Panic had me shooting up out of my seat. I didn’t know why. I didn’t know what I was so afraid of—that Danny would get angry and cause a scene, that the entire team would gang up on him, that he’d say something to embarrass me, that he’d mention my brothers and the fact that we’d shared a moment last night.
Okay, I was wrong. I did know what I was afraid of—all of the above. Conner was dangerous to everything I’d been trying to build these past six months since the breakup. Anonymity. A wall between me and the sharks that were constantly circling…
“Hey, beautiful,” Conner said as he drew near.
That sent the group of girls at the table into a fit of whispers and giggles that made me want to run and hide.
“Uh, what is going on here?” Erika was the voice that stuck out because it was the only one speaking to me, not about me.
I turned to face her and Allie. “I told you we’re in the same history class. I’m just…helping him study.”
By the looks of it, no one believed me. But Conner had heard me and his expression was filled with mischief as he announced loudly, “If it isn’t my favorite study buddy.”
He stopped right in front of me and I had to tilt my head up to meet his gaze. His dark eyes danced with laughter. He leaned forward slightly. “So, we are study buddies now, huh? Glad to hear it.”
I didn’t know whether to be annoyed or amused at the fact that he’d just used my excuse to his advantage. But now I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. I could either make the statement true—and I prided myself on being honest—or I could declare myself a liar in front of everyone.
“I guess we are,” I agreed.
He tilted his head to the side as he studied me, his eyes still warm with amusement and his voice still low enough that only I could hear him through the murmur of the crowd and the clatter of dishes. “I’m curious, did you say that to save me from that table full of goons back there or to save yourself the embarrassment of admitting you like me.”
I let out a little huff of laughter. “You don’t beat around the bush, do you?”
He lifted a shoulder. “Thought you might appreciate the straightforward approach.”
I did. I really did. It was so refreshing after the games and manipulations of the crowd I typically hung out with. “I never said I like you.”
“You didn’t deny it just now either,” he said with a careless shrug. “I’ll take that as a win.”
“You really shouldn’t.” But my comeback was ruined by the laughter that was clear in my voice.
His smile grew. “I knew it.”
“What?”
“I knew you’d fall for me.”
I rolled my eyes. “Get over yourself.”
“Are you going to introduce me to your friends?” He tipped his head to the side toward Erika, Allie, and the others who I was absolutely positive were staring.
“Nope.”
His laugh was low and rumbly. “Any chance I could convince you to have a study session over there at that table in the corner?”
I outright laughed. “A study session, huh?”
My laughter was cut short when Danny appeared at my side, looming over me, as he wrapped an arm around my shoulder. I stiffened at the touch, so familiar but so…not, all at the same time.
He hadn’t attempted to touch me since the breakup. Sure, he’d done some pouting, and he’d had his friends try to talk me into giving him another chance, but he’d never put his pride on the line himself by begging, and he’d always kept his distance physically.
“Is this guy bothering you, Rosalie?” Danny asked. His clean-cut, All-American face that I used to find so handsome was outright ugly when it sported a sneer.
Conner, on the other hand, was eyeing Danny with ill-disguised amusement. As for me? I was petrified from the inside out. It had little to do with Danny’s touch and everything to do with the silence that fell around us as they stopped what they were doing to watch this scene unfold.
This right here. This was my worst nightmare. Having my personal life on display, being the center of attention, having everyone watching, waiting, seeing how I would react.
I’ll freeze. I always froze. The ice queen nickname was more apt that anyone could ever realize, but not in the way they meant it.
Danny knew. He knew what happened to me when emotions reared up, when I was put in the spotlight. He knew and he was smirking now when I didn’t stand up for Conner or tell him to mind his own business.
I just…stood there.
And for a second I hated myself for it. I hated this stupid fear, or whatever it was, that made me turning hard and cold rather than react the way I wanted to.
It made me feel…weak.
I know you’re strong.
I heard Conner’s words from the day before as if he’d just said them now, that’s how loudly and clearly they echoed in my skull. I managed to look up at Conner and his gaze met mine. They were still crinkled up at the edges with amusement but the look there when he made eye contact was so warm. So intimate. So…tender. Like he knew what I was feeling, and like it was just the two of us standing here—
“Look at me when I’m talking to you, loser.” Danny’s voice broke through the moment and made me cringe.
Snickers, giggles, and gasps. That was all I heard from the table full of friends beside me. Tristan and some of the other seniors from the team were on the opposite side of the room but Danny’s friends, mostly fellow juniors, were all gathered behind us and I heard chairs scraping and voices murmuring as they started to crowd in on us.
Fear on Conner’s behalf flickered through me, made that much stronger when I saw his utter lack of it. His grin grew like this was hilarious. Didn’t he understand? Hadn’t anyone told him that I was Danny’s?
Danny’s hand squeezed my upper arm painfully. I didn’t think he meant to hurt me—the guy was selfish and self-absorbed but never violent—at least not with me. I was pretty sure he didn’t even realize he was gripping me so hard…or at all.
