Benefactor: A Greenbridge Academy Romance

by Knox, Abby

  K… well, have a good day.

  Oops. I’m losing her. Time to cut to the chase.

  What do you want the most out of life?

  She replies only with a bunch of questions marks.

  Too personal?

  No, out of nowhere. I’ve only ever wanted to act.

  How can I help?

  Don’t understand the question.

  You are an amazing actress and singer. You’ve attracted the attention of a very wealthy man. I’m talking virtually unlimited resources and connections. So tell me, think big, how can I help you achieve your goals?

  A long pause follows.

  I hold my breath. I wait.

  Minutes pass.

  I grunt and shove my phone into my pocket and lean on the balcony railing.

  Maybe I went too far too fast. Maybe my text was too long; I only recently figured out what Ridley means when she replies to me with “TL;DR.”

  Looking out over the grounds of Rushmore Hospitality HQ toward the residential areas of the city surrounding downtown, I orient myself. I know where she lives. I look in that direction. Her own neighborhood is not far from my lake house estate. I stare in that direction, willing her to text me back a reply. I can almost feel the pull. I know it’s silly and this isn’t a vampire love story, but god help me, I feel the universe pulling me toward her.

  Just then, Miles phones and I answer.

  He has good news.

  “The board has agreed to Ford’s terms. He just came in to sign the paperwork. Tonight there will be a special meeting of the school board to make it official, but it’s practically a done deal.”

  This is an enormous weight off my shoulders. One thing, at least, I can tick off my to-do list for today.

  “Good work, Miles.”

  I hang up and stare at my blank phone screen once again.

  No, I decide. This can wait. I pocket my phone and head home for the day.

  I text my daughter. In her reply, I find out that she is at the house today with her girlfriends and swim teammates―one last pool party before swim practice begins.

  As I drive home, I realize the timing is perfect for me to make the announcement to the bulk of the swim team. It also occurs to me that Hunter might be there as well.

  Hell yes! What started out as a shit day is turning into something quite remarkable.

  7

  Hunter

  I stare at my phone and wonder if I’ve done the right thing. But something compels me to keep going, to answer his questions and let him get to know me.

  It’s getting hot out here by the pool in my backyard, and I’m soaking up the last few rays of sun before the business and drudgery of senior year begins.

  A hummingbird buzzes around my mother’s flowering shrubs lining the concrete pool deck. I watch it as I think about what to text back to Rushmore. My mom planted those shrubs herself and yet she’s hardly ever here to enjoy them.

  This is a weird conversation to have over text. I don't know if I fully understand what he is asking me. This man doesn’t know me…and I don’t know him at all. Yet he brought me flowers and now he’s offering to help me do what? And for what in return?

  The tiny bird zooms over to the other side of the pool. I’m starting to sweat and consider taking a dip to clear my head.

  I nearly leap out of my skin when I hear the sliding glass door open and my dad bellow, “Got a text from the athletic director. Big changes coming to the swim program! Will let you know as soon as I know anything.”

  “Great,” I say blankly.

  I go for a swim and think it over.

  As I towel off, I examine the card from Rushmore again. I turn it over and read the words he wrote there. “Every bit of you is lover-ly.” His reference to one of the songs I sang in the show still gives me a little thrill. The lyrics dance through my head.

  “…warm and tender as he can be, who takes good care of me…”

  Oh god.

  It’s a clue.

  I wrangle up my courage and finally, after probably an hour since his last reply, I text him back: Seems like a conversation to have face to face.

  His reply comes immediately.

  Good. Are you at Ridley’s party?

  Excuse me?

  Ridley’s pool party, happening now.

  I think for a moment. Oh yes. That girl is famous for her exclusive pool parties at her daddy’s lake house.

  That’s cute you think your daughter invites me to things, I type, ending with a cry-laughing emoji.

  A pause. I sip my iced tea and wait for him to catch up.

  I’ve stuck my foot in my mouth.

