Chapter Nine
B y championship morning, Santa Monica looked like it had decided to become a festival.
The beach was packed before ten.
Bright umbrellas dotted the sand like candy.
Vendors lined the boardwalk with iced drinks, tacos, sunscreen, and tournament T-shirts.
Music pulsed from speakers near the registration tent, competing with the crash of waves and the growing roar of excited spectators.
Everywhere Hailey looked, there were people—families, tourists, locals, serious volleyball fans, athletes warming up, sponsors in branded polos, cameras, phones, sunglasses, sunburned shoulders, and enough nervous energy to make the entire shoreline hum.
It was chaos.
Professionally speaking, Hailey understood chaos.
Personally speaking, she hated that Tyler was somewhere inside it.
She stood near the edge of the player area with Amanda on speaker in one ear and a tournament bracelet around her wrist, trying very hard not to look like a woman whose heart had relocated itself into a beach volleyball court.
“So,” Amanda said, “let me make sure I have this right. You took a vacation to avoid athletes, then accidentally fell for a beach volleyball player?”
Hailey adjusted her sunglasses. “I did not fall.”
“Hails.”
“I became acquainted with him.”
“You spent the night with him.”
“That is a very invasive interpretation of acquainted.”
Amanda gasped. “You did! Oh my God. Meagan owes me twenty dollars.”
Hailey closed her eyes. “You two bet on me?”
“No. We made an emotionally supportive prediction with financial consequences.”
“That is called betting.”
“Fine, we bet on you.” Amanda’s voice softened. “But seriously. How are you?”
Hailey looked toward the court where Tyler and Jack were warming up.
Tyler was impossible to miss.
He moved through the sand in black shorts and a navy athletic tank, his shoulders loose as he passed the ball to Jack. From a distance, he looked calm. Focused. Every inch the athlete everyone had come to watch.
But Hailey knew him better now.
She could see the tension in the set of his jaw.
The way his eyes kept flicking toward the far court, where the top-seeded team warmed up with brutal precision.
The way he rolled his right shoulder twice between serves, not because it hurt, but because he was trying to keep his nerves from crawling out through his skin.
“I’m fine,” she said.
Amanda went silent.
Hailey sighed. “I know. I heard it too.”
“You sound terrified.”
“I am not terrified.”
“Hails.”
Hailey swallowed.
The sun was already hot against her face, but the chill in her stomach had nothing to do with the weather.
“I think he can win,” she said quietly. “And I think he’s afraid to believe that.”
Amanda’s voice gentled. “And what about you?”
“What about me?”
“Are you afraid to believe in something too?”
Hailey did not answer.
Because yes.
Yes, she was.
She was afraid to believe Tyler could win because she had seen what failure had done to him. She was afraid to believe this week had changed her because New York still existed, Gentry PR still existed, and her old life still waited with open hands and sharp teeth.
She was afraid to believe she could want Tyler and still want herself.
Before Amanda could press, a familiar voice barked from behind Hailey.
“Greenwood.”
Hailey turned.
Coach Medrano stood several feet away in sunglasses, a black cap, and an expression carved from pure disapproval.
Hailey straightened automatically. “Coach.”
“Are you working?”
She glanced at the phone. “No.”
“Then why do you have that thing in your ear?”
Amanda whispered, “Is that the terrifying coach?”
Hailey removed the earbud. “Goodbye, Amanda.”
“Tell beach boy I’m rooting for him!”
Hailey ended the call.
Medrano looked unimpressed. “You brought emotional noise.”
“I brought moral support.”
“Same thing.”
Hailey folded her arms. “Do you have pre-game wisdom, or are you just here to judge my phone usage?”
“Yes.”
“To which part?”
Medrano’s mouth twitched. Barely. “Both.”
He looked toward the court.
Tyler had stopped pretending not to watch them. The moment his eyes found Hailey’s, his mouth softened into the kind of smile that still had the power to make her forget where she was standing.
That was inconvenient.
Also, wonderful.
Medrano made a low sound of disgust. “He is thinking too much.”
“He always thinks too much.”
“So do you.”
Hailey gave him a flat look. “I am trying to support him.”
“Then do that.”
“I am.”
“No. You are standing there like his future depends on whether you hold your breath long enough.”
Her protest died before it reached her tongue.
Medrano’s gaze sharpened. “You cannot win this for him.”
“I know that.”
“Do you?”
The question landed exactly where he aimed it.
Hailey looked back at Tyler.
He was laughing at something Jack said now, but even from where she stood, she could see the strain beneath it. The hope. The fear. The years of almost pressing against his shoulders.
“I just don’t want him to hurt,” she said, softer than she meant to.
Medrano was quiet for a moment.
