“Yeah? You know some stats?” Jason asks, loading up his bar with tens on each side to warm up.
“Pish. She’s not a statistician. She’s a coach.”
A coach? Really? I would never have guessed that and not because she’s a woman, but because she looks more like a bookworm than someone interested in sports.
“Okay, you can keep your mouth shut now, Jerry,” she says, her face taking on a scary shade of pink.
“What? You are. Don’t sell yourself short, Milly. You know your way around the baseball field better than anyone I know.”
Milly and baseball? Panini line girl knows a little something about the sport? Is that why she was weird in the dining hall, because she’s a huge baseball fan? I mean, she is wearing those little baseball earrings again.
“You know baseball?”
“Her brother is—”
“Shut. It.” Milly takes on a scary deep voice, full of warning—like Satan popped out of her mouth and bitch-slapped Jerry.
“Don’t be mad at me. I’m just telling it like it is,” Jerry says, shrugging off how upset she is.
And I was the start of that. Now I feel like a dick. Again.
Glancing at my weight chart, she folds her arms across her chest and says, “You know, you’re right. You lift too much. I’ll get Vinny to help you.”
Without another word, she turns around and starts walking away.
Shit.
Now I feel like an even bigger dick.
“Hey, wait. You can—” But she doesn’t let me finish. Instead, she disappears into the office.
I stand there, silent, staring at the office, guilt hitting my chest. Even though I’m going through a tough time right now, I shouldn’t take it out on other people. I’m not really that man, and to be honest, I’m disappointed he’s the only version of me she’s met. I used to be better.
I step to go after her and apologize . . . again, but Jerry stills me with a hand to my chest. “Let her do her thing. She’ll only get more irritated if you go in after her.”
“But if I don’t, I’ll look like an asshole.”
“Trust me, she probably already thinks you are.”
“Great,” I mutter and slink back to my weight rack, where I put on the same amount of weight as Jason, who already started squatting.
I grip the bar, steady my legs beneath me, and lift. I step back and get into position where I start counting off my squats in my head, all the while, peeking in the mirror of the weight room to see if she’s watching.
No such luck.
When I’m done with my warm-up set, I rack up more weight, building up to two-fifty, while Jerry sits between both of us, observing with a watchful eye.
“She really knows her stuff, you know.”
“Who? That girl?” Jason asks.
“Milly. And yes, she does. I’ve seen her work magic on batters before. She grew up with three older brothers, dedicated her life to the sport, and all she really wants is to be taken seriously in this field. Maybe you’ll give her a shot, since you seem to be in a slump.”
It’s a jab, a direct one. A fucking ballsy move too, but then again, I just insulted his friend—or girlfriend, who knows—and he has his armor on display.
Feeling defensive and unable to hold back, I say, “We have the best coaches in the country on staff. I’m sure they can pick out anything we might be doing wrong.”
His brows lift as he looks to the side. “Sure, okay. Keep telling yourself that.” He pats his hands on his legs and stands. “I’ll be in the office if you need me.”
He takes off, and Jason and I both stare at each other in disbelief.
Okay, conceited moment coming up in three, two, one . . .
If there’s one thing I’ve gotten used to since I’ve come to Brentwood, it is the immense amount of ass-kissing we’re privileged to, not only by the student population but the administration and faculty too. No one ever gives us shit. Rather, they roll out the red carpet wherever we walk. So to have someone shoot some salt our way, it’s kind of . . . shocking.
Still confused, Jason asks, “Did he just give us attitude?”
I glance behind us and then back at Jason. “I think he did.”
“Huh.” He smiles. “I fucking liked it.”
“Yeah, it was . . . different. But I’ll tell you what I didn’t like—feeling like an ass.”
“Then don’t act like one.”
“You think I was acting like an ass?”
“Uh, yeah.” He laughs. “You could have at least heard the girl out. Maybe she has some secret sauce you need to drink.”
“You think she would have more knowledge than Disik at this point?”
He shrugs and squats under his bar, loading it onto his shoulders. “Couldn’t hurt to find out.”
Chapter Forty-One
MILLY
“Come on, Milly, it’s been two days, you can stop giving me the cold shoulder.”
My feet eat up the paved stone of the beautiful, historic campus. Coffee in hand, and a determined stride, I try to distance myself from Jerry.
I am still . . . humiliated.
Why did he push me on Carson?
I’m a prideful woman and won’t ever turn down a challenge, but there was no way I could have spotted Carson Stone. He’s at least ten inches taller than I am, his squatting weight was obscene, but if he had faltered, we would have crashed down together. And that’s not only dangerous, but it would have bruised my pride as well.
And then when Jerry opened his mouth about me possibly lending some advice to Carson on his swing, I couldn’t have been more embarrassed. I don’t advertise my coaching, or the fact that my brother is Cory Potter, because I want to be able to prove myself on my own. I don’t need to be begging for opportunities or using my brother’s name to back me.
I stick with my eight-year-olds, because they think the world of me. And who knows. Maybe I’m training up a future generation of professional athletes. There’s satisfaction in that.
“Milly, come on.” Jerry pulls on my shoulder. “At least talk to me.”
I have some time before class—thanks to my power walking—so I stop my pursuit to the classroom and step aside so we’re not in the middle of the walkway. “Why did you do it? Why did you try to force Carson on me?”
Stunned that I’m actually talking to him—I’m good at the cold shoulder, it’s not the first time he’s gotten it—he stutters a second. “I . . . uh . . . I thought, you know, you’d want to talk to him. You’ve always wished we were in the weight room with the baseball team and there was your chance.”
“The last thing I want to do is bother the baseball team while they’re trying to work out. That was humiliating, Jerry. And what would have happened if he actually needed spotting? There is no way I could have assisted him.”
“He’s Carson Stone. He doesn’t need assisting when it comes to weights.”
“That’s beside the point. You put me in a stupid situation and in the end, I was burned. You saw the look on his face when you said I could help him. If I wasn’t standing directly in front of him, he would have laughed out loud.”