Page 57 of Guarding the Star

Chapter 19

Iris

I wake up at three in the morning, and my blood goes cold when I see the left side of the bed is empty.

Two weeks without Paula have trained my body to react to the cold space where she should be. I reach out, grab the sheet, crumple it. No warmth.

I sit up. Scan the room. The dark. The bedroom door open.

Light in the kitchen.

I walk barefoot down the hall. The floor is freezing. It's always freezing in this apartment.

I find Paula sitting on the kitchen counter with her phone in one hand and a glass of water next to her. She's wearing my practice jersey from last year, the gray one, loose on her shoulders and short at the waist. Legs hanging. Bare feet.

“I didn't leave,” she whispers, and blows me a kiss.

“I can see that,” I say, stepping between her legs to kiss her.

***

Tuesday I show up to practice forty minutes early.

Tina is already there.

She's alone on the field, doing passing drills against a wall. Reps. Left foot, right foot, inside, outside. The sound of the ball steady and constant.

She sees me, waves, smiles, and goes back to her passes.

I just sit and watch. Tina, who started copying my worst habits because she thought being me was something special. Who sat in a locker room crying after Hades tore her apart and told me, “You do it all the time and nothing happens.” That sentence made me hear myself for the first time.

I grab a ball, stand next to her, and start hitting the wall too. The two of us. Side by side. A conversation that doesn't need words.

When Hades arrives, she watches us from the sideline. Says nothing. Nods and smiles. For her, that's a lot.

***

The last regular season game is at home. The stadium is already filling up, humming with that electricity that gets under your skin the second you step on the field.

Paula arrives with Tessa and Wesley. This time not as my bodyguard. This time as my partner. Someone who chose to be with Iris Vance not because she's paid to, but because she wants to.

I spot her from the field during warm-ups. South section, row seven. Wesley is wearing a tiny Emeralds jersey and throws his arms up every time I jog past.

“Iwis! Iwis! Goal! Goal!” he screams when he sees me. I love seeing him in our kit at every game.

“We haven't started yet, boss. But I appreciate the energy,” I joke, and kiss the top of his head.

The game starts, and the other team comes out to destroy us. High press, hard tackles, long balls over our back line. More tackles. They're good, and they're physical. Especially physical.

We go down one-nil in the thirty-second minute. A shot from outside the box that sneaks in almost by accident, with a lot of luck, but it all counts.

Hades's halftime speech is brutal. A couple of the younger players nearly cry.

The second half is a different game.

Sixtieth minute. Jade wins a ball in the middle of the park and finds me with a long pass that drops onto my foot like it has a magnet. I receive with my back to goal. Trap. Spin. Face the keeper. I shake one defender, the other can't get there, and I shoot without thinking. Clean. Low. Left corner where the keeper doesn't reach.

Goal.