by Rebel Hart
I chuckled, knowing that he didn’t know the true parameters of the favor. “You know that you’re, like, the best coach there ever was, right?”
“Obviously.”
“So, you would say that, without a doubt, you are the best person to lead a team to victory, or even several?”
“I do it every week.”
“Good.” I lifted the mug with my hot-chocolate in it to my lips. Right as I was tipping the liquid back, I said, “I-need-you-to-come-and-coach-my-team,” all in one, long, run-on word.
Cal leaned forward, raising an eyebrow. “I’m sorry, what was that?”
I cleared my throat. “Please come and coach the Black Widows.”
He leaned back against the booth and let out a shrill whistle. “That’s a huge favor. Like mega-huge. Ultra-mega-huge.”
“I know. I know it’s asking a lot of you, but I didn’t know who else to ask. You’re the best coach I’ve ever known, and you’re the only one I can trust to take this seriously.” I looked into his eyes. “We don’t want special treatment.”
He sucked his teeth. “Oh, don’t do that. Don’t use my words against me.” He sighed. “Quinn, that’s…I’d have to quit my job. That’s a lot.”
“Yeah.” I hummed, disappointed. “If we go semi-pro, you’d get that position, though.”
“In six weeks?” he asked. “I got bills to pay, Dallen. Besides, I saw it all over the news, and I don’t even like it when they do that stuff with the Bucks now.”
I bowed my head. “I knew it was a long-shot. I’ll just have to figure out how to get your name off the application.”
Cal was right in the middle of drinking his water when I said it and choked. “What?”
I looked up at him, throwing on my best pair of innocent eyes. “Well, I’m the one coaching the Widows now, but I can’t be a coach and a player, so I couldn’t put my name down. I had to put something to submit the application, and you’re the best person that came to mind. I never would have gotten a shot if it wasn’t for you. In a way, you’re the reason the Widows are here, so it only felt right that you’d coach them to semi-pro.”
Cal leaned his head back and closed his eyes. We sat there for an incredibly long time. It wasn’t until Melanie came back and set our plates down on the table that he finally looked up.
“What are you doing?” Melanie asked.
Cal looked over at me. “You know you’re the only person besides this one that I can never say no to.”
A wide smile rose on my face. “Really?”
“Well, we must ask the queen.” He looked over at Melanie. “Can I quit my job and play football with Quinn?”
I snarled at him. “Now, why would you ask it like that?”
“What?” Melanie asked, turning to look at me.
“I asked him to coach my team, the Black Widows. We’re applying for semi-pro status.”
Melanie looked back at Cal. “You’ve always said coaching Quinn is the most fun you’ve ever had.”
I dropped my jaw. “Wait, really? You said that?”
“Thank you, sweetie.” Cal put an arm on her and pulled her in, and she swatted him away with a laugh before walking off. He looked back at me. “Put those puppy dog eyes away.”
He pulled his plate closer and started to tuck into it. When I didn’t do anything else, he looked up at me. “Well, what are you waiting for? Catch me up on my new team.”
12
Zeke
Dinner with Daniel was supposed to help me calm my agitation, but instead, I was more irritated than ever. It wasn’t just that Wright tricked me and backed me into a corner, it was that Quinn didn’t even have the integrity to uphold her end of the deal. Daniel thought that maybe Wright tricked her, too, but I wasn’t inclined to believe it. She wanted to apply for semi-pro status, and if she wasn’t an arrogant daydreamer, she probably never would have risked that in a bet with me. Wright might have given her an out, but regardless of the reason, she went back on our deal, and that was unforgivable to me.
“Matheson!”
I jumped a little at the bark of my name, and the entire team and Coach were staring at me. “What?” I asked.
“Where are you?” Patrick asked. “It’s halftime. This is when you scream at us for sucking and tell us what you want us to do so that we can do it and still get yelled at after the game.”