This wasn’t about me. It was rarely ever about me. When it came to Danny, everything was about Danny. The world revolved around him, and the only reason he wanted me back was because I didn’t want him.
I was a challenge.
Ugh, how I hated when guys saw me as some sort of challenge. Like I was just another video game they needed to beat to feel like a manly man.
Anger had my blood burning in my veins. I wasn’t Danny’s. I never had been and I never would be. Miracle of miracles, I found the strength to pull out from under his arm. I was pretty sure it was surprise that actually had him letting go because he turned to me with the sort of open-mouthed look that had always made my stomach churn with mild disgust even before we’d broken up.
Everyone was watching me. Everyone. Even Conner.
Conner, who thought I was strong. Conner, who’d been nothing but kind to me despite the rumors about me. Conner, who’d been sweet to my brothers when they’d needed it most.
Conner, who would get his butt kicked from here back to California if this thing escalated.
Conner, who needed my help whether he knew it or not.
“He’s not bothering me, Danny,” I said, leveling him with the cold glare I’d become notorious for. “You are.”
“Ooh, burn!” I heard Allie say from the table beside me.
“You go, girl,” Erika added, pride clear in her voice.
She’d always been urging me to stand up for myself with Danny but I’d never had the courage. Or maybe I had it, I just hadn’t been able to find it. It had been too buried beneath all the other crap. But now…
Well, now I still felt like I was going to throw up and I was pretty sure my knees would give out any minute now if this scene didn’t end. I looked to Conner, hoping beyond hope that he’d understand.
He arched his brows and jerked a thumb over his shoulder toward the door. “You ready for our study date?”
He was all casual innocence.
Either he really was completely unflustered by all this attention—not to mention the fact that he’d been this close to being beaten up—or he was the best actor I’d ever met.
I nodded and didn’t resist when he reached out to grasp my hand in his and tug me along beside him, leaving Danny with that dumb open-mouthed expression that was a dead giveaway for the lack of action going on behind those cruel eyes of his.
It wasn’t until we’d taken a few steps toward the door that Danny seemed to come to his senses, spluttering and spouting, but I couldn’t make out his words through the noise that followed me.
Laughter.
Although for once in my life, I was pretty sure the laughter wasn’t at my expense.
They were laughing at Danny.
Oh, he was going to hate that.
10
Conner
Rosalie waited until we’d left the diner before collapsing.
Well, she didn’t fall over or anything but she wrenched her hand from mine and slumped against the brick wall of the diner, her hands on her knees.
“You going to be all right?” I asked, not sure whether I should rush to her side to hold her hair back or give her some room to breathe.
She nodded. “Yeah, just…give me a second.”
I shoved my hands in my pockets, warily eyeing her and then the front door and then Rosalie again. Don’t get me wrong, Rosalie was my number one concern—but I was keenly aware that I’d been this close to going up against an entire football team.
I wasn’t a wuss or anything, but I wasn’t a fighter either. Never had been, never would be. I was going to be a rock star, after all; I wasn’t about getting my hands busted up just to prove my masculinity.
“Thank you,” I said.
She glanced up at me in surprise. “What?”
“Thank you,” I repeated. “You saved my butt back there.”
She stared at me some more and I couldn’t hold back a laugh. “Surely you know that they would have—”
“No, I know,” she said quickly. “I’m just surprised you’re admitting it.”
I grinned. “Think my male pride is too fragile to admit when a girl has come to his rescue?” I shook my head. “Nah. Not me. You are officially my hero. My knight in shining armor. My—”
“Okay, I get it.” She held up a hand and I was happy to see her face had gone back to a normal color and wasn’t quite so deathly pale. Her expression was once more implacable as she looked back to the closed front door. “Um, do you think… I mean, my friends were supposed to give me a ride but—”
“Say no more.” I held up a hand to stop her just like she’d done to me. Then I added a silly bow, complete with an over-the-top hand flourish. “I’d be happy to drive you home.”
“Great.” She came to a stand and followed me as I led the way to the parking lot.
“It’s funny,” I said.
“What is?”
“Your lips formed the word ‘great’ but you managed to sound miserable.” I nudged her arm. “Is being alone with me really such a hardship?”
“No, it’s not that. I just…” She let out a long exhale. “I just don’t want to go home.”
“So we won’t go home,” I said, continuing to head toward the car. I paused for a second, not long but long enough that Rosalie noticed.
“What is it?”
I turned to face her in the middle of the parking lot. “What’s your take on that Tristan guy?”
Her brows drew together. “Tristan O’Hare? The quarterback?”
“Yeah. Him.” I’d seen the way he’d been watching Harley like a hawk when we’d walked in. She either didn’t notice or was doing a great job of pretending not to notice. Then I’d spotted Rosalie and had forgotten all about Harley and her boy drama. Who could pay attention to anything but Rosalie when she was sitting there looking so stoic, so mysterious. What was she thinking about? What was she feeling?
And at what point had I started to care so much that I needed to know the answer?
She shrugged. “Tristan’s a decent guy.”
