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“What’s going on?” Emma calls out.
“We’ve got practice in twenty minutes!” I call back.
I dump the grounds into the coffee maker and dart toward the stairs. I whirl around my room like a hurricane, almost toppling over as I rush to change out the pajamas I’m wearing into shorts and my practice jersey. My hair goes up in a messy ponytail, and then I sprint across the hall to brush my teeth and wash my face.
Slams and bangs around the house suggest everyone else is getting ready just as quickly. Coach Taylor does not love tardiness.
I sprint down the stairs, cleats in one hand and sneakers in the other. “EMMA! ANNE!” I holler. “We’ve got to go!”
“I’m coming!” Emma shouts back.
“Why is no one else ever ready?” Cressida asks from the front hall, exactly where I knew she’d be. Her usual routine is to lean against the cubbies and watch us all dart around desperately. “Practice is always at the same time. It doesn’t magically move up just to catch y’all off guard.”
“You could have a little more sympathy this morning,” I retort, hopping on one foot as I put on my shoes.
“Even less. We all woke up at the same time. I’m ready to go.”
“Start driving yourself, then!”
“No way. Watching y’all race around is too much fun,” she replies.
The frenzied sound of running footsteps echoes upstairs as Anne and Emma hurry about.
“Especially hungover.”
“Can you at least check if Jenny is here to pick us up?” I ask.
Cress rolls her eyes, but heads for the front door. “She wasn’t a minute ago—holy shit.”
“What?” I reply, lacing up my left sneaker. “Did she leave without us? I can drive, I just need to get my keys from—” I glance up as I grab my right shoe and freeze in place. Thoughts screech to a stop in my head. I might be hallucinating.
Adler Beck is in my house, standing five feet away from me.
He’s wearing a tracksuit, Kluvberg’s blue with the club emblem embroidered in white. A jacket is tossed across the top of the leather duffel bag he’s carrying. He must have taken a red-eye to be here this early, but his are perfectly blue, without any dark circles.
“What are you doing here?” I choke out.
“I got your gift,” Beck states.
I stare at him. Thanks to the large amount of tequila I drank last night, it takes me a good minute to realize he’s talking about the painting I sent. “A thank you note would have sufficed. You didn’t need to fly across the Atlantic.”
“If you’d answered any of my calls, I wouldn’t have had to fly across the Atlantic.”
Shit. I have no good excuse for not answering and no idea what him coming all this way means.
“I didn’t, um, I?—”
Loud steps pound behind me, followed by an even louder “Oh my God” in Emma’s voice.
Some of the shock is beginning to ebb away, letting details trickle in. Cressida is standing by the front door, her mouth literally open. If I glanced behind me at the stairs, I’m sure that Anne and Emma look just as shocked. When Emma and I discussed Beck, I definitely didn’t mention he might show up here sometime.
I can’t believe he’s here. That he came all this way.
Last night’s drinking and lack of sleep is catching up to me. My temple starts to throb.
There’s a knock on the door. I think it must be Jenny—wondering what the hell is taking us so long—when I hear my dad’s voice. “Saylor?”
My headache gets worse. I totally forgot he and Sandra were stopping by this morning.
