Beautifully Yours: A High School Bully Romance (Voclain Academy Book Three)

by Jordan Grant

  It’s raining so hard now, it hurts, but our love has always been painful. His hands grab my breasts and squeeze, his thumbs catching on my nipples. I feel his cock pressed against my leg, and God, I need him inside me. I need him to chase away the emptiness and fill me.

  My hands are everywhere, our shared breath steaming as it hits the cool air. My fingers run over the hard line of his pectorals, down his abdomen, and around to his back. He is solid and steel beneath my touch. His hands run up my skirt, peppering goosebumps across my bare legs, and it’s a fast movement as his thumbs hook on either side of my panties, ready to bare me for him beneath the storm.

  He leaves me abruptly, my panties snapping back into place against my skin, my skirt falling down toward my knees again. I blink as he lets out a singular, strangled oomph. There’s his coach holding Ian by the collar of his shirt, and I quickly cover myself, bringing my shirt together, though the guy doesn’t even look at me. Instead, Coach Wells glares at Ian.

  “Do you have any idea what I’ve done to keep you on the team, Beckett?” Coach yells, and it sounds like a roar. “Berkshire’s parents are so far up my ass, they can see what I ate for dinner last week!” Rain pelts him in the face, but the man doesn’t so much as blink. “Do you know what it says in the student handbook about violence? It’s a zero-tolerance policy, Ian, and it’s been a goddamn battle to keep you in school, much less on the team. Now you go and do this?” He gestures at me, but he doesn’t even spare me a glance. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Are you an animal? Want to do anything but fight and fuck?”

  Coach rolls his hoodie over his massive shoulders and tosses it at me without a glance.

  “Get dressed, Weathersby,” he says. “You’re both lucky the teachers realize where their salaries come from and Professor Collins called me first and not Headmistress. Not get the fuck inside before we get struck down by lightning.”

  He starts away and calls, “Beckett, with me now!”

  Ian frowns over at me for a moment, but he doesn’t spare me a single breath before he follows after Coach Wells and leaves me alone and cold in the rain.

  19

  Ian

  “Yellow 85. Yellow 85,” I say, calling the play. “Ready! One, two, hut!”

  It’s just practice with the team, and it doesn’t really matter, but my heart still pumps hard against my ribs, my blood surging through my veins, and there’s that familiar rumble of adrenaline as it floods my system. I wait for the snap, and it feels like it always does, like a lifetime passes as I breathe in field-stained plastic, my protective pads resting heavy on my shoulders.

  Our defensive line and offensive line are both strong, and we are a second away from being locked in a battle for dominance, where we will push to see which one gives way first and exposes the weakness. Davenport snaps the ball to me, a quick pass, and my fingers curl around the worn cowhide leather. Bodies crash together to the grunts of my teammates and the clunk of helmets colliding.

  Offense pushes and defense pushes back, no one falling, not at first. In every game, there’s a moment, sometimes a fraction of a second and sometimes longer, when the game is nothing more than a battle of wills. In that instant, it isn’t about who is bigger or stronger or faster. It’s an internal war of who has more willpower, who has the stronger resolve, and in that moment, time seems to pause, and the stadium wonders who will give way first, break the line, and pray to the unforgiving gridiron.

  Tackles clash with tight ends. My center smashes with my middle linebacker, both wearing blue and silver and neither one giving an inch. I take three steps back and scan the field.

  Chase is tailed by Torres.

  Rothschild is on Archie’s heels. Everett and Burley toe the line, fighting to see who will go down first before Burley’s heels give way, digging into the dirt as Everett pushes forward. Burley is the first to fall. I see the moment, my opening, and seize it.

  My right cleat digs behind me into the manicured lawn. Sweat pricks at my eyes and slips between my lips to salt my tongue as I spot the weakness in my plan. My safety already knows about Everett’s opening, and I can see it in his eyes as he bides his time and sees whom I’m going to throw to and where to intercept. He thinks Archie is an option, but he’s not. Rothschild will tackle him in the instant it takes to catch the spiral.

