False Start: A Roller Derby Romance (Beautifully Brutal Book 1)

by Casey Hagen

  “Practice tomorrow,” I said quietly.

  “I hate to admit this and if you remind me tomorrow, I’ll deny I said it, but—he sees something in you on that track.” She turned to me then as the first tear tracked down her cheek. “Despite it, he’s still a bastard for what he pulled today.”

  CAIN

  “Wow, that was a chilly goodbye,” Lilith said the minute I stepped through the doorway.

  “They’re just tired.” And pissed at me, but then, there will be more where that came from.

  Coaching had changed in ten years.

  Or maybe I’d changed in ten years.

  I used to step out there so damn sure of myself, but this time, I silently wore my old mistakes like a pair of wet jeans. I was all jerky movements, barked orders, and I suspected—fucking it up.

  My life for the last decade had been ruled by regulation, policy, and law. I held on to the absolute in that. I drew comfort from it.

  I sought absolution in it.

  But now I wondered if it had numbed me to some of the nuances of human interaction.

  The nuances of women.

  Because with one move, my team wanted to skin me alive.

  My team.

  They were mine, dammit. I don’t care if we’d only been out there for a day. Somewhere along the way, after giving in and agreeing to this, I’d started wanting it, too. This was a shot to get it right when I’d gotten so many things wrong.

  I could leave this town on a high this time instead of weighed down by regrets and a trail of destruction in my wake.

  “Oh, they’re tired too,” she agreed. “Turn around.”

  “Why?” I said but turned to hang up my jacket.

  She skimmed her fingers over my shoulders, smoothing my shirt. “Just figured I’d count the knives in your back.”

  With nothing better to do with her time than cook that little nephew of mine, she was definitely working on that skill of seeing everything.

  Every. Damn. Thing.

  “It’s fine. They’ll get over it.” But a bit of spark in Mayhem’s eyes died tonight—the exact opposite of what I expected to see when Tilly showed up, making me all but sure I’d misjudged the situation or I was missing something. Something big.

  “What did you do?” she said, propping her hip against the counter and popping a piece of chocolate in her mouth.

  I glanced over my shoulder as I leaned in to snag a bottle of cold water from the fridge. “What makes you think I did something?”

  She gestured with another piece of chocolate. “You’re a man.”

  She’d gotten so sassy. It’s a wonder Jordan got her to close her mouth long enough to knock her up. “They’re pissed about Tilly being on the team.”

  “Seems kind of stupid to be pissed at you when they agreed to it.”

  My skin prickled. I tossed back three long gulps before I turned to her—my throat still dry—with guilt. “I didn’t ask them.”

  “I’m sorry?” Her voice had gone all high-pitched now, telling me I was in for it and whose side she was definitely going to take in this particular hurdle.

  I was a man on my own. Cool. Not exactly new territory for me. “I. Didn’t. Ask. Them.”

  “Woooowwwww. Dick move, Cain.”

  I glanced away and shrugged. “Thanks.”

  “No, really. I mean, I said you were a good coach and I meant it, but this…”

  “Yeah, I get it, Lil.” I sucked down the last of the water and crushed the bottle in my hands. “You think I fucked up.” Tossing the bottle toward the recyclables, I watched it glance off the corner, spin, and pitch right back out onto the floor.

  “No—I know you fucked up,” she said, reaching for the bottle.

  I grabbed her arm to stop her and snatched up the bottle with my other hand. “Stop, I’ve got it.”

  She blew out an exasperated breath. “I’m not breakable.”

  “I’m not okay with you picking up after me.”

  “Fine, I’ll go back to what I’m good at then, irritating the shit out of you.”

  “Great.” I snorted.

  “Maybe you’re rusty with this whole coaching thing. It’s only day one. I mean, it’s a hell of a mistake to make on day one, but you’ve always been a bit of an overachiever. Go big, am I right?”

  “Your confidence in me is astounding. Thanks.”

  She crossed her arms and settled in. “If it’s part of a master plan…enlighten me.”

