Page 65 of False Start

You’d think they had better things to do with Christmas around the corner, but nope. Fueled with festive cocktails, more family around than ever to regal with tales, and embellishments these people had injected the salacious chatter with a hulking round of steroids until it flowed as smooth as rum-spiked eggnog.

But at what point did it stop? Ten years? Clearly not.

What about twenty?

Never?

Did we really need to be worried that somehow word would get to the WRDF?

And so what if word did get to them? Were they going to deny our application based on gossip? If they were, why would we even want to become a WRDF team anyway?

Sure, we wanted to grow derby in our area and up our game play, but did we really need them to do it? If left with no other choice, why couldn’t we just start our own junior leagues, recruit members, build more teams on our own?

I didn’t point that part out just yet. I decided to vent my doses of reality to my team in manageable nuggets. They were already on edge. Even the people who’d readily agreed to Priest’s involvement were fidgeting like they were fifteen again, storing contraband in the form of a half-naked varsity football player in their closet sporting 100% activated boy peen.

No sense in applying pressure on that constant worry because it was bad enough word had already gotten around about Crossroads coming to an end and at some point someone had overheard us talking about the charity exhibition so hope started to take root.

Now Galloway Bay had its very own raging wildfire sweeping through town.

We’d just asked a bunch of our employers for donations, but the minute word got around—the very next day—how we were going for the charity prize, those requests fell by the wayside and became the secondary focus to the glory of the underdog. Storytellers all over town had started elevating us to some weird hero status, counting on us to save all.

Guys…this was the long shot of long shots.

I hated to break it to them, but we needed our plan A and plan B.

We needed prayer chains, rabbit’s feet, crystals, horseshoes, fuzzy dice, ladybugs, shamrocks…hell, we could use leprechauns shooting out of our butts right now, sputtering, “I’m after me lucky charms.”

But fuck if I’d let doubt fall from my lips. I’d lay everything I had on that track for those kids leading up to the exhibition and all the way through it. Rylee’s worried face, as real as if she were right in front of me, popped into my head and a band tightened around my chest. I shuddered out a breath.

And the image sliding into place right after…Priest’s angry mouth and flashing eyes a split second before he mercilessly ate me alive.

My heart rolled a series of slow, hard thumps in my chest before taking off at a sprint. Heat slid through me. My skin grew hot and tight.

Absolutely devoured me.

And I wanted to do it again. I wanted to do it naked.

There should probably be some sort of break between the images flashing through my scattered imagination. A Parental Advisory: Explicit Warning.

Flaming girl bits mobilized… Good thing they came with their very own sprinkler system.

God, I was getting punchy.

I shot off the couch and glanced at the clock. Nine minutes. I rested for nine damn minutes. If you could call the mental acrobatics I’d just gone through rest.

Jamming my feet into my boots, I grabbed my duffel and I headed out the door. If I was going to be this restless, I’d put that energy into something useful.

I took a deep breath of crisp, cold air. A few familiar locals waved, nodded, and smiled as they hurried to and from their cars into the shops on Main Street. Janice Chase, the sheriff’s sister who ran the Galloway Bay library, called out just as I reached the parking lot.

“Make sure you bring in those little ones to see us. We’ve got brand-new books they’re going to love. Oh! And we have that camp series Addison has been waiting for,” she said with a wave.

“I’ll try to get them in next week,” I called back.

“If you can tear them away from Rockabilly’s. Am I right?” Janice called back with a wink.

“Yeah.” I forced out a laugh as my stomach pitched to my toes. Our issues went so much further than steering the kids away from the roller rink.

We needed to figure out how we were going to manage this training and continue our time with the kids at Crossroads.

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