My Football Star Betrayed Me, So I Chose His Rival

Vanessa arrived at training in white boots with four-inch heels and Lucas’s jersey tied above her waist.

She brought a photographer, a publicist, and the perfume of expensive trouble. I was reviewing security arrangements beside the pitch when she drifted close enough for her shoulder to strike mine.

“Careful,” she said. “That tablet probably costs more than your dress.”

My dress was navy, professional, and none of her concern. “Visitors remain behind the marked line.”

“I’m not a visitor.” Her smile widened as Lucas jogged toward us. “Am I, baby?”

Lucas kissed her cheek. Around us, practice slowed by a fraction. Twenty men found fascinating reasons to look anywhere except at me.

Vanessa’s gaze dropped over my body. “I expected someone more…forgettable. Now I understand why she got confused.”

“Vanessa,” I warned.

“What? I’m complimenting you.” She leaned closer. “But a tight dress and a club badge don’t make you one of them. Staff should remember their place.”

I looked toward Captain Owen Price. He had watched me sit beside his hospital bed after knee surgery and argue with an airline until his wife got a seat on the team flight. He lowered his eyes.

I looked at our keeper, at our vice captain, at the young winger whose mother called me whenever he forgot to answer his phone.

No one said a word.

Lucas rolled the ball beneath his boot. “Let it go, Maya. She’s joking.”

The loneliness that moved through me was cold and clean. “Training begins in four minutes. If your guest interferes again, security will remove her.”

I walked away before they could see my hands tremble.

Ten minutes later, I was inside the office fixing a travel error Lucas had caused by ignoring three requests for his passport information. The irony was so sharp. I called the airline, persuaded them to reopen the manifest, and protected him from a fine he would never know existed.

Owen appeared in the doorway while I was printing the confirmation.

“I’m sorry about Vanessa,” he said.

“Are you?”

“She puts Lucas in a difficult position.”

I stared at him. “She insulted me. That put you in a difficult position?”

His face tightened. “We share a dressing room with him.”

“And you have to work with me.”

“That’s different.”

It was. Lucas scored goals. I prevented disasters quietly enough that the men benefiting from my work could pretend it happened by itself.

I handed Owen the updated itinerary. “His passport issue is fixed. Make sure he brings it tomorrow.”

Guilt flickered across his face, but guilt without courage was useless.

That evening, both Harbor City and Kingsport United held pre-derby gatherings at the Meridian Club. The venue had divided the second floor, navy banners on one side and Kingsport’s black-and-gold colors on the other.

I had no desire to attend, but a sponsor insisted. At ten, after smiling through ninety minutes of conversation, I slipped into the hall to breathe.

Male laughter spilled through the half-open door of Harbor City’s private lounge.

“Bennett rejected me last season like she was too good for me,” defender Dean Walsh said. “Turns out she was just saving herself for Lucas.”

“Don’t be bitter,” someone replied.

“I’m not. I’m curious. Is the ice-queen thing an act?”

There was a pause, then Lucas laughed.

Every instinct told me to leave. I stayed.

“In bed?” Lucas said. “She’s pretty, but she lies there like she’s waiting for a performance review. No imagination unless you give her instructions.”

The room erupted.

My throat closed.

Dean whistled. “And she acts like she’s royalty.”

“She’s clingy,” Lucas continued. “You give a woman one good night, suddenly she thinks she owns you.”

I pressed a hand over my mouth.

One good night.

I remembered kneeling between his knees while he threaded his fingers through my hair. Swallowing pills that made me sick because he complained about condoms. Letting him bind my wrists, photograph the marks, and call my trust beautiful.

I had shaped myself around his wants. He had turned my devotion into a locker-room joke.

The door shifted. I backed away, hit a solid chest, and nearly fell.

Two strong arms closed around me.

One hand spread at my waist. The other braced between my shoulder blades, holding me upright with effortless control. My palms landed on hard muscle beneath a black dress shirt. Heat surrounded me.

“Easy,” a deep voice said.

I looked up into Adrian Cole’s face.

Kingsport United’s twenty-nine-year-old captain was six foot three, dark-haired, and famous for destroying defensive lines without ever losing his temper. Cameras loved the severe line of his jaw. Opponents hated the way he could see space before it opened.

His eyes were not on my neckline or the slit of my dress. They were on the tears I had failed to hide.

“Maya?”

Hearing my name in his voice broke the last of my control.

I pushed away. His fingers tightened once at my waist—an instinctive effort to steady me—then opened immediately.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re crying.”

“I said I’m fine.”

I hurried toward the stairs.

Behind me, Adrian called my name again, but I could not bear one more football player witnessing my humiliation.

The next afternoon, Harbor City hosted Kingsport for a closed friendly training match. I had slept two hours. Sunglasses hid the damage until Vanessa arrived carrying a red velvet case.

She made sure both squads were near the benches when she screamed.

“My bracelet is gone.”

Her publicist searched her bag theatrically. Lucas strode over. “When did you last see it?”

“In the hospitality suite.” Vanessa’s eyes found me. “She was there.”

I had entered the suite to remove confidential lineup sheets Lucas had left behind. Vanessa knew it.

Security searched the room. Then a guard approached me with a sick expression and pulled the red case from the side pocket of my work tote.

A silence fell so complete I heard studs scraping turf.

“That isn’t mine,” I said.

Vanessa covered her mouth. “You stole from me?”

“I did not.”

Lucas stared at me as if I were a stranger. “Maya, just apologize.”

“For something I didn’t do?”

“You were jealous. I get it. But this is insane.”

I turned toward my team. “You actually believe I did this?”

No one answered.

Across the field, Kingsport’s players had stopped warming up. Adrian stood at their center, utterly still.

Vanessa’s voice softened with false mercy. “If she apologizes, I won’t press charges.”

Lucas stepped close. “Do it. Don’t make this uglier.”

My eyes burned, but I refused to lower them. “You already made it ugly.”

The club’s sporting director approached with two security officers. “Maya, we need you to come inside.”

Every man I had protected watched them escort me away.

Not one came with me.