  “Tilly and Mayhem have a problem with one another.”

  “You’re supposed to be convincing me why you’re not an idiot.”

  “Working on it.” Only I was trying to convince myself now too because all of a sudden, my stellar idea didn’t seem so stellar. “The issue isn’t so much Mayhem. Her biggest problem is she lets Tilly get in her head. Tilly’s the one who likes to play dirty and throw elbows.”

  “Wait—hold up,” Lilith said, holding her hand up to stop me.

  “What?”

  She shook her head and shifted her weight, the wince on her face telling me she’d gotten uncomfortable on her feet. “That’s not having a problem with one another. That’s one person bullying another.”

  I pulled out a chair. “Here, sit.”

  She shuffled over, sat down, and glanced up at me. “How exactly do you expect Maisy to set aside the way she’s been treated?”

  “I, uh—” It’s not what I intended when I agreed to let Tilly on the team. I hadn’t even considered what I was asking Maisy to do—fucking hell—or would have been asking her if I actually, you know, asked her.

  “Did Tilly apologize?”

  “Shit.” I jammed my hand through my hair and glanced at the clock.

  “Like I suspected, you’re the one who fucked up.”

  “Son of a bitch.” It was late, but practice had only just broken up. Maybe I could do some damage control.

  She laughed up at me, her hand roaming over her belly. “You’re in the doghouse with the new girlfriend.”

  “She’s not my girlfriend.” I snatched my jacket off the hook and jammed my arms through the sleeves.

  “I saw you guys kissing in the barn.”

  My zipper whistled through the air as I yanked it up. “Stop snooping.”

  She shrugged, but her eyes danced. “Hey, I was just checking to see if you guys needed anything.”

  So glad I could be a source of entertainment for my restless sister. By falling on my face. A lot. “Yeah, we did. Privacy.”

  “You needed a hose turned on you. Besides, this property is half mine. It’s not snooping when you’re part owner.”

  “That half isn’t yours. I have to go into town. Will you be okay if I’m gone for an hour?”

  “I’ll manage. How long do I wait before I call 9-1-1 so they can start looking for your body?”

  “Cute.”

  “I thought so,” she said with a laugh. “Hey, Cain?” she called.

  I stopped one foot out the door. “Yeah.”

  “Start with I’m sorry. Now say it with me…IIIIII’mmmmmm sooooooorrrrrry.”

  I slammed the door on the sound of her cackling behind me. So glad I could provide her such quality entertainment.

  I went back in my head to the moment the team circled me, giving me shit for Tilly’s addition, but it was Mayhem, the look on her face, the way she stood apart that had me hitting the gas, pushing the cushion local cops gave people over the limit.

  Stunned.

  I told myself she was calm. The anchor for her team, but I’d misread what that meant—how much she could take.

  She’d been completely blindsided.

  So much so her first instinct wasn’t even anger.

  I climbed the stairs to her apartment first and knocked for a good five minutes, talking to the door, convinced she was in there but just ignoring me. I spotted her car in the parking lot so it’s not like she’d gone far, and after what I put them through on the track on top of her day job, she didn’t go
for a walk.

  Which left Banked Track. And maybe Patti on my side.

  I found Mayhem perched on a bar stool with Rory behind the counter, their heads together, their faces serious.

  Five or six other patrons lingered through the place as they wound down for the night.

  Good, less witnesses.

  “We need to talk,” I said, the words coming out harder than I’d intended.

  And completely unwelcome by the two fuck-you glances Rory and Mayhem aimed my way.

  Mayhem slowly straightened and held up her glass like a toast. “Well, if it isn’t Coach Flaming Asshole,” she said right before knocking back a gulp of her drink. “Have a seat. Rory, I’ll pay you extra to spit in his beer.”

  Rory glared and scoffed as she dug her towel into a highball glass she’d just grabbed. “I’d do it for free.”

