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I clenched my eyes from the tightness. Danilo placed his hands on my upper arm and elbow and carefully pressed against it to straighten it out. I grunted under my breath, and he halted and looked at me with his midnight eyes.
"It's fine, keep going."
He dipped his chin once. It wasn't fine.
Danilo applied more pressure, counted to ten and then let up. The muscles and ligaments in my arm screamed in protest. I bit the inside of my lip. He relaxed and then did it again, this time the sharp pain radiated from my wrist to my shoulder. Once he did a few rounds of those, we moved onto another stretch.
"Lie on your stomach and prop up on your elbows. Turn your hands up," he said, and I did. "Take a deep breath, then release."
Placing two fingers on the inside of my wrist, Danilo carefully pressed down until the top of my wrist touched the floor. I tensed and clenched my eyes shut. My arm was straining as he held it for a few seconds before he let up and repeated his actions. Something as simple as this caused a series of hot flashes to tingle through my body.
"Are you okay?"
"Yes," I said through clenched teeth.
"How are you feeling, Adrianna?" Madeline asked.
Sitting on my knees, I moved my arm around in front of me. "It's a little better, still tight, but it should loosen up during practice."
"Let's hope it does because with the time you missed, you don't have a choice right now other than to push through it. Your schedule is pretty intense—there's no room for downtime. You need to block it out and work your hardest."
I nodded in agreement and licked my lips. I was going to have to grin and bear it, and pray to every god that I didn’t make it worse.
"Lift your arm above your head," Danilo said. I was still on my knees and raised my arm.
He stood next to me and placed his palm to mine. His fingers wrapped around mine and held on while he very gently pressed down to see if I could handle impact. Danilo held my wrist as he did so.
"Lock your elbow if you can," he said, pushing a little harder.
My stomach twisted in agony. God, I wanted to cry from the excruciating pounding that took my breath away.
How the fuck was I going to do vault? Or swing on bars? Tumble?
"Block it out," he ordered. "Pretend it does not exist."
I nodded furiously, teeth pressing into my lip so hard I tasted blood. Clenching my eyes shut, I held my breath as he angled my arm back to stretch it out. My back arched and he noticed. Danilo used his knee to prevent me from leaning back. The jerk.
"You are going to need physical therapy tonight, warm compresses, and an inflammatory to get you through this. I suggest something like this every morning before practice to warm up the arm and loosen the muscles around the elbow, and then again at the end of the day."
"Great, you can do it for her," Madeline said. "Adrianna, I'll see you at beam while I speak to Danilo."
I stood up, giving my thanks to Coach Danilo, then turned around and made my way to the balance beam. I watched the floor as I walked, listening to the springboard at the front of the vault ricochet and the spring in the uneven bars rebound. A prickly sensation spread across my neck. I reached up to rub it away and glanced around the gym.
I felt like there were eyes all over my body. My brows furrowed. Was Kova here and I just couldn't see him? Maybe Dad really did have someone watching me.
The paranoia festering inside me was starting to eat away at me. I expelled a strained breath and wondered if anyone knew anything.
They couldn't… Right?
I'd been absent from the gym for five days. So had Kova. For someone who was going to the Olympic Trials, that kind of absence was unheard of. The same would be said for Kova, and he still wasn't here. It looked suspicious. People were curious, and for the most part, they weren't stupid. I felt like they were putting two and two together.
Stepping in front of the balance beam, my fingers trembled a little as I placed them on the leather. I grazed my palms on the material as I found my center again. My gaze dropped to my hands. There was an indentation on the edge from when someone slipped and hit their mouth.
An indentation like Kova had left on me.
I mounted the beam. The moment my feet touched the four-inch piece of wood, my mind cleared and I set my focus in place.
I knew what I needed to do and let the rest fade away.
