I all but pranced down the bleachers, simultaneously searching for my seat and Emma. Since I was more interested in finding one over the other, when I found it, I put on the brakes.
She’d found me at almost the same time I’d found her. She was sitting in a metal chair on the sidelines, her cheeks flushed and her hair pulled back into a high ponytail. She smiled. I beamed.
Even when she turned her attention away to retie her shoes, I stood smitten like I’d just been injected with a potent poison of love potion. I was oblivious to everything and everyone. At least until a wad of paper aimed at my head neared its destination.
I let my body do what it did, snatching the threat—small and insignificant as it was—from the air before it had a chance to serve its intended purpose of humiliating me in front of hundreds. The temptation to fire it back at the owner was overwhelming in so many ways, but a handful of spectators were already looking at me like I had mad ninja skills. If I unleashed my speed ball with dead on accuracy, the questions in their heads of what I’d just done might flicker over to conclusions I didn’t need them to draw. Especially now that I’d found a reason to stay firmly planted in the land of Mortals.
So instead, I finished my journey to my seat which, lucky for me, was right next to the paper wad’s owner.
“I think you lost something,” I said, like I was as happy I could reunite a couple pieces of trash back together as I would have been bringing a little boy’s lost puppy home.
“Keep it,” Ty said, his eyes already in full glare mode. “As a reminder of the only thing I’ll ever lose to you.”
So we weren’t going to waste anytime picking up where we left off. “If there’s only one thing you’ll lose to me, how about I return this to you,” I said, stuffing it into the pocket of his jacket, “and I’ll keep my eyes open for something else I’d rather take.” Sliding my glasses off, I let my eyes scan the room first before they fell on the prettiest back of a head I’d seen.
Ty’s fists balled as he began to rise. Were we going to do this here? Right in the middle of hundreds of smashed together bodies? If I’d known, I wouldn’t have worn my nice jacket. The person sitting next to him clamped a hand over his shoulder and shoved him back down into his seat. It was a fellow meathead, who glowered at me at the same time he shook his head.
“You’ve got some serious balls showing your face here,” Ty seethed, “and then disrespecting me in front of my boys.” He tilted his head to the side, where not one, but three similar looking, green eyed pit bulls sat glaring at me. Super, Emma’s brothers. I was scoring impressive points with all the people in her life.
I gave them all my most unimpressed look before glancing back to the gym floor. “I’m not comfortable talking about my anatomical manhood with another man, but I hear there are a bunch of wonderful clubs and support groups where you can do just that.”
Ty’s arm barely had time to flinch my direction before the guy next to him pinned it back.
“Ty, enough,” he ordered. “He isn’t worth it. And Emma would be pissed.”
“I don’t care,” Ty said, grinding his jaw.
“You start a brawl in here, it could threaten your spot on the football team,” his friend said, sweeping in front of Ty and pushing him over into his former seat.
“Patrick Hayward,” I said, extending my hand and acting like the meathead quartet didn’t loathe me. “And trust me, of all the potential dangers out there in the big bad world, I’m the last one you should be worrying about for your sister,”—he was ignoring me, so I glanced down to the court where my eyes targeted on a pair of bare, insanely hot legs—“especially when your sister’s running around in her underwear,” I said, well . . . I screeched.
A surge of conflicting interests attacked me. In one corner I had virtue wanting to search for a blanket to cover her up in, and in the other corner I had hunger. The kind that still had me thinking about blankets, but disheveled with sheets and pillows on a bed.
Imaginary face slap.
“I know who you are, douchebag, and before I put you in a headlock for mentioning my little sister and underwear in the same sentence, I’m trying to figure out if you’re talking about her uniform or if you’re actually visualizing her in her underwear right now. Either way,” he said, making slow work of popping his knuckles, “it’s not looking good for you.”
