“No,” I said.
They both looked up at me. My coach arched a brow and Maddie blinked in incomprehension. “But you don’t even know what—”
“No.”
I turned to face the door but my coach’s voice followed me. “Not so fast, Valencia. This isn’t just about you.”
That stopped me. I kept my back to them but my coach kept talking.
“Now, your friend here has an idea on how you could make amends for your bad behavior without being suspended from the team.”
I turned slowly. The coach’s ingratiating tone made it instantly clear that he approved—of Maddie and her plan. When I faced him, my coach leaned back in his seat with a little smirk. “Now, it’s not the team’s fault that their defensive lineman acted like a moron, so I’m willing to hear her out.” He shot me a meaningful look. “I suggest you do the same.”
Ah hell. I was beat. I couldn’t walk out on my coach again, not without being cut from the team entirely. And I couldn’t explain to him that Maddie would bring me nothing but trouble, not without having to explain that to her as well.
While I was all for cutting her out of my life, I didn’t want to be a dick about it. She wasn’t the type of person who’d understand that friends were a liability. She didn’t realize that it wasn’t worth it.
She would never understand that I just wasn’t a friend kind of guy.
But they were both staring up at me as I hovered near the doorway. They were waiting to see if I’d stay or if I’d go.
I didn’t really have a choice, now did I?
I sank into the seat beside Maddie and dropped my bookbag on the ground. Maddie looked undeterred by my frown and not even remotely intimidated by the coach, whose sole job was paid to scare the life out of a bunch of cocky, well-built teenagers.
“As you know, I’m organizing a charity football game,” she started.
Oh no.
“It’ll be an intramural flag football league,” she continued, presumably for the coach’s benefit since she’d told me all of this before last week. At which point I’d very pointedly told her I was not interested.
Her face lit up with excitement as she filled in me and the coach in on the specifics, most of which I already knew.
The coach listened with a small smile that I recognized. It was the smile most people gave Maddie when she talked. It was a smaller, less dazzling mirror of her own infectious grin. It was proof positive that her enthusiasm was contagious.
The coach’s response confirmed what I’d already suspected. I was impossible for anyone to listen to Maddie talk without a smile on their faces.
Unless the person listening was me, of course.
When her speech came to an end, I turned to face her. “How does this involve me?”
They both started at the sound of my voice. I was used to that. It was one of the side effects of not talking much. When I did, people noticed.
I met Maddie’s gaze and I knew that my subtext was clear. What does this have to do with me since I already refused to sign up?
Maddie blinked and then grinned. “You’d be helping me run it, silly.”
A, no one had ever called me silly. And B, I was going to do what now?
I shook my head. “No. No way.”
My coach interjected. “I don’t know that you have much of a choice, Mr. Valencia.”
Using “Mr.” anything was even more serious than him using my full first name. His narrowed gaze and furrowed brow only added to his severity. “You need to make up for your mistakes and this nice young lady is offering you a way to redeem yourself for your past transgressions while still remaining in the game next week.”
I shot him a look of surprise and an understanding passed between us. The old jerk didn’t care about me making amends. He just wanted me on the team to help win the game, and this way he could save face by saying he’d given me a different punishment.
One that was somehow even worse than being suspended from a crucial game.
I looked over to see Maddie giving me a smug grin.
She knew she’d won.
Why? Why are you doing this?
I turned away and stared at my coach. I knew the answer. Guilt. Not much better than her motivation to befriend me—pity.
I shifted in my seat. “Are we done here?”
The coach nodded but Maddie wasn’t so easy to please. “So you’ll do it?” She scrambled to her feet to walk beside me. I ignored her until we were out in the hall. It was empty since class had already started up.
I looked down at her. Do I have a choice?
Her smile broadened and for a second I could have sworn she knew exactly what I was thinking. “Great,” she said, patting my arm. “This is going to be fun.”
Fun.
This girl and I had very different definitions for that word.
Later that week she sat down beside me at lunch. The other guys at the table shifted their seats so she could force her way in.
“Okay,” she said, flipping through a notebook. “This is what I’ve done so far.”
I tried to concentrate but she was too close. Maddie was the only girl who would get this close to me and she didn’t seem to realize the effect she was having. She kept smiling up at me, all eagerness and excitement like this was the best thing to ever happen.
Like she actually wanted to be spending her lunch hour working on a charity league with me. After what felt like an eternity of listening to her talk about flyers and logistics, one word finally worked its way out of my mouth. “Why?”
She blinked up at me. “Why what?”
She was playing dumb. It didn’t suit her.
After a second of silence, she sighed. “I was going to do this charity league this fall anyway.” She sounded defensive. I waited her out. She shifted in her seat. “I was! You know I was. And I figured if you helped me out then maybe it would help you out and…” She pursed her lips a bit and hitched them to the side.
I tried really hard not to be amused by the sight of her trying to clam up.
She lost the battle after approximately two seconds. “Okay, fine, and I thought maybe I should do something to help because I know you were only trying to help me and even though I don’t love the way you went about it I do appreciate that your heart was in the right place.” The words came out of her in a rush of air.
