Covering the Quarterback

by Amber Thielman

  Chapter 43

  Grace

  I stared at the textbook in my lap, re-reading the same paragraph over and over and not registering what it was saying. The house was quiet, peaceful, but I found myself craving the company of another human being. I debated calling my mom to vent to her, but it was late, and I didn’t want to take her away from her family with my young adult drama. Alex was due to be home soon, and there was no way I’d survive the night without letting it slip to her that Jackson had made a move on me on the Quad. Even now, sitting by myself in the comfort of my home, I didn’t know what I was feeling, or even how I should feel.

  The kiss had caught me off guard, no doubt about that, but impressively I’d been able to pull myself together in time to stop a train wreck from happening. I didn’t know what to think about anything. Jackson, trying to kiss me under the night sky, the scent of his aftershave making my senses tingle in a way I never thought could be possible. And I’d turned him down flat because I hadn’t known how else to react. How should one respond to something like that? I couldn’t imagine that Jackson had true feelings for me, not even now, even after what had just happened. I was confident what I’d told him rang truer than either of us wanted to admit; Jackson didn’t want me. He wanted comfort; he wanted solace. And, well, I just so happened to have boobs and a vagina, and he was still a guy. That was the end of it. I knew it, and he would know it, too.

  I heard the key in the lock briefly, and Alex stepped through, shutting the door behind her as she dragged her work bag in behind her and collapsed next to me on the couch, exhausted.

  “Jesus, Grace, you look like someone kicked your dog,” she said.

  “We don’t have a dog.”

  “It’s an expression.” She looked over at me, tired, but knowing something was up. She always did. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.” I shrugged and reached for the cup of ice water sitting on the coffee table just for something to do besides cower under her gaze. She wasn’t going to let up, I knew that much, and I figured that if I tried to hide in the bathroom, she’d follow me there, too, so it wasn’t worth the effort of getting up off the couch.

  “I think I need to apologize to Jackson,” I said. I rested my head in my hands as every overwhelming emotion hit me in the gut, a sensation I should have known was coming in time. There was no escaping it, that much was becoming clear.

  “Why? What happened?” Alex asked. I shook my head, remembering the look on his face after the rejection. He’d been so defensive, so hurt, and it was because of me.

  “He tried to kiss me,” I said. “He asked me to meet him on the Quad so we could talk, and he made a move.” Alex said nothing to this at first, just waited for me to go on. “I turned him down, and I hurt him. Badly, I think.”

  “He likes you,” Alex said, and it sounded like she was talking to herself. “He cares about you, Grace.”

  “No, he doesn’t, Alex. He was lonely and horny, and I’m the only girl who will give him the time of day anymore. That’s all it is. He doesn’t want me. He wants sex.”

  “Listen to yourself.” I was startled when my best friend’s tone was suddenly sharp as if she were scolding a child. “God knows I’m not Jackson Tate’s biggest fan, Grace, but over the last few months it’s been clear you two were becoming close.”

  “We’re just friends. Jackson has no interest in me other than the fact I’ve been there when no one else has. I’m the only stable thing in his life, and he assumes he can take advantage of that.”

  “You’re in denial,” Alex said. “That boy is crazy about you, and you’re too afraid to see it.”

  “Afraid?” I repeated. I was angry now. “I’m not scared of someone like Jackson Tate, Alex. What in the hell do I have to fear?”

  “Feelings,” she said. “You’re afraid to care about Jackson the same way he cares about you because you think it’s too good to be true.” She paused, reading my face in silence. “No,” she said after a moment, mostly to herself. “You already do care about him in that way, and that’s why you’re so afraid. Because you’re already screwed even though you think avoiding it will make it hurt less.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense,” I mumbled, but God damn . . . it made perfect sense.

  “Leave before you’re left, huh?” Alex murmured. “That’s what you’re doing. If you can sabotage this potential relationship before it even begins, then there’s no way to get in deeper than you already are.”

