Page 25 of Big Man on Campus

Coach announces that I’ve been voted team captain and Fitz co-captain, then he dismisses us. My phone rings as we’re filing out and I check the screen. It’s an official PSU number and my stomach sinks. Fuck. I glance over my shoulder at Coach, but his ugly mug is the same blank as always. The phone rings again.

“You gonna answer that?” Fitz asks. I want to say no, but I don’t have a choice. So I bite down on my hesitation, pluck up some courage, and tap the screen, motioning for Fitz to go ahead of me as we exit the meeting room. I stand just outside the door and in the smoothest voice I can manage, I say, “Hello?”

“Your team meeting over yet?” Lassiter doesn’t bother with a greeting. But then he doesn’t need to because I recognize his voice immediately. Dean Lassiter is infamous on campus, well-known as the enforcer for SPU President, Reverend Church. Church doesn’t have the heart for it.

“Dean Lassiter. Yeah, practice is over.” I almost look around to see if he’s hiding in the bushes as I start walking again. Fitz watches me as I talk, his brows pinched together tight.

“Before you leave campus, come into my office. We have something to talk about.” Shit. I don’t want to ask, I shouldn’t ask, but I do.

“What’s this about, Dean—?”

“We’ll talk when you get here.” He ends the call. I look at my phone, controlling the shot of tension through my shoulder blades.

“Fuck, I think Lassiter wants to talk to me about the crash.”

Fitz rubs his jaw. “I don’t get it. What’s there to talk about? You think he follows social media, pays attention to student gossip?”

“Looks that way. I can’t think of another reason he’d call me in.” We get to the corner and I make a right turn to walk to the school’s administrative building.

“Now?” he asks. “You want company?”

“Nah. Go home. I’ll be there in time for dinner.” We bump fists and he takes off in the other direction. It’s not a long walk to Dean Lassiter’s office in the oldest, grandest building on campus, down the hall from Reverend Church. I’ve only been in for team recognition meetings in the past.

The receptionist is on the phone and waves me in to the partially open door. I knock and step inside.

“Have a seat, Mr. Jennings. I’ll get right to the point.” He barely gives my ass a chance to hit the chair in front of his desk before he lowers the boom. “I understand you were in a car crash recently.” He pauses and I nod. “I’m only going to ask you once, son.” He pauses, keeping his dark eyes on me, the air of authority beaming from him. “Did you, or did you not drink and drive to cause that crash?”

I blow out an internal breath of relief that I don’t have to lie.

“No sir, I did not drink and drive.”

He watches me, doesn’t follow up with another question, like about what caused the crash. I guess he doesn’t give a fuck as long as it wasn’t alcohol. Biting my tongue to keep from asking him why he wants to know, who put him up to it, I know from my dad that saying less is better when being interrogated. Not advice I ever thought I’d need to use, but I do. I follow it to the letter, sitting still and staring back at Lassiter with all the grave innocence I can muster in my expression, wide unblinking eyes and no hint of a smile or frown.

After the tense silence that seems to last ten minutes but it’s less than one, he nods.

“Okay. You can go, son. Keep out of trouble. I don’t like to see innuendos about our student athletes in the social media. Or anywhere, for that matter.” He turns away, looking back at the computer on his desk.

I get out of the office fast, like I’m escaping from the jaws of certain death, with that dread feeling in my gut that it was too easy, that it’s not over yet.

* * *

By the time I make it back to BMOC House, I’m beat, more from emotional energy expended than physical. Lunch with Glory seems like a million years ago after being battered by flak from the social media fallout of the car crash vid. Some of the comments are flat-out accusations, but some of them defend me. Unfortunately, my haters outweigh my fans in the commentary because that’s the nature of the social media beast, as fucked-up as it is.

I want to keep my head down and ignore it, know that’s what I should do, but the need to find out who took the vid and then gave it to the SADD group gnaws at me like a rat in my gut. Or maybe that’s my empty stomach telling me I haven’t eaten enough today.

Letting myself in the back door, I step into the kitchen and breathe in the heavenly scent of something Italian.

“Chicken parm or lasagna?” I ask Majik, where she stands at the stove stirring sauce in a pot. I grab a fork from a drawer and steal a meatball from the pot before she can shove me aside. If she wanted to, she could have me on the floor in a second. Did I mention that Majik is a very large and very tough woman?

“It’s homemade linguini with meatballs, pork, and sausage in marinara sauce. Shithead.” I laugh as I chew and swallow, barely avoiding choking, but it’s fucking worth it.

“Outstanding as usual. You sure you don’t want to marry me?”

“Wouldn’t your new old girlfriend, Glory Rose, take exception?” She raises her brows at me. Someone’s been talking. The guys are fucking gossips, for a bunch of jocks. Brick comes in from the dining room.

“Quit distracting the cook, hockey man, you’re holding up fucking dinner.”

“Make yourselves useful and take these dishes out to the table.” Majik hands me a giant bowl of plump-looking linguini covered in sauce and some green things because she always decorates the food with greens. She hasn’t realized yet that garnishes are lost on this crowd of ravenous jocks. All we’re interested in is the mouthwatering, belly-filling calories. Nutrition is a bonus.