She started to gather her notebook together, not seeming to notice that some of the guys around her were watching her with interest.
I shot them all a glare that had them looking back at their own trays. She was still focused on her notebook but I could practically see the emotions that were running rampant within her as they raced across her face. Frustration, hesitation. The girl was an open book. I saw the exact moment she decided to say what is was she’d been stewing over.
She lifted her head and met my eyes. “I’m still pissed at you, though.”
I didn’t look away. She had every right to be angry. Maybe it hadn’t been my right to confront that guy, but I couldn’t bring myself to apologize. Maddie might not have truly cared about me as a friend but she was still the first person to try and befriend me since I’d started here sophomore year.
That counted for something in my book. I wasn’t sure if we were real friends or not, but I liked her. She was a good person. And I would always stick up for good people.
Honest to God, I couldn’t tell if she was reading my mind or just super perceptive because her gaze narrowed on me. “I’m not talking about whatever stupid things you said to Alex’s friend,” she said. She tilted her head to the side. “Or whatever you did to him. I can’t imagine you said anything, did you?”
I met her stare with one of my own.
She sighed. “Right. So you did something then.” She shook her head. “Doesn’t matter. I’ll find out eventually. What I’m trying to say is—I can forgive that. I can move on.”
I hitched one brow up ever so slightly because my curiosity was getting the bett
er of me. If she wasn’t still angry about my going behind her back…then what was she still mad about?
She pressed her lips together and her nostrils flared. Yet again I tried not to be amused. I didn’t want to find this girl so funny, or so intriguing. I’d already determined that my life would be better without a friend, particularly not one who was only acting like my friend out of pity.
“I don’t pity you.”
My gaze shot back up to meet hers. Her eyes were filled with something fierce. The same look she got in her eyes when someone was rudely dismissive of her shy friend Kate or when anyone gave Callie grief over getting kicked out of that expo game back when they were in softball camp together.
I knew this look. I just never thought I’d see it directed toward me…for me.
“Look,” she said, casting a quick look around to make sure no one overheard. “Look,” she said again. This time she followed it with a quick lick of her lips.
She was nervous.
“Maybe…” She toyed with the notebook edges. “Maybe when I first started talking to you it was because I felt bad that you didn’t have any friends.”
She cringed a bit but I kept my face stony and impassive even though her words had landed like a punch in the gut.
I mean, I’d known it but it still wasn’t great to hear.
“That sounded bad,” she said. “Maybe you have friends. Maybe I’d read the situation wrong and—”
“I don’t.”
She met my gaze and blinked a couple of times. “Oh. Okay.”
I couldn’t bring myself to explain. I wouldn’t even though a part of me wanted to. For the first time in years I actually kind of wanted to tell someone about my experiences at my last school, but old habits die hard and once I’d gotten used to not speaking, it just became second nature.
“Anyway, my point is…” She visibly drew in a long inhale. “I might have originally gotten to know you because of, you know, that.”
That meaning my friendless state, I assumed.
“But that’s not why I continued to hang out with you or why I invited you out with me and Kate and Levi.” She licked her lips again and I was starting to wonder if I had a weird lip fetish because I couldn’t stop staring at hers.
I couldn’t remember ever being this fascinated by anyone else’s lips, but Maddie’s were just so expressive. And the way she licked them right now…well, it was a struggle to focus on words. Hers or mine.
She’d stopped talking but her lips were parted and after a moment I dragged my eyes up to meet hers. Hers had darkened and I forgot where we were and why.
“Why?” It was all I could manage but it was enough to prompt her, remind her what we were talking about because I got the feeling she’d lost track too.
“Oh, um…right.” She looked away and took a deep breath. “Why did I keep being your friend? I think the answer is obvious, isn’t it?”
She looked back at me.
No.
“I like you.”
I stared at her, unable to move, unable to breathe, unable to think. I like you. She made it sound so simple. So easy. Like it was the most normal thing in the world.
It wasn’t.
I didn’t have low self-esteem, I just knew the truth. I wasn’t very likeable. I never had been and I probably never would be. I didn’t have Maddie’s easy charm, or even Kate’s shy sweetness, or Levi’s sense of humor.
All I had going for me was my strength and my skills on the football field. That was it. And while that might’ve been enough for some girls…that wasn’t Maddie.
“You don’t believe me,” she said. It wasn’t a question and I wouldn’t have answered even if it was.
She gave a little shrug. “Well, it’s the truth. I like you. You’re easy to talk to and you’re a great listener and you don’t talk crap.”
I stared at her and her lips quirked up in a grin that took my breath away. “I mean, you don’t talk, period, but that means you don’t talk crap, either.”
I waited because I just knew there was more. She was getting to something. Sure enough, she started tugging at one of her curls, toying with it in a gesture that was uncharacteristically self-conscious. “I never told anyone about Alex.”
I waited a few moments but when she didn’t continue I realized she was done talking. “You still haven’t.”
Her eyes met mine and I saw a flash of amusement. I hadn’t been joking. I had no idea what had gone on between her and that guy at the party or what her history was with that D-bag who’d come to confront me in the parking lot.