  Doesn’t hurt my feelings. I don’t run with that crowd. NBD.

  I’ll talk to her.

  Oh god, oh god, oh god. Absolutely not.

  PLEASE GOD DO NOT DO THAT.

  Fine. I’ll just send a car to get you. Making a big announcement for the swim team so you should be here anyway. And your friend…Addison?

  I huff. He might be as oblivious as his daughter.

  I purse my lips and type, Addie. She’s working today.

  Car is on the way.

  DO NOT SEND A CAR.

  I continue to beg him over text not to send a car, but I get no reply.

  I sit and stew by the pool, determined not to go anywhere.

  Not five minutes later, Dad steps outside, looking annoyed.

  “There’s a driver here to take you to Ridley Rushmore’s house.”

  “Fuck no,” I reply.

  Dad shakes his head but is not overly bothered by my swearing. Mom and Dad rarely reprimand me. Call it guilt over being checked out of everything in my life but swimming.

  “Apparently that big announcement is happening at some party at the Rushmore estate, so you should definitely go.”

  With my hands in the air for added drama, I retort, “Why? Why can’t they just send an email? You are, like, golf buddies with the athletic director, are you not?”

  Dad crosses his arms across his big barrel chest. “It will be good for you to go. Come on, I’ve already packed your beach bag.”

  Well, well. Dad chooses now to parent me. He always acts so weird about swim. He couldn’t give less of a shit about theater or my plans to get into a good acting school. But hell, if the subject of swim comes up, look out.

  “All you Greenbridge parents have such a boner about swim. Maybe you all should join the team and leave the rest of us out of it,” I mutter as I brush past my dad. I practically stomp out to the car like a spoiled kindergartener.

  I cannot deny the possibility that seeing Rushmore is the one tantalizing aspect of the humiliation about to occur.

  I slide into the back of the town car, wryly making a mental note for my future memoirs. I can see it now: Chapter 12, My High School Frenemy’s Dad Propositioned Me At His Daughter’s Pool Party.

  8

  Hunter

  “What are you doing here?”

  Ridley’s reaction to me is about what I expected it to be and makes me feel exactly as small as I knew it would. As if I shouldn’t be here.

  What do I tell her? That her father has some kind of crush on me and insisted on sending a car to get me?

  But even though I don’t belong here, I won’t be cowed. I am an actress, after all. It’s in my job description to fake it until I make it.

  I roll my shoulders back and jut out my chin as I walk toward the pool like I own it. I shoot Ridley a brilliant smile—I’d better, I’d paid enough for the dentist to make it this brilliant. “Oh, there you are!” I say, waving at the other girls like they’re my lifelong friends. “I’m here for the team meeting? Didn’t you hear? There’s a huge announcement coming.”

  Ridley raises an eyebrow. “Really. Then where’s Judy? And where’s your little goody two shoes friend, Hattie?”

  I continue to smile despite wanting to smack her across her Instagram-influencer face. She knows her name. We’ve all been swimming together since seventh
grade. “Oh, Addie? She’s working today, so she asked me to share the news with her, whatever it is.”

  Ridley sneers. “Working. How quaint.”

  Sweet Baby Jesus, you’d better take that wheel because I’m about to run this bitch over with a Buick.

  The sound of Rushmore’s voice booms across the backyard, and I’m grateful for the interruption.

  I turn around to see him standing on the slate stairs that connect the pool area to the back patio through a terraced garden. He looks very different in the light of midday. If heat rippled through me at the touch of his hand last night, the sight of him standing there with a relaxed, regal air as he surveys his palatial backyard has all my body’s darkest places humming with desire.

  Rushmore wears what I’m sure in his world is casual summer clothes: a crisp, pressed white shirt, unbuttoned down to mid-chest.

  He glances in my direction and catches me staring at his partially exposed pecs, which are startlingly bronze set against his white shirt. The line of his lips curves upward when my eyes meet his. My sex flutters; my breath catches. I need a drink of water. Or something stronger.

