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"We’re talking about my cars," I retorted, pivoting on the fly with our new audience. "When the hell are my cars going to be released?"
Kassie laughed. "They put the boot on them for forty minutes. You could’ve waited an hour."
"What?!"
The traitor, Piper, giggled and tried to stifle it when I glared at her. All of my jokes got eye rolls but my Mustang, shackled—hilarious! I muttered under my breath and followed after them.
"Where’s Ryan?" I asked, irritable.
"Early meeting with Coach Lawson," King replied before Kassie could. "He won’t be at practice."
"How’s it feel to have some time apart?" I lobbed at Kassie.
She made a noise at the back of her throat. By now, the two of them were used to the constant jokes about how they couldn’t be six inches apart from each other without their organs shutting down.
"Piper, this is a good example right here." I drew her back into the conversation. "Relationships put a dog collar on you, you should see the collage in Ryan’s locker, it’s all these drawings of Kassie."
"Better than the collection of used condoms in yours," Kassie retorted.
"I don’t have—" I stopped myself at Piper’s giggle. "She’s kidding. I don’t have that."
"Nope, no used condoms," King announced. "I checked your locker yesterday."
We took a right but I glanced at King. He gave me an all-knowing look. Wait. Did he actually open my locker? I stopped in the hallway and Piper bumped into me. She shot me a quizzical look but I just broke away from her to try and read King to see if he was serious. Why the hell did King open my locker?
"My little sister wanted me to drop off Uncle Adam a gift," King informed me, layers and layers to his words. To anyone else, it was just a comment between friends, but my muscles tensed, watching him.
"Time to get to work," I nodded the girls off towards the side entrance to the training field but I matched my stride with King, who finally shut up.
He said absolutely nothing. The silence was murder.
"It’s not what you think," I muttered.
King shrugged.
"A locker’s a sacred place. You’re not supposed to go looting through another man’s private quarters," I continued.
He grunted.
I ground my teeth in the back with all the questions that hung in the air. If I knew King was going to rifle through my shit, I would’ve cleaned it out before the conference and hid them somewhere else.
"Why do you have door decorations in your locker?" King finally said.
I scoffed but I had no idea what to say. Both Piper’s original door decoration—the turtle—and the brand new one she’d made for me, were hanging up in my locker. If they would’ve stayed on my door, someone would’ve stolen them. Which never bothered me before.
"It’s part of a…” I wracked my brain. “It’s part of a prank."
He didn’t say anything.
"It’s a prank—I’m doing the prank," I repeated. "But it’s a prank that’s not—you’ll figure it out when I put it in motion. I can’t explain it now. It’d ruin the magic."
A lone grin lifted on King’s lips. "Could you describe the prank? I’m struggling to picture it."
"Well, I’m struggling to picture football practice," I snapped. "We’re in the training center, talking like we don’t have things to do. Like getting prepared for next year’s Birchwood Bowl."
King chuckled and I stalked down the hallway.
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