Page 161 of Ruthless Court

Noor waits.

“Several possessions.”

“There she is.”

“He was making the same mistake.”

“So you fixed it.”

“I explained it.”

“To Stanford’s star point guard.”

“He was rushing his left-side reads after bad calls. Anyone paying attention could see it.”

“No one else did,” Noor says.

I look down at my hands.

That is the part I don’t want to examine too closely.

“He listened,” I say.

The words come quieter than the rest.

Lila stops smiling.

“He didn’t brush you off?”

“No. He argued, but he listened.”

That mattered more than it should have.

The boys I grew up around wanted my answers, not my opinions. They smiled when they needed an essay repaired and laughed when I pointed out something wrong on the court.

Kane fought me on every point.

Then changed the play when I proved mine.

“Our minds do this strange thing,” I say. “They crackle against each other.”

Lila leans closer.

“Crackle?”

“Push and pull. Like magnets. One second we’re trying to get as far apart as possible, then something flips and we’re right back in each other’s space.”

Noor studies me.

I keep talking because stopping would mean thinking.

“I’ve never been this stimulated by a man before.”

Lila’s mouth falls open.

“Not like that.”

Her smile spreads.