All That Went Unsaid | Complete (18+)

Chapter 20

Raymond Reynold's POV

Mornings were brutal, but I liked them that way. The sharp bite of early wind against sweat-slicked skin, the burn in my calves as we sprinted through drills, the sound of cleats pounding the turf like war drums—it all grounded me. It reminded me that I was still here, still building, still fighting for something.

The Tokyo tournament was just a week away. Coach had us on a regimen so strict, we could probably train in our sleep. We ran plays until our legs turned to lead, lifted until our muscles trembled, and reviewed footage late into the night. Discipline, focus, repetition. That was the rhythm of our days. My body ached constantly, but it was a good kind of ache. The kind that came from purpose.

And yet, even in the thick of all this, she lived at the back of my mind.

 I'd text her every night, asking how the lab was holding up, if there were any replies from potential investors, my urge to know more about her was getting out of hand. If she'd eaten, slept, breathed that day. Sometimes she answered, sometimes she didn't. I never stopped trying.

The guys noticed. Of course they did.

We were more than teammates—we were brothers. There wasn't a single thing that slipped past Hudson or Caleb. We'd bled together, celebrated together, cried in locker rooms and on long bus rides home. We knew each other's silences as well as we knew each other's stats.

"You seeing that girl everyone's whispering about?" Hudson asked one afternoon as we walked off the pitch, sweat dripping down our necks, the sun setting fire to the sky behind us.

"What's her name?" Caleb added with a smirk. "Sophie?"

I just shrugged, tossing my towel over my shoulder. "It's not like that. It's just stupid gossip columns", and they should know better than to believe it. 

Hudson gave a knowing look. "Yeah, and I'm the Queen of England."

I didn't say anything. 

Caleb elbowed me with a shit-eating grin. "I've got it," he announced like he'd just cracked a damn code.

I raised a brow, already dreading whatever theory he was about to lay out.

He turned to James and Hudson, pointing a triumphant finger at me. "It's her. She's the one."

Hudson blinked. "The one what?"

"The girl he's been stuck on for years," Caleb said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "C'mon, you guys didn't notice? It's always been her."

James gave me a look—curious, knowing. Hudson's face twisted in that slow dawning realization.

James chimed in later, tossing a protein bar my way as we cooled down in the locker room. "You remember when I set you up with Hannah's sister?" he asked, peeling off his jersey.

"Oh, that poor girl," Hudson groaned with a laugh.

"She thought you were into her," James continued, "until you ghosted her out of nowhere. Said you were sweet, polite, even charming—but completely uninterested once things got real. Hannah was pissed."

I chuckled quietly, running a hand through my damp hair. "I wasn't trying to be an asshole."

James shook his head. "You weren't. You just... weren't in it. Not really. And now I know why."

 The next morning sun hadn't even cleared the rooftops yet, and I was already on the field, sweat beading along my temple, cleats pounding the turf as I charged forward, dodged a tackle, and struck the ball clean into the net.