Take Me On (8 page)

West

I assess the guy in front of me: my height, my build, my problem. Actually, it’s the kid skulking behind them that’s my issue, but overhearing the argument between Haley and this bastard, it appears all related.

“Who the hell are you?” the guy towering over Haley asks.

“West. Same question back.” Since, in theory, I shouldn’t have a clue who he is.

“Matt Spencer,” Haley answers for him, then gestures to the guy that knocked the hell out of me on Friday night. “That’s Conner, his younger brother. West is new here, Matt, and I’m guessing he’s highly medicated or high and therefore has no idea what he’s saying.”

I chuckle. Highly medicated. Good one.

Haley mouths, “Leave.”

I subtly shake my head. Conner and I have unfinished business and I’m not impressed with the direction of the conversation between her and big brother. “Granted, on most weekends that may be true, but I remember this past Friday night clearly enough.”

The skulker joins the party. “I remember my fist blacking you out.”

“I have a hard time believing you remember your name.” All the signs of a hard-core user are there: paled-out face, shadows under his blank eyes and jittery as hell. I’ve seen it before at my old school. Drugs are one of those things that cross party and money lines.

Conner flashes forward and in simultaneous movements Haley slides in front of me and Matt tackles his younger brother, demanding that he “Back off” and reminding him that he “Can’t afford another suspension.”

“Are you suicidal?” Haley stretches on her toes and tries to match my height. She fails. “Is that the issue? There are 1-800 numbers that can help.”

The walking, talking inferno is back and I like it. “You looked like you needed backup. You helped me on Friday, so I’m helping you now.”

She collapses onto her heels. “I don’t
need
your help. I
need
you to listen and stay the hell away from me. Are you deaf? Maybe have a little hearing loss you’re ashamed to admit to? Because I know I specifically told you to stay away.”

“Did you do it?” Matt demands. Skulker boy stands next to big brother with his hands shoved in his pockets, but his grimace suggests he’s just as eager as me for round two. “Did you jump Conner?”

Other guys slip into the picture. They hang back, taking seats at the table or leaning against the windows. Why are my odds always bad?

Haley turns her head so they can’t see her whisper to me, “Say no and let me handle it.”

My eyes widen when I look at Conner. I mean, really look at him. The yellowish fading bruise on his jaw—I did that. But the black eye...the wrist. It can’t be possible. I was the only one there and when I woke up there was Haley. “Nice brace.”

“Fuck you,” Conner snaps.

“Go, West,” Haley murmurs. “You’re making this worse.”

“Who’s the new kid?” A guy with a Mohawk walks up.

Haley throws her head back. “Really?” She mows down the Mohawk boy with a brutal glare. “I mean, really, Jax?”

Jax winks at her as another guy sidles up alongside of him. “It’s a little hard to eavesdrop while being on the opposite side of the room and I have a feeling we’re all interested in the same conversation. I’ll give a cookie to whoever tells me who hurt Haley and then we’ll make the decision, like the proper gentlemen we are, of what match we’ll be pounding this out in.”

A hushed argument breaks out between Jax and Matt. My stomach plummets into free fall. Jesus Christ, how could I not notice her bruised knuckles or how the makeup poorly hides the slight discoloration near her eye? Conner is a dead man walking.

I raise my hand and it hovers close to her eye, my palm almost connecting with her skin. Heat builds in the gap as I ache to remove her bruises. Haley tilts her head away and I drop my hand, feeling cold, rejected.

“Tell me you didn’t get into a fight over me,” I whisper.

She lowers her head. “Conner wouldn’t have stopped. Even when you blacked out, he wouldn’t have stopped.”

“Haley...” There are no words. None. It’s not okay for her to wear bruises over me. It’s despicable that a guy would strike a girl. Regardless of whether she hit him first. Regardless of whether she was defending someone else. Regardless.