  Rushmore’s cuffs are rolled up with a certain precision that makes me suspicious. He is not a sleeve roller-upper. Somebody pressed it that way. And I don’t particularly care, because the sight of his tanned, sinewy arms that end in strong, capable hands makes my insides nearly giddy. Was it the left or right hand that stroked me last night in secret, yet in plain view of everyone?

  Rushmore’s curled lip changes and his face goes dark. Not a frown or a scowl, but as if he’s studying me. Considering me. Thinking about how to proceed with me.

  My nipples tighten; I can only hope my cover-up is flouncy enough to hide those two announcing themselves like a neon sign. I refuse to let myself turn pink under his gaze. I can’t let anyone see the effect he has on me. Ridley would be the first to sniff it out and I’d be completely ostracized.

  Scratch that. Ostracized would be the kindest thing someone like Ridley could do to me. She has the power to ruin me.

  “If I could have everyone’s attention…” His face changes again. He’s all charm and gregariousness, a mask I assume has been practiced and perfected in the boardroom.

  Ridley, being so over her own father, mutters, “Here we go. Daddy’s announcing his pet project of the year. Everybody shower him with attention, please.”

  She should talk, I think, as I try to tune out the laughing of all her hangers-on.

  “Bob, can you come up here, please, to help me make this announcement?”

  The athletic director walks over and joins Rushmore on the stairs.

  “Bob and I have staged a major coup on behalf of the women’s swim team. I’ll let him tell you.”

  The AD says some ass-kissing things about Rushmore and how he made it all possible. Yes, yes, get on with it.

  “We’ve asked none other than Greenbridge’s own Weston Ford to coach the women’s swim team and lead us to our rightful place as state championship title holders!”

  I don’t know what these men were expecting, but probably not the sound of crickets. I’m the first to speak since everyone else seems dumbfounded. “What about Judy?” I ask.

  The AD mumbles about Judy having moved on to another school, and continues to extol the virtues of Coach Ford.

  I look over at the other team members who are here. None of them look pleased. I’m not pleased.

  This is not what I want to hear just before the start of my senior year. I’ve always done what my parents want me to do, and this is the year I want to make things bend to my will. I don’t want to spend time adjusting to a new coach with new ideas and new strategies. Swim isn’t that important to me. I enjoy it as an activity, but I don’t enjoy the pressure of it.

  Rushmore’s eyes land on me and I give a whisper of a shrug and a raised eyebrow that’s only intended for him to see.

  It’s true that Weston Ford was the reason my best friend Hunter and I tried out for Greenbridge swimming in middle school. I’ll also admit to having a bit of a crush on him when he worked as a lifeguard at the city pool. I liked his teenage muscles. For some reason, Addie fixated on his leg hair. No judgment. People like what they like.

  But we don’t need a man coaching us women, especially not a man who presumably wants to relive his high school glory days. Soon I notice the rest of the team’s muttering and whispering. Their reactions are similar to mine. Rushmore awkwardly asks if anyone has any questions, and a part of me actually feels a little sorry for him. Not totally sorry, as he’s responsible for this debacle.

  It sounds like the man who likes to run things is being undercut by his own daughter. His handsome face takes on an expression that tells me he does not like to be challenged. Well, he’d better buckle up, because woe to the man who tells a group of Greenbridge-educated women what’s best for them.

  On top of that, he picked me to flirt with. If he wants to start a little somethin’-somethin’ with a theater geek, he’d better be prepared for some drama.

  9

  Rushmore

  That was not the reaction I expected.

  “Hunter, wait.”

  She keeps walking. She doesn’t listen to me. Being ignored is new for me, and I’m not sure how to handle it.

  I leave Ridley and her friends who are still lounging by the pool, speaking conspiratorially about something.

  Hunter leaves a scent of lemon and honey in her wake as she brushes past me, which triggers a certain craving that has my mouth watering. But it’s not candy that I want. She rushes the main floor powder room, presumably to change back into her street clothes. I wait right outside the door.

