Playing To Win: The Complete King Brothers Collection (A Contemporary Romance Box Set)

by Teagan Kade

  I come to the final section and pause. This is where I had intended to place Peyton’s big secret — the whole sex-for-grades scandal, the blackmail attempt. My fingers hover over the keys and I don’t know if I can, or if I should, do it. I’m battling with myself — yes, no, yes, no. It fell into my lap almost like it was meant to be, mana from the heavens.

  I’m not even sure where’s Peyton’s at with the whole thing. He hasn’t told me if he decided to pay this Lorna woman or not. It’s his business, yes, but I’m sure if I asked him, he’d tell me what happened.

  It’s all distraction. The question remains. I sigh and decide to write it up anyhow, to see how the story stands both with and without the revelation. Even as I type, my hands are sweating, my pulse raised like Peyton’s about to pop over my shoulder at any second with a look of shock on his face. He’ll shake his head like it’s suddenly not working. ‘How could you?’ he’ll say, eyes wet and glassy. ‘How could you betray me?’

  But like the journalistic Judas I am, I keep on writing.

  Afterwards, reading through the article with what must be my fifth coffee of the day, the only thing I’m certain of is that I have no damn idea which version to go with. I hit print on both and stand to scoop them up out of the printer in the corner before Amanda smells the ink drying. I separate them and walk to Lewis’s office. He’s on a call, but he hangs up when he sees me, waving me in.

  I close the door and seat myself, the two versions of the story on my lap, one under the other.

  “Is that the story?” he asks, gesturing to the pile of freshly printed paper.

  “Two stories, actually, slightly different,” I begin, my heart beating far faster than it should be, the paper burning in my hands. It feels like it might spontaneously combust at any second, the ground opening up under my chair. “I’d like your opinion which is stronger — your professional opinion,” I add.

  He seems chuffed at that, straightening up in his chair and extending his hand. “Well, of course. Color me curious.”

  I lift the paper and it suddenly feels like it weights fifty pounds. He takes it but I can’t seem to let go.

  Lewis looks at me puzzled. “Erin? You do realize you have to let go of the article for me to actually read it, right?”

  I snap out of it and release my hands, fast twisting them together in my lap.

  It’s done. “Of course, sorry. I’ve been at it all morning.”

  Lewis is looking down at the article nodding. “Go grab yourself some lunch. I’ll let you know what I think when you get back.”

  So begins the longest lunch of my life. I don’t dare text Peyton, can’t even bring myself to pick up my cell let alone read his latest proclamation of love — well, the King approximation of it.

  I sit there staring at the egg sandwich I bought and can’t bring myself to eat a single bite lest I spew it back all over myself. My stomach isn’t full of butterflies. No, it’s a full-blown insect kingdom inside there.

  I toss the sandwich and make my way back inside, ascending the stairs, feeling hot and prickly even though the office air conditioning is set to its usual freeze-your-nips-solid temperature.

  I knock once on Lewis’s door and suck in a quick breath.

  “Enter,” he says.

  I take up the same seat and can’t make anything out in his expression, can’t gauge his reaction at all. The article, both versions, are spread across his desk into two semi-piles, so at least I know he’s read them.

  He locks eyes with me and places his pointer finger on the right pile. “This, this is a great story. You’ve really outdone yourself. It’s true in its intent and surprisingly personal, if I must say.”

  I go completely still waiting for more, but Lewis places moves his finger to the other pile, stabbing down into it. “But this, this version is absolutely solid gold. The thing with the teacher,” he brings his fingers to his lips and kisses them like a reality show chef, “this is going to make you, kiddo. It’s going to get you out of this small-time paper and into the real publications. There’s not a doubt in my mind.” His finger moves back to the other pile. “And while Daddy Lewis (cringe, cringe, cringe) could force you to run this version instead and keep you here all to himself, I know when to let a bird free to sing her best song.”

  I have no idea what he’s talking about bar the fact he likes the version with Peyton’s secret better.