I watched her throw her windbreaker top over her head, revealing a numbered jersey. I couldn’t decide if I was more relieved or disappointed. “You’re telling me those black, next-to-non-existent boyshorts are part of her uniform?” It was too good to be true. Especially as I watched with unblinking interest as she loped onto the court to finish her warm-up with the rest of the team.
“Is this your first volleyball game or something?”
“Well, yeah. It kind of is,” I answered, incapable of anything more intelligent as I watched Emma. “But I can tell you I’m planning on making up for my lapse in attendance at women’s volleyball games by becoming Stanford’s most recent season ticket holder. How much do you think it would cost for a lifetime membership?” I laughed at my private joke, finding no company in it.
“I bet they’ll strike you a great deal since your lifetime membership will expire in two minutes if you keep looking at my sister like that, Rapunzel.” His voice wasn’t quite murderous, but it was close enough to gather he was serious about facing a life sentence to end mine.
“So, the nicknames are inspiring. True masterpieces,” I said, not sure if I was trying to diffuse or exacerbate the situation. “You boys have a study hour where you get together and come up with these labels that showcase your bigoted intelligence?”
He grinned, just barely, but it still qualified. “No. It just comes naturally when someone like you tries to weasel his way into my sister’s, who’s too sweet and innocent for her own good, underwear.”
Great. He said it, so immediately I was thinking it again. I didn’t want to think about her that way, like I had so many of the masses before her, she was better than that and better than me, but I didn’t exactly not want to think about her underwear either. It was the trickiest kind of situation to be in.
Imaginary face slap.
“So you’re all right with Ty doing much more with her underwear than thinking about them why? Because he’s your football buddy or something? Some sort of bros before hoes thing?”
“Watch your step,” he warned, his fists clenching in and out with such concentration I could see the tension releasing from them. “You don’t know jack crap about Emma or any of us. You got that?”
Had I been Mortal, I knew I would have been signing my death certificate if I smarted him back, but I wanted to. I was tired of the macho act and we were still in pregame warm-up. But there was something honest, something relatable, about his hardcore protection of his sister.
It reminded me of me. The way I would have been if Elisabeth—the youngest Hayward sibling who’d died with the rest of us, but hadn’t joined us in Immortality—had made it into her teenage years and boys came knocking on our front door for her. I would have murdered them where they stood, no question about it.
Emma’s brother was giving me more leniency than I would have given to someone if I was in his shoes. I sighed, reminding myself why I wasn’t a proponent of empathy in times like these.
“Hey, you’re right. I’m being a dick,” I offered, not adding on, but you’re being a bigger one. “Let’s just rewind to three minutes ago and start over. So, how ‘bout those Yankees?”
This time, when I extended my hand, he shook it. “Dallas, and those Yankees suck.”
I had to bite my cheek from saying something in defense of his insult to the titans of baseball and put us back at square nothing.
“That’s my older brother Austin next to Ty, and the one on the end is Jackson. He graduated last year, but can’t miss a single game of his baby sister’s. Especially when Ty calls us and tells us some new rich boy’s trying to get into our
sister’s pants.” The killer notes in his voice were gone, although I knew one misstep by moi would bring them back in heightened quantities.
“I thought there were four older brothers who could squash me like a bug?”
Dallas smirked. “Tex’s somewhere up there in the nose bleed section,” he said, tipping his head behind us. “He and I are twins, and he wasn’t happy about drawing the seat short straw since Emma gave his ticket to you.”
Sounds like Tex and I were off to an even better start than I was with Emma’s other brothers. “Jackson? Austin? Tex? Dallas?” I listed. “What’s with all the city names?”
Dallas huffed. “My parents thought they’d be all original and name us after the places we were conceived in.”
“I’ve never heard of a city named Emma,” I said, shuffling through the memory bank.
“Nah, Emma wasn’t named for a city,” Dallas said. “By the time she came along, dad had his four strapping boys and couldn’t have cared if mom drowned their premature daughter. Dad was something of a dick,” Dallas said, his fists clenching again. “That’s why I’m so good at detecting other ones.” He looked at me in about as pointed of a way as a person could.