  “I’ll pass on the beer. Thanks.” I might have better luck in a pit of cobras. I propped my foot on the stool next to Mayhem only to have her slice me a cold, hard glance.

  “I said have a seat, but I did not say that seat could be next to me.”

  “Are you serious?”

  She turned her heavy-lidded glare back to her drink. “You have no idea.”

  “Fine.” I dragged out the stool one seat down and faced her. “I might have fucked up tonight.”

  “Nope. Not close enough,” she said with a snap of her fingers. “You did fuck up tonight. There’s no might have. Might have is what you say when you might have left the toilet seat up or you might have walked through the house with wet boots. There’s no might in inviting the biggest flaming twat in existence onto our team without saying a word about it. You did do that and the least you could do is own it.”

  “I fucked up,” I said, waiting for her to turn to me. When she finally did, the betrayal I saw in her eyes took me to another time, another place, another mistake, and made it hard to speak. “I’m sorry.”

  She searched my face, silent until her shoulders slumped. “Nope, that’s not satisfying either.” Turning away, she wrapped her fingers around her glass.

  “I’ll tell her she’s off the team.”

  She froze with her glass halfway to her lips and cut me a glance. “If you do that, I’m going to beat you with my skate, I swear to God.”

  “You don’t want me to kick her off the team?”

  “I didn’t want her on the team to begin with, but that ship sailed. It’s gone. Now that you put me in this position, you’ve made me more fuel for her fire.” She leaned on the bar and tilted her head. “What do you think happens if Tilly is kicked off because of me? Because you damn well know after watching the shit she pulled in that bout that she will definitely blame it all on me.”

  “Son of a bitch.”

  “See it now, hotshot? For a cop, you sure are slow.” She slammed her glass down, looked at Rory, and pointed over her shoulder. “Stop worrying about me, I’ve got this. Pay attention to Gerald. He’s serving himself now.”

  Rory whipped around. “Shit!”

  “You can’t turn your back on him,” Mayhem said, turning away from me again, glancing into the bottom of her glass like the amount of liquid left was an hourglass—the liquor the sand—telling her just how much longer she had to suffer my presence.

  “Where’s Patti?” It wasn’t like her to not be here—to let Rory cover her when the woman knew the team had their first practice tonight. She’d want to be here, with all of them, living vicariously through every detail.

  “She wasn’t feeling well,” she said, saying as few words as possible, making me pull the conversation out of her one stubborn word at a time.

  “I took your power away.”

  She sucked in a sharp breath. “You sure did.”

  A weight settled in my chest. I swallowed the unexpected knot wedged in my throat and forced the words past my lips. “And I weaponized you for her.”

  “Yup.”

  “Are you going to tell me what the deal is between you and Tilly?”

  “Nope. Now, if you’d asked me before—” She shrugged and pulled a twenty from her bag and tossed it on the counter. “Doesn’t matter now.” But her mouth trembled when she said it—just one of a dozen different ways she showed me it mattered.

  “You’re just going to let me go into this blind?”

  “How does it feel?” she snapped as she slid off the stool.

  Rory glanced between the two of us and moved in closer. Ready to protect Mayhem—from me.

  In the span of one disastrous move, I now stood apart from the team—maybe even more separated than Tilly. God, that was a kick in the balls right there.

  Mayhem started past me without even a glance and I couldn’t let her go. My sister was right… I was already well on my way to falling in love with her and if I let her walk away from me now, she might walk away from me for good.

  I curled my fingers around her arm and let them slide down over her wrist to her hand.

  She slowed to a stop next to me and closed her eyes.

  Afraid to breathe, I waited to see what she would do when my palm slid against hers.

  She glanced down at our hands, her index finger twitching against my skin. I felt the shudder move through her a split second before she lightly laced her fingers with mine.

  “I won’t let her hurt you,” I promised her, squeezing her hand gently, afraid to push her any farther.

  Damp, bright-blue eyes heavy with unshed tears ripped into me with a glimpse of what I’d done to her.