  I’m tempted to tell him it’s too much, that I’m happy running the version without, but his next words pull me back from the brink.

  He’s stabbing his finger into the article again, hard enough for it to knock against the wood of his desk below. “Everyone is going to want a piece of you after this. I mean, if you can get this kind of expose, from one of the most guarded families on campus… I don’t know how you did it, who you had to kill, but if you can get this, anything is possible.”

  It's more a question of how I got it, but I don’t divulge that. Instead, I’ve been blinded by the dream. I think of my mother smiling up there when she hears what I have achieved, that I didn’t compromise over some silly boy and let him steal away my life and future.

  You know he’s not just some ‘silly boy,’ my head argues back.

  But I don’t. What we have is still fresh. What Lewis is painting here extends far beyond these walls, this cursed campus. It’s real and it’s waiting for me if only I’ll put my personal feelings aside and get on with the damn job.

  “Anyhow,” says Lewis, leaning back with his hands behind his head and breaking through my daydream, “I trust everyone here, so it is your call. I’ll run either version, and I’ll do so happily. It’s completely up to you.”

  Damn his flip-floppiness throwing question marks up again. It’s almost like he’s there inside my head, which is even scarier, really.

  I stand, firm. “Run the story with the secret. I’m ready.”

  “Are you?” he smiles, leaning forward, hands tented in front of himself. “Are you really?”

  “Yes,” I reply, miraculously keeping the nervousness out of voice.

  “Okay then,” he nods. “Consider it done. We’ll run it the day after tomorrow, front page. Amanda’s story can be bumped. And take the afternoon off. You deserve it.”

  It’s exactly what I’ve wanted all this time, so why do I feel so empty when I leave his office?

  I close Lewis’s door behind myself and look out over the desks, people scurrying back and forth given we’re so close to print. No one seems to pay the slightest bit of attention to the moral conundrum that has set up shop inside me. Then again, it’s not like I’ve got a sign stuck to my head proclaiming my eternal love to Crestfall’s biggest bad boy.

  One hand goes to the other and it’s almost like I’m searching for a wedding ring there, have to be sure Peyton didn’t slip into my room overnight and slip it onto my finger.

  You’re insane, I tell myself.

  I gather my things and head out. A cold front has swept across the campus. Eerie bands of black and sooty grey are streaked across the sky, a current in the air signaling the approach of a storm.

  I almost turn around, telling myself to walk instead, to just keep on walking and get out of there before I do something stupid.

  All the while I’m thinking about the times Peyton and I have spent together. I know I’m more to him than another girl, another trophy he wanted because it sprouted a mouth and told him ‘no.’ I know there’s a real thinking, feeling human being inside that — yes, very beautiful — body, an actual beating heart. He may be the poster boy for frat parties and letting your hair down around here, but the time we spent together? Sure, some of it was the best sex of my life, no contest there, but what I really remember are the conversations, the mutual interests, the time spent finding out who the real Peyton King is.

  A gust of wind forces me to pull my coat harder around myself. I’m halfway across the quad when I see a group of students moving in the other direction. They’re wearing Thunder jerseys,
laughing, having the time of their lives post-lecture.

  I’m sad I never got to experience that in college. I always spent too much time with my head down. I never pulled it up enough to see life itself.

  I stop and stand, the wind picking up my hair and blowing it around my face.

  I can’t do it.

  Letting that version run will make me professionally, yes, but personally?

  It will break me, and not just me, but Peyton, too.

  Before I can talk myself out of it, I take out my cell. I fumble it, forced to crouch down and pick it back up, my fingers struggling to work against the biting cold.

  I text as fast as I can, tell Lewis I’ve changed my mind, that I want the version without Peyton’s secret to run.

  I don’t know if he’ll agree, which is why I’m pleasantly surprised when he texts back saying sure, that he said it was my call, but to let him know ASAP if I change my mind.

  I pocket my cell and can finally breathe again in the knowledge at least that one big secret won’t be coming out tomorrow.