“Listen, I get Emma’s got a serious boyfriend and four older brothers serious about committing a first degree crime if someone like me tries to screw with her, but I can promise you I want nothing more than to be friends with her,”—yes, I knew lying was a sin, but so was lust, and I’d had my fair share of that my whole existence and I had yet to be struck down by lightning—“so you’ve got nothing to worry about with me. Scout’s honor.”
“Brother, if I thought you were a boy scout, I wouldn’t have to worry about eagle scout nerdiness working its way into my sister’s fragile, often misguided, heart.” He shot me a sideways grin as the buzzer went off. “And just so you know where Ty stands with us, if he were thinking, touching, or trying to remove Emma’s underwear, we’d happily waterboard him to death, football teammate or not. It just so happens right now he stands with us against d-bags coming on to Emma. He’s with us until he’s against us, and if he’s ever against us, he’s as good as a Scarlett boys’ punching bag. And believe me, he knows it too,” Dallas said, watching with something that looked a lot like pride as Emma took her place on the court, adjusting her knee pads into place.
Just then she looked up at the five of us staring at her with a mixture of emotions and beamed, waving before turning her attention to the opposing team as they prepared to serve.
Something that felt dangerous pitted into my stomach right then, something that felt a lot like it was all over. I’d found the girl. The girl. I still wasn’t sure if I even believed in it, but instinct didn’t give a fart about belief. It did what it wanted to.
She had a boyfriend and four brothers who wouldn’t rest until I was worm fodder if I screwed this up. Why did I have to fall for the girl who was more heavily guarded than the pope?
Ah, that’s it. I momentarily forgot the world has a vendetta against my happiness.
CHAPTER FIVE
Stanford won. Correction—Stanford annihilated.
Large thanks due to their star sophomore Emma Scarlett. Silence was something I didn’t observe unless I was hiding in wait for the enemy or sleeping—even then I snored—but for most of the game, my vocal chords got a recuperative rest.
I was awed, no other way of putting it, as I watched her on the court. Graceful, aggressive, fearless. Very little of the sweet, smiling girl was left on the court from the first buzzer to the time the last buzzer went off.
Between the five of us and our cheering that sounded like a bunch of rabid gorillas pounding their chests and stomping their feet, Emma had her own cheerleading squad of imbeciles. I caught her blushing her acknowledgment a few times during a time out, but when she was playing, she was ignorant of everything except for that ball. Her eyes stayed fixed to it like mine stayed fixed to her. And despite what most might assume, my eyes hadn’t drifted south of her face since the game had started.
Her face wasn’t classically perfect, but that’s what made it beautiful. It was unique, all her own, all I could think about. I’d surrounded myself with beautiful women for generations, so many that beauty had become nothing but the standard. Somewhere along the way, I’d discovered beauty isn’t beautiful anymore when there’s no uniqueness to it. Emma’s fuller upper lip, the freckles smattering her nose she didn’t feel the need to layer makeup over, her eyes that were too large for her face, all those “imperfections” were what made her beautiful. Unique. Different.
She reminded me of what beauty was. It wasn’t in the uniform, cookie-cutter, surgically cut, molded, and shaped to perfection bodies and faces of the women before her; it was the quirks and definitions that made her different from every other woman out there. There was no one else like her. No one all but identical to her I could find to replace her when she was gone.
That scared me. More like terrified me. I knew I should be fighting the way I was feeling; I knew I should turn and walk away now. I didn’t want to let myself get to a point with Emma like I’d gotten to with Bryn, stumbling through the days together until one morning I woke up and knew I couldn’t live without her.
Emma was Ty’s, and as much of a crusty, stinky jockstrap as he was, it wasn’t my place to kick him to the curb. That was her honor, and I didn’t want to take that joy away from her when she finally realized what a slimeball he was.