  “You can’t protect me,” she murmured as she let my fingers go and walked out the door.

  I can’t protect anyone.

  But for the first time since Abel died, my instinct wasn’t to run from trying.

  17

  My hair follicles hurt.

  No really…all it took was a breeze wafting through the open doorway to make me whimper.

  And I still had two hours of practice left to go.

  “Push, Mayhem!”

  Push this, fucker.

  “Get up, get up, get up!”

  What the hell did he think I was doing? I just barely got down here. Like really, guy.

  “Find your balance!”

  I know he better not just be yelling that at me.

  “Stay low!”

  Demanding bastard.

  “That’s it. Take five,” he called.

  Marty hunched over and braced her hands on her knees as she gasped out a breath. “I don’t even want to skate off the bank because I’m going to blink and have to get back on.”

  “I’m not moving. I’m just going to be here trying not to die,” Rory said as she clung to the padded rail, her chest laboring to move air.

  “He’s got a real boner for being up your ass today,” Marty said with a quick glance in my direction.

  “He’s got a boner to get up her ass every day,” Sean said as she snickered.

  Where the hell did she find the extra air for that?

  “Has he gotten his boner near your ass yet, Maze?” Rory asked.

  “Don’t fucking call me Maze. I don’t want to have to use my last burst of energy to kick your ass.”

  Rory glared. “Hey, you let Patti call you Maze.”

  “Because I’m afraid Patti will kick my ass. Besides, no one lets Patti do anything. She just does it.”

  “Maybe he’d lighten up if you just do the deed already. You want it. He wants it. I’m ready to hear about some bone action,” Marty said.

  Sean squatted low and propelled herself back up with a wince. “I bet he’s got a really great bone. Like worth molding for a sex toy. Every once in a while he turns a certain way in those shorts and—”

  All of our gazes swung in her direction and froze.

  “Like you guys haven’t noticed,” she said, blowing a strand of hair out of her face. “But he’s still paying for letting Tilly on the team.”

  “She’s kept her ass in line. I’ll give her that,” Rory said, straightening and s
tretching her arms over her head.

  Something cold hit my shoulder and I glanced up to find Tilly tapping a water bottle against my skin.

  “Thirsty?”

  I tensed but took the bottle from her. “Uh, yeah, thanks.”

  No smile. Expressionless eyes. Without another word, she handed the bottle to me and skated away.

  I looked around to see if she’d handed out a bunch of them or only brought one for me, but I couldn’t tell. Carmen, Dixie, Lexi, and Cat all had water, but they were already half gone at this point. Besides, they stood in a tight circle with Zara, all lips flapping and hand gestures, talking about something that had them all fired up.

  My gaze landed on Tilly only to find her watching me from the edge of the infield as she tipped her bottle back.

  What the fuck did this mean?

  “Make sure the seal’s intact,” Marty muttered.

  “Funny.” I pushed off and started a lap around the track. And yeah, I made sure I broke the seal.

  We still hadn’t done an all-out jam yet. Instead, Priest kept us on the bank relearning every basic skill. Hours upon hours he hammered us with endless stops, starts, blocks, transitions, duck walks, duck runs, push drills, swoop and block drills, everything we needed to learn to stay upright on a bank while getting hit from each side.

  He didn’t miss a single thing, his shrewd eyes scanning, studying, always watching every move.

  If we did it wrong, slacked, or looked tired—he called us out.

  He called us out hard.

  He also made it hella hard for a girl to have a private couple of seconds to pick a fucking wedgie, that was for damn sure.

  When he wasn’t penetrating our brains with his superhuman stare, he yelled, waved his hands in frustration, scribbled notes, paced, and skated.

  Overall, he was a merciless son of a bitch.

  I wanted to hate him, and right when I was almost at that point, he climbed on the bank with us. He didn’t demand one thing that he couldn’t or wouldn’t do himself up there.

  The man didn’t have to say he had integrity, he showed it with his every single action, making it really freaking hard to stay mad at him for his misstep.