Page 56 of Red Zone
We keep running drills, and every time I glance over, I see Jaxon laughing with the kids, Beck making them do pushups for fun, the sun glinting off cones and cleats, the whole place humming with a kind of joy that’s rare. Earned.
This—right here? This is what it’s supposed to feel like. Not surviving. Not just getting through the day.
Belonging.
By the time we wrap up, we’re sweaty, starving, and half sunburned. Jaxon’s peeling off a sweaty T-shirt, and Beck’s downing the last of a Gatorade like it’s oxygen.
“That was actually kinda fun,” Jaxon says, tossing his towel over his shoulder.
I nod. “Yeah. Worth waking your ass up for.”
Beck pulls his phone from his pocket, taps a quick message, then looks at me. “Hey, can you stop at Angie’s? She’s not home, but I left my charger there Friday before she left for her friend’s bachelorette weekend.”
“Yeah, no problem.”
It’s not out of the way, and I figure we’ll stop for food after. Everyone’s in good spirits, tired in a satisfied kind of way.
We pull up to Angie’s place—a modest townhouse, cute little garden flag out front. Beck hops out, jogs up the steps, and punches in the code.
Jax and I are halfway through debating whether to hit a burger place or get tacos when he comes flying back out.
No charger in hand.
Just fury.
“What the—” Jaxon starts but stops when Angie appears behind Beck.
She’s in nothing but a towel.
“Beck, wait—” she calls, chasing him barefoot onto the porch.
He doesn’t turn around. Doesn’t yell.
Just gets in the car, jaw locked tight.
My stomach drops.
He slams the door and stares straight ahead. “She was in bed. With someone else.”
“Jesus,” I mutter.
“Eleven fucking years,” Beck says, voice low, raw. “Since we were kids. And she—she?—”
He chokes on the words.
No one says anything for a long minute.
Jaxon’s face is a mix of shock and anger. “You want us to go say something?”
Beck shakes his head. “What’s the point?”
I put the car in drive.
And for the first time in a long time, none of us say a word on the way home.
We don’t need to.
Half in shock, half in solidarity. I always knew she was evil, but I didn’t think it would be this bad.