  No, it’s going to be a matter of how fast Everett can run and if my tackle can run faster. I can definitely throw faster than he can run, but there will still be a moment when Everett, even for a split second, will have to pause and catch the ball. It might give Paverson enough time to bring Everett to his knees. I hurriedly eye the field again, but there are no other options. Everyone’s locked up, and I’m not about to have a try at cutting through the best damn defensive line in the state of New York.

  My cleat digs further into the field as I rear back and throw a perfect spiral. I watch, nearly oblivious as my center finally knocks our middle linebacker to the ground. Everything hits the pause button as the ball sails through the air, dividing the skyline into two parts, those above its glory and those below it.

  Autumn is nearly here, and it’s starting to get cool again at night. A breeze dries the sweat from my face and chills my flushed skin as the ball soars.

  One tha-thump of my heart beat passes.

  Two tha-thumps.

  Three.

  Before the ball lands true, Everett stretching to reach it, his fingers snatching it out of the evening sky as dusk settles home on the horizon.

  I watch as Everett and Paverson battle it out. Everett’s feet hammer against the field as he gives it his all, even though it’s just a practice scrimmage and for nothing more than bragging rights. Paverson is gaining on him though, inch by inch, as they both spring across the gridiron, running so fast their legs seem to blur in their practice uniforms.

  “Go, man! Go!” Chase calls off to my right.

  “Yeah, Reynolds!” Archie adds with a whoop as he dusts off his knees and stands. “Get it, boy!”

  Tha-thump, tha-thump, tha-thump goes my heart, the rhythm matching the pounding drum of their feet.

  You can tell by looking at them that both Everett and Paverson are giving it their all, each trying to outrun the other, Everett trying to reach the goal line and Paverson trying to reach Everett first.

  Their cleats mark the fifteen-yard line and keep pushing forward. I hold my breath and watch. It’s so painfully close. If Paverson was just a foot closer, he could grab Everett by the scruff of his neck and snap him back like an angry laundry line.

  The ten-yard line. Coach would normally be yelling by now, but I don’t hear his whoops and hollers. Whatever, I don’t care. I’m enjoying this too much anyway.

  Five yards, and the clamor of cheers sounds around me.

  “Get him, Pav!” someone shouts.

  Four yards.

  Three.

  Two.

  It’s now or never, and Paverson makes his play, leaping into the air like a frog with both legs pushing off the field, his long arms outstretched, his fingers grabbing for whatever part of Everett he can reach.

  Everett hits the field goal line and keeps moving as Paverson falls to the ground, his hands finding nothing but air. His fists land on the field as he lies there, slamming them into the gridiron with a loud groan.

  Chase slow-claps for Everett while everyone rides the high of a good end to practice, one even Coach can’t bitch about. Backs are slapped, high-fives given, and enough bullshit dealt to Paverson and Everett to fill the stadium, even though it was an awesome play.

  I look over at the sidelines and find Coach. He’s missed the entire thing and has his head buried in conversation with Headmistress DuMonte. Headmistress wears a long leather skirt and a flowing silk shirt that together should make her look younger, but instead, it just ages her. Of course, her tight bun making her forehead appear even more enormous and tortoiseshell, cat-eye glasses don’t help.

  I step closer, and I can see him better now. C
oach’s face is beet red, the veins in his forehead popping out from his skull as he shakes his head. He looks angry, furious even, as he white-knuckles his playbook. Headmistress frowns back at him, her ruby-red painted lips thinned into a wan line. She shrugs and mouths something that reads like, “I’m sorry.”

  The team carries on around me, oblivious to what’s happening on the sidelines. Coach stands there, fury rolling off his shoulders. I can’t remember ever seeing him this angry before, not even when the referee at the Parkland game benched Archie in a botched call. Dread coils in my stomach, and somehow I know when the hammer drops, I’ll be underneath it as it falls.

  Coach slams his playbook into the field, sending loose pages everywhere to float down like feathers to the green grass as Headmistress says something again and walks away.

  Coach’s gaze snaps up, and he is glaring right me when he shouts, “Beckett, get your ass over here. Now!”

