Chapter 1
CHAPTER ONE
Stella
Stanford College (Late Summer before Sophomore Year)
The first time I saw Tristan Vale again, I almost spiked a volleyball straight through his head.
The gym at Stanford smelled like rubber, sweat, and fresh polish. Early morning light slanted through the high windows, turning the court gold. Coach was yelling split times. My thighs burned. My pulse thudded in my ears.
Good.
Pain kept me steady, pain meant I was here—the D1 preseason dream.
“Cortez!” Coach Alvarez barked. “Again. Harder.”
I jumped.
Contact.
The ball cracked against the floor like a gunshot. I bent to grab it when the doors opened behind the bleachers.
I don’t know why I looked.
Maybe instinct.
Maybe trauma has its own radar.
Maybe some ghosts never stop following you.
And then—
Him.
Tristan Vale!?
“What the fuck?” The hoarse whisper tore from my soul more than it did my mouth. Was I hallucinating? Did I not drink enough electrolytes before practice?
No way. But I knew it was him—by the way his dark hair fell into his eyes like he’d just rolled out of bed or stepped off a magazine cover.
That stupid, sharp jaw.
Those cold, assessing eyes that always made you feel like you were either a problem or a prize.
My stomach dropped so fast it hurt.
No.
No, no, no.
Not here.
He scanned the gym lazily, hands in his pockets, like he owned the building.
Like he owned me.
Same as before.
Rage came quick. Hot. Clean.
Good.
I preferred rage.
Because the other feeling?
The old one?
The one that used to make me forget how to breathe when he looked at me?
That one could go to hell.
Coach tossed me another ball. “Cortez! Focus!”
“I am,” I replied stiffly.
I hit it harder than I ever had.
It flew straight toward the bleachers.
Straight toward him.
It smacked the wall inches from his head.
The sound echoed.
The whole gym went quiet.
Tristan didn’t even flinch. He just looked at me.
Recognition sliding into place.
His mouth tilted like he’d just found something interesting that he remembered liking.
My skin prickled. Something burned from deep inside me—complete rage that he hadn’t instantly recognized me that way I did him.
Coach yelled to go shag the ball I had just launched like an idiot.
Tristan walked closer, unhurried, like a predator who already knew the ending.
Damn, he even walked the same.
Loose. Confident. Untouchable.
“Cortez,” he said, handing the ball to me.
My name in his voice should’ve been illegal.
Low. Rough. Familiar.
I hated that my heart reacted before my brain did.
“You missed,” he added softly.
“I won’t next time,” I retorted.
His eyebrow lifted.
There it was.
That spark.
The one that used to make everything feel reckless and electric.
“Didn’t realize this was your court,” he murmured.
“It is and I don’t remember inviting you on it.”
We stood too close.
Close enough to smell his cologne. Clean and expensive and unfair.
Close enough to remember locker room hallways and stolen looks and the night he kissed me behind the curtains.
He studied me like he was recalculating.
“You changed.”
“Yeah,” I replied, “I got smarter.”
His gaze dropped briefly. Slow. Appreciative. Not subtle.
Heat crawled up my neck.
God, I wanted to punch him.
Or kiss him.
Probably both.
“I heard you vanished,” he said. “Guess you didn’t.”
“Vanish? I just stopped wasting my time on something small.”
Something flickered in his expression. Regret? Guilt?
“You hate me?”
I met his eyes.
Didn’t blink.
“Can’t hate someone you never think about.” With a shrug and a ponytail flip I took the ball and turned my back.
He smiled.
Like that was the best thing he’d heard all day.
And that terrified me more than anything.
Because Tristan Vale always liked a challenge.
And I had just made myself one.
“Water!” Coach blows the whistle.
My eyes lowered, trying to ignore the curious gazes of my teammates. I sense him. Physically feel him follow me to the bleacher where I had placed my hot pink Owala bottle.
The team scatters toward the coolers along the sideline.
From the corner of my eye, I check him out some more. He’s taller. Six-three. Maybe six-four now. Shoulders filled out like college lifting turned him from polished prep prince into something solid. Built. Controlled.
I had to tilt my chin up just to meet his eyes.
I hate that.
Everything about him screams wrong building.