“Just go,” she says. “This isn’t your fight and I’ve got to make sure it doesn’t become my family’s battle, either.”

These two guys must be the cousin and brother that Jessica referred to earlier. Two feet divide Haley’s family from Matt’s brood. Everyone’s posture is open, daring, yet they remain in their neutral corners. For a few seconds, I respect them. They’re smart enough to keep the fights outside of school.

“I did it,” I announce.

Mohawk boy loses his outer playful demeanor and his inner demons possess him as he advances on me. “You hurt Haley?”

“No. I defended her.”

“I fell.” Haley grabs my wrist and her slender fingers squeeze my skin. “I fell.”

I don’t know how to help you.
It’s what I want to scream. Instead, I lay my hand over hers and brush my thumb over her battered knuckles. Her hand is frozen, lifeless. She attempts to jerk away, but I hold tight. I don’t make promises lightly and I’m swearing right now to take care of her and her problems.

Releasing Haley, I face the two groups of guys. “She fell. I walked out of the store, saw Haley on the ground and Conner standing over her. I made the wrong assumption. My bad.”

The sneer on Conner’s face is almost enough to compensate for the blackout. “Bullshit.”

“Fine. Then you explain how it went down. We fought. I won. Unless you want to admit you were beat up by a girl.” I grin for effect and the asshole twitches. Several guys in his group laugh at the “joke.”

“Is that the way it happened?” Matt asks Conner.

His internal struggle plays havoc with his face. I’m not sure which one is worse. Could I admit a girl pounded me? Damn, it’s bad enough to know a girl kicked a guy’s ass in my defense. The asshole nods.

Matt scratches his temple and swings his gaze between me and Haley and Conner until settling on me. “Who are you and why are you up in Haley’s business?”

“He’s a stranger,” responds Haley right as I answer, “We’re dating.”

Haley whirls in my direction, a tornado in a cornfield. “We’re what?”

“Dating,” I state clearly. Because neither Matt nor her family is buying any of the bullshit I’m spewing and they won’t...unless we offer incentive. “In private. But it’s okay,
Haley.
” I overemphasize her name in the hopes of gaining her attention. “Now that I’ve transferred here, we can tell people our secret.”

She transforms into night of the living dead and blinks repeatedly. I position my hand under her elbow in preparation for if she faints. Note to self: she shocks out easily.

Mouths gape. Some guys harden into stone. Then it smacks me, is one of these guys her boyfriend? Jessica mentioned a failed relationship with Matt, but Haley could be seeing someone else. Shit. Fucking shit. Fucking shit in a Crock-Pot.

“You’re dating Haley?” The pure menace in Matt’s tone indicates I hammered the nail into the two-by-four. “My girl? You’re dating Haley?”

Haley snaps back to life. “I’m your
ex
-girlfriend.”

Thank God for small favors and the damn Easter bunny because that was one gift I needed. There’s no one else in Haley’s life and Jessica had it right: he is crazy obsessed.

Matt’s obviously the alpha in this mangy bunch of wolves, so I address him, “Is it a sin around here to protect your girl?”

He hasn’t peeled his eyes away from Haley since I announced our sudden relationship. Finally, he answers, “No.”

“Is it true?” Jax pinches his nose as if he’s smelling shit. “You’ve been dating this guy in secret?”

“I...” Nothing else falls from Haley’s lips.

“All the lies you’ve told since Friday... What I put up with at home because I covered for you... Over a guy again? Jesus, Haley.” He pauses, then sucks in a breath. “I’m done with you.”

“Jax!” Haley calls out, but he struts away. The other guy from her family wears the same expression my mom does when she talks about the daughter that died right after my birth. In silence, he follows after Jax.

Her posture droops. The look on her face...it’s like someone cut out her beating heart. I’ve got to get her out of here.

“Check it out, man.” I direct myself to Conner. “It was a misunderstanding. I saw you standing over Haley, I got protective and things went down. No harm, no foul.”

