“I said you’re being a chicken.” I did it. Holy shit, I called Reiner Kulti a chicken and a coward, and there was no coming back from it. In for a penny, in for a pound, I told myself. “Come on. What are you scared of? You know you’re better than me. I know you’re better than me, so let’s get this over with. Play me so you can get over this crap.”

“I’m not doing this with you, little girl,” he stated evenly, his jaw gritting.

Little girl.

Could I have let it go? Sure. Of course I could. But I hadn’t been lying when I said I couldn’t do this with him any longer. All that repressed anger he had, and the frustrations he took out on me because I unfortunately had so much knowledge of him, the tension was out of this world. It wasn’t like I’d forced him to tell me the truth, but regardless we couldn’t keep this hateful dance up.

“Yeah, we are.”

“No, we are not.”

Clenching my hands together, I was about two seconds away from going Super Saiyan on his ass. “I know I’m going to lose, Kulti. I fucking hate losing, but we’re doing this anyway, so let’s get it over with.”

He raised both hands into the air and scrubbed his palms over the back of his head. Jesus Christ, he was tall. “No.”

“Why?”

“You’re a pain in my ass,” he snapped.

It was my turn to blink at him. “You think I’m going to beat you, don’t you?”

He rolled his eyes upward as he huffed. “Hell hasn’t frozen over.”

Based on his tone, I wasn’t sure if he really thought so or not. Or maybe I was just being egotistical. Maybe. But I knew that I needed to set my ego aside and make him do this. Some part of my gut recognized that it was necessary, so I needed to do everything possible to make this happen.

Even if it meant pissing him off.

I tipped my chin up at him and looked right into those light-colored eyes. “Then quit being a pussy and play me.”

Yeah, that did it.

“I am not a pussy.” He took a step forward. “I can and will kick your ass.”

Whoa. I held my hands up and guffawed. “I said you were going to win, sauerkraut, I didn’t say you were going to kick my ass.”

That look I recognized all too well crossed over his features, and I was honestly torn between shivering in fear and… well I wasn’t going to say it, or even really admit the other emotion. He had the look of the old Kulti—the borderline psychotic competitor.

Oh my gosh, he was going to wipe the floor with me.

And then I almost laughed because, really? I wasn’t about to bend over and let him win. Please.

Something flared within my chest, and I let the fire of competition burn in my heart. “Let’s do this.”

And we did.

John the Baptist, Mary Magdalene and Peter Parker all spewed out of my mouth at some point.

It was one thing to have watched him play from the safety of my television or from the stands. To a certain extent, it was an advantage because I knew how he played almost as well as I knew my own game; the kind of moves he tended to stick to, his tells. My body was instinctively aware without me really thinking about it, that he faked leading with his right foot before switching to his left. I knew his tricks.

And yet…

Two years of not playing barely slowed him down. Barely. I was fast and he was just as fast, if not faster. His legs were a lot longer than mine, and he ate up the turf like no one’s business. There was a reason this man was an icon, why he’d been the best for so long.

But fuck that. I wasn’t going to let him win without a fight. I kept what I knew about him in the front of my brain, and I moved my legs as fast as I could. I tried to out-think him and play smarter more efficiently. The ball stayed as close to me as possible. Later on I would wonder if it really looked like we were playing ‘keep away’ from each other or not.