by Lucia Franco
Copyright © 2016 by Lucia Franco
Edited by Nadine Winningham
Cover Design by Romantic Book Affairs
Photography by Madison Mooring Photography
Cover Models Ethan Jose and Haley Scaman
Interior Design and Formatting by: E.M. Tippetts Book Designs
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Other novels by Lucia Franco
About Balance
Dedication
Quote
Reader Letter
Glossary of Terms
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Acknowledgements
About the Author
When Stars Collide
Copyright © 2016 by Lucia Franco
You’ll Think of Me
Hold On to Me
Adrianna Rossi is no stranger to the rigorous demands required of her body. Years of pain and determination make her one of the best. Olympic glory is the ultimate goal, and she'll do anything to achieve it. Even if that means leaving home to attend World Cup Academy of Gymnastics, a training center that serves one purpose—producing champions.
Perfection, precision, and dedication are required of his athletes. When two time Olympian Konstantin Kournakova is persuaded into training the young hopeful, he immediately regrets it. She doesn't come close to his high standards. As the relentless pursuit of her dream keeps her striving, a passion is ignited within him.
Kova's power and domination, coupled with Adrianna's fierce tenacity, reveal there is more for her body to learn. Every interaction can be misconstrued, but there’s no mistaking the darkening of his gaze, the lingering of his touch, or the illicit image of his bare skin pressed against hers. Integrity is on the line. One toe off the beam and their forbidden desires could ruin everything they’ve worked for, throwing it all off balance.
Alyssa West, thank you for supporting—and loving—my crazy and wild idea for the Off Balance series, probably more than anyone. You’ve been by my side since the beginning, continuously encouraging me, and allowing me to bounce tons of ideas off you. I could never thank you enough.
Kova is all yours.
“Any coach who has been coaching for ten years and says he never fell in love with an athlete or vice versa is lying.”
—Anonymous
Dear Reader,
Much like a student teacher novel, Balance is a forbidden romance story between a gymnast and a coach. If you find that genre of novels to be not to your liking in any way, shape, or form, Balance is not for you.
This novel is purely fictional and does not reflect on real life events. Gymnastics is a very hands on sport that involves a lot of close contact with an instructor. My main goal was to focus on the beauty of the actual sport, but also show what goes on behind closed doors and how working with a coach for nearly forty hours a week can transpire into something more. This story is meant to push you, take you outside your comfort zone. I hope you take the plunge and look outside the box before making judgment.
Balance contains explicit content some may find offensive. It is intended only for readers 18 years and older. If graphic language and underage, consensual sex are bothersome to you, I highly suggest not reading this novel. Reader discretion is advised.
—Lucia
All-Around A category of gymnastics that includes all the events. The all-around champion of an event earns the highest total score from all events combined.
Amanar A Yurchenko-style vault, meaning the gymnast performs a round-off onto the board, a back handspring onto the vault with a two and a half twisting layout back flip.
Cast A push off the bar with hips and lifts the body to straighten the shoulders and finish in handstand.
Deduction Points taken off a gymnast’s score for errors. Most deductions are pre-determined, such as a 0.5 deduction for a fall from an apparatus or a 0.1 deduction for stepping out of bounds on the floor exercise.
Dismount The last skill in a gymnastics routine. For most events the method used to get off of the event apparatus.
Elite International Elite, the highest level of gymnastics.
Execution The performance of a routine. Form, style, and technique used to complete the skills constitute the level of execution of an exercise. Bent knees, poor toe point and an arched or loosely-held body position are all examples of poor execution.
Giant Performed on bars, a swing in which the body is fully extended and moving through a 360 degree rotation around the bar.
Full-In A full-twisting double back tuck, with the twist happening in the first back flip. It can be done in a tucked, piked, or layout position and is used in both men’s and women’s gymnastics.
Free Hip Circle Performed on the uneven bars or high bar, the body circles around the bar without the body touching the bar. There are both front hip circles and back hip circles.
Handspring Springing off the hands by putting the weight on the arms and using a strong push from the shoulders. Can be done either forward or backward, usually a connecting movement. This skill can be performed on floor, vault, and beam.
Heel Drive A termed used by coaches to inform the gymnasts they want them to drive their heels harder up and over on the front side of a handspring vault or front handspring on floor. Stronger heel drives create more rotation and potential for block and power.
Hecht Mount A mount where the gymnast jumps off a spring board while keeping their arms straight, pushes off of the low bar, and catches the high bar.
