Foul Play

The moment the ball left my hand, I already knew.

Y'all know that feeling? When the shot is pure before it even reaches the rim? When your wrist snaps just right and the rotation is perfect and the net is going to sing your name?

That feeling.

I had it. 

Two seconds on the clock and we were down by one. It was time to show these years of sweat and sacrifice and lonely mornings in empty gyms wasn't a waste. All of it was funneling into this single…perfect arc.

I was going to win.

I was going to prove that Leo Mercer…the skinny kid from Inglewood with the dead mom and the absent father was worth something.

I was going to– and suddenly a hand came out of nowhere.

Dark, long and stupidly fast. Before I could process whatever the fuck was going on, the ball was gone.

I hit the floor hard and honestly? If I had a choice, I'd have died right there on the spot from shame. My palms scraped the court, my knees burnt and the air knocked out of my chest like someone stepped on it. I looked up at the bitch who bodied me like that and there he was. 

Number Twenty-three, six-foot-four of pure muscle and disgusting arrogance. I blinked and he was already at the other end of the court, already rising, already scoring.

The buzzer sounded, the gym exploded and it was amazing…but it was not for me…it was never for me.

I lay there, staring at the ceiling, my chest heaving. 

“How…the fu—” I couldn't finish because I'd cry and I don't cry…I never cry but something cracked open inside me and I hated it.

Then, just like he didn't just ruin my hopes and dreams, he was there…standing over me and looking down at me like I was nothing, like some bug he'd scraped off his shoe.

He leaned in close and one thing was certain. It was too damn close. 

So close, I could smell him. 

The sweat, the cologne and cedar and something underneath, something I couldn't seem to remember. His breath was warm against my ear.

"Better luck next season, rookie." And then he was gone…that fucker didn't even bother to help me up.

I never told anyone about that whisper…I never told anyone how it made me feel. The shame, the fury and the heat that spread through my chest and the sheer hate for his existence.

I never told anyone because I didn't understand it myself.

Until now.

******

"Leo."

I blinked back to reality and the memory dissolved right before me. I wasn't on the court anymore…I was sitting at a dinner table…My father's table.

“I wish I was still daydreaming” I mumbled to myself. My father's head snapped up, irritation painted across his entire face.

“The fuck did you just say, child?”

“Nothing, dad.” and I looked around. There's food in front of me…roasted chicken, green beans and a bowl of rice. But I don't remember sitting down, I don't even remember walking in…also not the drive over. 

The last thing I remembered was locking the door of my dorm and my father pulling me into a hug that felt like an apology.

And unrelated, the house seemed to smell wrong.

It used to smell like my mother…like her perfume and her candles and the rosemary she grew in the kitchen window. Now it smells like cinnamon and something floral and someone else's life.

And there's a woman across from me. 

Tall. 

Elegant. 

With dark glowing skin and sharp eyes. She's smiling at me like we're old friends but I've never seen her before in my life.

"Leo," my father says. "This is Yvette, my fiancée."

Fiancée. The word hit like a fist to the stomach.

I knew he was obviously seeing someone, he'd told me a few months ago but seeing someone and marrying someone are two different things. 

Two very different things and he didn't tell me he was getting married, he didn't ask…he just—decided, like I wasn't part of his family, like I wasn't part of his life.

Yvette extended her hand and as I looked down at them, her nails looked perfect…even her smile was perfect. Like everything about her was perfect.

“Ew.” I whispered low. She didn't seem to hear because her smile remained the same.

"It's so nice to finally meet you," she smiled wider, still extending her hands.

I shook her hand because I don't know what else to do and I'd get my ass beaten to shit if I didn't. 

Her grip was firm and confident like the kind of woman who would get exactly what she wants.

"Leo's going to be a senior this year," my father says, like he's selling me off to some creep. "He's a point guard for Westbrook. Starting."

"How impressive!" Yvette smiled and surprisingly, it sounded like she meant it…or maybe she's just really good at pretending but I don't say anything…

I just want this dinner to be over, I want to go back to my dorm and forget this ever happened.

But shit never goes my way, does it?

Yvette looks over my shoulder and smiles.

"Kaelen, sweetheart. Come sit down." And I froze instantly.

I don't know why…since it's just a name…it's about the way she says it.

“Sweetheart.”

Like he's the center of her world, like he's the reason she breathes…it makes my skin prickle. I turn my head and there he is.

Number twenty-three. 

Six-foot-four. 

Dark skin, sharp jaw and that same goddamn smirk from two years ago, curling at the corner of his mouth like he's been waiting for this moment his entire life.

Kaelen Blackwood.

Standing in my father's house, in my mother's kitchen and looking at me like he already knows everything I'm thinking.

"You," I breathe.

"Me," he says and my father frowns immediately.

“You boys know each other?"

Kaelen's smile doesn't falter…if anything, it widens. He walked around the table, slow and easy, like he owns the place goddamn…like he's been here a hundred times. Almost like he belongs and it irritates me to the very last strand of my hair.

"We've met," he says.

He stopped next to the empty chair across from me but he didn't sit yet. He just stood there, looking down at me, those dark eyes burning holes through my skull.

"Small world, isn't it?"