“I’ll grab you a mini-band,” Jenny said, tearing me out of my thoughts, thankfully.

I needed to focus.

* * *

Squeezing my eyes shut, I fell back against the turf to try and catch my breath after running sprints. My back hurt, my lungs felt like they were wrapped in an iron band that was shrinking by the minute, and as much as I wanted to pull up my shirt to fan off, I couldn’t without showing everyone my belly.

Good grief.

A shadow came over my chest, followed shortly by, “You have more in you, schnecke. Get up.”

I kept my eyes closed. The temptation to ignore him was overwhelming, but I couldn’t do that. Pretending like he wasn’t there would just give him more power. On top of that, schnecke? What the hell did that mean? It didn’t matter. Whatever. “I’ll be up in a second,” I told him on a long exhale.

My own personal eclipse didn’t move despite the fact I had at least responded to him.

I didn’t bother opening my eyes either as I finished catching my breath.

The shadow shifted to the right as something hit the side of my foot. “Are you well enough to play today?” Kulti’s voice was low as he spoke.

His nudge got me to open my eyes and stare straight up at the blue-gray sky. “No.”

Kulti was standing by my feet, his hands behind his back as he looked down at me.

I glanced at him for a second then rolled to sit up gently and get to my feet. Sparing him another look, I gave the German a tight smile I wasn’t feeling at all. “I need to get back.”

That’s exactly what I did.

* * *

At eight o’clock that night, my cell phone dinged with a text.

From my spot on the couch with my socked feet up on the coffee table, I glanced at the screen and saw ‘German Chocolate Cake’ pop up.

I went right back to watching my show. If it was life or death he’d call, and he didn’t.

* * *

At five o’clock the following afternoon, my phone beeped with an incoming text message again.

‘German Chocolate Cake’ appeared on the screen.

For a second I thought about picking it up and possibly reading the message, but I’d ignored the one the day before; during practice today, he’d given me a massive amount of hell during my one-on-one game. Basically, he was acting like nothing was wrong, and like he hadn’t been an ass days before.

Now he was texting me again.

“Did they get your phone number?” Marc asked from behind the wheel.

I set my phone back between my legs and shook my head. Marc already knew about the insanity at practice with the reporters and the mystery behind Kulti’s driving record. He’d been warning me that it was only a matter of time before someone got desperate enough to call, especially since Jenny and I were the only players that had pictures with him floating around the internet.

“No.” I smiled at my friend and before I realized what the hell was coming out of my mouth, I made up something up. “Wrong number.”

* * *

“Are you done?”

I pulled my bag up and over my opposite shoulder and straightened, wiping at my forehead with the back of my hand. “I have to get to work.”

The German had his own bag over his shoulder. His handsome, handsome face was tight as he ran a hand over his head.

I raised my eyebrows, forced a smile on my face and turned to start walking.

Kulti’s hand whipped out to grab my wrist, stopping me in place. “Sal,” he hissed, turning me to face him.

I took a breath through my nose and tipped my head back to look him in the eye. “Kulti, I need to get to work. “

His head jerked back, the corner of his cheek rounding like he was sticking his tongue there. “Kulti, really?”