I could wait. I had nothing but time.
Here was what put the terror in terrifying though. What if, after waiting around for Emma for weeks, months, years—whatever it took—at the end of the line, she decided to walk down the aisle towards Ty? The waiting for nothing, my efforts in vain, my heart shattered. Was the possibility of losing the girl to another guy—again—worth it?
When an auburn ponytail flipped around to reveal a face that had a smile that was aimed right at me, timidly followed by glowing green eyes, I had my answer. Hell yes, it was worth it. Girls like Emma Scarlett came around once an eternity, and I wasn’t going to spend what was left of mine without her.
I purposefully arrived to class a few minutes late on Monday morning, after spending a tortured weekend thinking, dreaming, and . . . well, shamelessly fantasizing about Emma because I knew I couldn’t go another hour without being close to her. I didn’t want to take the chance if I arrived first that she might not choose the seat next to me again. I was a man who believed in carving my own fate.
When I spotted her down front and center again, no sight of Ty-guy anywhere around, I couldn’t believe my luck. I was darn close to busting loose a happy dance. She glanced over her shoulder, scanning the filled seats around her, trying to look casual about it. I was as accustomed to reading people’s tells as I was winking at women, so she didn’t fool me for a second that she wasn’t looking for someone. I knew more than likely she was looking for Ty, but I didn’t let that stop me from hoping it could have been for me.
I knew it was foolish, juvenile, and asinine. I also knew my father, along with every other Immortal, would give me a serious ass whooping for even thinking about what I was about to do. But Patrick Hayward wasn’t the kind of guy that cared about those things. Besides, the professor was late and every student save for the fox up front was too caught up in their weekend reports with each other to notice.
I went from standing in the doorway in the back to sitting in the front row in the split of a second too short for a scientific calculator to equate.
“Looking for someone?” I asked, keeping a straight face.
She spun in her seat towards me, her already large eyes even huger, seeming to take up half her face. “When did you get here?” she all but shrieked, looking me up and down.
I shrugged. “Just now.” I tried to make the way I was staring into her eyes seem less intense, but I’m sure my attempts made it that much more obvious. “So who were you looking for?” I repeated, guessing that if I mentioned anything about telep
ortation she’d slap a restraining order on me by this evening.
“No one.” She did a clearing shake of her head before flipping her notebook open. The rest of the student’s laptops were buzzing at the ready. “So, two consecutive days in a row of attending class? Are you sure that doesn’t break some sort of rebel boy code?” she asked, recomposed and smiling at me from the side.
“You’re speaking like you know the rules that govern our secret brotherhood,” I answered, always one for playing along. I really hoped the professor was sick, or his car battery had died, or lord, anything. I had her to myself, talking, and I didn’t want it to stop. Ever.
“I know a guy,” she said, shrugging a shoulder.
“That’s a capital crime for one of ours to include the minions of this world in on our secret ways,” I said, folding my arms over the desktop and leaning as close to her as I could.
“Yeah, you don’t need to tell me. Poor whistleblower was found dead the next day,” she said, lowering her voice and putting on a dramatic face. “It was a closed casket.”
“We’re a merciless, brutal bunch of rebels,” I said, lowering my voice too, “so you have to swear to me you won’t tell anyone I was in class two days in a row. That’s a sin so severe they’d leave the casket open just to prove a point to everyone else.”
She put on a face of overdone shock. “How about this? I’ll promise not to tell a single soul about your perfect two day attendance record if you tell me what inspired such an act.”
I looked over my shoulder, then the other, secret agent style, before curling my finger at her. She leaned in, so close I felt goose bumps surface over the back of my neck, but it wasn’t close enough. I felt a hunger so deep I wasn’t sure I could ever sate it.
I closed the last few inches between us, knowing I was beyond pressing my luck with her, half waiting for her to slap me, half wanting to tilt her mouth up until it connected with mine, and whispered in her ear, “I came to see about a girl.”
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