Khakis pressed razor-sharp. Leather loafers that have never seen a locker room puddle. Armani belt. Fitted golf polo that probably costs more than my first semester’s textbooks. Ray-Bans tucked neatly into the collar like he stepped off a yacht instead of into a D1 gym.
“Wrong gym, country club. Get the message?”
I twist the cap back on my bottle.
He just smirks. “Loud and clear, bonita.”
“You lost?” I ask again more direct, irritated as fuck he just dropped a sweet nothing in that sexy voice of his.
His mouth curves.
“Not anymore.”
My face heats.
His flirting was always my weakness.
He doesn’t look uncomfortable. Doesn’t look out of place.
Which somehow makes it worse.
“I’m here to meet Coach Canely.”
I blink.
“For what?”
He shifts his weight casually. Like he has nowhere else to be.
“I entered the transfer portal a few months ago. I’ve been negotiating NIL and offers ever since.”
My eyebrow lifts before I can stop it.
“The transfer portal...?”
“Basketball, princess.”
He shrugs lightly.
“Harvard was a little… stuffy… even for me.”
“West Coast vibe feels more my speed,” he adds. “Sun. Space. Palm trees. Less hierarchy.”
I let out a short laugh.
“You are hierarchy.”
His eyes flicker with amusement.
“I’m also six-four with a forty-inch vertical.”
“Let me guess,” I say. “Power forward?”
He nods once.
“Lead rebounder. Crash the boards.”
The irony nearly makes me choke.
Clean up other people’s messes.
He steps closer, but still outside the boundary line. Careful. Watching.
Close enough that I have to crane my neck.
He notices.
His gaze dips, just briefly.
“Miss me?” he asks quietly.
“Not even a little.”
“Five years.”
“Five peaceful years.”
His eyes scan me slowly.
Not subtle.
Arms stronger. Shoulders broader. Confidence harder.
“You look…” he starts.
“Finish that sentence carefully.”
“…like you could bench press half my team.”
I snort before I can stop myself.
He leans a fraction closer.
“Little chiquita grew up.”
My jaw tightens.
“Don’t.”
“What? It was a compliment.”
“It was condescending.”
He pauses, considering that.
“You know I speak Spanish, right?”
Heat crawls up my neck.
“Claro que sí,” he says smoothly.
I switch instantly.
Latin.
“Superbia ante ruinam.”
His eyebrow lifts. Impressed.
“Pride before the fall.” I smirk as I close the cap on my bottle.
“Tu n’as jamais appris.”
“You never learned.” I snap back on my heels. Thanking my AI best friend that taught me enough of the basics that I ranked high in my graduating high school class and impressed Stanford with my linguistic abilities to get into the International School of Business.
“Du bist immer noch derselbe.”
You’re still the same.
He answers in German without missing a beat.
“Ich bin immer noch derselbe.” His voice is velvet dragged over a blade.
I’m still the same.
Damn.
I hate that he always lands on top.
That he was handed the world and then bothered to master it too.
Coach’s whistle shrieks again.
“Break’s over! Let’s move!”
I step backward toward the court.
He lowers his voice as I pass him.
“I didn’t transfer because of the weather.”
My pulse stutters.
“I transferred because I was bored.”
“Of Harvard?” I ask without looking at him.
“Of pretending. I can already tell there’s nothing boring about Stanford.”
Coach shouts my name. “Cortez!”
I jog back onto the court without another glance.
But I feel his eyes on me the entire next drill.
Feel them when I jump.
When I swing.
When I land.
And when I spike the next ball so hard it splits the air in two.
He transferred to the West Coast for vibes?
Cute.
He just walked into my house.
And this time?
I refuse to lose my footing. Or the armor around my heart. If Kane Haverhill, the starting power point guard hasn’t melted the ice cage around my heart—Tristan Vale won’t have a chance.
Kane and I met last August.
Before freshman year officially started.
Before I even got my class schedule. Before media day. Before Stanford became real.
The Athlete Mixer.
Which is code for—unsanctioned beach party thrown by every team captain with a fake ID’s and too much charisma.
The beach house is owned by Carlton McDaniels head of the Athletic Alumni Association.
The guy is rich, still wants to be twenty at forty and has just as much pride in athletics as he does his hair.
It wasn’t on any official calendar.
It didn’t need to be.
