Authors: Emma Hart
“Come on!” Kay begs. “It’s Sunday. Who the fuck does school work on a Sunday?”
“I do,” I tell her. “It has to be in tomorrow, so I have to do it.”
“Didn’t you stay in last night to do this?” She raises her eyebrow.
“Yes.”
“So why didn’t you do it?”
Because I was busy with my sort-of-almost-boyfriend. “Because I fell asleep early.”
“You never go to sleep early.”
“Oh my God! What is this? Interrogate Megan time?” I slam my pen down and look up at her. “Do you want me to tell you my turn-on spot while you’re here? Shit, Kay!”
She snorts. “No offense, babe, but I’m not really into you like that, so we’ll pass on the turn-on spot. But why were you asleep early?”
“Gee, I don’t know, Kay. Why do people usually go to sleep? Could it be because they’re tired?” I sigh.
“Shit the bed, someone is expecting Mother Nature!”
“Not for two to three weeks.”
“Then you must be pregnant … Oh wait–”
“Kay? Go fuck yourself.”
“I’m going,” she mutters, pulling the door open. “Try not to get your panties too twisted, my little hormonal bag of joy!”
I throw my pen across the room, hitting the shut door. I stare at it blankly for a second, then shake my head. I’m actually trying to write the essay – trying being the main word in that sentence.
I’m trying and failing because my mind is stuck on Aston and the way he acted last night. And this morning.
The Aston I’ve always known – and the one I fell for – is cocky. Egotistical. Pig-headed. He’s devil-may-care, flighty, and doesn’t think about anyone else. But that wasn’t the Aston I saw this morning. I could see it in his eyes – a deeper, darker part of him that makes me think his act is just that. An act. A charade put on to fool people.
A game he’s playing with himself, constantly fighting for the winning spot. A game he’s unwilling to lose, whatever the rules may be.
I get up to retrieve my pen and settle back on the bed, twisting it between my fingers. I have no idea why he said he needed me or why he said he wouldn’t use me. I have no idea why he’s acting the way he is.
Hello, he climbed through my freaking window.
Is it too much to think that – maybe – I could make him better? Whatever it might be that haunts him, whatever it is that makes his eyes darken the way they do … Maybe I make it bearable.
But what is it about today that’s haunting him so much? I wish he could have said. I wish he would have just told me.
I wish I knew if he was okay. And I wish I had the balls to pick up my phone and find out.
But I don’t.
~
“So you ran out on Charlie on Friday night, went to bed early on Saturday, kicked Kay out of the room last night, and still didn’t finish the essay?” Lila raises her eyebrows.
“Yup,” I sigh. “That pretty much sums it up.”
She frowns, chewing on a Twizzler. “Why?”
“Because I just didn’t.” I shrug. “I don’t have a reason. I guess I wasn’t in an English essay mood this weekend.”
“What kind of mood were you in?”
“Apparently, a sleeping one.”
“And your excuse for running out on your date?”
“He’s not my type.”
“He’s hot, muscular,
and
his dad is kinda rich. How can he not be your type?”
We get up from the lawn and make our way to the main building. Lila throws her empty packet in the trashcan before we pass through the double doors and hoists her bag onto her shoulder.
“That stuff doesn’t mean anything to me, Li, you know that. Money is money. It talks but it lies, too. And looks are crap – the hottest guy could be the biggest asshole in the world. It just … It doesn’t matter.”
“Let me guess – there was no magical spark and unrelenting passion as for Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth?”
“Absolutely,” I agree, my lips twitching into a smile. “He pales in comparison to the wonderful Darcy.”
“You and your books.” She shakes her head.
“There’s nothing wrong with my books. They give me what I don’t have in real life.”
“Like the perfect guy?”
“Exactly! And until I have my Mr. Darcy, I won’t stop reading. Charlie was definitely not Mr. Darcy.”
“You know something? You’re a really bad liar,” she says out of the blue.
“Hang on – what? How did you come to that conclusion when I’m not lying?”
“And again.” Lila laughs. “I don’t know what you’re lying about, but you’re not telling me the complete truth. At least not about this weekend.” She stops outside her class and tilts her head, studying me. “Got anything you want to share?”
I look at her, taking in her upturned lips and curious eyes. “Nope.” I hug my books to my chest. “Nothing I want to share.”
I’m not lying. I don’t want to share what happened in the slightest.
“I guess I’ll just have to find out by myself.” She grins and disappears into her class.
I take a deep breath in. See? If Sherlock Holmes and Cupid could have babies, the baby would be Lila.
An arm rests on my shoulders. “Smile, Meggy,” Braden chimes, steering me toward our class.
“Where’s Maddie?”
“She’s in bed. She’s sick.”
“She better just be sick.” I look at him pointedly.
“Fuckin’ hell, you sound like Mom.”
“It’s because I learned it from her.” I smile sweetly at him and push my way up the staircase, shrugging his arm off.
“You seem different.”
What is it with people today? “Do I?”
“Yep.”
“How?” I look at him like he’s crazy and enter the room.
“You seem … Distracted? Yeah, distracted.” Braden chews his thumbnail.
“I’m always a little scattered, Bray, you know this. Maybe it’s just pronounced today.” I shrug and slide into my seat next to Aston. Braden perches on the edge of my desk.
“Why are you still sitting next to this ass?” Braden looks at me, grinning.
I roll my eyes. “Because even sitting next to this ass is preferable to you telling me how “different” I seem today. I’ve had it from Lila all morning.”
“Different?” Aston questions. “Different how? Hey, Megan, did you finally get some?”