  “Fuck you,” I said, and stood up from the couch. Alex didn’t seem taken aback by my outburst. She only looked at me, as if reading an open book.

  “He sees it now, Grace,” she said. “He finally sees it. Now maybe it’s your turn.”

  Chapter 44

  Jackson

  I was halfway through my law class when my phone went off, alerting me to a text message. Flushing with embarrassment at being glared at by the professor, I fumbled for my phone to silence it, quick to note that the text was from Grace.

  Can we talk?

  Hiding my phone shamelessly near my crotch, I texted her back, unable to wait until class was dismissed.

  Yes.

  Come 2 my place after school.

  I slipped my phone into my back pocket, ignoring Tyler’s curious stare-down next to me. I had no intention of letting him in on my business, not after the drama between him and Grace. This was something I needed to do on my own, without the help of my trusty asshole sidekick who was more ass than he was helpful. I wouldn’t make that mistake again.

  When class ended, I couldn’t escape quickly enough. Tyler was hot on my heels, cat-calling the freshmen girls in their mini-skirts and halter tops as we walked by them.

  “Hey, we have a game on Thursday,” Tyler said. His tone of voice had changed a little bit as if he was now walking on eggshells and speaking to someone with a mental disability. “Are you going to come watch?”

  “I, uh . . . I’ll think about it, man,” I said, but I was lying. For the first time in a very long time, football was the last thing on my mind. And honestly, I didn’t care who won. Not even a little bit. My focus was on slightly more important matters at the moment.

  “I have somewhere to be,” I said, and fist-bumped Tyler. “I’ll catch you later.”

  “Sure thing, man,” Tyler said, and I had to try and ignore the suspicious look he gave me as I walked away and headed towards Grace’s house.

  It was a rare occurrence that I had ever been this nervous seeing a girl, especially a girl like Grace Harrison. I felt intimidated, a little bit guarded, unable to cope with the thought that she could very well push me away for good and I would never see or hear from her again. The scene from last night had been playing in my head every hour on the hour. I’d spent all night going over it in my head, wondering how I could have approached it differently, envisioning what it would have felt like had she kissed me back.

  When I got to the house, I stood hesitating on the front steps, tempted to turn around and go home so I wouldn’t have to face what I thought was coming. She would ream me, no doubt, make it clear yet again how inappropriate it had been for me to try and kiss her last night. Why she insisted on doing it again was beyond me; I thought she’d made herself damn clear when it had happened.

  I was about to chicken out and go home when the front door opened and Grace appeared. She wore sweats and a tank top, her brown hair clipped in a messy bun at the top of her head. Her skin was makeup-free, freckles glowing on her skin without anything to cover them up. She was Grace, just the awkward girl I’d met in the bar what seemed like an eternity ago; the same girl who I had to carry home the night we met, the woman I’d laid into bed and bid farewell without ever imagining I’d see her face again. She was just Grace, and she was exquisite.

  “Thank you for coming,” she said, and stepped aside to let me in. I hesitated, but only briefly. I still wasn’t sure if I could take another rejection from her.

  Grace shut the door behind us and t
urned to face me. The house was quiet, so I could only assume that Alex was in class or at work. That was a relief because I was positive I didn’t need an audience for what was about to happen next.

  “I think we need to talk,” Grace said. She folded her arms across her chest, and for the first time, I noticed that her skin was freckled there, too. Not just on her arms and face, however, but they also dotted her chest, all the way down and probably past the V-neck on her tank top. The very thought of that made my mouth dry, hands damp with sweat.

  “Grace,” I said before she could say anything more. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for last night. It was a jerk move, and I don’t know why it happened.”

  She kept looking at me. She was silent, and that was worse than anything she could have said. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, she took a long, deep breath, her chest rising and falling with the movement.

  “Would you like a beer?” she said finally.

  It took me a moment to decipher what she’d said. I had gone into this expecting something else entirely. She wasn’t smiling, which wasn’t necessarily a great sign, but the mere fact that she hadn’t slapped me across the face yet must have been progress.

