Kicked: A Bad Boy Sports Romance (22 page)

“I want to tell you something, but you need to promise not to have a fit,” Teagan told me first thing Tuesday morning. I hadn't seen her in person in like a week, but we'd been texting and sending videos on Snapchat; I'd been liking all her Instagram photos of makeup and colors and leaves and puddles.

I was hooked.

“That's a fucked up thing to say to a person,” I replied, looking her up and down. She was wearing the paint splattered jeans and a gray wifebeater that was now a familiar sight for me.
She needs new clothes,
my brain spat at me, but what the hell was I supposed to do about it? Once I made it in the NFL, I'd buy her an entire wardrobe of whatever designer crap she wanted. But to do that, I had to finish the season here without screwing anything up.

I thought of Venus and how she'd always told me that it was Tea and me against the world, that I should look out for her, fight for her, take care of her. I'd ran away. I didn't even fucking deserve to be standing here right now. I wished for a second that I was smoker, so I'd have something to do with my hands.

Teagan just stared at me, her skin turning red with embarrassment. Whatever it was, she was freaking out inside. The more she freaked, the less she moved. Her body went completely still, her breathing stopped.

“Melia saw your sex tape.”

“My … what?” I asked, and then she bit her lower lip and made some kind of gesture around her crotch like she was jacking off. Then it clicked. “Oh.” My eyes got big and I found myself crossing my arms over my chest. “I thought you said you'd deleted that.”

“I said I was going to delete it,” she told me, dropping her hands by her sides and looking up at me from those willow green eyes. They were shaded in a barrage of red, orange and yellow up her lids, the edges of the eyeshadow sculpted to look like the leaves from an oak tree. She'd already posted the pic online, and I'd seen Mason Fenna retweet it. That motherfucker. “I didn't say that I
had
deleted it.”

I wanted to get pissed, but … I had no room to talk. Teagan's pictures were still on my phone, too. So I just looked down at her, at the leaves she'd pinned into her hair.
I want to kiss her so bad right now,
I thought as I studied the pale smoothness of her nose and cheeks. She'd covered her freckles up with makeup so skillfully that even looking for them, I couldn't tell they were there.

“Okay,” I said because I wasn't sure what else there was to say. I lifted my hand up and passed over a plastic grocery bag full of candy and other tooth rotting shit. It was a care package. Not a very good one, but I felt bad about her ankle. Mostly, I wanted a reason to come over here and see her. “Can I come in?”

“Sure.” Teagan moved away from the door, limping slightly as she headed to the couch and flopped down. “I'm really sorry about that. I knew I should've password protected my phone, but there's usually nobody around but me to look at it.” She cleared her throat as I came to sit next to her, our bodies less than a foot apart from one another. “Are you pissed?”

I shrugged my shoulder loosely, tapping the fingers of my right hand on the back of the couch.

I should tell her I had her pictures on my phone, too, but I wasn't sure how to bring it up without sounding like a creeper. There was only one reason a guy would keep naked pictures of a girl on his phone.
And what exactly has she been doing with yours?

I pursed my lips a little against the rush of hormones in my blood.

The thought of Teagan touching herself to that video, it made me crazy inside.

We were friends, but I almost kissed her anyway, pushed her legs apart with my knee, filled her with my cock. She wanted me to do it, I knew. Her eyes took in my shoulders, the curve of my biceps, my chest, my abs, like she was desperate and drowning, like I was oxygen.

“No.” It was all I said. I could've told her more, told her the truth, but I just sat there and stared. “Has Mason been texting you?” He'd sure as hell been talking about Teagan in LA. I wanted to beat him up, but the second I did, he'd know. He'd know exactly how much I cared about her and he'd capitalize on that. I realized as I stared at Teagan that I was in a hell of my own making, but I didn't know how to make it stop.

Football.

Football came first. Success came first. And then, maybe … but no. Nope. Teagan and I were never going to happen. My brain kept asking why while my heart beat with a strange dissonance.

“Are you sharing because I'm starving?” I asked as I dug through the bag between us and pulled out a pair of matching Snickers. I handed one over to her, enjoying the relieved expression that flittered over her face. She really thought I was going to go apeshit again. Not that I blamed her. When I flew off the handle, I flew
high.
“Cheers,” I said, tapping our bars together and then unwrapping mine.

“I'll delete the pictures today,” she told me as she did the same, but she didn't sound happy about that. Good. I let her stew in that for a minute as I watched her lips slide over that chocolate like it was my cock. I wanted her to taste me so badly. Fuck, I wanted to taste
her.

“I still have yours,” I admitted finally when I couldn't stand to watch her eat anymore. The way she slipped that bar into her mouth, sucked the chocolate off before she bit into it … fucking criminal. “The pictures, I mean.”

Her mouth opened with a pop.

“What?” she asked, looking at me like I was crazy. “You didn't show them to any of your friends, did you?”

“Like I would,” I snapped, and then forced myself to relax. Being a dick didn't help things. I was just getting twisted up in testosterone; it was making it hard for me to think clearly. And in my heart of hearts, I knew. I knew that even though I couldn't have Teagan that I wanted to make her want me. I wanted her to look at me like that, wish she could touch me. It was so fucking cruel, but I couldn't make myself stop.

I'm such an asshole.

I shoved the Snickers in my mouth and chewed a bite to give myself a second to relax.

I was terrified Teagan, of everything she represented: my past, our hometown, my own failures. When I looked at her, I felt like I could get complacent, like her smile was all I needed to get through the day. But at the end of it, somebody had to pay the bills, pay the rent. And eventually, I knew that complacency led to leaving. Before he'd died, my dad had left. He'd written me once a month, but that was it. Teagan's dad had left, too. And both our mothers had gotten with their high school sweethearts, boys they'd known their entire lives.