  Peyton might forgive me after all.

  You sure about that?

  Hell no, I’m not. I’m not sure about much at all as I continue to walk.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  PEYTON

  I’ve been trying to get ahold of Erin all day, but she’s not answering her cell. I consider heading down to the Crimson, seeing what’s up, but I figure she’s busy working, not to mention it’s far more of a PITA getting there from this place.

  Titus spots me gazing into my cell at the dinner table. “I haven’t seen that kind of sulky shit since I took your Pokémon cards in fifth grade.”

  “You know how much those things would be worth now?” I smile, placing my cell down.

  He jumps up onto the table, rarely one for decorum.

  “What are you going to do? Send the debt collectors after me? I barely have two dimes to rub together, bro. Speaking of which, reckon you spot me a ten?”

  “For?”

  “For… entertainment purposes. Recreational.”

  I roll my eyes. “Same old Titus.”

  He puts his hands up in surrender. “Would you have it any other way?”

  “I would, actually. I’d have you a decent, hard-working contributor to society.”

  I can see why the girls are stumbling over themselves for him. Like all of us, he has that innate King charm, that mischievous twinkle in his eye that suggests a night of fun — if nothing else. He’s also getting fucking stacked. I didn’t know you had to be Mr. Universe to swing a bat.

  I find it funny how we all have gravitated to different sports. We could have been quite the force as a team.

  “It’s this girl, isn’t it?” Titus continues, dropping the tough-guy act like a well-worn coat. “The unicorn, right?”

  “Something like that,” I reply.

  “I think we both know better, bro. Girls aren’t worth the trouble. Here’s what you do. You go out there,” he’s pointing in the vague direction of the campus, and I recall this exact conversation only days ago, “select any one of hundreds of girls wanting to play pogo with your Johnson. Fuck them silly for an hour or three and I guarantee this supposed unicorn of yours will happily trot away out of mind. Whatever she’s got, it isn’t worth it, being beholden like this.”

  My eyebrows lift in surprise. “’Beholden?’ Holy shit, don’t tell me you’re actually learning something in English lit.”

  Titus’s smile grows. “You want to know another fitting word? ‘Whipped,’ as in completely, wrapped-your-dick-up-with-a-bow pussy-whipped.”

  “It’s not like that. It’s…”

  He rolls his hand over in front of himself. “Oh, do continue. Tell me why she is soooo special.”

  I don’t appreciate being patronized, but I play. “All right. I tried to get this through Nolan’s thick skull, but simply? She’s the complete package. She’s smart and funny in a weird kind of Zoey Deschanel way. She’s attractive, but she’s not an Instafamer. She’s hot without knowing it and yeah, the sex is pretty fucking good too. No,” I correct, “it’s the best sex I’ve had in my life, and we both know that’s the Vince Lombardi trophy right there.”

  “You’re comparing your beloved to a football trophy?”

  “Yes, because she’s the dream, brother. She’s everything I’ve ever wanted but never knew I needed. She’s the unicorn.”

  Titus doesn’t really have a smart comeback for that one, mulling it over silently. He jumps down. “I still think you’re insane. As for me, I’m going to campus to clean up what you’re leaving to waste. More for me.”

  “You can have them,” I laugh.

  He waves and collects his baseball bag by the door, heading out.

  Nolan left early for practice and Phoenix has been oddly absent for a while now. I’m not sure what’s going on there.

  In his own blunt away, Titus isn’t completely wrong. Even when we were teenagers with fresh pimples and raging hormones-slash-boners we’d make pacts never to let girls get the better of us, that we’d never settle down and instead lead the life of eternal bachelors. It sounded like a pipe dream until one day I realized it was reality. But the grass wasn’t green there, the thrill short-lasting, a quick hit and then a deep emptiness nothing could fill — not football, not liquor, not another wet mouth.

  My cell’s face-down on the table. I pick it up and try Erin one more time, but it goes to voicemail again, a chirpy Erin informing me to ‘please try again later.’

