Chapter 1

When Your Best Isn’t Good Enough

Sydney Shieh’s last pitch of the game traveled exactly where she wanted it to—low over the outside corner of the plate. It would have taken an impossibly angled swing to hit that thing, and the tip of Megan Mancuso’s bat scooped up a chunk of dirt as she tried for it. A mist of dry earth sprayed in front of her, and she ended her follow-through looking more like a golfer than a batter

Rubbing her palm against her pants, Sydney took a deep breath before walking off the mound. Her shoulders hurt where she’d been tensing them. She’d never struck out Megan Mancuso before. That girl seemed able to take Sydney deep no matter where she put the ball.

“Sydney! Sydney! Sydney!”

The lone voice cheering made Sydney cringe. That would be her girlfriend, Kayla, who knew how hard Sydney had worked to perfect the pitch that had taken Megan down, and who probably also knew that the three hits Sydney had allowed during the game were her fewest ever, and that this was the first time she’d pitched an entire game without walking anyone. Her pitch count had stayed low enough that the coach had kept her in every inning, and she knew that if she glanced toward where the relief pitchers sat, she’d see awed envy on every face.

That had undoubtedly been the best game she’d ever pitched, but now wasn’t the time for triumph. No one besides Kayla was cheering for Sydney and her team, the Central High Seabirds, because they weren’t winning. They didn’t have much chance of making up the difference in the last half inning of the game.

The opposing team, the Seacrest High Jaguars, had scored two runs off the three hits Sydney had allowed. Rebecca Howard, their pitcher, had allowed no hits at all. At this point, the Jaguars’ two-run lead looked insurmountable.

Even as Sydney made her way to the dugout, Rebecca was taking her place, ready to outshine her that key little bit more.

Sydney was too worked up to sit down. The adrenaline of pushing herself to a higher level than she’d pitched before surged through her body, but her heart ached with disappointment.

The crowd jumped to its feet for Rebecca—except Kayla, who was still shouting for Sydney. Glancing toward her beaming girlfriend, Sydney felt a flash of embarrassment. Kayla wore one of Sydney’s old jerseys and a Seabirds hat she’d made herself with puff paint. Her freckled cheeks and pinkish tan, the long blonde ponytail flowing through the back of the hat—they looked as cute as everything else about her. Sydney knew she ought to be happy to be with this girl and to have Kayla’s earnest, enthusiastic support.

Instead, Sydney couldn’t help feeling that, no matter how many stats Kayla could rattle off, she didn’t really get it. What did a personal achievement matter when her team was still going to lose? Sydney had pitched well, but Rebecca Howard had pitched better. That was the hard truth of the game.

Sydney leaned her lower body against the chain-link fence that separated the dugout from the field. She wound her fingers through the metal at waist height and watched Rebecca.

She was much smaller than Sydney, but more obviously muscular. Her dark skin glistened as she moved, that slight evidence of sweat the only sign she’d had to make any effort at all during the game. Even under the hot Florida sun, she looked cool, unfazed, barely squinting as she faced down the Seabirds’ star batter, Alyssa Tang. She’d shaved a Jinto the short hair on the side of her head. Sydney might have scorned that display of team spirit in someone else, but, at this moment, Rebecca seemed like the very soul of her team.

She flared her nostrils, then wound up for her first pitch of the inning. Sydney couldn’t help whistling under her breath at the way Rebecca exploded off the pitching rubber. She couldn’t have been much over five feet, but her stride during the windmill was as long as Sydney’s, if not longer, her back toe dragging in a straight line as her body traveled forward. It was textbook-perfect and powerful—Sydney wouldn’t have been surprised if the pitch Rebecca released was pushing seventy miles per hour—but the way Rebecca moved was also beautiful. She looked like a dancer as well as an athlete.

“I think I hate her,” Sydney muttered.

As if stunned by the grace of it all, Alyssa Tang struck out looking, not even taking a swing

The game was over after that. The remaining Seabirds, demoralized by Alyssa’s easy defeat, put up little fight. In a matter of minutes, Rebecca sat them both down, sealing the glory of her no-hitter.