  One of my brothers says, “Oooooo! Someone’s in trouble with Daddy.”

  Snickers follow the taunt, but most of my team goes silent. They know how unusual this is. Sure, Coach gets angry, but he never looks like his head is a teapot, and he’s about to blow his lid and erupt everywhere.

  I start over to the sideline, feeling the stares of my teammates follow me. Coach tugs at the little hair he has left, which is never a good sign. Normally hair tugging is reserved for bad referee calls or when someone cuts it way too close to game time. I think by the time this conversation is over, he probably won’t have any left at all.

  His skin is as flushed as a gala apple as he growls at me, his anger literally making him sweat in the cool of evening. Fat drops form on his forehead and follow the line of his hair as he scowls at me.

  “Yes, Coach,” I say as I arrive.

  “You’re benched, Beckett,” he barks.

  “What?” I ask, sure I heard him wrong.

  “You’re benched,” Coach repeats like he’s spitting out a curse in the heat of the moment, probably because it is one.

  This doesn’t make sense. He told me it was handled. My father assured me everything was under control; even his slimy lawyer said to not worry about a thing, so what the fuck is going on now?

  I feel a stare on me like a homing beacon, drawing me reluctantly in to its ominous, red light. I cock my head to the right and look past Coach’s broad frame to find Finn Berkshire watching us, a grin on his ugly face.

  Coach sighs as he follows my gaze to Berkshire’s dumb ass. “And I’ve been told I have to accept Berkshit back on the team.”

  You’ve got to be mother-fucking kidding me, I think. This is all one of Berkshire’s shitty mind-fucks and mid-season too?

  I wasn’t aware Coach realized we called Berkshire that, but then I realize he could just be commenting on how bad the asshole is at football.

  Fuck this! I get perma-benched and Berkshire is back?!

  “He gets my spot?” I demand, nearly yelling the words.

  I can feel the stares of the team locked on us now, listening to what’s happening. This doesn’t just affect me. It affects the team, our senior season, the entire goddamn Academy.

  “No,” Coach explains, “over my dead body. Chase is still backup QB. It just means you get to sit on the bench together, but since you can’t sit on the bench together because of your goddamned restraining order, you get to sit in the locker room.”

  “What the fuck?” I roar.

  First the fucker lies and gets me in trouble with the cops. Then my shitty attorney keeps telling me he’s getting stone-walled at every turn by Finn’s connections with the city, who apparently don’t believe due process applies in their jurisdiction. Now, this asshole gets to watch the rest of the season while I breathe in the smell of sweat and stinky feet?

  My fists curl at my sides, my knuckles cracking like popcorn. The dark thing inside my chest roars and snaps its chains taut. I want to unleash it into Berkshire’s face and give him a real reason for all of this bullshit. It takes everything I have to not give in and do it.

  I’m starting to realize that I underestimated Finn. Because unlike Aurora, who plotted and connived last semester to bring my downfall, there was no permanent damage, but this guy is fucking with my present and my future. Shit, how long has he been planning this, and what else has this asshole got lined up? His sole purpose seems to be to make my senior year hell.

  I try the reasonable approach, barely keeping the reins on my anger.

  “I didn’t do shit to Berkshire, Coach,” I tell him.

  “I know, son,” he replies with a sigh that already reeks of defeat. “You haven’t exactly been arrested for possession of deadly weapons in the past.” His blue eyes latch on mine, and I hate the pity for us both that I see there. “You’re goddamn good at football, Beckett, and it pains me to have to do this.”

  “So that’s it?” I clench my teeth together so tight I think I might crack my jaw with the effort. “It’s over?”

  Coach shakes his head. “I’ll talk to the Board on Monday. I’ll bring up donors. But right now, his lawyer has a shitty order,” Coach waves at the papers on the field like it’s somewhere down there, “and Headmistress wants to appease him. She thinks it’ll protect the Academy. Maybe it will. Right now, there’s nothing I can do, not tonight before tomorrow’s game.” He sighs again. “Lucky for us, the Cavaliers just had their QB benched for the season due to mono, so we will pull through, despite Berkshire’s best efforts.”