Then he said, “People hurt. Champions hurt and play anyway.”
Hailey exhaled slowly.
“That was almost compassionate.”
“Do not spread rumors.”
Despite herself, she smiled.
A whistle blew near the first court.
The opening match was beginning.
Medrano nodded toward Tyler. “Go.”
Hailey looked at him. “What?”
“He needs to see you before he plays. Not from across the sand. Go.”
Her pulse jumped.
She did not argue.
Tyler turned before she reached him, as if he had felt her coming.
Up close, his calm looked even thinner.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hey.”
Jack stood beside him, bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet. “Please tell me you brought more terrifying motivational speeches.”
“I only prepared one,” Hailey said. “And it’s for Tyler.”
Jack pressed a hand to his chest. “Favoritism hurts.”
“You’ll survive.”
“Barely.”
Tyler smiled, but his eyes stayed on her.
Hailey stepped closer, lowering her voice. “How are you?”
“Ready.”
“That was not an answer.”
His mouth shifted.
Then, because he had apparently decided honesty was their new terrible habit, he said, “I might throw up.”
“Very athletic.”
“I thought so.”
She reached for his hand, not caring who saw.
His fingers closed around hers immediately.
The contact steadied her.
Maybe it steadied him too.
“You don’t have to win the whole thing in the first match,” she said.
His gaze searched hers.
“You don’t have to fix last year today. You don’t have to prove every person wrong. You don’t have to become a legend before lunch.”
His grip tightened.
“You just have to earn the next ball.”
Tyler’s breath left him slowly.
“That sounds familiar,” he said.
“I know. I stole it from an awful man.”
“Medrano would be touched.”
“Medrano would tell me emotions are a hydration risk.”
Tyler laughed, and some of the tightness left his face.
Good.
Hailey lifted his hand and kissed his knuckles, returning the gesture he had given her more than once.
His eyes darkened.
“Hailey,” he said quietly.
There was too much inside her name.
Too much for a crowded beach. Too much for a championship morning. Too much when he needed to walk onto that court and become the man she knew he already was.
So she smiled.
“Go win your first match.”
His mouth curved. “Bossy.”
“Effective.”
He leaned down and kissed her once.
Quick.
Warm.
Not enough.
Never enough.
Behind him, Jack groaned. “I am begging both of you to remember I am also here and emotionally fragile.”
Tyler pulled back, smiling against Hailey’s mouth. “Tonight.”
The word was a promise.
Hailey’s heart stumbled.
“Tonight,” she said.
Then Tyler walked onto the court.
And everything went wrong.
Not all at once.
That would have been kinder.
At first, the match looked controlled. Tyler and Jack won the first two points cleanly. Jack’s sets were sharp. Tyler’s first spike hit the sand with a satisfying crack, drawing cheers from the crowd.
Hailey let herself breathe.
Then Tyler missed a serve.
Not badly.
Just long.
A small thing.
A normal thing.
But she saw it happen.
The flicker in his face.
The old story waking up.
The other team pounced.
Point by point, the match tightened. Tyler played well, then too hard. He overcorrected. A swing went wide. A receive popped too high. Jack covered him once, then again, but the momentum shifted like a tide turning under the sand.
The crowd grew louder.
Hailey’s stomach twisted.
Beside her, Bethany appeared with two bottles of water clutched to her chest and worry written across her soft face.
“He’s in his head,” Bethany whispered.
“I know.”
Aaron joined them a second later, jaw tight. “Come on, Von.”
On the court, Jack clapped once, hard. “Next ball.”
Tyler nodded.
The other team served.
Tyler received cleanly.
Jack set.
Tyler jumped.
For a heartbeat, he hung against the blue sky, all power and sun and possibility.
Then he swung too early.
The ball hit the net and dropped.
The opposing side erupted.
Match point.
Against them.
Hailey stopped breathing.
Tyler turned away from the net, hands on his hips, head bowed.
The sound of the crowd became distant. Muted. Like Hailey was underwater.
No.
Not like this.
Not in the first match.
Not after everything.
Medrano appeared at her side, his expression unreadable.
“Can’t you say something?” Hailey demanded.
“No.”
Her head snapped toward him. “What do you mean, no?”
“He cannot hear me from there.”
“He can hear you if you yell.”
“He has heard me for three days.” Medrano looked at Tyler. “Now he must hear himself.”
Hailey hated that.
She hated it because it was true.
On the court, Jack walked to Tyler and said something too low for the crowd to hear.
Tyler shook his head once.
Jack said something else.
Tyler looked up.
Not at Jack.
At Hailey.
Across the sand, through the noise, through all the people watching him, Tyler found her.
The fear in his eyes reached her like a hand.