I wrap an arm around her shoulders and Haley tenses beneath me. I extend my other hand to Conner, knowing full well there is plenty of harm done and
foul
is a mild adjective to use to describe the animosity between us.

“Fuck you,” says Conner. I withdraw my hand and shrug. Hey, I tried.

“Then I’ll leave you to lunch.” I attempt to guide Haley away but it’s difficult to do when she’s grown roots and planted her feet into the ground.

“Sounds like it was an unfair fight,” says Matt. “My brother being chivalrous and helping out Haley after she fell and then you jumping him from behind. It’s easy to take down a guy when he doesn’t know you’re coming. An apology isn’t enough.”

“It’s enough,” Haley pleads. “Please, Matt, let it go.”

Matt mimics the crazy grin his insane brother had right before he knocked me out. “Do you know the lies your
girlfriend
tried telling me before you showed? Listening to Haley beg for you makes me wonder if you can actually take a hit.”

I rub my chin, release Haley and step into Matt. Chairs crack and squeak against the floor as his boys bolt to their feet. Matt stops them with one raised finger. “Got something to say?”

“Yeah. Thought you should know I got expelled from my last school for fighting. I got no problems taking hits.”

“Then prove it.”

“Take the swing, asshole.” I’m not going to be accused of jumping a man from behind.

The air hums with pissed-off energy. Matt shoves his chest out, arms poised to come up, then a guy says, “Principal.”

Matt backs off and I follow his lead. Some old man in a gray suit watches us as he heads for the food line.

“New boy,” says Matt. “We don’t fight in school, but the moment the bell rings, your ass is mine.”

Haley angles to become a human shield in front of me. “No.”

“Haley.” My blood boils that she’s begging this bastard for anything. Does she honestly think I’m that weak? “I got this.”

“Listen to her, Matt,” Conner butts in.

“What?” Matt asks.

“One of us should fight him in the cage. You know, make it public humiliation. Best man wins and all that shit.”

Haley tunnels her fingers into her hair and clutches it as if to yank it out. “He’s not a fighter. It won’t be fair.”

“I can fight,” I snap, but not one of them acknowledges me.

“If he can’t take the hits, then he shouldn’t have messed with one of us,” says Matt.

“Matthew.” The pure desperation in her tone causes everyone to freeze. “I swear to you he didn’t know.”

The looks, the stares. All of them doubting me because Haley’s basically signed in blood that I’m incapable of holding my own. I’ve got four months in this school and I’ll be damned if she’ll be protecting me the entire time. “Name the day and time.”

Conner motions to Matt with his sprained hand as if deciding whether to have cheese on a burger. “The tournament in two months. I get the hand healed and then the two of us go at it.”

Matt nods. “All right. Are you in, New Boy, or are you chickenshit?”

I smile. An adrenaline rush floods my veins. This is possibly the craziest and the most alive I’ve felt in years. “Looking forward to it.”

The bell rings, ending lunch. Matt and his pack of wolves leave the table.

Haley closes her eyes and lowers her head into her hands. Not the reaction I hoped for.

Haley

I’m second bus run. When we lived in our old house, my home, I was first. That was back when things were simpler. Back before I started dating Matt and when Jax, Kaden and I weren’t at each other’s throats. Back when they could at least look at me...unlike now. Today, when they left to hop the city bus to train at the gym, they didn’t even mumble goodbye.

I sit away from everyone else. After my breakup with Matt, I can honestly say I don’t mind being alone. His version of attention left scars. I suck in a deep breath, missing the relationship I had with Jax and Kaden. Even worse? I miss who I used to be.

Both my knees bounce as I wait on the bench outside the loading dock. Blowing warm air onto my hands no longer helps. They’re frozen for good. We go so many days without seeing the sun during the winter it’s easy to believe it no longer exists.

“Haley.”

