiss on the cheek.
“Can we keep doing the dishes and not talk about this for a while before I start crying?”
“We could go to your room and talk about whatever you want with no clothes on,” she whispers, slipping a hand under my waistband to pull me against her.
She kisses my neck. Slow. So slow. Undoes two buttons on my shirt and pushes it down to kiss my shoulders. The freckles, which have become her obsession, the same way her collarbone mole is mine.
“We're still in the kitchen,” I remind her.
“I don't think we're making it to the bedroom,” she whispers in my ear. “Don't move. Don't talk,” she orders.
She touches me so gently it hurts, raising goosebumps across my skin. She takes off my clothes piece by piece, no rush at all, and the waiting becomes a sweet torture. The sweetest.
I gasp when my bra hits the floor, and again when her fingertips brush my stomach, unbuttoning my jeans, sliding them down my legs.
“You can't say anything or move,” she reminds me.
The gasps turn to moans when she drops to a crouch, hooks her thumbs under the waistband of my underwear, and peels them off slow. She kisses my ass, traces the tip of her tongue across it, makes me tremble before pressing her cheek to the sensitive skin there.
“I can confirm we're not making it to the bedroom,” I breathe.
She parts me with her thumbs, blows over my pussy, and my whole body tightens in anticipation.
“You okay?”
“I'm great,” I pant.
“Can I…?”
“Yes. Please. Everything. Whatever you want,” I answer, my legs shaking.
I don't get to say more. her finger slides through how wet I am and empties my head.
Just like that. Just that fast. I grab the counter, open my legs, close my eyes, and zero in on the feeling of her mouth on my ass and her fingers easing inside me.
My whole body trembles with want, like it's been waiting for exactly this.
“Don't stop,” I gasp.
I shut my eyes tighter, as if that could help me separate every sensation: the cold granite under my hands, the cool kitchen air on my bare skin, Paula's breath, warm and ragged, against my inner thigh. The wet sound of her fingers sliding in and out, what they do to every inch of me.
She moves at a perfect rhythm, like she knows my body by heart.
“You're biting your lip. I love that,” she murmurs before kissing my ass.
I release my lip, but the moan that escapes is almost embarrassing. Too loud for a kitchen.
She stands without pulling her fingers out, pressing her body against mine from behind. She's taken off her shirt, and I feel her bra against my bare back, the denim of her jeans against my ass. The asymmetry of it, me completely exposed, her still dressed, turns me on in a way I can't explain.
“Not yet,” she whispers in my ear when she feels me grinding for more friction.
“You're cruel,” I breathe.
“I'm patient,” she corrects, and her teeth graze my earlobe while her fingers make me shake from head to toe.
She changes the pace. Slow. Painfully slow. Pressing down until I'm about to beg. Then she speeds up, pushes harder on the exact spot, and I let my head fall back against her shoulder.
“I can't take it,” I tell her.
“I know,” she whispers, placing her free hand on my stomach. “Let go.”
I break. And it isn't a metaphor. Something inside me opens, spills over her hand in waves that don't seem to end. I scream. Or maybe I just moan her name, over and over, gripping the counter and shaking.
She doesn't pull out. She stays inside me, easing the rhythm, stretching the pleasure until it's too much and I have to push her hand away, too sensitive to take any more.
She turns me around gently, hands on my hips, and lifts me onto the counter next to the dishes we never finished. She steps between my knees and holds me. I rest my head on her shoulder. I kiss her while I catch my breath.
“I'm not done with you yet,” she murmurs against my hair.
“I know,” I answer, sighing.
“Take off my clothes,” she orders.
I've always liked being in charge during sex, but with Paula, that command, in the middle of a messy kitchen, feels like the sexiest thing in the world. So I pull her jeans down with hands that still shake, unclip her bra, take a little longer with her underwear because I want to reveal her slowly.
When she's fully naked, she moves close and I'm so sensitive that the first brush of her nipples against mine makes me gasp.
She presses me against the counter, finds my pussy with her thigh while I do the same with hers, and we grind at the same rhythm, each leaving a faint trail of wetness on the other's skin.
And we don't make it to the bedroom.
We don't even try.
Because watching Paula lose control while she comes is the best sound in the world. Better than twenty-five thousand people celebrating a goal.
Nothing compares. It's the perfect sound.
***
At two in the morning, Paula sleeps naked beside me. Relaxed. Beautiful.
I don't stare at the ceiling anymore. I stare at her.
Her black hair messy on the pillow. Her hand on my stomach. Outside, the rain has stopped.
Her phone buzzes on the nightstand next to mine. The screen lights up and the notification is impossible to miss.
“Subject on the move.”
Shit.
“Paula. Paula, wake up. Please,” I say, shaking her.
She opens her eyes, groggy, but the second she sees my face she bolts upright.
“What is it?”
I show her the phone.
Paula reads it and is dressed in seconds. She dials a number.
“Trent. Immediate protocol activation. I need visual confirmation.”
When she hangs up, she looks at me.
“Don't move from here. I'm locking the door. Don't move,” she repeats.
“Paula—”
“Iris. Listen to me,” she says, hands on my shoulders.
I hear the apartment door open and close. The key in the lock. Two turns.
I stay in bed. The sheets tangled. The smell of both of us on the pillow. The dark. Out there, somewhere on our street, a man who's spent fourteen months watching from a distance has decided to get closer.
It's no longer eight blocks.
It's zero.