When Kristie wakes up the next morning, the bed is empty on the other side, while the file is gone. The blonde shakes her head.

Damn it.

Kassey, who is now on her car, makes the call.

"Hello ?" a girl with a British accent asks, worried.

"Hey, Lucy, it's Kass" the defender says, setting her jaw. "We're ready for phase two."

___________________

Two weeks later

Lucy Bronze enters the room, nervously walking toward her new teammates.

Sam Mewis is the first person to come to her, obviously excited. With everything that has been happening - and Julie Johnston still in the hospital because her pregnancy is demanding a lot out of her body - seeing some fresh blood on the team is pretty reassuring. When she catches eyes with the brunette tho, something in her changes.

God she's beautiful.

The current Stanford captain stands there, in front of her, not able to say anything. That makes Lucy smirk.

"Good morning" the British says in a casual voice.

But Sam is not casual at all.

"Hi, hello, I mean, good morning to you to" she awkwardly stammers, before shaking her head. "U-uh, sorry, I..."

"Yo, Sammy, let the girl breathe" Cari Roccaro says, putting her hands on Sam's shoulders. She then looks at the newcomer, before forcing a smile. "Welcome to Stanford ! You must be Lucy ?"

"I am"

Lucy's voice is pretty confident and deep, but Cari is not fooled easily ; the brunette might be talking to her at the moment, but her eyes are wandering on Sam. The defender then smirks, before dragging Sam by the arm somewhere else because she says something stupid.

Meanwhile, the British starts greeting the other girls who now are her teammates.

The truth about Lucy is that she's always been kind of evil ; that one day, when her and her younger brother were left alone by their parents, she forced him (more manipulated, to be honest) to do something dangerous. In the process, he broke three ribs and his arm, and when their parents came back home and found him like that - and Lucy peacefully looking at the TV in front of her, they decided to put her in a private school so that they wouldn't have to deal with them all the time.

Nevertheless, she got accepted at Cambridge before having her file transferred to Stanford because of her great soccer abilities. But things weren't that easy : Lucy's mother now hates her, and wanted nothing to do with her anymore. So money became an issue, until Hope Solo found her and offered to finance her studies as long as she helps her with something. Leaving the British kind of out of options, Hope made her accept the deal.

And Lucy doesn't regret it ; after spending a few months in Florida State University, Hope asked her to go to Stanford, and she accepted : who wouldn't go to one of the best schools out there ? It would be madness.

The brunette accepts the glass of juice Olivia Schough is handing her, before sitting next to her. Of course she knows who she is, because Hope filled her in. She's a possible target, so getting pretty close to her is one of the things she has to do here. Lucy's not here to harm anyone - even Hope knows that - but since she's pretty good manipulation skills-wise, she needed her here no matter what.

Especially since her girlfriend is behind bars now, because Hope is determined to get her out of here as soon as possible.

"So, Lucy, who the hell are you ?" Leah Galton asks, feeling a weird vibe around the new defender of the squad.

The British girl senses that, and also the fact that Leah in fact is also from England. So she smirks and puts her 'good girl' mask :

"British interrogatory, I like that" she lets out, which makes some of her new teammates laugh - all of them except for Leah and Sam, who is looking at her from the other side of the room. "Nah, seriously : I'm a random person. Really. The only crazy thing I've done was to break the glass of a store not on purpose."

Her teammates burst into laughter, and even Leah cracks a smile.

"You're full back, right ?" Ramona asks, raising her eyebrows.

"Yes, exactly. I like playing in the wing, actually." That must be the Swiss girl Kassey told me about : irrelevant so you can be friendly to her. So when Ramona and Olivia exchange an amused look - mostly because the Swede knows her and Leah will play in close collaboration with Lucy in the close future - the Brit quickly adds : "Oh, I almost forgot : I have to meet your coach for the papers."

That makes the Swiss smirk.

"Well, it's up to our captain to go with you, right Sammy ?"

If the blonde was more uncomfortable than she is now, she would have made a heart attack. When Lucy sees who 'Sammy' is, she smiles in the inside and thinks : so that lost little lamb is their captain ? Very well. Pulling out her most cute smile, Lucy gets up and looks at Sam, who just tells her to come with her.

As they make it to the coach's office, they both get a hand on the door handle, before Sam starts blushing as hell. Lucy has a smirk on her face when she says :

"You're cute when you smile."

Sam seems to be stroke by lightning, but fortunately enough for her, the door opens and Laura Harvey smiles at them.

*

Julie sighs.

Ever since her former teammates - aka Becky, Kelsey and Shelina (even though they've never really been teammates) - left this morning, she knew there was no way out. Because when she saw Maro and Kop side by side, looking at her in a tensed atmosphere, she knew she had to keep her composure.

How am I supposed to chose between two girls that I love ?

She felt the distance Kop has put in, and knows that the goalie probably is thinking that she stands no chance against Maro, who has been here for a while now. Julie's stomach is hurting right now, and it has nothing to do with the baby.

As Zach went to look for some Ice Tea for Julie to drink, Mal stayed by Julie's side. The other newbie have exams coming up, but since the youngster already got hers, she thought that coming to visit the blonde every morning was a good idea. And Julie is happy about that, because Maro wouldn't try anything while someone else is here.

So as the German left the room, Mal smiles to Julie.

"You're in trouble, friend."

"I knew that already" Julie lets out, obviously annoyed by the whole situation. "Obviously"

"You're right, sorry"

"What about you and Jessie ?"

Mal immediately tenses up, but after a short blank, she says :

"Well, it's doing great... I mean, we are doing great... Step by step, you know."

Julie puts her hand on Mal's.

"I'm happy for youm Mal. You finally found someone that deserves you." The blonde honestly says, before smirking because of the concerned face the younger girl has on. "But I hope you know basically everybody on the team is about to 'investigate' on that poor Jessie to decide whether or not she's good enough, right ?"

Mal shakes her head theatrically.

"I'd rather not think about that, to be honest."

"Poor Jessie."

"Poor Jessie indeed."

But Mal has stars in her eyes.

_____________________________