Deep End(117)

“Let me say it,” he demands. “I want to say it. Just once.”

I know what he means. I cannot take it. I bury my head in his throat and shake it, because I cannot.

“Scarlett,” he pleads. “Let me tell you, please.”

Pen, I think. There’s Pen. And everything else. The future. The past. What if he says it, and then I lose him. What if I fail at this, too? How will I bear it, then?

He’s so deep inside me, my entire body trembles with it. “Please,” I beg. “Don’t.”

“The thing is.” His forehand drops against mine. “I don’t know if I can keep it in.”

“I just—I—”

He grunts in frustration, but then says, “Hush. It’s okay, baby.” He moves a little faster, a little harder, cupping the back of my head and leading it to the spot at the base of his throat, holding it there like he wants to protect me from something, and a moment later the shudders start, and my cries are muffled into his body, and I’m coming like a dam breaking, and Lukas — He says it.

Just, not in English. Slow, musical sentences. Words, repeated over and over. I’m awash with them as he comes inside me, his broad shoulders shaking under my arms. And yet, I have the luxury of pretending that I cannot understand him.

I cry anyway. After, he kisses my tears dry, and he’s not angry, or impatient, or anything but reveling.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I just . . . I need to . . . I need to square out a couple things. Make sure Pen is . . . before I can . . .”

He nods. “I know.” He pulls out of me, and I gasp at the sensation. He kisses the intake of breath off my mouth. “It’s okay. We’re going to figure it out. I l—” He huffs a small, rueful laugh, catching himself. His hand touches my cheek, and then he straightens my clothes, scattering kisses on me like breadcrumbs. “Let me take you home and—”

Buzzing startles me. Lukas finishes zipping up my shorts and pats the pocket of his jeans, looking for his phone. “Pen?” he asks, a tinge of impatience in his tone. There was no ringtone, which means that he must have deactivated the emergency bypass.

He tenses. Pen’s sobs are so loud, even I can hear them, and he’s saying things like Calm down, and Where are you? and Slower.

“Come on.” He tells me after hanging up, taking my hand. “We need to go get her.”





CHAPTER 61


IT’S A WEIRD SETUP, PEN AND ME IN THE BACK OF THE CAR WHILE Lukas drives. I’d throw out a joke about his Uber driver career, but humor would no more benefit the situation than picking up a serial-killing hitchhiker.

“I didn’t do it.” Her sobs have slowed to quiet sniffles. “You believe me, right?”

I squeeze her hand tight. “Yes, of course.” The more I think about it, the surer I am. Pen is no fool and she certainly wouldn’t jeopardize her NCAA eligibility by taking banned substances.

“When did you get the AAF?” Lukas asks.

“The what?”

“The notice of adverse analytical finding,” I whisper.

“Right, duh. Sorry, I had a shot on an empty stomach. I feel like a boulder just dropped onto my head.” She rubs her face. “Half an hour ago. I was at that party with Vic, but couldn’t find her, so I took out my phone to call her and . . . the athletic director emailed me and Coach Sima. It’s from the Pac-12 sample. Not even a random test!”

Lukas nods. “When was the previous time you got tested?”

“Five, six months ago? Diving nationals. ”

“And your diet hasn’t changed? No new prescription medications? Drug use, vitamins, supplements?”

Pen gasps. “Lukas, you know me.”

“I know very little about your daily life, by now.” He says it without inflection, but it ticks her off enough to twist her hand out of mine. She leans forward, gripping the headrest of his seat.

“My brain hasn’t turned into clam chowder in the past year. I know how easy it is to get a positive doping test. I would not take unregulated substances without running them by the team physician.”

He nods, unfazed by her defensiveness. “What are you positive for?”

“I didn’t—” She slumps back, bare arm brushing against mine. “Anabolic steroids? Where the fuck would I even get those? Do they think I’m cooking meth in my laundry room?”

“And this was the A sample?”

“Yeah. Jesus. I don’t even—what’s going to happen now, Luk?”

“Back when they tested you, they took a B sample, right?”

“Yeah.”

It’s a process all DI athletes are intimately familiar with. Chugging down gallons of water to pee in front of some lady who needs an unobstructed view of me filling a plastic beaker has been part of my life for years, and I barely register the unpleasantness. Every time, we’re asked to fill two bottles. The A sample is used for testing. B is frozen. If the A sample comes back positive, B is used for retesting when the athlete contests the results.

I’ve heard of a few people having to go through that, but they were always grapevine stories. Some cross-country junior. A diver who graduated before I joined the team. Friends of acquaintances. Famous athletes in the news. This just feels . . . odd.