“Right, sorry.” There was a round of murmurs and gasps around the room. “What now?”
Patrick shrugged. “You apologized.”
“I was apologizing to myself.”
I sat in silence for a minute and forced my brain to focus on the matter at hand. We were in the middle of a game, and after our loss to Minnesota, we needed a win. I stood up and moved to stand next to Tyler in front of the team. I let my mind rewind back over the first half of the game, but no matter what I did, I couldn’t get my brain around anything other than Quinn and her team. It was infuriating. I went for some stock advice.
“We’re still not locking in,” I said. “We’re a good team, but we’re running like we’re shit. I don’t get that. If we don’t figure out a way to work together, this game is going to turn into another Minnesota.”
Tyler leaned toward me. “Zeke, we’re ahead by two touchdowns.”
That was news to me. It was shocking. No one had ever been able to distract me from football, but Quinn Dallen had managed to do the impossible. “I said what I said,” I growled. “This lead means nothing. If we keep fumbling around out there, we’re going to get eaten alive.”
My mind did what it had been doing for the past week and drifted back to my game against the Widows. We had the Widows demolished in numbers, and that was why we beat them so badly. Still, the Widows worked like a single unit with Quinn at the heart of it. It was how they managed to get close enough to kick a field goal. That’s what the Vipers were missing. Even if I was pulling the advice I was giving out of my ass, I knew it was solid because it was always the case. In the year that I’d been with them, we had never worked together once. Not like the Widows did, and they had half the practice time and way less tense games.
I threw my hand back, balled it into a fist, and hit one of the lockers, sending a loud screech echoing throughout the locker room. “We gotta get it together.” All of a sudden, I was angry again. What the hell was I doing, thinking about Quinn and the Widows in a positive manner? We were better than them, and I was going to prove it. “Now, get out there and act like you’re a goddamn team!”
The response I got was lukewarm, but everyone shuffled around and made their way back out toward the field.
The second half of the game was just as gone from my mind as the first one was. I was vaguely present as I made a couple of plays, and I distinctly remember the clap of hands on my back in celebration of points scored, but when the whistle blew to signify the end of the game, I was surprised so much time had passed. I glanced over at the scoreboard, and I honestly didn’t expect it to say that we’d won. For all my preaching about being disjointed, I could barely get one foot in front of the other. The situation with Quinn and the Black Widows was so heavy on my mind that I couldn’t wrap my mind around the task at hand. I didn’t like things distracting me from the most important thing in my life. Mission number one would be solving this stopgap. I refused to give Quinn Dallen any more of my time.
We were packing up after the game when I heard one of the guys call out, “Hey, isn’t that the Black Widows’ captain?”
I looked over and followed his finger up to where he was pointing into the stands, and sure enough, Quinn was sitting in the very front row, centerfield. She had a notebook in her hand and was furiously scribbling notes. I threw off my helmet and stormed over to where a cement barrier separated the field from the spectators. Most of the seats were empty already, but Quinn was there, totally focused on her notebook. She was so consumed with whatever she was doing that she didn’t even hear me approach.
“Hey,” I snapped. “What the hel
l are you doing here?”
Quinn’s head shot up, and when she noticed it was me, she rolled her eyes and looked back down at her notebook. My skin started to prickle with anger. I stepped over to the barrier, reached over it, and snatched the notebook away.
“I asked you a question,” I snarled.
Quinn stood up and reached out for the notebook, but I pulled it out of reach.
“Give that back.”
I looked down at the notebook, and it was a flurry of difficult to read notes on the game. To my insult, it seemed that most of the notes were regarding our opponents. I threw it into the stands a few rows back from where she was sitting.
She rolled her eyes and huffed, “That was mature.”
“I thought I’d get rid of that useless information for you.” She turned around, but I reached over, grabbed her arm, and pulled her back to face me. “Don’t walk away from me while I’m talking to you.”
“Hey! Matheson!” Tyler called.