Huge chartered busses or Ubers took us down to the coast where bonfire pits carved into the sand and portable speakers thumping bass heavy enough you feel in your ribs. Kegs buried in coolers. Sunset turning the Pacific into molten gold.
Shirtless swimmers. Soccer boys already sunburned. Gymnasts in cutoff shorts. Volleyball girls pretending not to notice how many eyes were on them.
Hookups happened before the second playlist started.
It smelled like salt, beer, sunscreen, and bad decisions.
I almost didn’t go.
New campus. New start. New version of me.
But my senior setter dragged me.
“Cortez,” she’d said, “you don’t move across the country and not show up.”
So I went.
Black bikini. Oversized Stanford tee tied at the waist. Hair loose, wind-tangled, dangerous.
I was leaning against a driftwood log nursing a warm beer when he found me.
Kane Haverhill.
Already a name on campus before classes even started.
The favorite to be starting point guard as a freshman.
Projected NBA buzz.
Smile like he knew exactly what effect he had and enjoyed it responsibly. The memory of meeting him played in my head as I went through receiving drills.
He had walked up slow, not cocky. Not desperate.
Measured.
“Volleyball,” he said, nodding at my calves.
“Yep.”
He laughed.
Low. Easy. Real.
“You’re the freshman from Connecticut, right?”
I narrowed my eyes. “I’m from Westerly, Rhode Island. Went to prep school in Connecticut.”
“Yeah, I remember reading that on the athletics Insta.”
“You stalking me?”
“Research,” he corrected.
The music shifted. Something slow and heavy and deliberately provocative.
People were already pairing off. Bodies closer. Shadows longer.
Kane didn’t crowd me.
Didn’t touch me.
Just stood there like he had nowhere better to be.
“You don’t look impressed,” he observed.
“I’m not.”
“Good,” he said. “Impressed is boring.”
That’s when I looked at him differently.
Because most guys at that party were already drunk on attention.
Kane was sober in it.
Controlled.
We danced later.
Not grinding. Not sloppy.
Just close enough to feel the heat.
Close enough that when his hand slid to my waist, it felt intentional.
Not entitled.
He leaned down near my ear.
“You’re hard to read.”
“Good.”
He smiled against my hair.
“I like a challenge.”
I stepped back before the air shifted too far.
Before memory crept in.
Before velvet curtains and laughter tried to rewrite the moment.
“I don’t do easy,” I told him.
“I won’t expect you too,” he replied.
Since then?
He hasn’t stopped trying.
Protein bars in my locker.
“Accidental” seat next to mine in study hall.
Front row at my matches.
Hookups with other girls, dates three at the same time, never the same girl sat courtside. But he never doted on any of them.
Hands in his pockets, watching like he’s calculating the long game.
He’s a player.
On the court and off it.
But with me?
He’s patient.
Which might be worse.
And now— Tristan Vale stands in my gym.
And across the glass partition, Kane spots him.
Basketball practice has started.
Sneakers squeaking.
Whistles blowing.
Kane jogs toward the basketball coach and the Harvard transfer, Tristan.
My Tristan.
Handshake.
Firm.
Smile.
Too calm.
He glances toward me.
Just once.
Then back at Tristan.
Then back at me again.
Oh.
He knows something’s up.
And Tristan?
Tristan tracks that look.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Calculating, if Kane and I are a thing.
The two of them have every0ne’s head turning, not just mine.
“Ladies!” Coach is frustrated blowing her whistle. This is volleyball. My court is not a Tinder app. Stop scrolling in your heads and get refocused! Suicides on my whistle until I blow twice.”
Groans erupt.
But none of us stop looking as our punishment is center court sprints.
Point guard and power forward.
If they sync?
Stanford basketball becomes lethal.
Kane runs the floor like a general.
Tristan owns the paint like gravity answers to him.
They could be unstoppable.
If they don’t kill each other first.
Coach blows the whistle twice after four minutes.
“Reset!”
I step back into position.
Let them stare.
Let them measure.
Let them calculate.
I’m not a rebound.
Or a trophy.
And I am definitely not a bet.
But if they want to compete?
Fine.
I’ll break both their hearts and collect the wreckage as interest
or every girl they’ve ever treated like practice.
Welcome to sophomore year.