Page 506 of Bad Prince

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CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

Stella

The entire campus knows—not suspects.

Knows.

That’s the first thing I realize when I step out of the SUV before dawn with my duffel over one shoulder, Tristan’s stupidly soft Newport hoodie on my body, and the whole impossible weekend still warm in my blood.

The athletic complex is mostly dark, but not quiet. Even before sunrise, student-athlete life has a pulse—doors opening, shoes squeaking in distant halls, the low hum of people who belong to schedules more than sleep.

And somehow, against all odds, I have become news.

I see it in the first girl who passes me outside the side entrance and does a full double take.

In the second who glances from my face to the hoodie to my wrist and then immediately down to her phone.

In the fact that when I check mine on the way into the locker room, I have three texts from teammates, two from unknown numbers, and one from Lila that just says:

#S&T??????

I close my eyes briefly, pinch the bridge of my nose—people have already named us, after years of silence and almosts and buried history, the second Tristan and I finally step into the light together, it turns into content.

Fine.

Let them choke on it.

I walk into the locker room and the entire team goes dead silent.

Fourteen girls.

One trainer.

Half-open lockers.

Tape, shoes, water bottles, the smell of menthol and damp cotton and too-early effort.

And every single one of them looking at me.

Then Lila, because she is incapable of not kicking the hornet’s nest, slowly lowers her phone and says, “Well, well, well.”

Mari leans back against her locker, eyes wide.

“Is it true?”

I drop my bag onto the bench.

“That depends.”

“That you disappeared all weekend with basketball royalty and came back looking like a postgame perfume ad,” Lila says.

My face goes hot.

Which is the worst possible reaction, because the entire room explodes instantly.

“Oh my God.”

“Look at her face.”

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