Page 14 of False Catch

He pauses, scanning our faces.

"What I haven't seen is a team go from exceptional to amateur in less than a week without explanation."

The silence is suffocating.

"Now," he continues, "I may be human, but I'm not stupid. Something happened at Riverside. Something that's affecting every aspect of your performance. And if you don't tell me what it is, I can't protect you from what's coming."

"What do you mean?" Gray asks carefully.

Coach Wilder speaks up. "The administration received a formal complaint yesterday. About inappropriate team dynamics. About potential designation fraud. About competitive violations that could result in immediate suspension."

My blood goes cold.

"From who?" Bo demands.

"Anonymous," Coach Wilder says. "But detailed. Someone who was at Riverside. Someone who saw something they thought was actionable."

Kinsley. Has to be. Or Andrea. Or both.

"There's going to be a review," Coach Bennett says. "Assistant Director Carmine from the Athletics Department will be observing practice tomorrow. Making assessments. Looking for anything that violates university policy."

"We haven't done anything wrong," Gray states.

"Haven't you?" Coach's eyes are sharp. "Because from where I'm standing, a team that was perfectly functional with a male Beta coxswain is now falling apart with a female one. That raises questions."

"It's an adjustment period," Tyler offers.

"Maybe." Coach doesn't sound convinced. "Or maybe there's something else going on. Something that could destroy everything we've built."

He moves to the whiteboard, erasing our Riverside times with quick strokes.

"I don't need to know details," he says, back still to us. "What I need is for you to get your shit together. Fast. Because if Carmine sees what I saw today, we're done. Not just as a competitive team. As a program."

He turns back to face us.

"The university is already nervous about mixed designation teams after what happened at Columbia last year. One Alpha-Omega bonding incident and their entire crew program was disbanded. Lawsuits. Title IX violations. Career-ending publicity."

His gaze finds Reese.

"Ms. Callahan, I took a chance accepting your transfer mid-season. I did it because you're talented and because this team needed you. But if your presence is going to destroy what these men have worked years to build..."

"It won't," she says firmly.

"Prove it." He looks at all of us. "Tomorrow's practice. Six AM. Assistant Director Carmine will be watching. So will coaches from other teams who'd love to see us fail. The JV crew will be on the water at the same time, showing what Sable Ridge is supposed to look like."

He heads for the door, then stops.

"One more thing. Humans make up eighteen percent of the population. We can't smell your pheromones or detect your designations. But we've learned to read the signs. The territorial behavior. The protective formations. The way eight Alphas suddenly can't row straight when their female coxswain's scent changes."

The words land like bombs.

"We evolved without designations," he continues. "Which means we evolved to observe, to analyze, to understand through pattern recognition what we can't detect through biology. So whatever you think you're hiding? You're not hiding it as well as you think."

He leaves, Coach Wilder following. The door closes with finality.

"Fuck," Beckett summarizes eloquently.

"He knows," Zane says, slumping in his chair. "He absolutely knows."