ログインBailey POVI lasted three days before I called him.Seventy-two hours of sitting in my apartment with the curtains drawn, scrolling through job listings that made my stomach turn. Lola called every few hours to check on me. My brother kept texting, but I wasn't ready to tell him I lost my job. The cardboard box sat in the corner of my living room untouched, and every time I looked at it, something inside me sank a little deeper.On the third night, I picked up my phone and dialed Mark's number.He answered on the first ring."I'm in," I said.No greeting. No small talk.A pause."Yeah?" he asked."Yeah. But we need to talk first. In person.""Name the place.""Lincoln Park. Tomorrow morning. Six o'clock.""I'll be there."I hung up before I could change my mind.The next morning, I got to the park at five forty-five. The sun was barely up, the sky still gray and pink around the edges. The air was cool, damp with dew, the kind of morning that reminded me of early training days back whe
Bailey POVMark stood outside my window, his face tight with something between concern and anger.I wiped my eyes quickly with the back of my hand, but it was too late. He had already seen.He tapped the glass again."Open the door, Bailey."I shook my head."Just go, Mark.""Open the door."His voice was firm. No room for argument.I turned off the engine and unlocked the door. He opened it and stood at the door of the driver's seat, his eyes scanning my face, taking in the red eyes, the swollen lids, the tear streaks I hadn't managed to hide."What happened?" he asked."How did you know I was here?""Word travels fast in that building. I heard ten minutes ago and came straight here."I couldn't look at him."I got fired."The words came out flat. Empty. Like all the emotion had already been wrung out of me in the last hour."Fired?" His brow creased. "For what?"I reached into the back seat and grabbed the letter. Handed it to him without a word.He read it standing up. His eyes mov
Bailey POVTwo weeks later, it happened.I walked into the USTAF Academy on a Monday morning with a coffee in one hand and my training bag over my shoulder. The sun was out. The air was crisp. I had spent the weekend putting together a new sprint program for my group, and for the first time in a while, I felt something close to normal.Then I saw the envelope on my desk.White. Sealed. My full name typed across the front in bold letters.No stamp. No return address. Hand delivered.I set my coffee down and picked it up. Something about the weight of it made my fingers go stiff.I tore it open.The first line hit me like a fist.~Dear Ms. Bailey Adams, we regret to inform you that your position as Assistant Coach and Sports Trainer at the USTAF Academy has been terminated, effective immediately.~My eyes read the words three times before my brain caught up.Terminated.Effective immediately.I kept reading.~Following a review of staff performance and professional conduct, the decisio
Bailey POVA week passed.Seven days of showing up early, coaching my groups, and going home to an empty apartment. Seven days of avoiding Mark's side of the track, eating lunch alone in the staff room, and pretending the hollow feeling in my chest was nothing.The whispers had died down. Or at least, I stopped hearing them. People moved on to other gossip, other drama, other things to talk about behind closed hands.But the damage was already sitting in places I couldn't see.It showed up in small ways first. I forgot to log my weekly training report on time. Mixed up two athletes' sprint times on my clipboard. Zoned out during a staff meeting and had to ask the person next to me what was said.Tiny slips.The kind most people wouldn't notice.But Coach Mercer wasn't most people.He found me after practice on a Thursday afternoon. I was stacking cones by the equipment shed when his shadow fell across the grass in front of me."Bailey."I straightened up and turned around.He stood wi
Bailey POVI made my decision Tuesday morning.The whispers hadn't stopped. If anything, they had gotten louder. I caught two more glances in the hallway before lunch. Another conversation that went quiet when I walked into the staff room.The walls were closing in, and I was running out of time.So I texted Mark after practice.~Meet me at the college track. 6pm.His reply came in seconds.~Everything okay?I didn't answer.The drive to the campus felt heavy. My hands gripped the steering wheel too tight. My chest ached with something I couldn't name. Or maybe I could, but naming it would make what I was about to do even harder.He was already there when I arrived. Sitting on the bench near the starting blocks, elbows on his knees, scrolling through his phone. He looked up when he heard my footsteps and smiled.That smile almost broke me."Hey," he said, standing up.I stopped a few feet away from him. Kept my bag on my shoulder. Didn't sit down.His smile faded."What's wrong?" he a
Bailey POVSunday crawled by in a blur of restless energy. I cleaned things that didn't need cleaning, ran a route I don't remember finishing, and checked my phone more times than I'd ever admit.Mark didn't call. Didn't text. He gave me what I wanted. Space.By Sunday night, my nerves were already building.Tomorrow was Monday.Monday meant the academy. Monday meant pretending I hadn't let my student between my legs two nights ago.I told myself I could do it. Told myself nobody knew.Then Monday came.And I was wrong.I didn't notice them at first. I was too busy running drills with my group, too focused on keeping my mind off Mark and the mess I had made of my life over the weekend.But by midmorning, something felt off.Two coaches standing by the equipment shed stopped talking the second I walked past. One of them smiled at me. The other looked away too fast.Strange.I shrugged it off and kept moving.During the water break, I caught one of the female athletes glancing at me, t
Monalisa POV.Oh my God, I now have a boyfriend.Just like that.I didn't think he would agree to date me this easily, but he did.And he was the first boyfriend I ever had.Tommy had been a crush and Ethan had been a prospect.But Greg? He was officially mine.Well, for two months.It was more of
Monalisa POV.The question hung heavy in the air, between us, and his eyes bored into mine;Searching....Waiting....He was giving me another opportunity to back out, to give up and run away.I should stop here.If I had any self-preservation, I should tell him I wouldn't bend over and do as he pl
Monalisa POV. I couldn't believe my eyes. What did I just read? I knew I said rules don't scare me, but I was expecting a regular guideline, not an iron cage to lock me up in. I read the document again for the second time, to be sure I wasn't imagining things. "What the heck does he mean by I'm
Monalisa POV. I took in a deep breath and jerked the front door open. Seeing Ethan standing here, with a painful look on his face made me want to puke. "Mona, what's been going on?" He asked immediately, "I've been trying to reach you for days now." "Why have you been trying to reach me?" I







