By Tuesday afternoon, the ready room feels quieter than it should. Practice already ended, swimmers and other students already moving through the hall outside, though everyone seems to be on edge, Reece and Tate included. I already looped CoachMarsh in on my suspicions, coach asking for a private meeting just before practice.
He said we’d all be called in individually to discuss the circumstances which means I only have one chance to prove they’re fucking with my Omega’s ritual. Which means that this informal practice where half the school had been invited to watch was my best hope that they fucked with something.
Jude’s bag is still open beside the bench, which means if his blocker went missing or was altered, no one can pretend they grabbed the wrong tube by accident. It’s in his bag where he always keeps it, tucked in the inside pocket with the wipes and the sign-off sheet folded around it.
Jude sits on the edge of the bench with his chin lifted, eyes on my face instead of the mirror behind me. Hollis stands near the doorway with one shoulder close to the frame, trying to look like he isn’t guarding the room with his whole body. He has barely spoken since breakfast, which means his fear has gone deep enough that he doesn’t trust himself to talk around it.
I take the tube from Jude’s bag and show him the label. He checks the cap, the seal, and the crimped end with the same sweep of his thumb, slower than usual. When he nods for me to continue, I twist the cap open.
My hand stops before I touch him. The blocker should have a little resistance when it moves, a thickness that holds against the applicator. This one slides too easily, glossy under the ready-room lights, with a chemical edge under the base that doesn’t belong there. It’s subtle enough that a trainer in a hurry might miss it. I know Jude’s blocker too well now to mistake wrongness for variation.
Jude’s eyes widen, then drop to the tube in my hand. Hollis’ purr cuts off from the doorway, leaving the room so quiet I hear Marsh’s papers shift in the hall.
“Don’t move,” I say.
Jude goes still at once. “Bishop?”
I set the tube on the clean wipe without letting it touch his skin. “This isn’t right.”
The color leaves his face slowly, like his body needs time to understand what his mind already has. I keep my attention on Jude because if I look too long at Hollis, I might lose the thread of what has to happen first. “I’m going to bag it here, in front of you. Then I’m taking it straight to Marsh.”
Jude looks at the tube, then at me, and the fear in his face is sharpened by recognition. “Someone messed with it, didn’t they?” he asks.
I pull a clean evidence bag from the trainer’s kit Marsh left for us after Jude told him everything. The tube and wipe go in together. I seal the edge, write the time across the label, and keep the bag flat on my palm so Jude can see that it exists and that no one has had a chance to turn it into a misunderstanding.
Only then does Hollis come closer. He moves slowly, waiting until Jude leans toward him before settling a hand at the back of Jude’s neck. Jude doesn’t collapse into him, but his shoulders tip just enough for Hollis to catch the weight he won’t admit he’s giving up.
“I want to know what happens,” Jude says.
“You will,” I tell him. “Nothing moves without you knowing.”
His eyes search mine, and whatever he finds there makes him nod. Hollis bends close enough to press his mouth to Jude’s hair, but he doesn’t say anything. I stand there for a few more seconds before heading to Marsh, the coach just outside the ready room. The moment he sees my face, the paper drops a few inches in his hand.
“It’s wrong,” I say.
Marsh looks at the sealed bag, and his expression goes flat. He turns toward the athletic office without wasting a second. “My office. Now.”
The camera feed is already pulled up by the time campus security arrives. Marsh explains it while the file loads, voice controlled but thin. “We installed cameras after Jude’s incident last year. Ready-room hall, athletic office corridor, entrances and exits around the locker room. Nothing inside private changing areas, but enough to show who goes near personal items and areas that are off limits to the public.”
After Jude’s incident. After the report. After the damage had already been done. I don’t say any of that because Marsh knows. I can see it in the way he won’t quite look at me while the footage buffers.
Then the video starts, and every thought in the room narrows to the screen. Tate appears in the ready-room hall eight minutes before we began the ritual. He looks both directions, waits while two first-years pass with towels over their shoulders, then crouches by Jude’s bag. His movements are too quick to be casual and too careful to be accidental. He opens the inside pocket, takes out Jude’s tube, jams something into the small hole, and squeezes.
Tate looks around while he adds something to Jude’s blocker before closing it back up and placing it where it came from. This is so much worse than just switching his blocker or taking it.
Marsh doesn’t speak through the first replay. He doesn’t speak through the second either. By the third, his face has gone grey. He reaches for the phone. “Yes, can one of you please come to the office? Thank you.” He sets the receiver down and then shoots off a text. “I’ve asked Tate to come in here as well. You’re here as the captain of the team, not as Jude’s Beta, do you hear me?”
I nod, about to explain myself.
“No. I know you’re pissed and I’m sure Hollis, if given the chance, would rip Tate’s head off but I need evidence and an explanation. He’ll be kicked off the team and we can meet withthe campus police as well to discuss criminal charges. He’s endangering more than just Jude.”
I nod again, sitting back in my seat as I wait for the other participants to file into the room. Tate looks sheepish as hell, one of the campus security guards stepping in behind him. I don’t expect to see the athletic director, her face scrunched up in fury. I can only imagine what Marsh alerted her to.
Tate’s eyes move from Marsh to the athletic director to me, and the sheepishness starts to crack. Marsh turns the monitor toward him and plays the footage.
Tate watches himself on the screen, his face growing paler by the second. “I can explain,” he says.
Marsh’s voice is low. “Then explain.”
