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“What the fuck!” I bark, twisting my naked body on the floor and looking up in time to catch Toby laughing at me over his shoulder while he walks away. I scramble to my feet, ready to rush him, but Cameron shoves a wadded-up towel into my chest, pushing me back a few steps.
“Don’t react to him. Don’t give him that,” he cautions, and though his face is close to mine, I look right through him, my eyes lasers on the back of Toby’s fucking head.
I breathe through gritted teeth until the door falls closed behind Toby, then blink my focus to Cameron’s serious gaze. His brows inch up as he pushes the towel into me once more, likely in an attempt to shake me out of my rage. I slap his hand away and grab the towel, which I realize is the one I lost during my fall. Our eyes meet once more before I huff out a breath and spin toward the back of the shower room and duck into the final stall on the right.
I twist the faucet and plant my hands firmly on the tiled wall, letting the spray sting my face. My mouth opens to take in the burn of the water, and I let it fill my cheeks several times before finally dropping my chin and letting the water blast the back of my neck.
My dad’s right. No more fucking around. Zero distractions. It’s football and class and nothing else.
Chapter5
Morgan
Games.
That’s what James was playing at the party the other night. I recognized it. I’ve played them myself, and I indulged again. There’s nothing wrong with being young and having a good time, flirting with the cute boy, and maybe feeling sexy about it. But that high doesn’t last as long as it used to—the way it did before I learned intimately how cold and cruel and rare and precious life is. And how fast the wrong kind of attention can make you feel ugly and alone.
Anika and I both liked to play games. She was always willing to sneak into nearby college frat parties with me and indulge in the free beer and cute older guys. We were each other’s wing woman, complete with test strips for our drinks and safe words to make sure we always got out of the parties together. Only once did I decide to stay on my own. I was seventeen and the guy was an eighteen-year-old college freshman. He and I ended up dating for almost a month before I broke it off because the social media comments on every photo of the two of us together started to chip away at me. I swear half of the people following my accounts are simply there to hate on things.
If only those people could comment on the morally gray things my father has done.
Anika was the only person who knew my full truth. She’s the only person I trusted sharing about my late-night talks with Coach Wallace. She was glad I had someone to confide in other than her, someone who could do something if they had to. I ate dinner at his table many nights, the same table James and his family eat at now. It was me and Brennan Wallace’s two girls, who he let me babysit sometimes when he had to travel with the team for away games. I loved those girls; they were like little sisters to me. He was like a father.
Coach Wallace listened. And I knew he would never tell anyone unless I told him it was okay. And he never has. Still, after everything that happened to him because of holding my secrets, I don’t believe he’s told a soul.
Somehow, though, my father knew I had been confiding in him. Perhaps it’s his good business sense. Or maybe that’s simply how Christopher Bentley quells his paranoia—by wiping out all possible triggers. Whatever the motivation, my dad detected I may have been spilling what he considers family business to an outsider, and he made sure he knocked over all the chess pieces.
I should have stopped playing games a long time ago. And I should have known better when I played them with James. Games never go anywhere. They finish with a winner and a loser. And it’s pretty clear from where I sit, across the table from James, who has yet to say a word to me since the first party five days ago, that this time I am the loser.
“You’re staring,” Brooklyn whispers at my side.
I unclench my teeth from the straw of my smoothie and set my drink on the table.
“I know,” I admit.
I won’t pretend with Brooklyn. She knows me too well, even if she doesn’t know everything.
“Lily and James are not a thing. She promises.Ipromise. We’ve all gone over this, the three of us, in detail.” She’s trying to quell my jealous streak, but it’s too far gone.
“And James? Does he know they are not a thing?” I lift a brow as I meet her gaze.
Games.
“I don’t know James,” she says.
“That’s a get-out-of-jail-free card kind of answer. You can’t say that. It’s meaningless,” I retort. I grab my smoothie again and return to biting on the end of the straw. I don’t want any more of it, but I need something to do with my mouth, so I don’t say stuff I’ll regret. “Why do I even care?” I mumble around the straw.
“Because he’s nice and he’s really pretty to look at,” Brooklyn hums.
I sigh, then my lips close around the straw while I attempt to suck fruit juice through the mauled plastic.
Nice.
Nice guy.
Is that what this is about? Am I simply desperate to know what it’s like to date someone kind? To get attention from a good guy? To not be treated like an object, a sponsorship tool, a bargaining chip for my father’s company?
My phone buzzes against my thigh as everyone clears out from our lunch table, and I know it’s my mom before I look.