My heart stalls at the sound of West’s voice. Dear God, is he always so gorgeous? Especially now with his hat on backward and those ocean-blue eyes twinkling at me. Teeny-tiny wings flutter in my chest when he drops onto the bench beside me. He’s close. Superclose. Like his jeans touching mine close. Heat rolls off his body and I sort of crave to snuggle up to him and steal his warmth.

“West,” I respond. Good girl. Act casual.

I should move. At least an inch. Prove to us both that I have an inkling of self-respect. But I don’t. He’s warm and...well...dammit, he’s cute. I rub my hands together, half wondering if I should thank him for what happened at lunch or if I should punch him for getting involved or if I should press my fingers to his face and save myself from frostbite amputation. I seriously want to do all three.

“Would you like a lift?” he asks.

“You really don’t listen, do you?” I try to bend my fingers, but they’re so cold they’re swollen. “I told you Friday I don’t ride with strangers.”

“Well, you are my girlfriend.”

I choke on the laugh that bubbles up my throat. West smiles and I have to admit it’s a sweet sight on his face.

“You realize,” I say, “that after what happened at lunch we’re both undeniably screwed.”

“It was an interesting first day.” He stands and extends his hand. “Come on—let me drive you home.”

I accept the offer and I hate the way my insides palpitate when his fingers wrap around mine.

“Jesus, your hands are ice cubes.” West’s hand flinches away from mine, and, with red cheeks, I pull my hand back, but West denies my retreat and reclaims my fingers.

“Don’t. It’s okay.” I yank to free myself, but I’m unsuccessful. “I’m just cold.”

“No shit. Gloves could help.”

I don’t have gloves. If I did, I’d wear them, but I lost them when we lost the storage unit. Ticked off by the reminder, I start to inform West the exact route to hell he can take when he draws my hand toward his lips.

The world stills when he opens his mouth and blows hot air onto my skin. My eyes widen, my toes curl and my blood explodes with heat. Holy freaking crap.

Staring straight into my eyes, he blows onto my hand again. My fingers tingle with the warmth, with his touch. His thumb sweeps over my skin and my heart skips too many beats.

“You’ve got smooth skin,” he murmurs.

“Yeah,” I whisper. Yeah.

Um...what? I blink. We are overly close, like if either of us moved, clothes would be against clothes, and I like the thought of his body brushing against mine way more than I should. I extract my hand from his. “I don’t mind cold hands.”

He smirks. “You don’t?”

“No, I don’t.” I beeline it for his car and moronically stumble over a parking curb. Then, for giggles, I trip over my own feet. At least I stay upright—barely. “They’re always cold, even in the summer.”

West says nothing as he walks beside me, but he does watch me with an amused grin. Twice his hand flies out to grab me if I should fall. I hate him. I like him. I wish I wasn’t so pathetic.

“I’m used to it.” I glance around, wishing Marissa would pop out of thin air because friends shouldn’t let friends ramble and stumble. I massage the hand he blew on. It’s like the skin there is now hypersensitive. “It’s not a big deal since it’s normal.”

Because I can’t stupidly zip my lips, I go on to say, “My hands are always cold. It’s genetics. My mom has cold hands and her mom had cold hands. Bad circulation or something like that.”
Shut the eff up, Haley!

West pushes a button on his key chain and the lights on his Escalade flash. Like a gentleman, he opens the passenger-side door. “Good to know.” There’s a sparkle in his eye that matches the smug smile.

“What?”

The grin widens. “The cold hands. The genetics. All good things to know.”

I smile widely because I don’t know what else to do. Kill me now. West shuts my door and I knock the back of my head three times against the seat. He climbs in and I smile falsely again. He chuckles and I die of mortification.

When he starts the car, rap pounds from the speakers, causing the frame to vibrate. He turns the radio off, turns up the heat and points the vents at me.

The rich smell of leather wafts in the air and every electronic and computerized gadget embedded in his dashboard intimidates me. “This car is quiet. It’s like the motor isn’t even on.”

