Excerpt from The Falconer by Dana Czapnik, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

I squint and purr back at him, "Let's see whatchya got."

Why did I tempt him? His arms are long and his hands are quick, so I put my right arm up to ward him off and dribble with my left. Lean into him with my elbow. He reaches across my chest, grazing my breasts. What little I got is bound against my ribs by a sports bra, so I doubt he feels anything that moves him. He swipes at the ball from under my forearm, and I heave up a Hail Mary.

"Reach-in!" I yell as the ball sails overhead and lands with a high bounce right behind him.

"You can't be serious. You are not calling a reach-in on me. No blood, no foul. Don't be a pussy."

"I'm tryna help you with the little problem you have with self-control. In a game, a ref 's gonna call that on you."

Percy doesn't believe in stifling one's id. He's a creature governed by the pleasure principle, and because of that he can't resist the reach-in. It feels too good when he gets away with it, so it's always worth the risk.

"Whatever. You just wanna win."

I smile. "Maybe." I walk to the line. "So, you gonna honor it?"

"Such bullshit. Sure, go ahead. Take your fucken' free throw. It'll make beating you more fun." He bullets me the ball. I catch it and don't flinch.

Five dribbles. Bend the knees. Squat. Square my body. Release. Damn. Just missed. Percy snatches the rebound before I can even make it a contest.

For a second, I glance over at the guys playing full-court five-on-five next to us. They're mainly black and Hispanic kids, but there are a couple of white guys and an Asian kid playing. They all look to be somewhere close to our age, maybe a little older. They're playing shirts and skins. The guys on skins for the most part deserve it—sleek six-packs and taut outtie belly buttons abound. They're swimming in their worn-out Nike shorts, the waistbands of their Hanes peeking out. They're shouting, Watch him. Watch him. Me. Me. Me. Pass it. Pass it. Shoot the ball, pussy. They're clapping, they're smacking each other's backs, they're laughing. Their boom box has been blasting some random mix of hip-hop—some Beastie Boys and Das EFX and now Slam! Duh-dun-uh, duh-dun-uh, Let the boys be boys! The speakers can't handle the bass. The music pours over the courts, tinny and harsh. Doesn't matter, though. It's the beat they're after.

The shirts asked Percy to join their team as soon as we walked onto the courts in Riverside Park. Why wouldn't they? Just look at him: six-foot-three rangy beast. He glanced at me first for approval and said, "Sure, we'll play." They said, "Just you, not the girl." Percy spit on the court near them, a nice fat loogie. "Your loss. She can kick all your asses." Melt my little girlie heart. What those kids on shirts don't know is that Percy is better with me as a pickup game teammate. Do they know how many hours we've spent on his alley-oop? Do they know that no one can put it in the exact right spot for him like I can? Do they know that we've been playing together on these courts since we were fucking embryos? That we are basketball telepaths at this point? They don't know shit.

I walked away from them feeling both triumphant and tiny as a pinprick. Screw them, anyway. We played the middle-aged fatties instead and won. I'll take it.

I get into the beat of the hip-hop they're blasting. My temporary metronome. I perch myself on the balls of my feet, try to get ready to play D, but my concentration slips for a bit, and that's all it takes. Percy's on the board.

"So it's like that," I say.

"If you play crap defense, I'll drop bombs on you all day."

"Shuddup and check it back already."

This time I play the dirty defense I know he likes. Force him weak side, his right. He drops his left shoulder and pushes it into my collarbone. I use all my strength and body up. Play whatever weight I've got. Try to knock him off balance. He bangs back into me, but he's delusional if he thinks he can move me that easy. Contact like this is what I live for. I try to outmuscle him. Push back at him hard, so hard I find that I'm basically growling, like the effort it takes to defend him requires the help of every muscle in my body, including my solar plexus. Every time we collide back together, the crash of our bodies is harder and harder. He's banging into me with a force I know is going to leave me with tender surface bruises. It feels good. But I can't keep it up. It's getting more difficult to push him off me. The electromagnetic pull between us too strong. Each time I grunt, Percy's smile gets bigger and bigger and ... Wait. Shit. He's ... toying with me. He could easily just shoot the ball, but he wants to see me work. Nuh-uh. Lucy. Adler. Does. Not. Get. Played. So I stop. I lay off him. He pulls back and dribbles the ball a couple times and shoots. His shirt lifts up, and I get a brief, teasing glimpse at his happy trail, which is dirty blond and sweaty. Damn. I shouldn't have looked. Hopefully he didn't notice.

Excerpted from The Falconer by Dana Czapnik . Copyright © 2019 by Dana Czapnik . Excerpted by permission of Atria Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.