Page 3 of Cross the Line
“I should’ve drowned you.” The words are acrid and blunt with the vicious twist of my grip on his shirt.
Maybe I’ll make up for it now and strangle his leering breaths out of him.
“Yeah,” he chuffs, “you should’ve. Now, you better watch your back, pretty boy, ‘cause I’m coming for you. I’m going to fuck you up so bad, you’ll beg me to hold you under that pool while the whore watches.”
My fist rears back so fast, I don’t know what I’m doing until my hand hits flesh.
“Enough,” Coach barks, squeezing my fist as he forces it down to my side.
“All right, boys, break it up or go to bed,” Coach Murray pushes us apart. “Whatever this is, it’s done. Now.”
I scoff at the same time as Presley laughs Coach Murray’s statement off.
“Do we have a problem here?” Coach asks, getting up in our faces.
“Nah, I’ve got it handled,” Presley mutters, shaking Coach Murray’s hand off his shoulder as he turns to leave while holding me with a scowl.
Any other time, his remark wouldn’t faze me. Today, there’s something more to it that makes me uneasy. I can’t put my finger on it, but the ominous energy he leaves behind constricts around my chest. Suffocating me with its twisted bitterness.
Neither Coach bothers to dig into what happened. Guys fight all the time when the adrenaline is running high. It’s part of the sport—the highs are high, the lows are low, and the in between tends to get messy.
Grabbing my phone, I clean it up with my napkin before I head up to my room. I don’t bother taking the elevator when I spot Presley and his cronies waiting for it. My gut is screaming at me to stay away.
After climbing seven flights of stairs, I trudge into mine and Ryker’s twin room to find him sitting on his bed, taking his anger out on hisSwitch. He doesn’t acknowledge me as he throws it down on the bed and pushes past me to the door.
“Ry…” I call after him, rubbing my arm where his shoulder shoved me. “Ryker, where are you going?”
“What do you care?” He snaps back, twisting his feet into his sneakers with more vigor than required. “It’s not like you’re my friend, because friends help each other. Friends don’t want to ruin?—”
“Why is this party so important?”
A grimace twists his face. “Because I’m so fucking tired of being the outcast. I hate it. I hate being stuck here all the time. We never have fun. We never do anything. We’re so fucking boring. No wonder they think we’re banging. I mean, why else would we always stay in our room?”
The vigor in his words startles me.
I didn’t know he felt this way.
Most of the time, I go along with what Ryker wants and follow his lead because he’s used to this world, while I’m still finding my feet.
I don’t bother addressing the latter part of his rant. But after the altercation with Presley, it lingers. Its venom seeps deeper until I physically step away, putting space between Ryker and me.
“Well, what else do you want to do?” I ask.
With a huff, he twists to face me fully, giving up on his shoes. “I want to party like all the other guys on the team. I want to be normal and have fun as part of the team.”
“Ryker… youarenormal.” His chin juts out in a silent argument that, with his downcast eyes, dupes me into capitulating to him. “Fine, if it means that much to you. I won’t stay long, though. Finley’s gonna call, and I promised I’d be waiting.”
“Can’t believe you’re actually chasing Presley’s sister’s skirt,” Ryker scoffs with a grimace. “How can you be into that family? He’s gross and the apples never fall far from the tree, so…”
“Sometimes they roll far away from the roots.” He doesn’t know the Tomes family, and while he’s not completely wrong about them, he is one-hundred percent wrong about Finley. “Besides, you’re the one who wants to go to his stupid party.”
“It’s not his party. Hughes organized it,” he retorts with a terse smile.
I don’t bother arguing with him. It’s a waste of time and energy. Instead, I change out of my post-game smart clothes and into my cleanest pair of jeans and a t-shirt I’ve only worn once in the last five days.
When I’m coming out of the bathroom, Ryker stops me. “What’s with the hair? You should put product in it.”
Dragging me back into the bathroom, he sits on the vanity with the mirror behind him while he instructs me on how to style my hair. It’s not that I don’t know how to, but rather that I can’t be bothered when I’m going to bed soon. Ryker gives up instructing me with a huff and takes over.