“My sister, Rachel...” He pauses and switches the hand he drives with. In the short amount of time I’ve known West, this is the first time he appears unsure. “She’s great with cars. Anything good about this thing is because of her.”

“That’s cool.” And unusual. I’ve never heard of a female mechanic, but who has ever heard of a female fighter?

West grows grim and we sit in awkward silence. His sister must be a sore subject and, because of Kaden and Jax, I can highly appreciate that.

Murphy’s Law dictates we hit every red light. After one particularly long light, I tap my fingers against the door and replay the events of the cafeteria. Should I be mad or grateful to West? To be honest, I’m both, but still, there’s this nagging inside me that if he had gone along with the original plan...

“Why didn’t you listen? Friday night or in the cafeteria? If you had just listened to me once you wouldn’t be in this mess and I wouldn’t have to bail you out.”

His head jerks. “Did you say bail me out?”

“Yep. Bail. Like a bucket and a boat with a leak.”

“Nah. You’ve got it wrong.” West readjusts the hat on his head and his jaw solidifies into steel. “You don’t like accepting my help.”

“I don’t
need
your help. What I
need
is for you to listen to me.”

The incredulous glance from the corner of his eye causes my skin to crawl. Cocky bastard.

“If you had acted like we were talking,” I say, “I would have made it and we wouldn’t be here.”

“You don’t know that.” He floors the gas when the light turns green.

I stop tapping and bang my hand against the door. “I got hurt anyway. I got hurt and I lost my father’s medication and I had to hit someone. Something I swore I’d never do again. Now my father is a wreck, my cousin and brother hate me more than normal and I have to worry about you dying in two months.”

“I am not weak!” He slams on the brakes at the next red light.

My body lurches against the seat belt then smacks into the seat. “I never said you were.”

“Yes.” His blue eyes burst into twin flames. “You did. The moment you begged Matt to back off, you announced to the world I’m weak.”

A grunt of disgust leaves my throat. Boys. Stupid boys with their stupid egos. “You’re mad because
I
saved you.”

Because a
girl
saved him. Revolted, I cross my arms over my chest. God, the countless times I’ve seen that same look on the faces of guys at school. I’m the fighter—the girl who can throw a punch. Sure, they’ll say it’s cool, but their egos require that they be the protector.

The light switches to green and West floors it again, causing his engine to roar in anger. “Even if I had pretended to chat it up with you, they still would have followed.”

“It would have worked.”

“And you know everything?” he snaps. “If I didn’t follow, then I would have thought about how they beat the shit out of you and how I was to blame—that I failed. Again!”

I’m mad. Shaking mad. So mad, I shouldn’t open my mouth, but I do, and I scream at the top of my lungs. “I obviously can take care of myself.”

“How the fuck was I to know that?”

The car behind us blares his horn when West cuts him off.

“I hate you,” I mutter.

“Right back at you.”

He pulls into the neighborhood and before me is the spot where our worlds collided. One second earlier or later and maybe I could have avoided Conner and his friend. One step in the other direction and West would have never almost plowed me over.

Nausea disorients me and I lay a hand over my stomach. Is this all we are? Continual actions and reactions? No control over our futures? One pink slip and we lose our house and I lose my father? One decision to date the wrong guy and I lose Jax and Kaden? One step off the wrong curb and my life is entangled with a stranger’s?

If that’s true, then life is one pathetic and sick game.

West eases into the lot and shifts the SUV in Park. “We can’t leave it like this.”

“I know.” A pause on my part. “I don’t hate you.” I fidget with one lone long fingernail. I’ve never been able to grow them long or figured out how to paint them properly. I totally stink at all things girl. “That was mean to say.”

“I don’t hate you, either, and, trust me, I’ve been told worse.” He releases a breath. “I’m in this, Haley, whether you want me or not.”

