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Twenty yards.

My lungs burned with every quick pant that escaped me.

Ten yards.

My legs screamed as I pushed myself to run faster.

Eight yards.

I was right there.

Five.

Almost.

Three.

The goal line rushed up on me.

One.

I crossed the big white line with every ounce of momentum I had left in me. My heart raged in my ears as I slowed. I stood there, panting and catching my breath as a stupid grin overtook my face.

For a fraction of a moment, the silence was deafening.

As I turned and thrust the ball in the air, the stadium erupted. Cheers, screams, and claps filled my ears, blending together as the sound grew louder.

On instinct, I glanced at the sidelines, searching for Rhodes. I shouldn’t have, but I couldn’t help it. His grin was as wide as mine as he clapped. My gaze lingered only a moment—I couldn’t handle any longer.

Across the field, Wyatt barely managed to catch Jude as he jumped on him in excitement. With the ball still in hand, I pointed at them. The next thing I knew, I was swallowed up by blue jerseys and screaming. Someone nearly knocked me off my feet, and another player ripped the ball out of my hands to spike it in celebration. I couldn’t stop laughing as I joined them in celebrating.

I was on top of the world.

CHAPTER 38

Theo

Iwas drunk on the locker room chaos. Music blasted from somewhere, water bottles turned into pretend beer bottles as everyone clinked them together in mock cheers, and someone had stolen Coach Hale’s visor to use as a victory trophy. We laughed, sang, and danced around.

Wyatt had somehow convinced half the offense to reenact my touchdown run using a towel as the football, and now Max’s locker had a massive dent we were all pretending wasn’t there. Their rendition was horribly inaccurate, but perfect anyway.

My cheeks hurt from smiling so hard, and I’d given up changing. I sat there in just my football pants, letting myself have fun. Jude was half naked and doing what he called his Theo’s getting drafted dance, like he hadn’t just had one hell of a throw.

When the locker room door opened, no one bothered looking up. We were on cloud nine and didn’t care.

“McLaughlin!” Rhodes bellowed from the doorway, his voice cutting through the noise. “Get dressed, and get out here! Someone wants to meet you.”

That single sentence reinvigorated the chaos. There was only one person Rhodes would pull me out to meet: a scout.

Holy shit. A scout had seen my best run yet.

The locker room exploded. Fists hammered against lockers, and teammates howled loud enough to drown out the music as hands clapped me on the back from every direction. Wyatt grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me so hard I nearly lost my footing while Jude was already chanting my name. The rest of the team quickly joined in until my face was so red it almost hurt from the burn.

“Get dressed!” Jude exclaimed. “You can’t go out there like that!”

I scrambled to get dressed, pulling on jeans and a t-shirt. I almost tumbled over as I tried to get into my shoes. Every minute spent getting dressed felt like a minute wasting the scout’s time. My teammates pushed me through the locker room, and I practically fell out the door while I tried to pull a sweatshirt over my head.

Strong hands caught me, steadying me until I was dressed. Unfortunately, those strong hands belonged to Rhodes. I pulled away quickly and put some distance between us. One touch from him was dangerous.