by Ali Dean
It was so utilitarian that if it were underground, I would assume it was a bomb shelter.
Before I could fully absorb where we were, I found myself on my back on one of the beds, a stormy Cruz caging me in.
“I think it’s time to set some rules,” he gritted out.
“And I think it’s time for you to give me an explanation.”
He shook his head. “Not now. Not tonight. You know enough to understand it’s not safe right now. You need to be with one of us if you go out again.”
I swallowed, the fight leaving my body with his nearness. With his stricken expression. There was a tinge of panic in his eyes, and it scared me.
“And if you ever need to cry again, you come to me. You can always come to me, Hazel,” he softened his hard tone just a touch at this last statement.
“What about tonight? At two AM?”
“You’ll stay here. It’s safe. We have to go but we’ll be back.”
A sense of alarm pulsed through me. “When?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Shouldn’t I just go back to my house?”
Cruz shook his head. “It’s safer here.”
I didn’t have to ask. I knew whatever they were going to do was dangerous, and it terrified me. “What about my dad?”
“He can take care of himself.”
“You’re not doing much to reassure me here, Cruz.”
Cruz let some of his weight drop onto me before answering. “I’m not trying to reassure you, Hazel. I’m being honest. I can’t tell you everything, but I want you to trust me.”
On instinct my back arched to close the distance between our bodies. Cruz let out a shuddering breath at the contact.
“You could distract me instead,” I suggested. He reacted immediately, capturing my mouth in a hungry kiss that had me squirming beneath him. It was all heat and fire, the tension rolling off his body as he kissed me greedily, almost angrily.
The friction of my shorts at my center made me wild as I lifted my hips, seeking more pressure. I felt just how desperate and hard he was when his hips met mine. We ground into each other blindly, with zero finesse. It was frenzied and wonderful and when his hand slipped under my shirt to my stomach, the touch seared me. I moaned, and he took my encouragement to travel to my breast. He cupped me and let out a groan of satisfaction.
“Cruz!” a voice called. “We’re coming up. You decent?” It was Spike.
My eyes snapped open and met Cruz’s glazed ones. He was as lost in the moment as I was, but a second later he blinked and pulled his hand out from under my shirt, his body off mine. The loss of his heat left me cold, shivering.
“One minute, man. I’ll be right down,” Cruz called back. He moved to a sitting position, breathing heavily as he rubbed the back of his neck. His face looked pained and my eyes darted to his crotch. I couldn’t help myself. I’d felt enough to know he was packing, and I didn’t mean of the firearm variety. My mind flickered to earlier, when Bodhi had heard an engine in the drive and reached for his waistband. No, he wasn’t even eighteen yet. That thought was ridiculous.
Not as ridiculous as this warehouse and everything else that’s gone down in the past few days, a little voice in my head countered.
“Well,” Cruz said on a shaky breath. “If the rest of the night goes to shit, at least I finally got to touch your boob.”
We both released nervous laughs at the lame joke. “Puh-lease. You didn’t even unclasp my bra.”
Cruz let out another groan and it went straight to my lower belly. There was another pulsing need in me that needed relief, and I couldn’t let Cruz just walk out of here when he was the one responsible for putting it there. Before Cruz could stop me, I sat up and swung a leg over his waist, straddling him and effectively trapping him to the bed as he had done to me.
“Hazel.” My name on his lips came off half-growl half-hiss. I fought to suppress a victory smile as I took his hand and guided it back to where it had been on my breast.
“Come on, Cruz, you can’t leave me like this. It’s not right.”
Through the cloud of lust in his eyes I could see the indecision. Feel it throbbing beneath me. His eyes darted over my shoulder and before I could turn my head, he gritted, “Get out, Spike.”
“Yeah, yeah. Come on, man.” I heard both amusement and stress in Spike’s voice.
“You should go,” I relented.
“I know. But now I know you’ll be thinking of me while I’m gone.” He stood up, holding me as he did so and then placing me back on the bed. “Don’t go anywhere, okay? If anything feels off, call your dad first. Got it?”