Tyler was already running over, but before I could even look in his direction, Quinn swung out and struck me right across the face.
“Hey! Knock it off!” Tyler yelled at us.
My face stung, and though it wasn’t enough to break my jaw, the force behind it would certainly leave me bruised.
“Keep your hands off of me,” Quinn growled.
I stabbed a finger out at Tyler. “Don’t.” Tyler and the few remaining members of the team who’d stuck around stopped in their tracks. “Get out.”
Tyler took a step closer. “Zeke.”
“Now!” I shot a glare at him. “I have business to take care of.”
Quinn was walking back down from where I’d thrown her notebook and was scooping up her stuff.
“I asked you why you were here. You trying to jack my plays? Ruin my chances of going pro?”
“Ha!” Quinn laughed. “First, what plays? Second, you’re not going pro. If you honestly think you’re going pro with the shit way you played tonight, I’m the Queen of England.”
I wanted to argue, but knew I couldn’t. I was so distracted that I barely registered when a ball was in my hand. It was all her fault, though. “You think you know better than me, still? After the way we trounced you.”
“You had twice my team size.”
I couldn’t argue with that, either, but I wasn’t about to be pushed around. “Whatever excuses make you feel better.”
“I’m not making excuses. You slaughtered us. You were right. We had no business getting onto that field with you.” The sudden confession took me back a little. “But I’m not about to give up on my team because some crybaby chasing the pros thinks that we should. If you really want to go pro, prove that you can handle it without being a brat about it. Your team runs plays like you’re all using individual playbooks, and you’re a fucking blackhole. When the ball is in your hand, no one on your team can tell what you’re going to do, and it shows. You probably think it’s all of them that can’t get it together, but it’s the fact that you’re out there running mystery plays!”
I stood speechless for a moment. Her words coiled around my neck and started to gently close in. I was the problem? Not in a million years. I was officially done with Quinn Dallen. If crushing her with her team wasn’t enough to shut her up, I’d do it one-on-one. “You think you’re so smart? Come put your money where your mouth is.”
“What?” she asked.
“Right now. Come down on this field and run drills with me. Run plays. Show me for yourself how weak I am.” This was what it was going to take to get Quinn out of my mind. I’d put her down so hard she’d never want to touch a football again.
“Fine.” Quinn grabbed her jacket and backpack, climbed up onto the barrier, and then jumped the two feet down from the top of the barrier to the field. “But don’t expect me to make any more stupid bets.”
“Why would I? You’ll just go back on them,” I sneered. Quinn stared at me through hate-filled eyes, but I stood my ground. “What? It wasn’t me who made an announcement on Twitter the next day. It was you.”
Quinn watched me for a long time before finally looking away and continuing forward. I saw a hint of embarrassment flash across her face before her wrath replaced it. I started after her and noticed that Tyler hadn’t taken my order to leave.
“Are you still here?” I asked.
He held an arm out in my path to stop me. “Zeke, this is a bad idea.”
“Move. I’m ending this.” I slapped his hand away. “Leave a football.”
Tyler let out a long, disgusted sigh, but eventually started to move. “I’m leaving the water, too. If one of you kills the other, I’m not responsible. Don’t stain my field.”
I ignored his comments. The only death here would be Quinn’s dreams. I wanted to crush them once and for all.
I walked over to our bench and started to take off my jersey and pads, leaving only a tank top and my field pants on. When I turned around, Quinn had similarly disrobed, leaving her in a pair of black form-fitting leggings and a teal and gray sports bra. I looked her up and down while she took her hair and knotted it up on top of her head. I’d really only seen her in football gear up to that point.
With her body more exposed, I could see how fit she was. I didn’t necessarily have a type of woman. I didn’t usually pay much attention, but the setting sun formed a gray halo around Quinn’s wide hips and slender waist leading up to her larger bust. I supposed she was probably the kind of woman men found attractive. I might, too, if she wasn’t deplorable.
