by Ella James
I have the urge to wrap my arms around his waist again, but I think of his reaction last time at the grow house. And that’s how I know I should.
Is this what he does with other girls, too? Just fucks them, and if they make him laugh or wrap their arms around him, they get pushed away?
I put my hand on his back, then realize I want more and press my cheek against it.
He goes very still. So still I can hear his heartbeat.
I kiss him through his shirt, and then I wrap an arm around his waist.
“Don’t be pissed,” I whisper. “You seem sad. I like hugging you... I’m a hugger.”
I smell something burning, and I lean around him to find the pancake smoking.
I slide my arm from around his waist and kiss his bicep. “I didn’t mean to make you burn the food.”
“You didn’t,” he says gruffly.
I walk around the bar and take a seat on the stool right in front of him. I find myself waiting for his eyes to meet mine. He looks everywhere but at me as he finishes the pancakes, smears butter on them, and brings out a small cup of hot syrup from the microwave.
He puts three on a plate for me and sets it in front of me, still without looking in my eyes. Then he turns around to open the refrigerator. He takes out some fresh-looking strawberries and sets them in front of me as well.
“Thank you,” I say, as he finally looks me in the face. “Are you going to have some too?”
He shakes his head and mumbles something about working out.
I puzzle over this as he walks slowly toward the living area. He opens a door that looks like a closet door, situated between the kitchen and the living room, and disappears into it.
I eat slowly.
Should I ask him about football? Should I tell him what I saw? And what I read? I want to know the answers to my questions, but do I really have to have them? He’s clearly in a shitty mood. I don’t want to make things worse. Although of course, I want to know.
I finish eating, clean and wash my plate, and when he’s still not back, I can’t help myself. I follow him through the door, which leads down to a basement.
At the bottom of the stairs, I find a nice home gym, and Kellan running on a treadmill, pouring sweat.
He glances at me, then straight ahead. I’m not sure if I should feel irritated by how he’s acting, or sorry for him. I go with sorry. If I knew him even just a little better, I would ask what’s up. As it is, I stick my hands in the pockets of my robe and stand there feeling like some awkward stalker.
“This is really nice down here. I guess this is how you stay in shape for soccer.”
“Yeah.”
“Don’t you guys have a game in a few days?”
“Yeah.” His gaze flicks to mine, and I see effort on his face. He’s trying to be... not an ass. Which I appreciate, even as I wonder why he has to try so hard. “You a fan?” he asks. His voice is rough, the words slightly panted.
My throat tightens with the secret I’m keeping—about his past. “I’m a fan of how you look in your uniform,” I say slyly.
“Is that right?” He slows his pace.
I nod as the air around us starts to prickle. “I used to appreciate you as eye candy even though I thought you were a jerk.”
“And now?” He steps off the treadmill and closes the distance between us with three steps. He seems so tall. He looks very serious, considering we’re teasing.
“Now I don’t know.” My heart gives a long, unsteady beat. “You seem... really hard to read. I don’t know what I think of you.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he says, folding his arms. Any emotions I might have seen on his face are locked away now. “Tonight, we’ll be going somewhere. It will be a chance for me to show you another aspect of our business.”
“Are you getting a shipment or something?”
“You’ll see.”
I nod, and when silence spreads between us, I can’t stop myself from prying. “So what about last night? What did you have to do?”
“It was nothing,” he says softly.
Sweat rolls down his temple. I put my finger on his shirt, where it’s stuck to the middle of his chest. “Do you do this every day?” I step slightly closer as I ask.
He nods.
I stroke his chest, then ease my hand away. “How long do you run?”
“I try to do aerobic shit for at least ninety minutes.”
“Holy hell. Ninety minutes? You’re like, training,” I say, stepping a little bit away.
He raises his brows.
I take another small step back, establishing a safe distance between the two of us. Then I take a deep breath. “Can I ask you a question?”
He plucks a towel off a weight machine and wipes his forehead, not quite meeting my eyes as he says, “You have that ability.”
“Will you promise not to be growly about it?”
“Growly?” He smirks—but it’s a ridiculing smirk. Like he thinks I’m crazy. Like he isn’t close enough with me to tease.
I plunge right on ahead, keeping things casual even as my pulse picks up. “Yep, growly.”
He stares at me. “Is something wrong, Cleo?”
“No,” I hedge. “But I... last night, I saw a DVD of you playing football.” I search his handsome face. “You had black hair, and you were playing for USC. Your last name wasn’t Walsh. Your jersey said Drake.”
I know I’ve hit on something, because his face stays absolutely neutral and his jaw tightens. He doesn’t move, just stares right through me.
“Kellan?”
IT ALMOST FEELS RIGHT—that Cleo found it. Sloth. I let her in my house, of course she finds the DVD of me playing.
This girl has got some fucking link to me. I’ve heard of it before: a soul tie, that’s what Whitney used to call it. When people’s souls just know each other. Maybe that’s Cleo and me. Sloth and “R.”
As I cooked her breakfast this morning, I wished I knew more about her than chicken pizza. Tonight before we meet Pace to look over the stuff, I thought about taking her for pizza. I can’t let her stay the full three weeks now that I know who she is—but I’m not sending her away quite yet.
