After runs on the field, the weight room came next, and for once, I wasn’t thinking about maxing out — I was thinking about how damn close she stood behind Mike while he set up on the bench press.
“You always breathe out too early,” she said, scribbling something. “Does your trainer tell you to fix it?”
Whittaker spluttered. “Uh... Do I? Um, no, I don’t think they noticed?”
He hadn’t even lifted yet. How the hell did she catch that? I racked my own bar and pretended I wasn’t listening, which I absolutely was.
“See here?” She pointed at his rib cage. “Your diaphragm rises before the strain actually hits. That’s why you wobble on rep three.”
He stared at her like she was psychic.
I stared at her like she was trouble.
Because she wasn’t wrong, I’d seen the wobble. I’d never bothered figuring outwhy.
“Peterson,” I said before I could stop myself, “you got a secret coaching certification I don’t know about?”
“No.” She glanced at me like I’d interrupted something sacred. “Yoga, and I just pay attention.”
“Yeah, well,” I muttered, wiping sweat off my brow, “maybe pay attention somewhere else.”
Her brows lifted, that sharp look slicing right through me. “Why? Did I say something else people shouldn’t hear?”
Goddamn woman.
Then she went back to Whittaker, and I briefly imagined spanking that sass out of her, but I brushed it aside just as quickly. I hated it even more that I kept hearing her voice in my head as I finished my reps. Early exhale. Left-side compensation. Wobble on rep three.
She saweverything.
Film session was always the worst part of my day, even before she showed up. Sitting still wasn’t my sport. But now she was in the room, tucked next to Whittaker, constantly jotting things down and whispering questions he couldn’t answer.
“What does he mean that he’s rotating his hips early on the snap?”
“What’s that? Is that supposed to be part of the technique?”
“Why does that coach look like he’s about to throw a chair?”
I choked out a laugh at that last one. She looked over at the sound, eyes locking on mine for half a breath too long. I looked away first. Like a coward. Great.
Then she said something that made me tense.
“Why do all the injured guys sit in the back corner instead of up front? Doesn’t that make it harder to follow the plays?”
Whittaker shrugged. “That’s just where they always sit.”
She didn’t accept that. I saw it in the way her lips thinned as she wrote something down.
I swallowed. Injured guys. Back corner. I looked over my shoulder. I’d never noticed. Or maybe I had and just didn’t want to think about it. The air suddenly felt heavier. She wasn’t here to dig. That was the deal. But she didn’thaveto dig. All she had to do waspay attention, and the cracks showed themselves.
By the time practice wrapped for the day, I was exhausted — not from drills, not from conditioning, but fromher. Her questions. Her eyes. Her brain missed nothing. Her voice in the back of my skull, pointing out things I’d trained myself to ignore.
“What is it?” Dante murmured beside me. His eyes were on the film, outwardly relaxed and calm.
“She has to go.” I said it so quietly, I wasn’t sure he’d hear me.
His head cocked to the side quickly, the way it did when he was about to throw a game-winning pass. His ‘locked and loaded’ tell. “Agreed.” He sniffed as he straightened in his chair. “Sav’s meeting us after this.”
That weirdly made me feel better. Which was crazy in itself; Savvy and Dante were so new, but somehow she was in it with us, and it felt right. In fact,notincluding Savvy would feel wrong. Looks like Dante wasn’t the only one of us who was enamored by the dean’s daughter. The thought made me snicker, and Coach Sutherland turned to glare at me.