“Sure.”
He started walking to the door, turned, and looked back. “I’ve waited years for you. I can wait one more night.” It almost sounded as if he was talking to himself. Before I could respond, he was gone. And I was alone.
Chapter Sixteen
I stared at the ceiling for a long while after I heard the guys leave. Questions floated in and out of my head. I had no answers. My frustration grew with each passing second. Why was I even here? I didn’t want to be. I wanted to be home. No, scratch that. Home wasn’t ideal either. Not after it was broken into and possibly bugged. Maybe Mimi and Pops’s place again.
Even if I wanted to leave, I couldn’t. I had no vehicle. I couldn’t call someone to get me because this place was, apparently, top secret. I didn’t even know if I could get an Uber.
As I lay alone in a strange room, unanswered questions pounding through me, I suddenly missed soccer. Not playing it, not exactly. I’d been on the field for three hours every day this weekend. And it wasn’t that restlessness I sometimes got when I hadn’t played a game in a while. No, I missed my fixation on it. I longed for that single-minded focus to return and consume me. It was easier that way. All these jumbled emotions and the uncertainty, it was tearing me up.
Taking a step back from my obsession hadn’t been entirely a conscious decision, not at first. But after the last major tournaments of the season ended and my top choice colleges gave me as much reassurance as I was going to get, something in me deflated. Not in a bad way either. Actually, it was like the pressure and momentum had gotten so big, impossible to sustain, I simply couldn’t go on like that. I needed to reboot.
And… now I was comparing myself to a robot. Or a balloon. Maybe smoking pot was a bad idea. I had the strangest thoughts. I understood why people did it though. Earlier, it had shut my mind off to things I didn’t want to dwell on and let me enjoy the music. Now, as the high was fading away and I was overthinking everything, it allowed me to think about things I never wanted to think about. It made it bearable. And it gave me clarity. If this was what being a normal teenager was like, no thanks. Maybe the house robbery and warehouse prisoner stuff weren’t normal, but the lack of control over my turbulent emotions was going to break me.
I couldn’t handle all these feelings, that was the truth of it. As soon as I got out of this jail, I was going back to my cocoon of focus. Soccer, school, and surface friendships. I could handle that. Hell, I excelled at it. I was built for it. I wasn’t built to be a prisoner in a warehouse, supposedly for my own protection. I was a fighter, not a damsel. If Cruz wanted a girl he could hide away, and the guys wanted a girl who allowed that, then I shouldn’t be part of their world. It wasn’t me. And it never would be.
I must have fallen asleep at some point because when I woke, I was wrapped up in Cruz’s body. After removing his arm I sat up on an elbow and found the guys had crashed on the other beds. I let out a breath of relief that everyone was accounted for, but I didn’t forget my decision. In fact, in the light of day, it was clearer than ever.
Now, I only had to figure out how to go back to my old ways without the guys getting bent out of shape about it. Oh, and somehow convince Cruz that we weren’t together. That we couldn’t be.
I didn’t have time to grieve or feel sad about what I was losing. No, I had made a decision and the newfound purpose gave me a s
ense of control. Maybe it was only an illusion, but I held onto it anyway as I debated my next move. It would have to be Cruz that I woke up to give me a ride home. I wouldn’t break up with him. Not yet at least. I’d just avoid him for a while until he forced a conversation. If danger was their primary concern when it came to keeping tabs on me, I’d stick to school and my house or Mimi and Pops’s for a while.
I started to sit up and Cruz’s arm around me tightened.
“Cruz,” I whispered.
He didn’t say anything. I wiggled until I was turned in his arms. His absurdly long lashes fluttered, fanning over his cheeks. “Cruz,” I tried again.
“Hmmm…”
“Wake up. I need a ride to my car.” I was all business, even as my body reacted to him, remembering last night and the state he’d left me in.
I could tell he was awake now, even though he kept his eyes closed. His mouth tilted up ever so slightly as his hand slipped under the back of my shirt.