Alex.
Who the hell was he and what had he done to my Maddie?
Ah hell. I had to stop thinking of her as mine.
Maybe she really was my friend—I wouldn’t let myself cling to any hopes on that front—but I did recognize that she believed we were genuinely friends and…well, I wasn’t sure what to make of that.
I’d have to stew over that another time. Even if we were friends, Maddie was friends with lots of people. It didn’t make me special.
She leaned in a bit and lowered her voice. “Mr. Valencia, are you asking me to spill all my deep dark secrets?”
One of my eyebrows twitched up in surprise. Not at her joking tone but at the flirtatiousness there. I wasn’t sure she was even aware of it. Her eyes twinkled with mirth, not desire, but my whole body responded to that underlying tone of teasing flirtation.
Maybe that was why I said what I said. “You’re the one who told me I was a good listener.”
She jerked back a bit in surprise. “I did, didn’t I?” She seemed to be mulling that over. “I guess you do deserve an explanation, huh?”
I didn’t say anything for a moment because again—words. Not my forte. I wanted to get this right. “You don’t owe me anything,” I said slowly. “But if you want to talk, I’m here.”
She blinked at me a few times and it took me a moment to realize that her eyes had grown all soft and watery.
Ah hell. “Don’t cry.” It came out short and gruff and really, it was a plea. I couldn’t handle seeing her cry again.
She shook her head quickly. “Don’t be stupid. I never cry.”
Her gaze met mine and we shared a moment, a shared memory. It was weirdly intimate, but also oddly funny. Like that whole crying episode was a private joke. I realized that my lips had twitched up to match her small smile.
“Okay,” she said suddenly. “I rarely cry. Happy now?”
I gave a short nod and she started to move. “I’d better get back to my table. I recruited Kelly and Tiffany to help spread the word so I have to give them the deets.”
I turned back to my tray of food but felt it the moment she hesitated beside me. “So, are we cool?”
I turned to look at her.
She bit her lip and studied my eyes. I knew from looking in the mirror what she saw there, but somehow it always felt like she saw…more. Her quick grin lit up the entire cafeteria. “Okay, cool,” she said. “We’re friends again.”
And then she did something so unexpected it turned my world upside down. She leaned over and planted a kiss on my cheek.
It wasn’t meant to be seductive, that much I knew. It was friendly and platonic and a gesture to seal the deal. It was a friendly kiss, that was all.
But the feel of her lips on my skin set my blood on fire. Every muscle tensed as if her soft, gentle touch had been a blow to the ribs.
My self-protective instincts kicked in quickly and I scowled down at the table, ignoring her goodbyes as she walked away.
Chapter Seven
Maddie
Kate was looking at me like I’d lost my mind.
“Wait,” she said slowly. “What do you mean this is going to be a singles’ event?”
I reached over and patted her arm as we jogged slowly around the track during PE. Neither Kate nor I needed the extra exercise but PE was a fabulous excuse to chat.
“I mean, it’s all part of my perfect plan.�
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Kate arched one brow. “Why do I feel like that should be followed by an evil laugh?”
I genuinely laughed at that. “My plan is genius, all right, but definitely not evil.”
We both slowed to a stop as we waited for the rest of our classmates to catch up. Kate and I were the most athletically inclined out of this whole group and we were barely winded as we watched the others huff and puff their way to the finish line.
My plan really was genius, if I did say so myself. “You see, it’ll kill three birds with one stone.”
Kate didn’t look impressed. If anything, she was looking at me like I’d lost my mind. “Three birds, huh?”
I nodded and ticked the first three off on my fingers. “With this touch football league, we’ll be giving to charity, we’ll be giving Ox a chance to work off his punishment, and we’ll be helping Ox to find a girl.”
Kate blinked. “Does Ox want you to find him a girl?”
I rolled my eyes. “You know Ox. Do you really think he’d outright ask me for my help with girls?”
Kate continued to stare at me. She obviously didn’t get it. But then, she hadn’t been there the day before when I’d gone over to talk to him at lunch so of course she hadn’t seen the disbelief in his eyes when I’d said I liked him. She hadn’t been to his house and seen how lonely he was, or how hard it was for him to believe any of us could really want to be his friend.
Poor guy.
“Trust me, Kate. He needs my help.”
What he really needed was a confidence booster, and what better way to boost his ego than to find him a girlfriend who adored him for the kind, handsome teddy bear that he was?
Kate didn’t look like she believed me, but she didn’t argue. “Are you sure this isn’t just your way of meeting new single guys?” she teased.
My smile faltered a bit. She wasn’t trying to be mean. In fact, she was spot on. Under any other circumstances, that would totally have been my main goal. Kate and Callie always teased me about being boy crazy…and maybe I was. There was no shame in that. Besides, dating and flirting had been an excellent means of diversion this past year. I’d drowned the heartache with fun flirtations and dreamy crushes. It had worked…for a while there.
The Perfect Score (Kissing the Enemy Book 3) Page 7