She caught my gaze and shrugged her shoulders. “What?”
“If you think that getup is going to distract me, you’re wrong,” I replied.
She scoffed. “The only way I use my body to distract someone is when it’s putting their face in the turf. Don’t flatter yourself.” Definitely not attractive. “So, what magical drills and plays are we running, and exactly when were you planning on telling your team?”
“We’re starting with suicides,” I growled back.
She shrugged. “End zone to end zone?”
She didn’t wait for my response and made her way toward the left end zone. Was she Spartan? I wasn’t planning on going from end zone to end zone. Even in practice, I only made the team run half the field, but I was too embarrassed to admit it. She was already standing on one end zone line, looking at me like I’d suggested little more than going for a light jog. I wasn’t about to be one-upped, so I walked and joined her on the end zone line.
“Fives or tens?” she asked.
It took everything in me not to show my surprise at the question. Suicides were a drill that involved starting in one place, running to a predetermined location, tapping the floor at that location, and then running back to the starting point and tapping it. When you repeated the cycle you went to a second, further point and repeated the process, increasing the distance interval by interval until you’d run the entire allotted distance. A football field was a hundred yards and had yard lines every five yards and marked yard lines every ten yards. The up and down and back and forth of suicides was intense on the body but helped increase stamina and were particularly good for football players who were constantly being pulled in all directions on the field.
That said, fifty yards with each of the ten yard lines being the interval points was normally what I ran in practice. The fact that Quinn was willing to do the entire field, and at every five yards at that, was unbelievable. Was she just showing off, or could she actually do it?
“Fives,” I replied.
She faced the field and prepared to run. “Fives it is.”
Burning lungs and a throbbing headache were the cost of my arrogance, but it was worth it to see what Quinn was capable of. She was a speeding bullet down the field, and she didn’t have any trouble at all catching her momentum and reversing it when she touched her target lines and started back off toward the other end. Shame enveloped me when Quinn was already charging toward the other end zone when I was s
till just on my way back from the five yard line for the other end zone, ninety-five yards away from my starting point. When I finally touched the starting line and turned to head for the other end zone, Quinn was already halfway back. When she passed me, I was just barely able to see the freezing look of determination on her face.
I got back to the starting end zone, finally, and if it weren’t for the pouring sweat soaking the edge of Quinn’s hair and dripping down her body, I wouldn’t know she ran the drill at all. I could barely breathe, but I did my best to pull myself upright when I reached the end zone and to act as aloof as she seemed.
“Took you long enough,” she huffed.
“One of us played a whole football game tonight,” I spat back.
“I had a three-hour practice,” she grumbled, “but use whatever excuse makes you feel better.” I snarled at the use of my own words against me but otherwise ignored it. She took the strap of her sports bra and ran it along her forehead. “What’s next?”
Everything in my body begged me not to do anything else, but I didn’t listen. I pulled off my tank top, used it to wipe some of my sweat away, and then threw it to the side. “Kicks.”
The next hour brought more pain than I had inflicted on my body in quite some time. We ran kicks, jumps, turns, presses, and tosses until every muscle in my body was demanding me to stop. Every time it seemed like one of us was gaining edge over the other, we’d switch drills and the other would come fighting back with all their power. I hated to admit it, but Quinn was one hell of a football player. Knocking her force of will out of her was going to be tougher than I thought.
Quinn did a good job of keeping her cool during the intense drills for a while, but by the time we’d finished throwing, she was starting to look a little worse for wear. We’d emptied the full dispenser of water Tyler had left behind and were relying solely on our bodies to keep us going.
“Next?” she asked, and I nearly collapsed. How had she not given up yet? “Tackles?”
I snickered as best I could through my desperate attempts to catch my breath. “You could never tackle me.” The game we’d played against one another had never given us the opportunity to tackle. I’d seen the way she took down some of the players in her rec game, but she wasn’t ready for someone like me.