Inverted Cross Performed by men on the rings, it is an upside down cross.
Iron Cross A strength move performed by men on the rings. The gymnast holds the rings straight out on either side of their body while holding themselves up. Arms are perpendicular to the body.
Jaeger Performed on bars, a gymnast swings from a front Giant and lets go of the bar, into a front flip and catches the bar again. Jaeger can be done in the straddle, pike, and layout position, and is occasionally performed in a tucked position.
Kip The most commonly used mount for bars, the gymnast glides forward, pulls their feet to the bar, then pushes up to front support, resting their hips on the bar.
Layout A stretched body position.
Layout Timers A drill that simulates the feel of a
skill, or the set for a skill without the risk of completing the skill.
Lines Straight, perfect lines of the body.
Overshoot, also known as Bail A transition from the high bar facing the low bar. The gymnast swings up and over the low bar with a half-turn to catch the low bar ending in a handstand.
Pike The body bent forward at the waist with the legs kept straight, an L position.
Pirouette Used in both gymnastics and dance to refer to a turn around the body’s longitudinal axis. It is used to refer to a handstand turning moves on bars.
Rips In gymnastics, a rip occurs when a gymnast works so hard on the bars or rings they tear off a flap of skin from their hand. The injury is like a blister that breaks open.
Release Leaving the bar to perform a skill before re-grasping it.
Relevé This is a dance term that is often used in gymnastics. In a relevé, the gymnast is standing on toes and has straight legs.
Reverse Grip A swing around the bar back-first with arms rotated inwards and hands facing upwards.
Round-off A turning movement, with a push-off on one leg, while swinging the legs upward in a fast cartwheel motion into a ninety degree turn where legs come together before landing on both feet. The lead-off to a number of skills used to perform on vault, beam, and floor.
Salto Flip or somersault, with the feet coming up over the head and the body rotating around the axis of the waist.
Sequence Two or more skills performed together, creating a different skill or activity.
Stick To land, and remain standing without requiring a step. A proper stick position is with legs bent, shoulders above hips, arms forward.
Straddle Back An uneven bar transition done from a swing backwards on the high bar over low bar, while catching the low bar in a handstand.
Tap Swing Performed on bars, an aggressive tap toward the ceiling in a swinging motion. This gives the gymnast the necessary momentum to swing around the bar to perform a Giant or to go into a release move.
Toe On Swing around the bar with body piked so much the feet are on the bar.
Tsavdaridou Performed on beam, a round-off back handspring with full twist to swing down.
Tuck The knees and hips are bent and drawn into the chest, the body is folded at the waist.
Twist The gymnast rotates around the body’s longitudinal axis, defined by the spine. Performed on all apparatuses.
Yurchenko Round-off entry onto the board, back handspring onto the vaulting table and Salto off the vault table. The gymnast may twist on the way off.
“Absolutely not!” My father’s harsh voice boomed around his home office.
“You haven’t even heard what I have to say,” I argued my point, not settling for anything less than his full attention.
“I don’t care what you have to say. You can talk until you’re blue in the face. You are not moving to New Hampshire. End of discussion.”
“Dad, just listen. Gymnastics—”
“I’ve made my decision and it’s not changing.” He picked up his pen and focused on the papers in front of him. “Now, please, I have work to do.”
Devastation sucker punched me in the gut. I was surprised by how unreasonable he was being in not letting me speak. The East Coast was home to one of the best gymnastics facilities in the country and I’d prove it to him. My weeks of research wouldn’t be wasted. I would not give up, I just had to try harder.
“It’s renowned for its coaching and athletes,” I pressed on.
“No.” He gave me his infamous look, the one capable of making a grown man flinch.
My future was at stake and I had to fight for it. As much as I would miss my current gym, it was no longer useful to me. There were only so many extra hours of conditioning and private classes I could take. Advancement in this sport required the proper training, and I couldn’t get it at Palm Beach Gymnastics.
“Transferring to another gym isn’t unheard of. A lot of families send their gymnasts to train at better facilities.” I stood my ground.
“Adrianna Francesca Rossi!” His tone and anger bled into my frustration, but it didn’t stop me.
“Just hear me out! Please,” I pleaded, on the verge of tears. My mother would no doubt sniff them in the air and be on me like a bloodhound within seconds. Tears showed weakness, and a Rossi was never weak—at least according to her.
Dad didn’t respond. Instead, he stared right through me.