I eyed the door, wondering just how badly Harley would kill me if I left her here without a ride. “I think something’s going on with him and my stepsister,” I explained when I saw her watching me, waiting for me to explain my sudden interest in Tristan O’Hare.
“Oh yeah, I heard something about that.”
I frowned. “You did?”
She nodded.
“What did you hear?” My eyes narrowed and there was that weird protective instinct kicking in.
“Just that there was something going on between them.”
I eyed the door again. On one hand, I honestly thought it might be good for Harley to get out of her shell a bit. Interact with an actual human, for once. But on the other hand…I had no intention of throwing her to the wolves, and if Danny and his cohorts were anything to go by, Talmore’s football team was made up entirely of wolves.
“He wouldn’t hurt her,” Rosalie said. “Or anyone.”
“You seem pretty certain of that.”
She lifted one shoulder. “I’ve been doing a lot of people watching lately.”
After a heartbeat, I let out a startled laugh. “Was that a joke, ice queen?”
She grinned and the effect was instant chaos in my brain. “How would you know, druggie? From what I hear you’re too high to understand a word I’m saying.”
My head fell back with a laugh. “And here I heard I was living in a box under the bridge.” I turned to her with my arms outstretched. “I ask you, how on earth am I affording all these drugs?”
She shook her head, her lips pressed together like she was suppressing another smile. “I wouldn’t look for reason in their rumors.”
“No, I guess not,” I agreed. “Where would the fun be in have logical, fact-based rumors?”
“Precisely.”
“So you’re sure about this Tristan guy?”
“Positive,” she said. “He’s one of the good ones.” She eyed me as we paused beside my car and I pulled my cell out of my back pocket. “What are you doing?”
“Giving Tristan a stroke of good luck.”
“Okay,” she drawled.
Once I’d texted Harley that I’d taken off and she’d have to find another way home—she was totally going to kill me for this—I held the passenger side door open for her. “Where are we going?”
“How do you feel about a road trip?”
“Where?”
“To wherever the wind takes us,” I said. “Or…a tank of gas.”
She didn’t answer; she just gave me a sort of quizzical look I took to be an affirmative before I slammed the door shut and went around to my side.
“Why a road trip?” she asked.
“Well, for one thing, if we went back to my place we’d have to play board games with my mom and Frank.”
“Frank?”
“My new…stepdad.”
She shifted in her seat. “That’s the second time you’ve done that.”
I put the car in gear and backed out of my spot. “Did what?”
“Hesitated when talking about your family.”
I winced a bit at the word. “Yeah, well…that’s probably because it’s not really my family.” That sounded way harsher than I meant it to and the words seemed to echo in the car before I snapped on the radio.
She didn’t prod but I figured if I stood any chance of getting this girl to open up to me, I needed to trust her with my own drama first. And no, this wasn’t about the bet anymore…or the challenge or the dare, or whatever this stupid thing was between me and Harley.
I honestly wanted to get to know this girl, who was by far the most interesting person I’d met since we’d moved here. I’d meant every word when I’d said she was strong and honest and…intriguing. Sure, she was pretty, but she was also different from these people who spoke first and thought later. The morons who ran that stupid school with its outdated ideas that confused popularity wi
th conformity.
She was a diamond in a sea of cubic zirconia.
So yeah, I wanted to get to know her for purely selfish reasons that had nothing to do with Harley.
Of course, I wouldn’t mind it when I got to rub it in Harley’s face either. I mean, trying to steal my car? That was just rude. And quite frankly, it would be doing her a favor to force her into a date with a guy who by all accounts was good. And popular. Let her see what life was like on the other side for a change. Maybe some of that bitterness would fade when she realized that no one was smoothly sailing through life, not even the people who made it look easy.
Rosalie was quiet. Waiting. She wouldn’t push me to talk about it but it was the least I could do if it helped her. “My dad split when I was twelve,” I started. And then…I didn’t stop. I meant to give her Cliffs Notes and instead I gave her the entire epic saga, from the day my family fell apart to now—when I was suddenly thrust into a new situation and told it was supposed to feel like family.
After I was done spewing she sat there for a while in silence. “So he just left?”
She sounded so horrified that I gave her a little grin as I pulled onto the highway heading out of town. “Like a thief in the night.”
She winced. “That’s so harsh. I’m sorry.”
I shrugged because what else was there to say. I didn’t want her sitting there feeling sorry for me—I mean, sure it might’ve helped me seal the deal. She’d probably say yes to homecoming out of sheer pity, but who wanted that? Not me. I wanted her to say yes because…
Because I want her to want me.
I shook off the thought and the weird needy feeling that came with it. That wasn’t me. I didn’t need people to like me, and I didn’t need them to want me. I didn’t need them…period, and I certainly didn’t need this girl, in particular.
“There was a second reason, you know.”
She turned toward me again. “A second reason he left?”
I laughed. “No, a second reason I wanted to take you on a road trip.”
“What’s that?” she asked, settling back against the seat and sinking in like she was getting comfortable.
Good.
Charming the Cheerleader (The Bet Duet Book 1) Page 8