  “I’ll take a beer,” I said carefully. As Grace went to the kitchen to grab our drinks, I took a seat on the couch, feeling oddly out of place. Being at a girl's house was bizarre. Shamefully, they’d always come to me.

  “Here,” Grace handed me a bottle of beer and sat down on the couch next to me. As we drank in silence, I looked around, admiring the cute, personal touches she and Alex had used to decorate. It was grown-up. Cozy. Very unlike my apartment with the trash and dirty laundry strewn across the floor.

  “Grace,” I said when she didn’t speak for another few minutes. “Why am I here?”

  It was a dangerous question, of course, but I was anxious to get to the bottom of this, if only to stop putting off the inevitable rejection deep down I knew was coming. Dragging it out would only make it worse, if not for her, for me.

  The warmth of Grace’s fingers on my arm startled me to look at her. She turned in my direction, legs tucked beneath her, staring at me with that sincere concern in her eyes, fingers brushing my skin so softly that I wasn’t sure she was touching me.

  “Are you okay?” she asked. I reeled that question over in my mind, wondering what to tell her. I was okay. In fact, I was more than okay, but how could I tell her that I was only okay because she was there with me?

  “Yes,” I said. I turned my body to face her. From the way she was sitting on the couch next to me, I could see her breasts rise and fall below the open V-neck of her shirt. As she looked at me, those bluish gray eyes seemed to read straight into my soul. I was an open book in front of this girl, and she knew it.

  “Do you want to stay here?” she asked. “You can take the couch if you don’t want to be alone tonight. I don’t want you to be alone.”

  “No,” I said, and Grace looked briefly taken aback.

  “Okay,” she said. “I’m sorry, I just figured you wouldn’t mind the company.”

  “I don’t want the couch.”

  “You don’t want—?” She started to draw her hand away, sensing she was stumbling into potentially dangerous territory. Before she could withdraw completely, I seized her hand in mine and held it for a moment before bringing it up to my lips. I could see the surprise in Grace’s face, but she didn’t pull away like I expected her to. She only stared at me, the wheels in her head visibly turning as I kissed her fingers before running my hand slowly from the tips of her fingers up her arm. She shivered, and I felt a trill of excitement shoot up my spine.

  “I don’t know if this is a good idea,” she said. I took the bottle of beer from her and set both drinks aside before I adjusted myself on the couch, leaning into her, bringing my hand away from her arm and resting it on her hip. When I leaned in to kiss her again, Grace didn’t pull away. Instead, her lips met mine in a shocking act of certainty, like every minute before this had been inevitably leading up to this very moment. Her lips parted slightly, inviting me in, and I slipped my tongue between them, drawing her body to mine.

  “Jackson,” she breathed, and for a perturbing moment, I was sure she was going to push me away and banish me once again. I hesitated, praying she wouldn’t refuse me, but knowing damn well that I would go to the ends of the earth for this girl. I would do whatever she wanted or didn’t want.

  “Should we stop?” I murmured in her ear. Grace shook her head and closed her eyes. My hand, which had been caressing the skin on her hip, slid down her thigh and between the soft crevice of her legs. I hesitated again, willing to give her time to change her mind. Instead of saying anything further, however, a soft moan escaped her lips as my hand gently massaged her beneath the pair of fuzzy sweats she wore. She pulled her mouth away from mine, her eyes closing as she pressed herself into me, small gasps escaping the lips that had at one time swore they hated me. As I massaged her, pleased, she surprised me by reaching her hand down to touch my growing erection getting hard against her leg. She seemed briefly surprised, as if not expecting she could turn me on so quickly. Granted, I hadn’t been expecting it, either.

  “I don’t know if this is a good idea,” she said again, and then gasped as I took my hand away from the outside of her pants and slipped it back in under the elastic. She was wet and warm, and her hips reacted to the motion of my fingers inside of her.