Call it selfish. You’d be right.
I look down at her, and I try to imagine Cleo writing me the letters.
I didn’t really go to sleep last night. After I slipped into the windowed room and held her for a little while, I re-read every one of them. Before the sun rose, I went and got Truman. Got her some strawberries from the farmers’ market. Stared at her art.
Cleo.
Sloth.
I’m not in a good place, but having her here... it eases me a little.
“You watched my DVD?” I ask.
She nods.
“What did you think of it?”
“Your name was Kellan Drake. You had black hair.”
I smirk and run a hand back through my sweaty locks. “Which do you prefer?”
“I think the blond is really your hair. Is that right?”
I nod. I have a memory of Lyon snickering at the black dye stains all over my neck the day I did it—to disguise myself at a game of flag football with the senior dudes from our rival high school. I can hear his laughter.
“That’s right,” I rasp.
“Why did you dye it?”
“For a dare.” It’s not entirely true, but I don’t want to recount the flag football game. Don’t want to think about it—him.
She chews her lip. Her brows are drawn together. “What about your name? Which one is real?”
I remember the stench of heavy perfume, and an older lady’s gentle hands on my shoulders. The way I fell into the cab that day, the first day I told someone my name was Walsh. “Walsh was my mother’s maiden name,” I tell Cleo now. “It’s my middle name.”
“So your real last name is Drake?”
I nod. I’m not telling her much more, but I don’t see the point in lying about these basic facts. I don’t think BTM ever to
ld her anything about me. She doesn’t know anything but what I told her in my letters: that my name is Robert. Which is, of course, untrue.
“Why’d you change it?” she asks.
The truth of my change in surname is not just the need for privacy once I came back from New York and started college here, but what happened before that. All the many things that made me feel like leaving Kellan Drake behind. Things Cleo can never know—lest she should find out how the two of us are linked.
I would never put her through that.
“Something happened,” I say slowly. “Something that made it so... I couldn’t be that person anymore.”
“Was that something an assault charge?” she whispers.
My stomach clenches as my pulse pounds behind my eyes. “What do you know about that, Cleo?” I rasp.
“I Googled you.” She looks nervous—and guilty.
“And you read I was suspended from the Trojans for a bar fight.”
She nods quickly.
I nod with her, trying to decide what if anything to add to that.
“What else did you read?” I need to know if any of the articles mentioned Lyon. His situation.
“That’s all. You had some killer stats when you were a senior at private school. You played first string as a freshman after Mark Waldon tore his ACL.” I nod, because those are facts. “And?”
“And then you got into a fight that night. You weren’t drunk—that’s what the story said—but you were at a bar in L.A. at like... closing time. And you got into it with this guy, this other player. It said he lost his hearing,” she says in a whisper.
I grit my teeth. Fear swells in me. Worry—about what Cleo thinks of that.
“It happened in January,” she adds, as if I need reminding.
“Yes.”
Her green eyes widen just a little. “So you really did it?”
“Do you think they lied?” I snap.
She shrugs. “Sometimes people do. Or there are disputes. Someone remembers one thing, someone else remembers something different. Keeps lawyers in business, you know?”
Not in my case. Everything the papers reported about that night was true. Franks did lose his hearing in his left ear. Like both Lyon and me, he never returned to the field. My father found a way to settle out of court.
Franks runs a vineyard now. And the truth of that story is, it took me years to feel sorry for what I did to that fuck.
I nod at her comment about lawyers. I’m starting to feel twitchy now. I want this subject dropped—but Cleo doesn’t notice. She shifts her stance a little, digging her hands deeper into the pockets of her fluffy robe, and tilts her head.
“So you moved here and changed your name?”
I shrug. I wipe my face again. “Looks like it.”
“Did you? Is that how it happened?” she asks. Her tone tells me everything I need to know about the likelihood she’ll let this drop.
I smooth the irritation off my face and try to appear forthcoming. Or like not a fucking liar who’s deceiving her about almost everything.
“I did some traveling first—but yes,” I say. “I left USC and ended up here.”
I turn back toward the treadmill, eager to get back on it and run from those green eyes. After last night—after I wrapped my arms around her and used her heat to warm myself—after she hugged me in the kitchen—and after this line of questioning—I’ve decided it’s a bad thing that the universe brought the two of us together in person. I should send her packing right now, but I’m finding I’m not strong enough. If she learns more about my past, I’ll have to find the strength somewhere. Until then... For just a little longer...
I step onto the treadmill and start the belt back moving, even as part of me is waiting for her words.
She walks over by me. I keep my eyes down as I start to run. She wraps her hand around the treadmill’s grip bar. “Kellan, I’m so sorry. That sucks.”
I turn, confused. “What sucks?”
“You lost... your life. I mean, you had to like playing football, right? You probably loved it. And after you got suspended, you must not have been able to go back. The news didn’t say anything about that—I didn’t Google much, because I wanted to ask you instead of prying on the internet—but I know that when something is a huge part of your life and you have to give it up, it always sucks. That is, if you loved it.”
