Page 5 of Change Your Play

But here’s a secret. If you have a gift, you can show up anywhere.

The KYU athletics facilities were abuzz with the start of summer training. It only took a few minutes to locate the Marrs team. I just had to follow the football players power-walking together, glancing over their shoulders, waiting for the inevitable comments.

“Locke?” someone demanded in surprise, and I grinned, waving back the concerns.

“We need you to finish the physical before we can consider—” one of the Marrs assistants, decked out in the dark blue colors, jerked up to look at me, stunned. “Miles Locke? Uh…what are you…?”

I held up the coffees, stacked neatly together. “I bring gifts. Can I go in?”

My question was met with pure silence as the assistant glanced back at the line of other football players, waiting for the chance to talk to Coach Lawson and his crew. Everybody elsehad clearly filed into place. Would they tell me off for ignoring the rules?

Ha. I’d take that gamble.

“Yes, of course.” The assistant nodded and grumbles met our conversation.

They could grumble all they wanted. I grinned and waved the coffees at the hallway full of my teammates before I slipped into the meeting room.

Coach Lawson himself, captain of the Marrs Romans, indisputable champion of Texas, sat at the main table. Sometimes I traveled to Austin for concerts and you couldn't visit any sports bar without seeing a framed picture of the football coach. His grizzled look matched the way he ordered everyone into place. If there was one thing I knew about Lawson - he kept his team the fuck in line.

“Locke?” He glanced up. The others were openly shocked, but a smile crossed Coach Lawson’s face, like we’d been planning a joke on everybody and we finally initiated it. “Good timing, I needed another coffee.”

“Who said these were for you?” I chuckled, and he grinned.

The door behind me pushed open and a brisk voice entered the room, commanding, methodical. Its own kind of music.

“We have everyone here for the three o’clocks, but we’re missing Chad Skewer and—”

Lightning struck again.

Trying to comprehend exactly what was happening, she took a quick look back at a room full of surprised faces. Her rich red hair curled over her shoulder, her eyes, caramel, the kind that comes with fancy desserts. The kind of sweets you pay extra for. And her lips, full, plump, gorgeous.

I drank her in without regret.

Coach Lawson’s voice boomed behind us, amused. “Bennight, you’ve got to know who Miles Locke is.”

She stared at me for a moment, shocked, before her eyes flickered to her boss. “Um…yes, sir.”

“Yeah,” I grinned. “I bet we do know each other. Because I remember faces and you’re the only one I’m thinking about—”

“Number eighty-eight on the Kennedy Young University roster.” She pressed her lips together. “Winner of the Jerry Royce Accomplishment Award for his freshman year, top five of the Southern Football Boys annual pick. Beat the KYU rushing record with nineteen hundred fifty-one yards his sophomore year.”

God. Damn.

“Consistently leads the league in receiving touchdowns and receiving yards—”

“And receptions,” I offered, amused. “I can work well with others.”

I expected a smile, but her eyebrow raised instead. “Your reception score could be better.”

“What?” Was she serious? Completely blindsided, I paused. Her words sank in and I was still confused. “Really?”

“Your last five games were fine, but overall, they could be better.”

“I had the best scores in KYU.”

“And KYU isnotthe conference. It’s KYU,” she finished for me. I stared at her, but she shrugged, nonchalant. “Your receptions could be better.”

Her cool, methodical way of listing off every part of me, the parts that’d been analyzed, recorded, and broken down by the KYU team, was something else coming from her. Honestly, it was pretty fucking hot. With her lips pressed together, she bypassed me with a stack of papers in her arms.

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