Blowing out a loud, aggravated breath, I stood up and peered through the large window in his office which overlooked the expansive, lush lawn in our backyard. My gaze drifted over to the right, catching the beautiful colors of the late afternoon sun reflecting off the pool. We lived in one of the most elite neighborhoods on the prestigious Palm Beach Island. We had everything money could buy. Everything except a great one-of-a-kind gymnastics coach that could help push me closer to achieving my dream.
Turning back to my dad, I took in the flare of his nostrils and stiff jaw. He had become eerily still. The room grew cold and goose bumps broke out on my skin. I knew this side of him, and it wasn’t pretty. This was a side nobody dared to test.
I had pushed too far.
“Go,” he said. “Now.” His voice quiet and calm before dismissing me to return to his work.
I fled his office and retreated to my bedroom, slamming the door just as the tears started to fall.
Gymnastics was everything to me—it was my heart and soul, the air I breathed. It was the one thing that allowed me to be me. To express myself creatively in the way I chose, not how someone else decided for me. I’d rotated between eating, sleeping, and flipping for as long as I could remember. The competiveness, the challenge of mastering a new skill. The way I defied gravity—my heart soaring, the sound of applause, the gasp from the audience—made the sacrifice worth every bit of pain and manipulation my body went through. Nothing could take that feeling away.
It was the one place I could be free from the restraints my family’s name had on me.
My name is Adrianna Rossi. I’m fifteen, and a competitive gymnast. Elite gymnast, to be exact. Or I would be, as soon as I had the right coach.
I had completed all levels required according to USA gymnastics in order to move forward and test for elite. It was only a matter of time before I held the coveted rank. I trained day in and day out for this. My days consisted of four-hour training sessions in the gym, a tutor to homeschool me, and a private chef to prepare my calculated caloric meals.
As I fell onto my bed, devastation hit me hard. The rejection crushed my heart and it felt like my dreams were slowly being ripped away.
Like most hungry gymnasts, my ultimate goal was the Olympics.
If I graphed the training along with my age, I could possibly compete in my first Olympic Games by twenty. Possibly, being the key word. While twenty was still considered youthful by normal standards, it was ancient in the gymnastics world. Though, it wasn’t unheard of to compete in The Games at that age. One of my favorites, Svetlana Khorkina, competed until she was twenty-five years old and in three Olympics, the first being when she was seventeen. Oksana Chusovitina, competed in six Olympic Games, also starting at seventeen. So my goal wasn’t completely farfetched, I just needed the proper training. I was good, but I wanted to be great. And the only way to be great was to train with the best.
Though I was young, I wasn’t naive. I knew what kind of mental and physical abuse my body would go through in order to reach the professional level. I needed a drill sergeant with a sharp eye.
Needed it, and wanted it.
I didn’t fully understand why my dad objected to me leaving. I knew he thought of gymnastics as a hobby, but he’d always done anything to placate me. He never told me no and usually threw money at whatever my heart desired. It wasn’t as if he spent much time at home anyway. Frank Rossi was too occupied with expanding and maintaining his real estate empire. Rossi Enterprises was one of the top developers, with properties worldwide. He left my mom in charg
e of raising my brother and me, which was a joke.
When I first began gymnastics at three years old, my mother used to sit at my practices and attend my meets. It was all about appearances back then, but I was young so she really didn’t have much of a choice. However, the older I got, the less of an effort she made. I think the last meet she came to I was twelve years old. Mom was usually too busy with her charity work or trying to keep my older brother, Xavier, out of the media.
At first their lack of interest bothered me. I wanted them to want to be there, to watch me tumble and flip and balance on the beam. To see me move up to another level or stick a dismount without wobbling. I craved my parents’ attention like all children do, but after years of begging, I eventually gave up and learned to adapt to their indifference. Nowadays, Mom rarely came to practice, and neither of my parents attended many competitions.
Their actions forced me to be independent, something I quickly learned to value. That being said, I refused to give up. I wouldn’t let anything, or anyone, take my goal away from me.
I WASN’T SURE how much time had passed when I heard a faint knock on my door. I cracked my eyes open and was surprised by the darkness surrounding me. Another louder knock sounded, and I prayed it wasn’t my mom.
“Yeah?”
“Ana?” Relief coursed through me at the sound of my dad’s voice. “Can I come in?”
A fatigued sigh rolled off my lips as I sat up on the edge of my bed. “Come in.”