Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 135539 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135539 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
A quiet shiver dances over my skin. Having fought off a hard-on since the moment I got my hands on her, I can’t let it rise here of all places. Frowning, I pull my head—both of them—away from thoughts of Pen and her succulent mouth.
“Did you know there’s a fungus that turns ants into zombies?” I ask no one in particular.
“Say what now?” Carter leans forward, intrigued.
“The ant is infected by the fungus and the fungus then compels the ant to latch onto the underside of a leaf until the ant dies. The fungus grows within its host and eventually shoots spores out of the dead ant’s head to propagate.”
“Get the fuck out,” Jelly exclaims.
“It’s true,” Rhodes puts in. “Heard it on NPR.”
“You listening to NPR?” Carter finds this amusing.
“Helps me relax on the way home.”
“Put your ass right to sleep on the road, is what it’ll do.” Carter smirks.
Jelly makes a sound of wonder. “And here I thought The Last of Us would never happen.”
“Better watch yourself. If they can come for the ants . . .”
On that note, Carter shivers. “Man, I hate all this zombie shit. Talk about something else.”
“All right,” I say easily. “We’re going to win.”
I do another mock throw. The commercial break is done, and our defense is lining up.
Rhodes quirks a brow. “You psychic or something?”
“No. Pen told me.” I roll my neck. “Pen thinks her grandfather might have been psychic, though.”
“Her grandfather told her we’d win?”
“Pay attention, Rhodes. Her Pops is dead. Pen says we’ll win. I agree.”
Rhodes runs a hand over his head in beleaguered fashion, then sets his eyes on me. “Is she psychic?”
I flash a grin. “Not that I know of.”
“Bro, stop playing.”
“I’m not playing. I’m clearing your mind of all the useless chatter. We’re going to win. Pen knows it. I know it.” I punctuate my words with a focused look at the whole of them. “Because that’s what we do.”
The tone of my voice, the look in my eyes, or maybe even the way I stand—something there must transmit because a change stirs through my offensive line. It starts with the group of guys closest to me, then spreads out like a ripple in a pond.
Winning.
Pen was right. It’s all in the mind. A mind-fuck, really. Because you gotta feel it, know it, but not be owned by worrying about it. I’d understood this for years. But it took her words to remind me. My head’s been in my ass for too long, worrying about things I can’t control.
Here, I can control.
Our time is up. The defense has done a good job at keeping the other team contained. Now it’s our turn to run up the scoreboard.
I grab my helmet and put it on, as the defense jog back to the sidelines. The field spreads before me, a vast sea of vibrant green, the sides of the stadium rising up around us like a cresting wave. Sound rushes down those seated sides and crashes into us.
People sometimes ask me if I feel small stepping out on the field, with all that noise and those eyes watching. Never. Out here, everything is huge—the guys moving around, the yellow uprights taunting us from beyond. A wall of guys surrounds me, faces dark and sweat-slicked behind the grill of their big helmets.
They look to me to lead. Focus. Win.
Anticipation pulls tight at my gut, prickles along my skin. Fucking heady sensation. I can hear the blood pumping through my veins, my heart thumping strong and steady in my chest. Arousal, not unlike sex, but slightly different, more aggressive, something dark and primal, has me twitching. I know my guys feel it too. Battle ready.
The game plan runs through my head. My coach’s voice a presence inside my helmet. It’s all there. Everything I need. Inside, I slow it down, focus. Outside, I ramp up, flex my muscles, remember the power in my body, in my arm. The talent.
Jelly saunters up, taking front and center in the circle we create. “How we do, Rocket Man?”
“We do it right,” I bark.
“We do it hard,” Carter adds.
They’re bouncing now, adrenaline and anticipation surging.
I catch every eye, let them see the focus, then give them the play name, and end with a sharp “No fear.”
My hands come together in a thunderclap, and we flow to the line.
Game on.
Twenty-Two
Pen
With all of the Lucks now in the know, I realize I can’t put off the inevitable, so I bite the bullet and call my mom on Monday morning. By now, pictures of me sitting next to Monica freaking Reyes while cheering for August have circulated. Mom’s bound to be twitching with irate curiosity. I can’t exactly blame her there.
We’ve opted to tell our parents the truth; the risk of our family members exposing us is nil. Even so, the call with my mom goes about as expected with her lecturing me on being inconsiderate, implying that I didn’t tell her because I was still salty about her not helping me with the house—I didn’t inform her that I was getting help from August—and then her insistence that she somehow knew our engagement couldn’t have been real.