Chapter 21 #2
Piper scrolls, mumbling to herself. “Well, apparently, it is possible. I’ve had a lot of female riders in here who don’t get their period regularly. All the training, stress, hormone imbalances… it messes everything up. Maybe yours were all scrambled and now they’re rebalancing?”
I shoot her a look. “Why would they? I’m not training less. If anything, I’m doing more than before.”
“Okay… maybe not then,” she admits. “Maybe you have a stomach bug? Ate something bad. Magnesium overdose? You guys drink those giant recovery drinks like it’s your job. Normal people would hang over the toilet for days.”
I perk up. “That could actually be it. I chugged a full bottle this morning before practice.”
“There you go,” she says, visibly relieved. “Let’s go with that, but let me work on your hip a little if it’s giving you that much hell.”
I nod stiffly and flop back with a grunt, pulling up my hoodie to free my hip and stomach, and trying to breathe through the steady throb in my abdomen.
As Piper starts working, her fingers move too precisely to be soothing.
She finds a knot on my side near my hipbone and presses, and a bolt of pain shoots down my leg like fire.
I hiss. “Jesus, woman.”
“Breathe. I’m not even going hard yet.”
I lie there in pained silence while she keeps going, her thumbs digging into muscle that feels like it’s just one big bruise.
“I’m sorry you can’t have kids,” she murmurs quietly after a while.
I bark a laugh, half-real, half-reflexive-pain-response. “Oh, that’s the least of my problems.”
“You don’t want kids?”
“Nope. Never wanted them. Can’t see children in my future.”
Not that I have a future anyway, I think but don’t say.
Piper presses her palm down into the joint of my hip and grinds into it, and a raw, involuntary curse claws its way out of my throat.
She winces. “Sorry, tight as hell there.”
“No shit,” I grit out, my jaw clenched so hard it aches. “What about you? Do you want kids?”
“Sure, with the right man.”
“The right man like… my brother?”
Her cheeks pinken. “I really said that, didn’t I?”
I smirk. “You so did.”
“Did he… say anything?”
“Nope.” I shake my head. “But he’s still sick as fuck, so maybe you’re lucky, and he thinks it was a fever dream.”
“You’re only saying that to make me feel better.”
“Yep.”
She groans. “He’s so going to remember it, isn’t he?”
“Absolutely.”
“Fuck.”
“Hey.” I rest back on my elbows as Piper digs into another knot. “I mean, shoot your shot. He’s single, he’s a nice guy. And honestly, girl, you’re pretty cool yourself.”
I don’t say the rest aloud. That I’d be glad, relieved to know somebody is there for him when I’m not anymore.
She exhales through her nose. “I’ll think about it. But maybe not. Maybe we just go our separate ways from now on.”
“Not gonna happen.” I raise an eyebrow. “I need you, and I need him. So, you’re kinda stuck.”
“Stuck with the hot-as-fuck Dane Crews,” she muses. “Yeah, there are worse fates.”
“Ew,” I mutter. “He’s still my brother.”
“Sorry.” She lifts her hands in mock surrender. “Anyway, there’s nothing I could really find. I mean, aside from the obvious, your muscles are all in tension, rock hard around the hips. But for the new pain, if I didn’t know better, I’d say it’s period stuff.”
“It hurts like a motherfucker though.”
“Yeah, it does. Want painkillers?”
“Already on them. Thanks.”
She leans against the counter, folding her arms. “Well, if I’m wrong about it being the drink messing with your stomach, you’re about to make history as the first guy on the circuit to get his period.”
“Ha ha,” I deadpan.
“Speaking of gender crises, Otis told me he found you in Delacroix’s room yesterday morning. What was that about?” Her smile is pure maniac.
Fisher, you little gossip.
I sit up. “I’ve got shit to do.”
“No waaait,” she whines as I start pulling down my hoodie. “It was just getting interesting.”
“Uh-huh.”
I’m halfway to the door when she says, “Wait, hold up.”
I stop, glancing back, and she grabs her phone and holds it out. “Put in your number so I can text you mine. Next time, instead of stomping in here like it’s an ER, you could just call.”
“Sorry,” I mumble, taking the phone and typing quickly.
Piper steps forward and hugs me before I can make my exit. “Call me if it gets worse.”
“I will,” I promise quietly when she lets go of me.
The moment I step out of the pit, it hits me just how alive everything is, with people everywhere.
Riders laughing, mechanics hauling gear, someone walking past with fries drowning in cheese, and something that smells suspiciously like bratwurst. The whole place buzzes with energy. Adrenaline and carbs in equal measure.
My stomach growls, hunger now overriding the nausea and pain. Maybe I should get some food for Dane and me. He’s probably hungry for more than the sad crackers and canned soup he’s been living on. Putting something in my stomach will probably help settle it. And maybe I’ll find Luc there.
I start toward the gondola station, since there’s a restaurant next to it, tucked just above the pit level with a little walk-up takeaway counter. Fries. Schnitzel. Kaiserschmarrn.
But I barely make it to the edge of the locker room zone when a sharp voice cuts through the air.
“Crews! Number seven!”
I go rigid like I’ve been shot.
One of the UCI officials waves me over, stepping fully out of the big white tent half-swallowed by the gondola building. “We’re doing doping tests. Come on.”
“Wait, what? That wasn’t on the schedule.”
“That’s why they’re called surprise tests.” He points toward the men’s bathroom. “Go ahead.”
Fuck.
I step inside hesitantly and immediately want to back out. Two officials in blue lanyards are posted like statues beside the row of urinals, each holding a clipboard, supervising the racers standing at the second and fourth urinals. One of the racers is Mason.
He’s got his back to me, thank God, but the sound of him pissing into a cup might be the most mortifying thing I’ve ever heard. I whip my head away so fast I nearly sprain my neck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
My breath hitches, and my pulse is in my ears.
Breathe, Alaina. Just breathe.
This isn’t news. We knew this could happen.
You can’t ask for privacy during a doping test. The officials are literally allowed to stand there and watch you piss into the cup. That’s the whole point. No switching samples, no cheating, or faking it. And yeah, I don’t have a fucking dick. But Dane prepared for this.
“My manager…” I start, sounding a little shaky. “He arranged for me to do all doping tests via blood.”
The official frowns, flipping through his clipboard. “I don’t see anything listed under medical exemptions.”
My heart plummets straight into my gut, and I start to ramble. “There has to be. I lost a kidney. Urine tests might not be reliable and could skew the results. I don’t want to risk that, that’s why I’ve been moved to the blood-only protocol.”