RISKY PLAY (RED CARD #1) BY RACHEL VAN DYKEN Page 0,19

beyond our game. Just seeing him reminded me of mistakes.

Besides, he would rather run me over with my own car than shake my hand. We’d gotten into it at finals last year. Penalty cards were thrown. Punches followed. We’re both lucky as hell we didn’t get kicked out of the game.

Finally, he met my gaze, his icy blue stare boring right through me. No acknowledgment, just hate.

So it was going to be like that?

I turned on my heel and started to run around the stadium, and the rest of the players followed like I knew they would. I was a born leader.

I just didn’t feel like one anymore.

Instead, I felt like a giant fake.

Who was one mistake away from never feeling normal again.

Chapter Fifteen

MACKENZIE

The guy was an animal!

He ate more takeout than a college student, and his poor dog was so hungry I had to give him three more helpings of food.

It was starting to get dark by the time I heard the car pull up.

And it was impossible not to hear that engine.

I had turned a few lights off, made sure the oven was off, and left a note, but there would be no escape. Not tonight.

My heart clenched when the door opened.

I busied myself with wiping the counter.

“Shit, you’re still here?” His raspy voice sounded tired. The slight Spanish accent I’d once found sexy now made my heart hurt and my embarrassment fan to life as I remembered the way his mouth had nibbled and nipped trails inside my thighs.

So. Stupid.

I’d trusted too easily.

Never again.

Well, I’d done what I had set out to do! I’d lived on the wild side and got my heart broken in the process. Well. Done.

“Yeah,” I responded, dumping the paper towel in the trash as he made his way into the dimly lit kitchen. “Dinner’s in the oven, already finished, I reorganized your dishes because they were everywhere. Alfie’s been fed a few times, since he’s clearly not eaten in a month, but you should have enough dog food to hold you over until I get back in the morning.”

I tried walking by him, but he caught me by the elbow. I thought maybe he’d say thank you or even apologize. Instead, he stared me down with hatred. “Never. Ever. Touch my shit again.” He jerked his hand away.

My lips parted as I stepped back slowly and accidentally said out loud, “Who are you?”

His eyes flickered with something before he sneered. “If I never told you my real name, do you really think you knew me at all?”

Getting punched in the gut would feel better than this. “No. You’re . . . right.” I ducked my head and walked by him. With as much dignity as I could summon, I grabbed my purse, leaned down and kissed Alfie on his fur, and then stalked out, slamming the door as hard as I could behind me. I prayed pictures would fall from the wall and create such a mess of glass he’d cut up his perfect soccer feet.

Tears streamed down my cheeks as I made my way to the first Central Market I could find. I cut the engine, ran inside, grabbed two bottles of my favorite blend, and waited in line.

Only to suffer through more torture.

His face was everywhere.

US Weekly. In Touch. People.

They all had him featured.

European bad boy.

Downward spiral since his father’s death.

I frowned.

Then grabbed every last magazine I could, and dumped them on the belt, brain spinning.

I was losing it.

Was I really going to be that person? The one who believed everything I read in the tabloids when I’d been on the receiving end of their hatred more times than I could count?

I looked back down—one had him shirtless in Mexico.

My skin flushed.

Yes. Yes, I was.

Because behind him, in that very same picture, was a girl I no longer recognized.

A girl who looked like she’d just tasted freedom and never wanted to go back.

“Ah.” The checker scanned the magazines. “I get it, he’s smokin’ hot, but I bet he’s got a small thing. Most of the good-looking ones do.”

“Thing?” I squinted at her, seeking clarification.

“Peter.” The woman was in her fifties at least, with salt-and-pepper hair and purple lipstick. “All the good ones do.”

He doesn’t, I wanted to say.

Maybe it would be easier to forget him if everything about those moments in his arms had been a letdown.

But he’d been . . . everything.

He’d been gentle, tender. Well, if soccer stopped paying him millions he could probably win Oscars for his