Kicked: A Bad Boy Sports Romance (9 page)

When I showed up at Melia's front door, my hands were shaking. I hated that.
This is stupid,
I told myself as I thought about seeing Tyce on ESPN, a ball in his hands, that muscular body of his moving with violent elegance and unrivaled athleticism. It'd be almost like watching him kiss another girl. Football … that was his first and only love, something worth sacrificing everything else for. Including my mom and me.

I pinched my wrist and steadied my hands, reaching up to knock and finding the door thrown open. A barrage of smells assaulted me as Melia threw her arms around my neck and kissed both of my cheeks. Weed, beer, burgers, popcorn … patchouli?

“I'm so glad you came,” she gushed, pulling me inside by the wrist and kicking the door closed with the heel of her wedge sandal. “They're about to kickoff. You almost missed it.”

“Cool,” I said, moving inside the tiny, cluttered apartment and marveling at how different Chelease and Melia were. At our place, everything was in order, decluttered to the point of being sparse, utilitarian and functional, cold and sterile. Here, the walls were covered in posters and canvases, plants hung from hooks in the ceiling, draping their green leaves over my shoulders as I paused next to the kitchen entrance. Bookshelves filled a wall to my right, crammed with dog-eared copies of every genre imaginable, decorated with bits of driftwood, crystal, incense burners puffing away with patchouli. The floors were covered in rugs and the dining table was a piece of wood on four cinder blocks, surrounded by beanbags. It was hippie paradise in there.

“Teagan, I want to introduce you to my brother, Loe, and his girlfriend, Thina.” I waved at the two dark haired people in the kitchen, plates in their hands, smiles on their faces. “And this,” Melia continued, sweeping past me and into the living room area. There was an actual couch in here. It was lumpy and misshapen, draped in blankets and colorful throw pillows but it looked comfy. “Is Mee, Risika, Dane, Alton, Nyle and Vienna.” Melia pointed to each person in turn and they waved back at me, some of them getting up and holding out their hands to introduce themselves properly. I doubted I'd remember any of their names, but that was okay.

Everyone was high, relaxed, waiting patiently for the game to start with bowls of chips and popcorn tucked in next to them.
I can do this,
I told myself as Melia showed me all the food and forced me to make a plate. I still wasn't hungry, but I knew from past experience that things got easier if I went through the motions, practiced participating in everyday life.

I won't let Tyce make me feel defeated.

I'd moved to Eugene to start a new life, not mourn the old one I'd left behind.
That would've been a nice thought to have
last
night, before you … you …
I sat down on one end of the couch, next to a girl who looked about as short as me. The ache between my legs was still there, a constant pulsing beat that both scared me and aroused me. When I thought of Tyce's hard, warm body pressing into mine, the firm planes of his chest, that perfect 'V' of his hips … it was difficult to think straight.

I was focused on my plate, trying to organize the messy tower of my hamburger when Melia squealed and came to sit on the pink beanbag in front of the couch, a joint pinched between her fingers.

“There he is!” she exclaimed as the camera zoomed in on Tyce's face and the announcer started talking stats. I didn't hear a word of it, my gaze trapped on those blue eyes of his, on the dark smudges that lined his cheeks. His face was shuttered, dark, that full mouth of his tight and determined. I wished that some of that expression was for me, imagined for a split second that maybe it was. But then one of his teammates approached him and he smiled. No, no he
smirked.
This smug confidence rode on Tyce's shoulders as he held his black and gold helmet under his arm. “That's my future husband right there,” Melia joked as she reached back and played with her fall of long, dark hair.

“Sure thing, Melia,” the blonde on the opposite end of the couch joked. I think her name was Risika. Or maybe she was Vienna. I couldn't quite remember, and right now, I didn't care to.

I was too focused on Tyce's face, the determined set of his jaw, the fabulous cut of his body in that black and gold uniform. There was a Pac-12 patch above the number eight, the color popping against the dark fabric that wrapped Tyce's wide chest and slender waist. And the tight fit of those black pants? I could scarcely breathe, seeing him there in his element.
You clean up good, Tyce Winship,
I thought as the camera stayed focus on the team's star player.

I didn't blame them; I didn't want to look anywhere else either.
No wonder I've avoided watching him all this time,
I thought as I stared at the screen, completely and utterly mesmerized. Not once in his two previous years on the Ducks had I seen a single game. It wasn't that I hated football or that I hated him (at least not back then), but I knew. Somehow, I
knew
that if I'd seen him, I'd fall head over heels all over again.

“Do you think he has a big dick?” Melia asked, looking over her shoulder and raising her eyebrows at me. Something must've shown on my face as I pulled my gaze from the black and gray tattoos spilling out from beneath Tyce's jersey.

“Huh?” I asked as I blinked to clear my vision, my hamburger clutched tight in my hands, dripping sauce all over my plate. “What did you say?”

Laughter erupted from all around me, but it didn't matter. I set my food down and wiped the grease from my hands. I wanted to run away, head home and bury myself in my schoolwork.
Why, why, why did I have to bump into him in the park? And why, why, why did he just
happen
to show up at Jia's party?

I'd spent a long time trying to get over Tyce's betrayal and now, here he was, gracing an HD TV in all his gorgeous glory, his bronze skin gleaming beneath the lights of Autzen Stadium. In truth, he was just a half dozen blocks away from here, less from my actual apartment. But to me, it felt like he was a million miles away.

When the kickoff finally started, I watched from my spot on the couch, detached and hurting, my body throbbing and my heart breaking. It shouldn't have been like that. I shouldn't have felt like that.
And I wouldn't have if I hadn't slept with him.
The Tyce I knew and loved was gone, replaced with an arrogant jerk that cared more about a sport than he did about his own family.