  “Your body tells a different story,” I said, and before she could react, I pushed her onto her back down on the couch and pulled her sweats off, revealing a damp pair of panties and beautifully flushed skin. For a moment, she was shocked, and I could practically see her trying to decide if she should let this happen, or else cover herself and scream profanities at me. I paused long enough to allow her to object if necessary. When she didn’t say anything more, I reached for the wallet in my back pocket and removed the handy condom I’d been carrying around for months.

  Grace watched me rip the foil from the rubber, and I kicked my pants off, keeping my eyes on her face the entire time. As I reached down to slip it over me, Grace sat up and reached for it. She smiled, almost shyly, as she took the condom and rolled it over me herself, caressing my already aching penis as she did so. I swallowed as a shocking sensation washed over me. I needed her so badly, more than I’d ever needed someone in my life.

  As I lowered myself into her, meeting her lips for another desperate kiss, I tangled one hand in her hair and supported myself with the other against the arm of the couch. She closed her eyes and wrapped her legs around my waist, silently pleading for me.

  “Are you sure?” I asked, and Grace nodded. She was sweating already, her dewy skin glowing under the shade of the lamp.

  “I’m sure.”

  Chapter 45

  Grace

  Somehow, within the next hour, we ended up in my bedroom huddled under the covers, entwined in each other’s arms, exhausted but energized and buzzing at the same time.

  Jackson’s body was beautiful, just as an athletic guy should be, and I couldn’t stop running my hands up and down his abdomen, wondering if we could get away with staying in bed forever. While his skin was flawless in my eyes, he still had scars. Battle wounds, if you will, from years of football and child’s play. The scar from surgery, a long, angry pink one that started at the midpoint in his back and traveled down his spine, was healing nicely. I settled into him, wishing this moment would never end. Maybe we could lock the door, close out the world, and never face the reality again.

  “Tell me what you’re thinking,” Jackson said as he caressed my thigh. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, trying to clear my head even briefly from the fuzzy moment of ecstasy. As I thought about what I had to say, Jackson’s fingers moved up from my thigh and over my waist, his fingers finding and tracing the tiny tattoo I had etched on my hip.

  “I didn’t take you for a tattoo kind of girl,” Jackson said, admiring the work. “I’m impressed.”
<
br />   “There’s a lot you don’t know about me,” I said. Jackson tore his gaze away from the tattoo and looked me in the face.

  “Your tattoo is unique. What does it mean?”

  I looked down at the symbol on my hip and traced the design with my finger. “It’s a mark that means survivor,” I said. “My mother has an identical one on her shoulder.”

  “What kind of survivor?” Jackson asked. I took another breath, debating as to whether this was a conversation we should get into now. But I guess it was a little late to be bashful. There was nothing more to be done; it was time for the secrets to come out.

  “My dad isn’t a good man. He never was.” I focused my gaze and attention on a pattern embedded on the quilt, unable to look Jackson in the face. He didn’t say anything at first, just looked at me, waiting for me to go on. “He used to hurt my mother,” I said. “He was mean to her. He’d hit her, kick her when she was down. He was also controlling, and very demanding. He was a jerk.”

  “Was he like that to you?” Jackson asked after a moment of silence.

  “He only ever hit me once,” I said. “But he hurt me every day, emotionally at least. He would tell us both how worthless we were, and how we’d never add up to anything.” Jackson reached over and took my hand, a silent gesture of support.

  “Your mom is a cool lady,” he said. “And she has an even more amazing daughter, so it sounds like this prick didn’t beat you down the way he hoped to.”

  “Maybe,” I said, and cracked a tiny smile for his sake. Deep down, I was hurting. Just talking about my father, thinking about him, stirred up so many shitty memories that I had for a very long time locked away in the deepest part of my soul. It wasn’t something I let myself think about often. In fact, if I never saw my father again or even thought about him like I was doing tonight, it would be too soon. I knew my dad was the reason for my insecurities. He was probably the reason I’d never had a committed relationship.