7. Relocated
Chapter 7
Relocated
Kolby
W ith one minute left, the game is a brutal back-and-forth—blown coverages, last-minute flags that don’t look right, and the ticking down of a quarter in which neither team can hold a lead.
Vegas ties it again with just under a minute left.
Outriders burn the clock with two quick sideline passes and a QB scramble that slips through a missed tackle. They set it at the 36, tying it up, and Vegas calls their last timeout.
“Rookie kicker,” Jackson Brooks says as he settles into the empty chair beside me, “who always chokes in the clutch.” He grumbles, “Fifty-three yards, all but guarantees we’re playing Vegas.”
I nod. Just enough to pass for agreement. Inside? I’m hoping the kid blows it. Not because I’ve got anything against him. I don’t. But because I don’t want to play the Outriders. Not with him on that roster. The one guy on Earth who knows everything I buried.
Everyone else at this table who wants a shot at them says so out loud.
“Let’s take the damn Outriders,” Skinner mutters beside me. “They’re soft in the slot and are cockier than they deserve to be.”
I keep my mouth shut, even though my gut’s already turning.
The kicker lines up. Ball’s snapped. Hold’s clean. And somehow—somehow—the kid drills it. Dead center. Fifty-three yards. Ice in his veins.
The bar erupts. Chairs scrape, voices rise, and hands slap the table.
I don’t move. Because after that speech, the battle I’ve been fighting since I saw that message—Lo saw that message—doesn’t seem like much compared to the other battle I’ll be going into, playing a position I haven’t since college.
After everyone is sufficiently celebrating, having forgotten they’re pissed off about the lockdown turned confinement, Trucker whistles. “All right, tomorrow’s practice is going to have a late start. At one o’clock, we’ll be in the conference room with some insight and new plays to win the division. Tonight, we’ve got places for The Stable residents to sleep. In the morning, we’ll know better what we’re looking at and get the things you need if we need to stay relocated for a bit longer.
“Jade and Ryan have four empty bedrooms. Alex and Phobe have four, as well. Tessa and I have our guest house, two bedrooms, and the main house with four. Hart has room for four, and Boone and Syd have one with two beds. Grimes and Skinner, you’ll be with them. The rest of you, listen for your house and your names. We’ll all ride out together.”
“I’m Gryffindor,” Skinner yells.
A few of them laugh. Me? I have no idea what he’s yammering on about.
Lo, fucking Lo, and those eyes, I feel them burning into the side of my head. She’s holding what happened last night a secret, and now a fucking text that I should be giving everyone a heads-up about. Secrets are like poison, and I’m basically feeding it to her one spoonful at a time.
As everyone’s filing out, I step way the fuck out of my comfort zone, look at Jackson, raise my voice enough so that some of the guys will hear me, and the rest will know within the next couple hours, and maybe they’ll step forward and give the fucking militia a direction.
“I got a message that should probably be checked out.”
“Yeah, all right,” he says, holding out his hand. “Keys. I’ll have Skinner start your ride.”
I toss them to him and nod toward the bar. “Be back.”
I walk over and sit down as Lo’s wiping down the bar.
She whispers, “You’re doing this because last night was as good as it was .”
I can’t help it. I laugh out loud, and she grins.
“That ego of yours is massive.”
She smiles softly now and tucks a lock of dark waves that have fallen from her braid behind her ear.
Her eyes are dark green right now . Sometimes, they’re lighter. When she’s pissed. When she’s lying about not being pissed. When she’s holding something in and thinks no one notices. I’ve seen her cry once, just once, when she heard about Syd being taken by her ex-boyfriend, the cop. And even then, they didn’t go dull. They burned.
That’s my favorite feature of hers. But there’s one close behind—her lips, which are the same color as her nipples—both like dark red wine, the kind that leaves a stain.
“You’re doing the right thing.”
“Yeah,” I say, but I hope it doesn’t bite me in the ass.
“Hey,” Jackson says as he sits down. “What do you have?”
I unlock my phone, hit messages, and slide my phone over to him.
“Silence will cost you.” Jackson scrubs a hand up his beard. “You know who it’s from?”