Smart boy.
“Hey, Aston, I see you finally managed to get your dick back in your pants long enough to make it to class.” I smile at him, exaggerating it for Braden’s benefit.
“Well, you know …” He leans back in his seat, linking his fingers behind his head. “Sometimes it’s a fucking hard call, but I thought I should probably make an appearance. Wouldn’t want you missing me now, would I?”
“I’d miss you like I would a lego under my foot. Oh, wait, I wouldn’t miss that!”
“Do you two even know what you sound like?” Bray looks between us.
“I have ears, Braden,” I retort. “I can hear, funnily enough.”
“You sound like an old married couple.”
“I said I can hear.”
“I know. I chose to ignore you.”
“Well isn’t that a surprise?”
“You two sound like a couple of kindergarten kids,” Aston offers.
“You two sound like you want my knee in your balls,” I say, following suit. “This is why I sometimes wonder if Kay is the smartest person I know. Guys are annoying.”
Braden snorts, jumping up. “Of course we’re fuckin’ annoying. We have to be to put up with
your
annoying whiny asses.”
I scrunch up a ball of paper and launch it at his head as he walks to his desk. It bounces off the back of his head and he bends down, scoops it up, and throws it back at me. I catch it and grin.
“He’s got a point,” Aston mutters.
I turn, looking at him blankly. “I meant what I said about a knee in the balls.”
“You’re really fucking hot when you’re mad.”
I swallow the bubble of laughter inside my chest and fight the smile my lips are twitching into. “I’m not mad. I can always get mad though, and when I do I’ll be so hot I’ll burn your damn ass.”
He grins slowly – that sexy grin he does – and lowers his eyelids slightly. My heart pounds a little harder when I recognize that look as his bed look.
“Is that an offer?” he says in a low voice.
I can feel Braden’s eyes on us. “Even if it was, it wouldn’t be much of an offer because you wouldn’t be able to pay the price.”
“Try me,” he offers, his smile turning cocky as we both put on the charade. As we both play for the silence of the secret we have. As we play for keeps.
For keeps of each other. For keeps of the secret that binds us together. For keeps of the lie we’re now committed to telling.
The lie that breaks my heart a little every time I play this game.
I flick my blonde hair over my shoulder and smile, resting my chin on my hand, and cross my legs. “How about the price would be so high that you’d be ruined for all other girls – and you’d never have an opportunity to put it back in your pants?” My stomach twists with my own words.
He runs his teeth across his bottom lip, his gray eyes darkening a shade as they flick down my body and back up. When he looks at me the way he is right now, I feel naked. Like he can strip away the layers of clothing I’m wearing to my body beneath with a mere glance.
“I don’t think that would be such a bad price,” he mutters, stretching his arms out in front of him and tapping his fingers against the edge of the table. “In fact,” he says even quieter as the class finally starts. “I think I’ve paid that damn price.”
I almost choke as I breathe in sharply.
Only I could choke on air.
Aston raises an eyebrow, and I do the only thing I can do. I spin abruptly in my seat, focusing on the front of the room. It’s not what I want to do … but that’s an “if only”. If only. If only.
I keep getting caught up in games. First, Maddie and Braden’s – and now my own, however voluntarily. Both a game for love, but each with their own set of complex yet easily broken rules. Both with the ability to make or break the players. And both with the same prize.
The one thing coveted above all else, for however long it lasts. The one thing we all want regardless of who gets broken along the way. The one thing that no matter the cost, no amount of money could ever buy it.
The grand prize we play for.
Love.
~
“I went to the supermarket and I bought an apple.”
My lips curl to one side and I look behind me at Braden. “What?”
“I went to the supermarket and I bought an apple,” he repeats, sitting opposite me on the picnic bench.
I know this. We used to play it all the time when we were kids – usually when we were hiding from our parents because we’d done something wrong. By the time we’d finished it, they’d forgotten we were in trouble because they were so worried.
We were the biggest little shits ever.
I close my book and resign myself to the fact he won’t let it go until I play. “Okay. I went to the supermarket and I bought an apple and a beer.”
He raises an eyebrow. “I went to the supermarket and bought an apple, a beer, and a crotchless thong.”
“What?” I cover my face with my hands and shake my head. “I cannot believe you just said that.”
I guess this game has evolved a little over the last ten years.
“You know the rules.” He kicks me under the table.
“Fine. I went to the supermarket and I bought an apple, a beer, a crotchless thong, and a dildo.”
He pauses before bursting into laughter. I grin at him, propping my head on my hands.
“I really wasn’t expecting that,” he admits.
I shrug. “Bit of a change from bananas, carrots and donuts, right?”
“Just a fucking bit.” He laughs again. “For once I’m going to quit. I’m a little worried about what we could come up with.”
“You and I both, Carter.”
“So, Harper.” He leans forward, studying me. “What’s up?”
You’re kidding me. I appreciate the concern, but sheesh.
“Mom set you on my case, didn’t she?” I raise my eyebrows again. “She was going on about me getting pregnant this weekend.”
“What the fuck?”
If the twitching of my lips didn’t give me away, I so would have followed through with that.
“I’m not pregnant. She’s worried about me getting pregnant.”
“No. Well, yes. She did call me.” He rubs his hand down his face. “For what it’s worth, I reminded her you have to have sex to get pregnant, so you’re definitely safe there.”
This is becoming a common theme for my conversations.
“Gee, thanks,” I reply sarcastically. “Was that all?”
“No. Y’know, sometimes I think about when we were kids and think we were right little fuckers.”