"Kinsley!" Becca called my name from across the room, and I looked up to see her and the sophomore girls waving me over.

I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts, but my head was too foggy. Why did someone put a fog machine in there? I 48/890

dropped my ice pack in the sink and slunk off the counter.

"Better get some sleep, Kinsley. You have quite an early morning tomorrow,"

Liam noted with a smile. I stepped to move past him, but then I thought of something.

"How'd you know I was on the ULA team?" I asked.

He grinned, and for a moment I thought I was going to have to pound my chest to make my heart keep beating. He had slight dimples and perfectly straight teeth. That grin should be tucked away and brought out only for special occasions— where heart de-fibrillators would be present and accounted for.

"You were the top recruit in the country.

There's not a person in the soccer world that 49/890

doesn't know who you are," he answered with confidence.

I’d been featured in a few magazines in high school, but damn. Liam Wilder knew who I was. He knew me enough to recognize me at a party… and tomorrow he would be my coach.

Oh god. I just almost sniffed his shirt and then I asked him if he’d show me his tattoos.

I'm in major trouble.

With that thought, I nodded and turned away from him to find my teammates. I had to fill them in stat. We had a lot of Googling to do.

"Are you okay? And more importantly, were you just talking to Liam Wilder?" Emily asked with wide eyes as soon as I reached 50/890

them. Becca was standing directly behind her with her mouth hanging open.

"Yes, and you won't even believe what I have to tell you guys, but I should wait until later." The party was still going strong and I didn't want to squeal about what I'd just found out in front of all these people. Word would probably get back to Liam before I even reached the front door.

"Okay, that sounds really mysterious.

Now I'm even more curious," Emily answered.

"You should be," I laughed, and then tugged her and Becca through the crowd toward the door. "I'm kind of tired. Do you guys want to share a cab back to the house with me?"

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"Kinsley!" someone called from across the room just as I’d asked my question.

Josh.

Damnit, with everything going on I'd completely forgotten he would even be at the party. I shifted my gaze just as I saw him pushing through the crowd and calling my name again. He looked cute as always with his dark brown hair and boyish face. Too bad I knew what kind of asshole he actually was.

"Kinsley, wait up!"

Every person in that living room was watching him trying to get to me. Did he have to keep yelling my name like that? I clearly wasn't going anywhere.

Just as he was about to reach me, I saw movement in the doorway to the kitchen and then Liam stepped into the living room. Oh, 52/890

great. Let’s make it a show. Maybe we could flip the lights on and cut the music so everyone could have a front row seat.

"Josh, seriously, not now. I'm tired and drunk, and it's my birthday." I stepped closer to Becca and Emily.

"I know. I'm so sorry. I tried to call you and I even sent flowers to the house. Did you get them?"

He meant the roses that I had shredded in the disposal earlier that morning.

Whoops.

"Yes. I got them Josh, but I don't want to talk right now." I ground my molars together.

"Just let me make it up to you. Can I come see you later this week? Maybe we can get coffee after you're done with practice one 53/890

day?" His voice was carrying over the party, and I was painfully aware of everyone's eyes on me. I couldn't very well make a scene in front of all those people. He deserved to be punched in the face, but seeing as how I had already incurred one injury on my birthday, I decided to give in.

"Fine. Just text me, but you need to realize we aren't getting back together." I turned away from him and started to make my way to the front door. I tuned out everything around me. I didn't want to hear if Josh said anything else as I walked away. I didn't want to know if Liam had heard that entire ridiculous exchange. I just wanted my pajamas and fuzzy socks.

…

54/890

"Are you serious?!" Becca screamed.

"Dude! If you scream in my ear again I will punch you in the uterus."

Becca, Emily, and I were lying on my bed back at the Rookie House. Four days before, I'd moved into the rookie house where I'd stay for my freshman year of college. It was within walking distance from the ULA campus and a few miles from our practice fields.

"Okay, I'm sorry, but you're not kidding, right? I can't tell if you're joking," Becca laughed.

I rolled over and gave her a dead-serious look, but I was still tipsy so I ended up laughing when she started making faces at me.

55/890

"Ugh, okay. Just believe me. He told me at the party that he was coaching us starting tomorrow."

"But why? He doesn't need the money and surely he's already busy enough," Emily protested. I’d been wondering the same thing. I wouldn't have believed it either if I hadn't heard it come out of his own mouth. A perfectly supple mouth, fyi.

"Oh, look at this!" Becca said, pointing to my computer’s scene. "This article talks about him volunteering as a soccer coach with the ULA team after a few of his sponsors got onto him for his ‘bad-boy’ ways. It says they gave him an ultimatum: get dropped from their labels or clean up his act."

56/890

"They couldn't drop him! He's the best soccer player in the US!" I argued.

"Obviously. But this article says he’s a huge liability," Emily muttered.

"Well, he seemed fine earlier and he wasn't even drinking," I defended him, trying to recall the scent of his cologne from memory. It was probably called Nectar of the Gods.

"Well the night is still young, so maybe he started partying hard after we left," Emily murmured. "He's really hot, though, I have to admit."

"She does have a pulse!" I joked, poking her in the lungs.

"Hey! Yes, okay. I'm not immune to Liam Wilder, but it doesn't matter— he's our coach now."

57/890

Ugh, she just had to kill my buzz.

"Not until tomorrow," I clarified.

"How old is he?" Emily asked.

"Twenty-five," Becca answered, having known it off the top of her head.

"Do you think he has a girlfriend?" I asked.

"Well according to Google images, he has about one thousand of them. Seriously, does this man sleep?" Becca clicked through photos, but I didn't look.

"Gross, close it," I groaned, lying back and staring up at my ceiling.

"He's never been linked to anyone in particular, though. He's photographed with women, but he's never gone public with a relationship. For being a media darling, his life is relatively private. These photos of him 58/890

with women are mostly at fundraisers and parties," Becca explained.

I wasn't sure what to make of that information. Did he not have a girlfriend because he liked to play the field? Or did the media just not know about it?

"So, what happened with Josh? That was super awkward," Emily asked, trying to broach the subject lightly. There wasn’t time to fill Becca and Emily in about what had transpired with Josh, so I’m sure they weren’t prepared for the scene back at the party.

Emily probably wasn’t sure how heartbroken I felt about the whole situation.