I wasn't entirely convinced the whole male population wasn't fucked.

Even me.

I used her. She bled on me. I ran away.

I squeezed my right hand into a fist.

“Why do you still have my pictures?” she asked, but I was too busy getting lost inside my own head to think clearly. Instead, I tossed my candy on the table and leaned forward, putting my left hand on the couch next to her hip. The cushion dipped her body into mine with the added weight, putting our faces close together. She looked back at me like she was terrified but exhilarated at the same time.
Teagan loves me.
I almost screamed.
She hates me, too, but she wants me. Maybe even more than I want her.

No.

I stood up suddenly and hooked my hands behind my head.

Teagan looked so small and colorful sitting on that boring ass couch in that boring ass living room.
She would've looked even smaller in a trailer with a baby and no air conditioning and an empty pantry and a shitty cheating husband who worked all the fucking time.

I sucked in a massive breath.

I was a selfish prick. What if all that had happened anyway? What if I'd left and made things even worse for her? What if she'd given up and stayed in Quaker Park? I was so desperate not to be held back, to escape, that
I
ended up being the one who was doing the holding back.

“I kept your pictures so I could jack off to them.”

Silence.

“You …”

“I touched myself. I came all over my hand. I do it a lot, actually. Do you? Do you watch my videos and touch yourself?”

“What are you … are you crazy, Tyce Winship?” Teagan asked, shaking her head and putting her fingers on her temples like she couldn't figure out what was happening here. “Why are you telling me this?”

I had no idea.

“I've gotta go,” I said, and then I turned around and left. Sprinting away, running away, just like I always did.

Hey, it's what I was good at.

'Hey, what's your favorite color?'

That was a question that'd been bugging me since the Halloween party. For whatever reason, I really needed to know. I sent the text over and then looked up at the stars. The lights above the field were on, doing their best to obscure my view, but I squinted past them and caught a glimpse of silver dots splashed across the navy sky. It reminded me of Teagan's Halloween dress, so random but so fucking beautiful.

I am seriously losing it.

I dropped my head, surveying the practice field and enjoying the emptiness of it. Our second practice of the day was over; everybody was inside changing—or sleeping. And here I was, sneaking out and standing like an idiot in the middle of the field. Behind me, the multimillion dollar Hatfield-Dowlin Complex loomed in black granite and glass. It housed our locker rooms, a one hundred and seventy seat theater, saunas, a barbershop. And that was just the tip of the iceberg. It was luxury, pure fucking luxury. It wasn't what I was used to, but it was what I was going to
get
used to.

I'm here. I'm doing this. I made it.

I forced myself to relive every shitty moment that had gotten me to this point as I tried to stay focused. I couldn't let this obsession with Teagan take over and consume me. I needed to stay grounded, that's why I was out here.

And yet … I was sending texts to Teagan and asking about her favorite color.

'Are you sure that's what you want to know? Why not tell me how many times you've touched yourself today?'

I almost cringed. Instead, I squeezed the phone in my gloved fist and then sat down, right on the green FieldTurf. I told myself that it was okay to get caught up in all of this, to enjoy the ride. My mom had me at fifteen, watched my dad walk away at eighteen, died in a crosswalk at age twenty-two. She'd been mowed down by a drunk cop, a guy who'd literally gotten up and walked away from the accident with a clean record and a slap on the wrist.

I'd suffered during all that. My mom had suffered. It was my time here. My time.

'Three,'
I sent back to her, knowing I was being a jerk again. A-fucking-gain. Damn it. Even if I really did deserve all of this, Teagan didn't deserve to be treated like crap. In fact, she deserved all of this, too.
I should marry her. I should take her with me to the NFL. I should buy her nice things and fuck her good and slow at night.

I closed my eyes as a gust of wind broke over the field and ruffled my hair.

None of that was ever going to happen. Maybe I was too selfish or too stupid or something, but I couldn't make myself admit that I could probably have that, have everything maybe. I'd been taught that when life kisses you on the cheek, she's fucking you with her other hand. If I tried to have Teagan, keep Teagan, something would go wrong.

Friends. We'd stay fucking friends.

'And I'm sorry. I shouldn't have fucked up like that.'

'No, you shouldn't have.'

I sent her a picture of the field and the stars and the lights.

'Where are you?'

'Sitting on the field. Practice was brutal. I have a test tomorrow. I should be sleeping.'

'So what's new?'
Teagan sent back, and I smiled.
'Go to bed, Tyce.'

I laid back on the turf and crossed one leg at the knee. In a few minutes, a crew would come out here and start prepping the field for the morning practice. They were like multivitamins, two a day every day. It was a lot of work, but I didn't mind it. I actually loved the sport, the way it brought people together, gave them just enough violence to satisfy their base desires while keeping it civil enough that I felt elevated. Evolved.

It was probably a bunch of bullshit, but whatever. I reached down and picked at the edge of my cleat while I thought about what to say next. I had an idea. It was probably stupid, but it wouldn't go away no matter how hard I tried.

'You can keep the pictures,'
I finally sent back.
'I'm keeping yours.'

'Um?'
I was seriously fucking with Teagan's head today. I knew that. It wasn't fair. I kept doing it anyway.

'We could do it again,'
I continued, waiting, my breath picking up speed as my cock hardened and I imagined another secret shot of her breasts in the dark, nipples peaked and rosy, chest rising and falling with rapid breaths.
'Like a friends with benefits thing? Not actual sex, I mean. Just this. Texting or Snapchats or whatever.'