Oh, no. This was not good. But it was a reminder about why I had to stick to my purpose. Soccer. School. Lots of friends but no one I had to make any promises to, commitments towards. I needed independence, control. I couldn’t get that in this warehouse. With Cruz, all my resolve slipped away before I even realized it was happening.
“I have to go pee,” I blurted. It got the reaction I was hoping for and his eyes opened.
“Good morning, Hazel,” he said. Cruz’s morning voice was rough and perfect. Of course. His eyes on me, inches away, did not help matters one bit.
I shifted and this time he let me go. I found a bathroom by the stairs, and it had a shower too. I noted towels and toothbrushes, shampoo and soap. How much time did the guys spend here, anyway? It didn’t matter. It wasn’t my business. Not anymore.
Cruz hadn’t moved when I returned to the bed, and I shoved his shoulder. As much as I wanted to climb in next to him, I couldn’t.
Eventually, I got him up. The entire way to his bike he grumbled. He wanted coffee, breakfast, kisses. Nope. I insisted I had to get home. He wanted explanations about why I was rushing out? Too bad. Tit for tat and all that.
He didn’t bring me to my truck at Heritage Fest though. He told me they’d already dropped it at home last night, and he drove me to my front door.
“I get it, Hazel,” he said at the front door. “You’re pissed and want space. It’s how you operate. I know you.”
I wanted to take a dig, banter with him about his assumptions, but I knew I couldn’t engage. I had to cut him off if I had any chance of going back to doing things the only way I knew how. My way.
Instead, I just nodded before opening the front door. “Yeah. Thanks for the ride. Bye, Cruz.” And then I slammed the door in his face. Fine, it wasn’t exactly a slam, but it was close.
I’d almost made it to my bedroom when Dad came out of the bathroom.
“Hazel? You’re back sooner than I expected,” he said.
“Yeah. I’m going back to bed.” Before I could turn back to my room, Dad stepped closer.
He crossed his arms and asked quietly, “You don’t have any questions? Anything you want to talk about?”
The back of my eyes burned. I wanted to rage at him. Instead, I kept my tone as even as possible. “What’s the point? None of you tell me anything anyway. I’m tired, Dad.”
He took a small step back like my quiet words had knocked the wind out of him. We’d have to go back to pretending, and that sent a stabbing pain to my chest. Is that what we’d been doing all this time? I always thought Dad and I had a great relationship. That we were close.
I climbed back into bed, refusing to let tears fall again. Last night’s tears were plenty.
Instead, I thought about soccer. Each time an unwanted thought or feeling crept in, I pushed it out. I thought about what it would be like if I went to UMass. I’d probably be an outside midfielder freshman year. At Harvard or nearly any other school I’d take a center position where I could have the most control of the field. I’d have to spend a season or two, maybe even three, proving myself on a team like UMass before I took the center position. That would be an adjustment. I’d been center on all my teams for years now. But the challenge would be good for me. Maybe I’d play striker occasionally. I was great at the final execution, putting the ball in the net. But a striker’s role was limited, and I liked moving around the field, taking defense when the moment called for it, being in a position to set the course of the game or move the play in a different direction. Strikers had to be patient. They spent a lot of time watching, waiting, positioning themselves. I could do that once in a while, but it wasn’t my preference. I liked being right in the middle of the action.
Shit. Maybe this decision wasn’t as simple as I thought. It wasn’t only about a more intense and competitive soccer experience in college versus a more well-rounded college experience. My role on the team would be drastically different as well. I didn’t want to change positions, but I didn’t want to sit the bench as a back-up center either. Sure, the challenge to prove myself at Mass was enticing. Something new. A change. But it also meant more uncertainty. Right now, I wasn’t feeling especially eager to embrace uncertainty. Even if it meant an escape from Cruz Donovan and all that came with him.