The gray day makes the dismal shopping plaza more depressing. A woman too thin and barely dressed hauls a crying toddler by her arm, practically breaking it. The child trips over a curb and the woman drags her against the blacktop. I hate this place. Not West. Just my life.

“I keep searching for a way to fix this so you can be free and I can’t think of one.” Not when he insists on continually butting in. “I’m not looking to argue again, but can you please tell me why? I’m a stranger. I could be a serial killer or I could collect road kill and turn it into stuffed animals or own two million porcelain dolls and hang their decapitated heads from my ceiling—”

“The dolls would creep me out.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Just the dolls?”

West smiles again, like he did outside school, and that sweet, sweet sight causes me to smile in return. “I have a high threshold for creepy.”

I laugh and the high feeling plummets when I search for the last time I laughed before today. Last month? Six months ago? Years? “My point is, you don’t know me, yet you volunteered to become a modern-day gladiator without an ounce of training.”

“Cool. Does that mean I’ll get a sword?”

“I’m being serious! This whole situation is utterly and completely serious!”

“You need to learn how to chill.” West exhales, then slides his hand over the steering wheel. “I don’t know why I’m doing this.”

“Please?”

He’s silent, but it’s the type of silence that tells me he’s sorting his thoughts. My dad, before he was laid off, had that same expression whenever we had a discussion. Dad always answered me and I have no doubt West will, too...if I grant him time.

“I’m involved now because that Conner kid hit you.”

My stomach sinks. “West...” God, I hate admitting it out loud. “I hit him first.” Because he wouldn’t relent against West.

He holds up his hand. “He hit you. I don’t care if you backed over him with my Escalade two hundred times. It’s not okay to hit a girl. Besides, you had my back. I don’t forget that type of thing.” His lips slant. “Granted, I’m usually saying this to a guy.”

There’s more. I can see a pain etched on his face...in his eyes.

“You said earlier you couldn’t live with the idea that you failed. What did you mean?”

“We all have demons.” He stares at the bar situated at the end of the strip mall. “How about we leave it at that.”

“Do you have any idea what you’ve walked yourself into?”

“In two months I’m going to be in some tournament. For all I know, I’ll be throwing knives at this kid and he could be tossing them back at me.”

“No knives. Though that could be faster and less painful.”

“Good to know.”

The school bus rumbles on the road behind us. “I need to get home. Can I explain everything tomorrow at lunch? Then we can devise a plan to keep you alive.”

“Sounds like a date.” West puts the SUV in gear and I give him directions to my uncle’s. He leans against his door as he drives and watches the road intently. Something tells me he’s not focused on the road as much as he’s trying to digest the world he’s thrown himself into.

West stops in front of the box house. “What are you trained in?”

The instinct is to divulge nothing because my fighting days are long over.

“I saw the damage you did to Conner. You’re trained in something.”

If West is going to survive, I’ve got to wade through the charred and ruined bridges I’ve burned and find a way to rebuild them. Might as well start with the truth. “Muay Thai.”

“And that is?”

“Kickboxing.”

West releases a paralyzing grin. “Holy shit, my girlfriend’s a kickboxer.”

I sort of giggle, but it’s so halfhearted it falls flat. Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined I’d be sitting in such an expensive car with such a gorgeous guy. Taking a page from Marissa’s book, I tuck my hair behind my ear and suddenly care what I look like.

I wish I was wearing something nicer. Something more than ripped jeans and a long-sleeved cotton shirt. Something that would make me “girlfriend” material for a guy like West. “Look, the whole relationship thing—”

“Yeah,” he cuts me off. “Sorry. No one was buying what we were saying so I ad-libbed. Can we keep up appearances for a while? We can ‘break up’ in a couple of weeks after they believe the reason I went after Conner was because I was into you.”

The glare I throw him causes him to toss his hands in the air. “I swear to God, I’ll keep my hands to myself. I highly respect that my girlfriend can throw a punch.”