Uncaged (An MMA Stepbrother Romance) (83 page)

Unleashed

An MMA Stepbrother Romance

“Great speech.”

I look up and am too slow to stop the gasp from leaving my lips.

It’s Chance Hudson. What the hell does he want?

His gorgeous hazel eyes bore straight into mine, and I find it hard to maintain eye-contact. He’s been teasing and tormenting me for
a whole year
. Somehow, he was in nearly all of my classes.

He wipes his chestnut-brown hair to the side, and his golden-tan seems to shine in the afternoon sunlight. His huge body, all muscle and not an ounce of fat, towers over me. I’m literally sitting in his shadow.

“Oh God,” I groan, looking away.

It’s warm, and I’m tired, and I shook like a wet puppy on the stage. There were hundreds of parents there, and the red lights of camera-phones recording me had done nothing to quell my nerves. My voice had hitched, my lips had trembled.

Really, the speech was anything
but
great. It wasn’t even good.

I think to my ending:

And so this new generation sets off into the world, wary of the conventions set down by the old. We hope to improve, but betterment so often comes in the form of subversion, of questioning. We hope that you don’t judge us for our life decisions. The world is forever in flux, and so let us be different. Let us look at your methods and adjust them, or strike them out so that we might forge newer, better ways.

Let us change. Support our change.

Because when you were our age, that’s what you would have wanted.

I groan. It sounds so trite in my head, so vague and so boring. All the typical clichés. All samey, no punch.

“No, it wasn’t a good speech,” I say to Chance.

I keep my eyes off his, on a bright red car in the distance, but soon it turns a corner and disappears out of sight.

I’m sitting on a bench waiting for the bus to take me home – Dad left for Las Vegas yesterday – and in my gown the sun is making me feel more than a little warm.

Chance is standing right in front of me, though, so it’s practically impossible for me not to look at him eventually, and when I do, he’s got his hands on his hips, his head cocked to the side, and an amused grin pulling at his lips.

So I look at his body because I don’t want to look into his eyes. He’s wearing a tight t-shirt that fits him too damn well, and a pair of dark jeans. It’s unfair really how good he can look in casual clothing.

I hate that I’m attracted to him. I can easily see the shape of his body through his clothing, from his muscular chest to the way the sleeves wrap around his veiny, defined arms. He’s lean, like an athlete… well, he
is
an athlete. Well, he
was
an athlete.

He barely graduated, from what I heard on the grapevine.

But still, school wrestling champ? And from what I hear, a bit of a local legend in the amateur boxing and MMA leagues? I wouldn’t be surprised if he had scholarship offers lining up.

That’s our country. Sports. Money. Fame.

“What do you want, Chance?” I ask, impatience in my voice. I don’t bother playing nice or blunting my attitude. We’re not friends. We never have been. I dislike him intensely. He’s everything I’m not. He’s everything I don’t like. Chance never worked hard in school a day in his life, and yet he’s destined to go to college, destined to graduate as they give him dummy courses with low standards.

It’s like that with all athletes. He’s nothing like me.

“Nothing that you’d give me,” he says. “Yet.” He smirks at me.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Why are you so sensitive all the time?” Still his lips are pried apart, almost nastily. He thinks he’s such hot shit. I can’t understand why he behaves this way. He’s so repulsive.

“I’m
not
sensitive. I just don’t like you.”

“Why? Because you want me?”

He doesn’t move. His hands don’t move. He doesn’t fidget. He’s just so damn
comfortable
all the time. I find my eyes going to his lips… and I hate that I like the shape of his lips. They are full, kissable, set within a strong and defined jaw.

They’re soft, and when his tongue wets them, I find myself momentarily mesmerized.

I just can’t see why the most attractive boy in school is also the most assholish. It
bothers
me. Is there some kind of script we all adhere to? Why does it happen so often that it’s become a cliché?

What cliché am I? The nerdy girl who did well in school? The geek girl who never had a boyfriend, who was hall monitor and a teacher’s pet?

Well, I wasn’t a damn teacher’s pet. I wasn’t anybody’s
pet.

“I
don’t
want you,” I tell him. “Leave me alone please.”

“Sure you don’t,” he says, sitting down next to me on the bench. He spreads his arm out on the backrest behind me, and pokes my shoulder with a finger. “So, why are you waiting for the bus, then?”

“My dad is away. He left the car at the long-stay parking at the airport, and we only have one car.”

“He didn’t come to your graduation?”

“No.”

“My mother didn’t, either.”

“Really?” I ask, looking at him. For the first time, I feel there might be a thread of similarity between us, but he ruins the moment.

“But it’s not like I give two shits. I couldn’t care less.”

I balk. “You don’t care that your own mother didn’t attend your graduation? Figures. You must be dumb.”

“Oh, I’m certainly not as smart as
you
.”

“Hey, I worked hard for this. We’re in a weighted-GPA school. Do you know what that means?”

He shrugs. “Jack shit, truthfully.”

“It means that you are awarded more for harder courses, and less for easier courses.”

“So?”

“So?” I echo, exasperated. “It means that I’m not just any little-miss-smart or whatever. I worked for this. I took the toughest courses and I aced them. I did extra credit.”

“So? So what?” He looks at me and grins. “What’s it going to get you?”

“Well, it got me into LSE. That’s the London School of Economics, in case you weren’t aware. It’s one of the best universities in the world.” I peer at him. “You probably weren’t.”

He grins, like he’s enjoying this, and it just pisses me off.

“You’re a bit of a snob, aren’t you?” he says.

“I’m not a snob. I’m just telling it how it is.”

“What’s that super-prestigious degree going to get you, then? Run through your plan with me.”

“Why should I?”

“Well, the bus isn’t here yet, and you’re enjoying talking to me.”

I make a face.

“So, what’s it going to get you?” he pushes.

“I’ll graduate with honors in political science.”

“And then what?”

“I’ll do my master’s.”

“And then?”

“I’ll teach.”

He scoffs. “You’ll teach? That’s it? That’s your sole ambition? That’s the final step in your plan?”

“Hey,” I say. “The world needs more teachers. Good ones. Smart ones.”

“You’ve got this little plan all worked out. You think that it’s all going to depend on how well you do in your classes, what grades you get. Let me ask you, we go to a good private school, right?”