My throat closes off, my body’s own acknowledgement that what she said is true—on so many levels. I swallow and nod. I bite my cheek as I lengthen my strides.
“Did you play a long time?” she asks warmly. “I wanted to read profiles about you, but like I said, I didn’t want to snoop.”
“Except right now?” I huff a laugh—and am surprised. That I’m able to. After last night...
“Except right now.” She smiles. “You’re right here in the flesh. The legendary Kellan Drake-Walsh-Charitable Kingpin-SGA President. I can’t resist a few questions. Maybe an autograph.” She tugs on her t-shirt. “You know,” she smiles, “the Sharpie-on-cleavage.”
That gets a chuckle out of me. “Bring me the Sharpie.”
“I just might.”
I push my body from a jog into a run. Her gaze moves with me. “Thank you for being honest with me. I know you didn’t have to tell me, but I like to know where you came from.”
I snort. If there’s anything I’m not, it’s honest.
“No biggie,” I say, as I stretch my legs into a more punishing pace.
“You know... I won’t tell. I swear. No one here knows that you played football, do they?”
“Nope.” Our soccer team sucks too much to get me any exposure. Which has been a good thing. I’d have never played if that wasn’t true. Don’t need any sports press sniffing around.
“Well I won’t tell a soul. Not even my best friends. Maybe just Truman.”
I jerk my head in a nod.
Now that she’s standing silently off to my side, and not distracting me with her questions and her pretty voice, the pain inside my chest flares to life again.
I run faster.
Harder.
“My first class is ten. When’s yours today?” she asks.
“Eleven.”
“Okay. Well I guess I’ll drive myself then.”
“Don’t. I’ll take you.”
She looks surprised. “You would have some time to waste.”
I shake my head. “I have to go to the dentist at 10:30, so it works.”
“Yuck. I hate the dentist. Do you have a cavity?”
I smirk at her. “What do you think?”
“I think your teeth look pretty perfect. Is it just a cleaning?” she asks.
“Cleaning.” I nod. “Now get out of here.”
“I want to work out too,” she pouts.
“Later.”
She turns to go. At the bottom of the stairs, she turns back to me. “Kellan?”
“Yeah.”
“Last night was—crazy. Like the wolf.”
She walks back upstairs, and I laugh. That’s me. I’m crazy like the wolf.
MY SCHOOL DAY IS DOMINATED by a run-in with Milasy. I pass her on the concourse and can’t miss the Gucci boots she has on—mine: the tan ones that are knee-high. I’m walking with Lora, talking for the first time since the other night, and Milasy glares at her as if she’s doing something wrong.
Before I can even ask Lora what’s up, Milasy is in front of us, with her hands on her hips and her dark hair flowing in the humid breeze.
“Lora—what did we talk about?” she asks, not looking at me.
“Yeah I know, but—”
“But?” Milasy asks.
“Cleo is my lab partner,” Lora lies.
Milasy’s face is unreadable, so I’m surprised when she says, “Find another partner.”
As soon as she stalks off, Lora pulls me into the nearest building—an aviation science lab—and tells me Milasy has told some of the Tri-Gams that I’m blacklisted.
“
She didn’t tell us why, just that you’re sort of like... suspended. I was going to tell you...” Lora bites her lip.
“It’s fine,” I say—even though it isn’t. Lora is supposed to be my good friend. I don’t think I’ve missed a single call from her in the last day or two. Nor has she sought me out, except a few minutes ago when we bumped into each other on our walk to the west side of campus.
We part ways outside the aviation lab, and Lora promises to call me later.
As soon as I get into my next class, Art as Self-Expression, another Tri-Gam, Sally, asks about my grandmother.
“What?” I frown.
“Milasy told us you’ve been home a lot, because she’s... Well, Milasy says she’s not doing so good.”
Perfect.
Another girl, a freshman named Christine, confirms this as I leave that class. She pats me on the arm as we pass one another in the lobby of the psych building and says, “I’m thinking of you, darlin’.”
I plant myself under my favorite willow tree to kill a little time before my next class, biology II, and as I step inside that classroom, my phone vibrates with a text from Kellan.
‘Pick u up at 4:30 behind Taylor?’
‘PLEASE.’
When I drag my tired ass into the parking lot at 4:32, he’s waiting in the Sexcalade. I experience a bolt of glee, like a lab rat presented with a carrot.
I slide into the passenger’s seat and quickly size him up. He looks nice: same dark jeans and emerald green button-up he had on when he dropped me off, so I can’t explain why the sight of him makes my heart do backflips. I notice his hair is a little wind-blown, I guess because he has his window down.
I give him a small smile. “How was your day?”
He lifts a shoulder. “How was yours?”
I drop my head into my hand. “It was tedious and tiring. I’m grumpy. And can’t wait to get away from campus.”
“I know something you might like.” He looks surprisingly light-hearted.
“Well, what is it?”
“You like pizza?”
“Who doesn’t?”
We drive the short distance to Mama McCalister’s in companionable silence. He parks behind the restaurant and comes around and opens my door. I smirk at him, but it slips into a smile as I check him out again. He looks more casual frat boy than usual today. And either way, “You make a good Southerner.”
