Page 67 of Sacrifice the Knight (Checkmate 6)

18

Mac

Saturday morning, Ben and I stop at my front door before the sun has barely cracked over the hills. “Just wait here a sec.” I push him back a step. “I’ll be right out.”

“Yeah, okay. But you gotta hustle, Blair. We wanna hit ten miles before the Rollers do breakfast.” He checks his watch. “We have an hour at the most before they eat everything.”

I rub the soft ache in my leg and nod. I slept on the damn floor all night, with nothing more beneath me than the three-quarter-inch rubber mats we bleed and sweat on. The weather is cooling, which means my leg is stiff as fuck, and there’s no way we’re going to hit Benny’s ten miles in an hour. But that won’t stop us from trying. I have a world championship belt to win, and eating bacon and eggs on the gym floor isn’t what I need to do to achieve those goals.

“I got it,” I whisper. I unlock my front door and slide through a small crack I make, then silently close it again as Ben leans back to rest against the hallway wall. I move through my living room in complete silence, tilting my head when I find my mom’s heels kicked beneath the couch. She’s always so neat, so her shoes not being put away stands out in my mind, but not enough to distract me from my plans.

Or the pretty girl I kinda turned stalker for overnight while I watched her sleep.

I need to get my sneakers from my room so we can run, and take a pill before I’m left crying on the couch this afternoon because floor-sleeping, ten miles, and shitty weather kill my old injuries.

The Rollers gave us permission to run this morning since the sun is creeping up and our behavior last night was perfect. Well… except for the watching the girls sleep thing. But I keep that shit to myself and go about my life without the threat of a broken neck from a protective daddy.

Moving quietly since Mom’s car is downstairs but there’s no coffee in the air, I move into my bedroom and switch out my shoes. Stepping into the hall, I pass Mom’s bedroom on the way to the bathroom, only to come to a screeching halt at her open door. I let my eyes scan the heavy boots lying on the floor.They don’t belong.Then the jeans slung over the end of the bed.They definitely don’t belong.My brain knows I should stop looking, but my eyes keep going until I catch sight of a dude’s inked back and his tattooed arm slung over my mom as they both sleep on their stomachs.

With a pounding heart and shaking hands, I back out of the room and vow to never speak of this again. Closing the door in silence, I practically sprint back to the kitchen and toss my pain pill into my mouth. I chase it with a glass of water and do everything in my power to not look toward the hall. If they wake up while I’m here, I’ll for sure die.

Tiptoeing from the kitchen to the living room while I swipe water from my lip, I slide out the front door and look at Benny as though he’s a changed man. Or maybe it’s me that’s changed. Maybe my mom has.

Fuck knows, but something changed in there, and I can’t figure out what the fuck I think about it.

“Let’s go.” I grab Ben’s arm and drag him along the hall. “We got fifty-five minutes now, and there’ll be no bacon left by the time we get back.”

“Wait up.” Benny skips down the stairs in time with me, but his brow is lifted. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” My voice breaks. It fucking breaks! “Nothing’s wrong. But I was thinking; do you think your mom will be cool with me sleeping over tonight?”

“Sure. She won’t care.” He opens the door at the bottom of the stairs and waits for me to pass through. “Why? I thought you were eager to get home to your mommy.”

I roll my eyes. “You saymommylike I should be ashamed for wanting to hang out with her. As if you don’t have attachment issues to yours. Get the fuck outta here, Conner.”

He sniffs because I’m right. I’m pretty sure Benny would still sleep in his mom’s bed if she wasn’t a newlywed and Oz Franks wasn’t taking up that side these days.

My mom finally has someone taking up the other side of her bed, and better yet, I like that motherfucker, so I’ll make myself scarce tonight and let my mom enjoy what she’s got a little longer. I don’t have to know the details, so long as she’s smiling when I call her later today to tell her I’m crashing at Ben’s.

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