“My wife,” I say and catch Lo stiffen. “Ex-wife. Well, working on the ex part for the better part of two years now.”
“The holdup? How long were you married?”
“Less than a year.” I shift in my seat, feeling really fucking uncomfortable, and admit, “After I put my signing bonus for a down payment on a house in New York City.”
“You knew you were playing here for at least a few years?”
“She, uh, she wasn’t happy I didn’t get picked for the Jets. Her Dad, a lawyer, has connections there, and”—I shake my head—“he wasn’t too happy that she and I got married. He, uh, I signed a prenup.”
“You wanna tale a walk?” he asks.
I lift a shoulder. “Doesn’t much matter.”
“Come on.” He slides off his stool. “Let’s take a walk.” He holds up my phone. “Gonna screenshot this and send it to 711.”
* * *
Outside, CJ is leaning against my truck, talking to Skinner.
“He know about the ex?” Jackson asks.
“Little bit,” I admit.
“You know her being a cunt is not a reflection on you, right?”
“Marrying a college hookup during the pandemic because she asked me to come stay with her isn’t something I’m proud of.”
“We all make choices we regret.”
“Yeah, well, I should have seen the signs. Should have had my own lawyer signing a prenup that says I have to pay her half for five years after the marriage was dissolved.”
“Fuck, man, ouch.”
I exhale slowly and keep following him, but not toward my vehicle—toward Lo’s place.
“We came up with a number, she agreed. She then doubled it, and I haven’t responded.”
“Her old man?” Jackson asks as he taps in a code on her door and opens it.
“The text— silence will cost you —leads me to believe that yes.”
He heads over to her stove, opens the door, and I hear the sound of crackling and popping, then feel warmth as he starts loading it up with wood.
He stands up and smiles as he turns around. “You don’t think there’s anything to worry about, nothing connected to the power to the security grid at The Stables being cut?”
Damn . I shake my head. “Guessing this is gonna be more than a night or two?”
“They got the message when the team was watching the game. Motion cams looped for twenty-two minutes before the breach was caught. CJ, Matthew, and Remington are pissed it took that long to notice. They’re handling it. The team was celebrating, not fucking with Vegas again. Didn’t want to rial them up again.”
“We’re playing a championship game in a week, not one of us has gone that far.” I’ve slept in worse places …
“You mentioned the text so others would follow your lead,” he states.
I don’t answer yes, because that’s not the entire truth, but I do nod.
He shrugs off his jacket, hangs it on a chair, and pushes up his sleeves.
The door opens, and CJ steps in. “The truck won’t start. Riley messaged that she thinks Syd and Boone could probably use some time alone, just being married and all that. She offered up her place. You think Lo will throw a fit if these two stay here tonight and we get Riley’s place set?”
I avoid looking at Skinner entirely, knowing his poker face blows, and I’m not going down like this.
“Did Lo ask her?” Jackson asks.
“Yeah, no.” CJ chuckles. “She’s been hell-bent on staying by herself. Thinks it’ll be fine.”
“She’ll be fine,” Jackson says then looks right in my fucking eyes. “Who fixed your truck?”
Thank fuck.
“It started just fine.”
“You didn’t get the battery changed?” he asks.
“Thought maybe it was the cold.”
“Trade that bitch in,” CJ says then looks at Jackson. “You good?”
He nods.
“Let’s get the fuck out of here before Lo has a meltdown.”
And just like that, they’re walking out the door, CJ saying, “Security here’s all linked up to us already.”
Skinner leans over my shoulder. “Guess we’re shacking up with the girl who half-hates you.”
“She doesn’t half-hate me,” I mutter.
He smirks. “Oh, right. She only hates you horizontally.”
I grit my teeth and grab my jacket.
This is going to be a nightmare.
The door clicks open behind us, and I barely have time to turn around.
Lo steps in, arms full of takeout containers, and the second her eyes land on us—on me —she freezes just inside the threshold, wind still clinging to her, snowflakes melting in her braid. Cheeks flushed from the cold.
“What the hell are you two doing here?” she asks, shocked.