Chapter Seventeen
I got to our first practice late the next day. Despite my determination to return to a hardcore soccer focus, it was just as important to avoid the guys. I’d seen Bodhi and Em at Pops and Mimi’s the night before, of course. But we had a rhythm there. A routine. A dynamic that worked between all of us. We could almost pretend like nothing had changed since last Sunday night’s dinner.
The guys’ team had the fields in the morning for the next two days until school started, and by the time I arrived, most of them had cleared out. I spotted Spike’s Hummer and Moody’s 4Runner in the lot, and hoped they were lifting weights in the gym.
No, all five of them were standing by the bleachers overlooking the varsity field. The coaches were already calling out for the girls to gather around, but the guys didn’t look like they would give me a pass.
“I have to get to practice.” I tried going through the gate, but Bodhi stepped out to block me.
“Hazel, we’ll pick you up after practice. We can talk then.”
“No, I’m lifting after practice.”
“We’ll lift with you,” Emmett offered.
“I don’t want to lift with you. Besides, I’d rather do it here and you have your own gym. Just do it there.”
“Not very subtle, Haze,” Em mumbled.
“You have to eat. We’ll take you to dinner.” This time it was Cruz.
“We’ll see.” I’d have to get creative if I was going to avoid them. They’d give up eventually and let me go. “Move, Bodhi, I have to get to practice.”
The coach called out to me, and the guys finally let me through.
I tried to push myself on the field, attack each drill and play with intensity, but I was distracted. Maybe it was the lingering looks I felt on me from my teammates, or the unanswered questions still bouncing around inside me. It could have been the throbbing in my lower belly that Cruz ignited Saturday night and that continued to hum incessantly. Whatever it was, by the time practice ended late afternoon, I was frustrated. There was more energy in me.
Knowing the guys could show up any minute, I tried to make a beeline for the weight room. My path was intercepted by a trio of girls from the JV team who had finished up their practice at the same time. I recognized them from Cruz’s birthday party last week. One had brought whiskey at the suggestion of her older sister.
“Hi, Hazel,” one with French braid pigtails said. I couldn’t recall her name so I smiled at all three of them.
“Hey. How was your first practice?”
Pigtails pursed her lips. “We wanted to talk to you about that, actually.”
I snapped my attention from getting to the weight room as quickly as possible to the three girls. They appeared nervous
and determined, shifting on their feet.
“See, we know you helped decide the teams.” I recognized the speaker as Afua and remembered her name because it was so unique. I also remembered her because she was hella fast. Usually I was the fastest one when we did suicides or sprints of any kind, but Afua beat me every day at tryouts. Her skill with the ball still needed some work though. She was a good player with a lot of potential, but her footwork lacked finesse, to the point of being sloppy at times. If she practiced consistently, she could be a real asset.
Afua took a deep breath. “And we think there’s been a mistake,” she rushed out.
“Three mistakes,” Pigtails added.
“Girls, I really don’t have much say in the process. This is probably something you should speak to the coaches about.”
The third one, Melissa I think it was, explained, “We thought we’d explain it to you first, get some advice.”
“Uh, yeah, okay. Shoot.” This was weird. Awkward. But I could handle it. I was fine with weird and awkward. After all, I spent most school days with the advanced placement honor roll crowd. Some stereotypes rang true.
“See, all three of us play for New England Elite,” Afua offered. It was the same club I played for. They were sophomores, so likely on the U-16 team. “And ODP.”
“There are girls who made varsity who are only on Commonwealth or Premier FC and didn’t make ODP,” Melissa said. She referred to the other two club teams in the greater Boston area, which weren’t quite the same caliber as New England Elite.
I felt a presence beside me. It was Louise. “Being on certain teams doesn’t guarantee you anything, girls. You’re all good players but you know varsity at Defiance Falls High is probably the most competitive team in the state to make. It’s four different age groups.”
The one with pigtails mumbled something under her breath I didn’t hear. Louise asked, “What was that, Kylie?” Oh, right. Kylie Cornwall. The one who had an older sister who knew Cruz liked whiskey.
