Page 35 of Kiss Me Tonight

The whistle blows, and Bobby sprints forward, shoulders hunched, as he snatches the two-by-four foam pad out of Topher’s grasp.

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Bobby takes my son’s place, and the next kid comes barreling forward to repeat the drill all over again.

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And again.

I let the whistle fall to my chest. “Guys, you need to explode from the hips and thighs! You want to end up with stress fractures in your back down the road because you took the easy way out?” I point to the second three-pound memory foam pad down by my feet. “Three pounds versus picking up Coach DaSilva. See the difference?” As one, they all check out the other side of the field where the man in question is running a different set of drills with Group B. “What’re you gonna do when you’re lifting guys his size and your arms are too weak to get the job done?”

“Uhh, we’ll do more push-ups?” calls out a wiseass from the back of the line.

I want to hang my head in defeat.

We’ve been at this all morning. Honestly, I’m not sure what I expected in coming on to coach the Wildcats. Under my dad’s leadership, the team was a powerhouse—and I’m not only talking about trophies and wins. Dad fostered their love for the game while instilling in them a sharp blade of discipline. By the time they graduated, those players had all the tools they needed to succeed, both on and off the field.

The kids staring back at me now look like the third-hand rejects off a football recreational team. I have no idea what my dad’s successor did when he came in to work every day for the last three years. From where I’m standing, it looks like he did a whole lotta nothing.

At the rate we’re going, summer camp is going to be nothing but undoing bad habits and rehashing drills they should have perfected in the youth, Pop Warner league.

The freshmen are a little easier to manage, considering they’re fresh-faced and on the verge of pissing their pants whenever I blow the whistle, but the juniors and seniors are something else entirely. Angsty, pimple-faced teenagers are the worst.

I drag my palms over my sweaty face. “Again.”

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I’m met with groans from all twenty-two kids in the lineup, including my own son. When they drag their feet, I blow the whistle for a second time and motion with my hands to get a move on.

They shuffle into place with so little enthusiasm I nearly start yawning.

The stark difference between Group A and Group B might as well be night and day. I check out the other half of the field, where Dominic is leading his group through a series of fire-out blocks that shouldhave the kids wheezing on the ground.Shouldbeing the operative word here. Instead, every one of those boys looks like they’re having the time of their lives as they sprint from the thirty-yard line to the twenty.

Dominic slaps the hands of the five guys who make it to the twenty-yard line first, then blows his whistle for the rest of the kids to line up in a three-point stance and wait for the pretend snap of the ball.

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Dominic and I blow our whistles at the same time, our individual groups moving in sync even though we’ve barely exchanged a word in the two days since he stormed out of my house.

Yeah, I pushed him.

I pushed him because I care about the well-being of the kids on our team. I want them to feel as though they can come to us with whatever is on their minds—things that are happening at home, problems at school, worries about the game—without feeling as though we’re going to turn a blind eye because we don’t give a damn about them as individuals.

Football saves people. It can change the trajectory of a person’s life forever. Give them confidence where they otherwise have none. Teach them the value of building a family that has nothing to do with bloodlines and everything to do with bonding with people who share similar goals and fears and dreams.

And I . . . I acted like Dominic—a vet of the game—understood nothing of that.

You were an insecure jerk and he didn’t deserve your tongue-lashing.

I quiet my rebel conscience for no less than the fifteenth time in the last forty-eight hours and blow the whistle again, my gaze still fixed on my assistant coach.

Dominic’s standing with his feet spread apart, hands squared off on his hips, a Wildcats baseball hat turned backward on his head. As I’ve come to expect from him, he’s not sporting a smile though he does call out encouragements, rooting the kids on as they race to the next benchmark.

Does he want to be here?Reallywant to be here? My gut tells me no. Actually, it tells mefuck noand warns me that London is only a passing stop on his path to god-knows-where.Something I’d do well to remember the next time I grow tongue-tied around him. It’s not every day a man like him looks at a woman like me—and it’scertainlynot a frequent event that a man like him nearly strips me naked in my kitchen.

For the third time since practice started this morning, my fingers drift to my collarbone. The fabric of my Wildcats polo bunches under my touch but does nothing to eviscerate the memory of Dominic’s full lips parting on a heavy breath as he toyed with my tank top. Had he wanted to kiss me? Maybe the better question is: would I have let him?

Now isnotthe time to be thinking about that.

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