Chapter 1 Chapter 01

Skylar's POV

I stood at the gates of Crestfield University with one bag on my shoulder and a football under my arm. I could not believe I was here.

Me. Skylar Scott. A girl from a group home with nothing but a scholarship and one shot at a better life.

The buildings were tall and made of red brick. The grass was so green it looked fake. Students walked past me in clothes that cost more than everything I owned.

I held my football tighter.

"One season," I whispered to myself. "Win this season, and you go pro. Lose, and you go back to nothing."

I took a deep breath and walked toward the football building.

The locker room smelled like new paint and money. My locker was at the very end, and my name was on it in gold letters. SCOTT. Number 7. I touched the letters with my fingers.

"Well, well. Look what the wind blew in."

I turned around. A tall girl with long blonde hair stood behind me. She wore a white jacket with a gold C on it, and two other girls stood at her sides like guards.

"Can I help you?" I asked.

"I'm Penelope Harrington," she said. "My father paid for this building. Every locker, every light, every towel in here. So, you could say I'm the boss."

"Okay," I said. "Nice to meet you, Penelope."

She did not shake my hand. She looked at my bag.

"We don't allow dirty rags in this locker room," she said. "Let's see what other trash you brought in here."

Before I could stop her, she grabbed my bag and pulled it open.

"Hey! What are you doing?" I shouted. "Stop it! Those are my clothes!"

Penelope pulled out my old gray sweater and held it up with two fingers like it was a dead rat.

"Oh my God," she said. "Ew!"

Her friends laughed.

"This is so ugly," one of them said.

"These clothes are so old, I wouldn't even clean my car with them," Penelope said. She threw the sweater on the wet floor. "Oh, never mind. Wear them to practice. They'll match the dirt."

"Give me my bag!" I reached for it.

Penelope stepped back and held it high. "Say please, scholarship girl."

"Let go!"

I grabbed the strap and pulled hard. Penelope pulled back. Her friend shoved my shoulder, my feet slipped on the wet floor, and I fell backward.

I hit someone. Hard.

A cup of iced coffee flew into the air and landed right on the chest of a boy in a white polo shirt.

The whole room went quiet.

I looked up. And up. And up.

He was tall, with dark hair, sharp brown eyes, and a jaw that looked like it was cut from stone. Coffee dripped down his shirt and onto his expensive white sneakers.

I knew who he was. Everyone in America knew who he was.

Owen Caldwell. The star wide receiver of Crestfield. The golden boy of college football.

And my brother Ryan's best friend.

"Are you serious right now?" Owen said, looking down at his shirt.

"I... I'm so sorry," I said. "She pushed me, and I..."

"You idiot," he said. "Look what you made me do."

Penelope gasped and ran to his side. "Baby! Oh my God, your shirt!"

Baby? Of course. She was his girlfriend.

"Did you see that?" one of Penelope's friends laughed. "She was looking at him like a sad puppy."

"What a loser," the other one said.

I pushed myself up from the floor. My hands were wet, and my face was hot.

Owen pulled the wet polo away from his chest. "This shirt was brand new. Do you know how much it cost?"

"No," I said. "And I don't care."

He raised one eyebrow. Then he pulled the shirt off over his head and threw it at me. It hit my face and fell into my hands.

"Wash it," he said. "Dry it. Whatever you do, don't shrink it."

I stared at him. "Excuse me? I'm not your servant."

"Then wash yourself while you're at it," Penelope said. "You smell like a bus station."

The girls laughed again.

"You're messing with the wrong person, charity case," Penelope said.

"Look at her," a boy said from the doorway. A few football players had come in to watch. "She can barely stand on her own feet."

"There's no way she's any good on the field," another player said. "She's going to break in half the first time she gets hit."

Owen bent down and held out his hand to me. For one second, I thought he was being kind.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"I think so," I said, and I took his hand. "Thank you."

He pulled me up. Then he leaned close and said in a low voice, "Do yourself a favor. Go home before you embarrass Ryan."

My heart stopped. "You know who I am?"

"Everybody knows who you are," he said. "The girl quarterback. The pity scholarship. The little sister Ryan begged me to babysit."

"I don't need a babysitter."

"Good," Owen said. "Because I don't babysit."

A big boy with broad shoulders and a shaved head walked over. He was the size of a refrigerator.

"Don't mind these idiots," he told me. "They're full of themselves. I'm Zeke. Zeke Brown. I play center."

"Skylar," I said.

"Zeke," Owen said. "Don't feed the stray."

Something inside me snapped.

"Hey, Owen!" I shouted.

He turned around. So did everyone else.

"I am not a charity case," I said. "I'm here because of my talent. Not because of my family's money."

Owen crossed his arms over his bare chest. "What are you trying to say?"

"I'm saying that without your last name, you are nothing special," I said. "Care to prove you're worth more than your bank account on the field?"

The players all said "Ooooh" at the same time.

Owen laughed. "You want to challenge me?"

"Throwing challenge," I said. "Right now. Five targets. First to five wins."

"I'm a receiver," he said. "I catch balls. I don't throw them."

"Scared?"

His smile died. "I'll destroy you."

Twenty minutes later, half the team stood on the practice field. Somebody had hung five old tires from the goal post, and Zeke stood by them with a clipboard to keep score.

Owen held a shiny new football with the Crestfield logo on it. I held mine.

Penelope looked at my ball and laughed out loud. "You can't be serious. You're going to throw with that piece of junk?"

My football was old. The brown leather was scratched and faded. The white laces were gray now. But it was the only thing I had carried with me from the group home.

"Oh, you mean Hope?" I said.

Owen blinked. "You named your football?"

"Yeah," I said. "Her name is Hope. Because when I had nothing else, I had her. She and I have never missed a target together."

"Well," Owen said, "you're about to."

He threw first. The ball flew through the air and went straight through the first tire.

The players cheered. Penelope clapped and screamed his name.

I threw next. Hope sailed through the air and went through the first tire without even touching the sides.

The cheers stopped.

"Lucky throw," Owen said.

We went back and forth. Two to two. Three to three. Owen was good, better than I wanted him to be. But I had been throwing a football at old tires behind the group home since I was seven years old. I did not miss.

On his fifth throw, Owen took a deep breath. He threw. The ball hit the edge of the tire and bounced off.

"Miss!" Zeke shouted.

The crowd went silent.

"Four to four," Zeke said. He looked at me and grinned. "Last throw, Skylar! Hit this one, and it's over!"

I looked at the last tire. It was swinging in the wind. My hands were shaking. Everyone was watching. Penelope. The players. Owen.

I closed my eyes for one second and thought of Ryan in the backyard of the group home, telling me, "Don't look at the people, Sky. Look at the target."

I opened my eyes. I pulled my arm back.

And I threw.

Hope spun through the air in a perfect spiral and flew straight through the center of the last tire.

For a moment, nobody made a sound.

Then I threw my fists in the air. "Take that, Owen Caldwell!"

Owen stared at the tire. His face went red. He kicked the grass.

"Damn it!" he shouted. "Damn it!"

The players started talking all at once.

"Oh my God," a girl said, holding up her phone. "The scholarship girl just beat Owen Caldwell."

Another player laughed and pointed at Owen.

"Hashtag humiliation."