  Clearly I fucked something up and I need to talk to her. I thought this would make her happy. Not just her but the entire swim team.

  After a few minutes she comes out carrying her small straw beach bag and a determined look on her face. I’m not happy she looks like she’s leaving but very relieved about her change of clothes. Her short coral cover-up was too sheer to hide the curves underneath. When she stood in the sunshine a minute ago, the tempting sweep of her nearly-bare hips was scandalous. That string bikini she had on left nothing to the imagination including enough side cleavage to make my cock twitch―not a good thing to have happen in tailored white pants in front of party guests. God help me, when I caught her staring at my chest, I could see her nipples react under those flimsy neon triangles barely hiding her breasts. I was this close to wrapping her up in a beach towel and carrying her inside to teach her a lesson.

  Hunter’s hair is down and falls in long, white blonde waves that bounce as she flounces to the front door across from the grand staircase. Again, I implore her to wait.

  “I need to talk to you.”

  I dare to touch her arm but she snatches it away before I can get a grip on her.

  “I need to leave. I don’t know what I’m doing here.”

  I’m so shocked at her words I let her get all the way down the front steps before I ask her to at least wait for me to call a car.

  She tosses her hair dramatically as she rushes down the front steps. “I don’t want a ride from your driver. I don’t want your staff to wait on me. I don’t want this weird, rarified world you live in. I can’t be friends—or whatever this is—with a man who doesn’t even realize what kind of a person he’s raised his daughter to be. So just let me go!”

  I know that Ridley is spoiled and can be a handful. As I watch Hunter hustle down the driveway and out to Lakeside Drive on foot, I realize she might be even more so.

  I can’t let her walk home. Three miles in flip-flops down a winding country road that teenagers in BMWs treat like the Autobahn? I think not.

  I sprint over to the garage and slide behind the wheel of my Range Rover because it’s the least pretentious vehicle at my immediate disposal. When I catch up to Hunter about half a mile down the road, I roll down my passenger side window and try to talk to her.

  “You’re a
fast walker.”

  “That’s because Judy taught me everything I know about fitness. Maybe you shouldn’t have let the school board fire her!”

  “I didn’t say she was fired,” I try.

  She throws up her arms to the heavens. “Give us a little credit. Why do parents pay a massive tuition to this school and expect us to be too stupid to see right through their bullshit?” I feel as though she’s said this before. She’s not wrong.

  “Fair enough,” I say, rolling slowly beside her while she continues to speed-walk down the road. She refuses to make eye contact.

  “Oh!” she says. “Does that mean you’re going to hire Coach Judy back and get rid of the meathead?”

  I chuckle. “You’re a piece of work, you know that? You’re making me question everything I do and how I do it. And I don’t like it.”

  She laughs. Cackles, actually. “He’s human, everybody!” she shouts to nobody in particular.

  Last night I fell head over heels with her acting, her singing, her presence, and, yeah, her looks. Today, I’m intrigued by this headstrong, dramatic spirit, confused by her disdain for my excellent work in procuring the absolute best coach for her team, bemused by her insistence on walking away from me, and frustrated by her ambiguous energy. Does she want me to chase her or go kick rocks? “Don’t you want to win a state championship?” I offer.

  She scoffs, a little too loudly. “I should have seen it coming. Swim parents are the worst!”

  “I never really thought of myself as a swim parent, more of an all-around supporter of the school…”

  “Try dictator on for size!”

  Ouch.

  OK. I’ve had enough of this.

  “Get in the car, Hunter.”

  “No!”

  “I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear you.”

  She whirls on me and finally makes eye contact. I stop the car while she lets me have it. “Are you this obtuse with everyone in your life or just women? Because I think I see what went wrong with your daughter.”

  That hits me right in the gut. “Will you let me take you somewhere to eat and then drive you home?”