  “As if I haven’t tried enough already,” I mumble to myself, tempted to throw the phone against the wall but unable to draw the necessary anger to do it. What good would it do?

  Such restraint is new. All of this shit is new. I’m not quite sure what to make of it. Instead I poke and prod at it, test it like a scientist would and gauge the reaction. It’s not altogether unpleasant, doesn’t seem like it will kill me, so what’s the problem?

  Indeed, my head answers.

  *

  The following day I’m on campus for class. I’m in one of my spare jerseys, notice plenty of red and white around the given game night’s coming up. When it comes to football, Crestfall is about as serious as it gets short of Notre Dame or Alabama. We might not have their numbers, but what we lack in crowds we make up for with enthusiasm.

  The mid-morning lectures have just finished. The campus is a scramble crossing of students shifting through the campus to their next class.

  But something’s off.

  I nod at one of hockey guys, but he smiles back and it’s wrong, like he knows something I don’t.

  Things get even weirder in class.

  I sit there and get the impression people are watching me, whispers darting back and forth, eyes darting away.

  You’re being fucking paranoid, I tell myself. Your Peyton King. Of course they’re looking at you.

  But they’re not looking at me with awe or wonder, but with something else I can’t place.

  The midday bell goes and class breaks. Outside, suspicions turn into panic. There’s no more doubting it. People are looking. They shuffle past me watching and whispering and I know it’s not in my head.

  I signal one of the guys from the team, but he ignores me, changing direction.

  The fuck?

  I’ve found myself in the middle of the quad, spinning in a circle while people watch. One of them points. I’m about to go over there, ask him what his god-damn problem is, until someone grabs my shoulder from behind.

  I whip around, fist raised, but it’s Tony. He jumps back. “Whoa, there, bro. Chill.”

  “Chill?” I laugh, keeping a lookout. “What the fuck is going on, Tony? Did something happen overnight? Have I grown a third fucking eye?”

  The look he gives me back tells me immediately that whatever this is, it’s deadly fucking serious.

  “Hey,” he says, reaching for my shoulder again, “what do you say we get off the quad, huh? Go hang in the shade over t
here.”

  I shrug his hand off, losing my patience. “Tony,” I tell him, spelling it out, “What. The. Fuck. Is. Going. On?”

  He scratches behind his ear, eyes darting left and right, twitchy.

  He steps close to me, brings his mouth to my ear. “Alright, alright. Fuck. It’s the paper.”

  I bring my head back, eyes scrunched up. “The what?”

  Tony’s shaking his head, hands on his hips. “The college paper, man. The Crimson.”

  “What about it?”

  “You’re on the front page.”

  It wouldn’t be the first time. I don’t know what all the fuss would be about now. “And?” I press.

  “Look,” says Tony, voice low. “Just find a copy, okay. You’ll see.” He claps me on the shoulder and walks off, leaving me in an even greater sense of confusion.

  I don’t like the feel of this.

  I don’t like it at all.

  I take his advice and head over to where a stack of papers has been dumped at the corner of the IT building.

  I pick one up and move into an alcove I typically reserve for public sex acts, but which is now, thankfully, deserted. The light’s not great, but I can read the front page just fine.

  And I can’t believe my eyes.

  “No,” I say aloud, flicking to the next page where things only devolve further.

  “No, no, no,” I repeat, reading on, eyes scrolling fast unable to take it all in, because it’s extensive. Thorough.

  I turn back to the front page and look at the byline hoping against hope I don’t see what I fear will be there, but it is.

  By Erin Nash.

  I drop the paper, just let it fall from my hands, an image of myself with two girls someone’s pulled from my Instagram feed looking back at me, smiling smugly as if to say, ‘You fell for it, bro. You fell hook, line and fucking sinker.’

  Disbelief turns to anger turns to self-pity turns back to full-blown rage in the space of seconds.

  I fall back against the wall scared without it I’ll find myself on the ground. Sweat’s broken out across my brow, a beating, thumping headache below.