  But I won’t. I won’t pull through.

  “I have to get it back, Coach,” I tell him.

  It’s all I have left.

  Coach levels his gaze on me. “I will do what I can, son, but don’t hold your breath. This shit takes time, which we don’t have. I don’t know what you did to piss off Berkshire, but please stay clear of him from here on out, if not for your future, then for the sake of the team.”

  But it’s too late, I want to yell.

  I interfered with his torment of Molly junior year. I put an end to Finn’s favorite game. Then I kicked the fucker off the football team and helped spread a few well-placed rumors to ensure everyone in the Academy hated the asshole as much as I did. It’s too late for apologies, though even if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t waste my breath.

  I storm off the field and head toward the locker room. I don’t know where I am going, but it can’t be anywhere near Berkshire because if I don’t get some distance now, I just might end up killing him.

  20

  Ian

  The sun is going to sleep, but the echoes of daylight still show in burnt oranges and reds on the horizon. I am in my own little slice of serenity, sitting on the edge of an overlook above Ellisville, my feet dangling into the abyss. One nudge, and I’d be gone, but I’m not scared. I am alone, but I am in control here. No one’s pushing me, and I’m not planning to fucking jump.

  This sure as hell isn’t serenity anymore though. It doesn’t calm the thrum of my anger or steady the twitch in my fingers that want to go back to campus and wrap around Berkshire’s throat until he stops twitching. My rage is suffocating, landing a semi-truck dead center of my chest and parking it there.

  The emptiness isn’t peaceful either, not like it used to be. It is dark and murky, and I am alone in the abyss. It’s no longer tranquil. It’s fucking loud with the words of Coach replaying inside my skull.

  Benched.

  Berkshire.

  I’ll try.

  Meaningless consonants and vowels that don’t change the outcome and don’t undo what’s happened to me. I might as well be off the team, not to mention the newspapers will have a field day, speculating where I disappeared to mid-season. My father has done what he can to keep this entire ordeal off Columbia’s radar, but if he can’t—if he and his team fail—they’ll rescind my college acceptance offer. It won’t be a matter of guilty or not. It’ll be a matter of school policy and ensuring they promote a safe environment for all students. My dream school down the drain, and I’ll be force
d to look at the backups, all hand-picked by my father, if they’ll even let me in either.

  Fuck!

  The curse rings inside the hollow of my head, but outside, I am stone. I don’t so much as inhale sharply or grind my teeth together. Not even my eye twitches. My father would be proud, a perfect picture of confidence and control on the outside, just like he taught me, even if I am falling apart where no one else can see.

  Gravel bites into my ass as I sit on the edge of the overlook and this shitty day bleeds out into night. It’s game day at Voclain Academy, and I should be there, bringing home the win beside my brothers, breathing in the cheers from the crowd, and smirking at the opposing team’s shitty taunts.

  Instead, I am alone in my own personal purgatory. Well, almost alone anyway. I’ve got a bottle of top-shelf bourbon still in the brown paper bag to my right and my car keys to my left on the pebbled ground.

  I’ve been here for who knows how long, but I haven’t moved an inch in either direction. I know I shouldn’t be here, not with the bottle so close, temptation literally at my fingertips.

  I shouldn’t let my mind wander from Berkshire’s ugly mug to all the other fucked up things weighing on my shoulders. But anger loves company, after all, so let’s ride the wave of fury all the way to the gates of Hell.

  I shouldn’t be thinking of her, yet I am. When I do, I remember how this is the place where I went to escape her existence the first semester we met, to free my mind from her, little good it did. Then, when she was mine, it was the secret spot I shared with her, our little slice of privacy. Now, it’s a reminder, a bitter, broken reminder of everything I have lost and will never get back.

  I want to understand what she did, but I don’t.

  It’s better this way, she said.

  Four weak-ass words, hollow and practically worthless.

  How can saying so little cut so deep?

  I’m dying over here, and I didn’t even see the blade coming until it was already there, buried in my back to the hilt.