Page 15 of Their Cruel Play
“So is this what every year has been like?” Nico shakes his head.
“No,” Caden bites out. “Harper’s special.”
No one denies his claim. No one says yeah, she’s—fuck, was—the last virgin. She’s more than that, and we all fucking know it. We want her for more.
Nico nods. “How do we protect her?”
“We figure out who’s targeting her.” I push my hand through my hair. “But it’s not like we’ve been making friends all these years.”
We’ve never stolen a guy’s chick, but they’ve strayed to us. We created a culture of respect and demanded it. But we also had to take care of problems for other students.
“We need to bring her in fully.” Jack’s voice is steady and his gaze meets all of ours. “No us versus her. Only us.”
“If she’ll let us.” Eli chuckles. “Pretty sure we’re all on her shit list right now.”
“Maybe you are.” I smirk. She wants me as much as I want her. I could have taken her in that classroom, and she would have begged me for more.
“Trust. She needs to trust us, and we need to trust her.” Jack turns to Caden. “This petty shit needs to stop. She tried to protect you, and you repaid her by punishing her. She cares about you.”
Caden presses his lips together. This won’t be easy for him. Especially with what happened to his sister. He couldn’t protect his sister because he didn’t know.
“Focus that hate on destroying Tanner Lewis.” I clap him on the shoulder. “Tonight we’ll see what we can find out at the party.”
CHAPTER 5
The Poisoned Apple
Jack
After we enter the locker room to get ready, I head to Assistant Coach Turner’s office. The world around us is on fire, but apparently my coach wants to talk about how I can improve my performance on the field.
Hopefully, this has nothing to do with how good my mouth felt on his cock. I blow out a breath and knock on the door.
“Come in.”
Opening the door, I walk in, leaving it open behind me.
“Close the door.” Darius rocks back in his office chair and nods toward it.
Fine. I close it and drop into the seat across from him at his desk. “What did you want to talk about?”
He folds his hands. “You blocked my number.”
I rise, but he holds out his hands to calm me.
“Sit, Jack. I just want to talk.” His brown eyes plead with me. I hope to hell this is about the closure he needs, because I’m more than willing to give it to him.
“I’m with someone.” Lounging in the chair, I stretch one leg in front of me. “I don’t cheat.”
He nods. “Harper Davidson, right?”
“Yeah.” I cock my eyebrow. It’s weird that he knows, even if it’s not a secret.
“I’m not here to get with a student, Jack.” His hands fold together on the desk as he meets my eyes. “What happened over the summer was good, but a mistake I shouldn’t have let happen.”
“Like you said, it was a mistake.” I lean back in my chair. “No harm. No foul. I’m eighteen. We just didn’t realize we’d have this type of relationship in the future.”
He nods. “I also want to apologize for reaching out the other weekend.” He drops his gaze to the desk. “It was a weak moment, and it won’t happen again. I don’t want you to think I’m hung up or anything. I just want us to be coach and player and nothing else.”