“Riley offered her place, so Sydney and Boone could … chill,” I explain. “Jackson and?—”
“Okay,” she interrupts, “but you’re not in Riley’s place.”
“Let me take that from you,” Skinner offers, and a growl comes from her. His hands go up, and he steps back.
“Yeah, they said they’d be back tomorrow, and they’d get her place in order.”
She huffs. “And no one ran it by me?”
“I mean, to be fair, no one asked us, either,” Skinner says, eyeballing the tray. “But I know something that could make it?—”
“There are rules.” She kicks the door shut behind her and heads straight past me and Skinner, jaw tight, boots tracking in half-melted snow, not saying a word. She dumps the containers on the counter and doesn’t even look at us.
Skinner whistles low. “Welcome home?”
Lo doesn’t answer. Instead, she yanks open the drawer by the sink, grabs a pen that clearly doesn’t work, scratches at it with a snarl, then snatches another and marches to the kitchen island like she’s about to draw battle lines.
The fact I’m unaffected isn’t shocking. Since that almost kiss, she’s had a really bitter attitude. I mean, so did I when I thought she and Hart had a thing, but this Lo is kind of cute.
She slaps a half-used notebook on the counter, flips past a grocery list, a floor cleaning schedule, something that looks like a brewery supply order until she finds a blank page. And starts writing. Hard. Like she wants the ink to cut through the wood beneath it.
HOUSE RULES
She underlines it … twice.
She doesn’t look at us when she starts reading them off.
“Number one: You use the bathroom down here, and if you have to shower here, the only one is in my room. If I’m in there, you’re not. And you absolutely do not shit in my bathroom.”
“Got it.” Skinner chokes on a laugh.
Me? I watch her write.
“Number two: If you cook, you clean. And don’t touch my cast iron.” She underlines that. A lot. Like maybe there’s a story behind it.
“Number three: No sex.” Her eyes flick up, right at me, and then to Skinner. “You bring a hookup to my place, and I will verbally castrate you.”
Skinner raises both brows and holds up his hands. “Would never.”
Lo ignores him.
“Number four: You pick up after yourselves. This isn’t a frat house, or a locker room; it’s my house.”
She hesitates then writes the fifth one slower.
“Number five: If I ask for space, I get it. No arguing. No following. No back-and-forth bullshit.”
The pen stills.
She stares at the list and blinks slowly then sets the notebook down, slides it across the counter, and walks out of the room.
Skinner waits till her footsteps fade before exhaling. “Well”—he picks up the notebook, squinting at the handwriting—“she’s thorough.”
I watch her take the stairs, ones I went up last night.
“The spare bedroom has a full-sized bed. Either you two get cozy, or one takes the couch. The couch is not big enough; there’s an air mattress in the closet.”
She’s sputtering and slamming doors then two pillows come flying down over the railing. Skinner and I both catch one before it hits her wood stove.
I call up to her, “Hey, Lo?”
“What?”
“Don’t throw anything else down. The pillows almost hit the stove. We’ll come grab?—”
“I’m not going up there,” Skinner whispers and shudders. “She’s scary.”
“She’s five-foot-six and even you could take her down.”
“I’m five-seven, and I dare you to try,” comes from above us.
We look up as she drops a couple of pairs of sweats and some blankets down.
“Sweats are Jacskon or Harts. Catch.”
“No way,” Skinner says as he shakes the quilt out and calls up, “Hey, Lo, my nana made me a T-shirt quilt for graduation from high school, too.”
She walks out of her room, having changed into a Blue Valley High hoodie and navy-blue sweats, twisting her hair up in a top knot. “I didn’t mean to throw that down,” she says, disappearing into what I assume is the other room then walking out with another blanket. “I won’t share that one.”
“Field hockey, softball, basketball, and …” He turns it around, and I see her number on every tee. “You played tennis?”
“Not well, but I needed four varsity sports,” she says, coming down the stairs with another blanket in hand.
She eyes me, and I’m not even trying to hide my amusement.
“What?” she asks.
“Your number was 1?” I ask.
“Of course it was.”