I hate him,
I thought and I meant it. Even as I watched him make some impressive plays, draw the crowd into his aura of charisma, charm the pants off of everyone in that room with his skills, his talent, his dedication. Watching him throw, leap, twist, flip, I could almost make myself feel what everyone else was feeling. There was this sense of camaraderie in the room, an 'us versus them' mentality as we bonded over our hatred for the other team.

The problem was, I knew it was all fake. False. A sham. A lie.

Last night, it had felt like Tyce and I could have something, that we could reconnect like we had as kids,
better
than we were as kids.

But that, that was a lie, too.

Two nights after the game, I was at another party, trying to pretend like everything was normal when nothing fucking was.

“Good game, Winship,” one of the girls said, giving me a flirtatious wink as she passed by. I smiled back at her, but I wasn't feeling it. I wasn't feeling any of this. My gaze traveled across the gathered crowd, across the sea of gold and green shirts, sweaters, hats, even shoes. Tonight, we were finally getting the chance to celebrate our victory. Coach was at some anniversary dinner with his wife, so the guys were taking this as their chance to go buck wild. Not that anybody would miss our presence here, but they'd look the other way. They always did.

“You alright over there?” Mason Fenna asked me, waving a hand in front of my face. He was the second string quarterback, an asshole sophomore nipping at my heels. Sometimes I felt like he was about
this close
to pushing me down a flight of stairs. I kind of fucking hated him. “You've been completely out of it since the game.”

Since before the game,
I thought as I tipped back my drink and decided a loose, easy shrug of the shoulders was the only response Mason was gonna get. Screw him. My problems with Teagan were … fuck. They weren't even problems at all. I screwed her. So what. Big deal.

Only it
was
a big deal. A really freaking big deal. I thought of her mother, Venus, and how disappointed she'd be in me she was still alive, if she knew. I could still smell the sweet, sticky scent of her perfume, hear the sound of her wooden bracelets clacking as she bent over to give me a hug. She always liked to joke that Tea and I were going to end up together. I think she really, truly wanted that for us.

What a fucking disappointment I must've been to her.

“You got girl problems?” Mason continued, oblivious to my stoic expression, my hatred for him that I wasn't really trying all that hard to hide. The girls loved him almost as much as they loved my stupid ass, but I couldn't figure that out for the life of me. Mason had thick dark hair and some heavy, drawly southern accent that he tried to hide. Not sure why. The chicks seemed to like that, too. To me though, he just seemed oily with his dark eyes and his sly smile. He was the son of some NFL big shot, raised in money and football and copious amounts of ass kissing.

We couldn't have been anymore different.

“I never have girl problems,” I told him honestly. And I hadn't, not in Eugene or back home either. I let my gaze slide over to Mason. He was still staring at me, like we were friends or something. There was this glint in his eyes that I didn't like.

“Is it about that redhead Kai was hanging with at New Intentions?” My hand squeezed tighter around the beer bottle in my hand. I managed to keep the reaction off my face, but my body betrayed me, getting stiff and taut, like I was about to beat some ass or something. “She's like some high school sweetheart or whatever?”

“It was never like that,” I ground out, my voice laced with darkness and rage. I wasn't sure if I was actually talking to Mason anymore or myself.
It never
was
like that. But it is now. I made it like that. I used Teagan. I used her. I'm the asshole.

I felt the revelation crash into me and fuck up my insides. I almost puked, and I have a steel stomach. I had no idea how many girls I'd slept with in my life, but I'd never felt like this before, like I'd betrayed them with my dick.

“Whatever you say man,” Mason said with a dirty bro laugh, that insider track that guys use on each other when they think they're being slick or cool. I couldn't pretend I'd never done that before, but I also couldn't put up with it tonight.

“I gotta go,” I said, putting the bottle down on the wooden mantle next to me and heading for the door. I was in some sorority house, surrounded by girls from the Ducks' cheerleading squad and all I could do was sit and stew about Teagan.

When I closed my eyes at night, I felt her body wrapping mine and I couldn't stop myself from grabbing my dick and pleasuring myself to that memory over and over and over again. But when I opened them back up afterwards, I saw the blood on my cock. I saw her face as she leaned against that tree and struggled to put her shoe on.

The guys I'd tried to protect her from back in the day, the assholes I punched out for saying the wrong thing, looking at her the wrong way, that's the kind of guy I was now.
I
was the asshole.
I'm the asshole.

I moved through the crowd and people skittered out of my way like I was a superstar, a god of the field.
King of the Quarterbacks.
I was the best fucking QB this school had seen since fucking forever, and yet that excuse didn't seem to matter right now.

This is
exactly
why you left, Tyce,
I told myself as I pounded down the steps outside, past the clusters of people on the lawns, the cheers, the congrats that followed me like a wave down to the sidewalk. As soon as I hit the pavement, I started running again.
Teagan makes you feel … she's got this magnetic pull.

I pushed myself into a hard sprint, getting as far away from that party as I could as I tried to sort out my thoughts. I was pissed again, but that was no surprise. It wasn't a shock to me that I had anger problems.

I won't end up like him,
I thought as I ran fast, faster, fastest.
I won't be like my dad. I won't have the broken spirit of my mom. Of Venus. I won't get stuck in the quicksand of life until I've sunk too far to breathe. I'm making something of myself. I'm doing something that matters, that people care about. Football comes first. It always comes first.

In my heart, I knew that if I'd stayed with Teagan, I might've been tempted to put her first.

No, I
know
I would've put her first. I would've stuck around in that shit hole on the Nevada/California border, the town that didn't even deserve a
name.
I would've let my feelings for Teagan tumble out of me; I would've fucked her. And then, I would've married her and had kids, and then we
all
would've suffered. I'd have been a trucker or a gas station attendant. I would've been trapped; Teagan would've been trapped.