“Ugh, this sound isn’t matching up with the movement of our lips,” she said, moving her chair closer to the keyboard. That slight shifting had her knee bumping up against mine. I tried to just ignore the innocent contact, but it was hard to keep my attention on the mind-numbing work in front of us.
At least we were back in business. Confronting Cassidy in a janitor’s closet the other day hadn’t exactly been my grand plan, but it was the only place I could think of that would let us talk without everyone else butting in. It’d worked. Cassidy and I were on speaking terms again. The project was back on and so were my plans to gain back Ken’s trust.
I just had to keep it that way.
Getting a strange rush of heat every time Cassidy bumped into me wasn’t helping.
“I think I’ll go get a drink,” I said suddenly, jumping up from my chair.
Cassidy spared a small glance in my direction. “Okay. I’ll try to have this figured out while you’re gone.”
I backed up toward the doorway, watching her as I went. She’d curled her hair today in these big waves that fell over her shoulders, kind of like the models in the magazines Mary got in the mail. A curly strand kept falling into her face and she’d puff up her cheeks to blow it out of her face every few minutes. She did it again, right then. I couldn’t help but laugh silently as I backed out the door.
But when I turned toward the water fountain, I found myself face-to-top of head with a short redhead.
“Just the man I was looking for.” Cassidy’s friend, Hannah, stood in front of me with her hands locked on her hips and a devious smile on her face. She took a step toward me and then walked her fingers up the front of my t-shirt and onto my shoulder. “Graham McGrady, we need to talk.”
I swallowed down the nerves that had jumped up into my throat. It was hard to tell. Was Hannah hitting on me or just being overly friendly? Normally, I wouldn’t have cared, either way. Hannah was easy enough on the eyes. Any other day, I would’ve jumped on this rare chance to flirt back with someone like her, but it felt wrong with her best friend sitting just behind that classroom door.
“What’s up?” I asked, keeping my voice straight.
“Why don’t I ever see you at anything?” she asked, folding her arms over her chest. Her brow arched as she stared expectantly up at me. “Are you the loner type, Graham?”
“Um...maybe?” I wasn’t sure where this was coming from.
“Partier?”
I shrugged. “Depends on my mood. Not usually.”
“Dogs or cats?”
“Both, as long as I don’t have to clean up after them.”
“Tell me, how do you like to treat the woman you’re dating?”
I took a step back and frowned at her. “What is this, some kind of dating profile quiz?”
“Maybe.” Her lips quirked. “Answer the question, cowboy.”
I hadn’t really dated a lot of girls in my life, so I wasn’t sure how to respond. Something told me by the intense way Hannah watched me that there was a lot riding on this answer.
“Like a queen?”
Her eyes narrowed and she studied me for a full thirty seconds as I squirmed under her gaze. For being so tiny, Hannah was kind of scary.
Finally, with a sigh, her face brightened and she grabbed my arm. “Congrats. You pass the first test. Where’s Cassidy?”
I pointed toward the classroom I’d just left, feeling slightly dizzy. Test? What test? She’d mentioned it being the first. What were the others? I was so confused.
“It’s game time!” Hannah yelled as she yanked me through the door.
Cassidy looked up from the computer, her gaze instantly zeroing in on Hannah’s arm looped through mine. I disengaged my arm gently away from hers and let it hang limp at my side. Cassidy’s gaze rose up to meet mine and then her face reddened and she turned back to look at the computer.
“We’ve got work to do,” she said.
“No, no, no.” Hannah skipped over to her friend’s side and pushed the button on the monitor to make it go black. Cassidy protested as Hannah laughed. “Come on, it’s Friday night. There’s a home football game. You guys can’t be in here all night.”
Cassidy gave her a deadpan stare. “Wanna bet?”
Hannah looked over at me for help. All I could do was shrug. Spending Friday night editing interviews didn’t exactly sound like a great time, but I wasn’t sure going to a football game was any better. Normally, I avoided preppy stuff like that. Those boys thought they were so tough, with their jerseys and helmets. They needed to try a real sport. One with crazy-eyed two-ton bulls. A man’s sport.
“Pleeeeease.” Hannah put her fists under her chin and gave us both big puppy dog eyes. “You know I love a man in uniform. I need my fix. Please come watch the game with me.”
I wasn’t touching that comment with a ten-foot pole. Instead, I stood back and watched the battle rage in Cassidy’s eyes. She was determined to get her project done, but it was easy to see that she had a soft spot when it came to Hannah. Something had to win out.
I saw the moment it happened—the moment she gave in and her expression softened—and Hannah saw it, too. She squealed and then pulled Cassidy from her chair.
“Come on, hurry, you guys. We don’t want all the best seats to be taken.”
Hannah skipped out the door ahead of us, her voice echoing in the hallway as she started one of our school’s pep cheers. Cassidy trudged toward me, defeat written on her face. She dropped her chin to her chest and sighed. “I’m sorry about this. There’s no reeling her in.”
I snorted. “It’s all good. Maybe I should just find a ride home. Ken wants me to take out that new mare and see how she handles being on the line. She’s still skittish.”
Cassidy jerked her chin up. “What? No way. You’re not abandoning me now. I cannot sit through an entire game where Hannah compares the other team’s uniforms to ours in minute detail. I just can’t. If you’re there, she might just keep it to a minimum.”
I tilted my head to one side and smirked. From what little I knew about Hannah, that didn’t seem entirely accurate. “Would she, though?”
Cassidy cringed. “Is it too much to hope? How about I sweeten the deal? If you come, I’ll buy you a hotdog.”
The muscles in my jaw immediately tightened. I stuffed my hands in my pockets and shook my head. “No. I don’t need anyone to buy me anything.”
Nothing made me more uncomfortable than charity. I didn’t need it. Didn’t want it. Cassidy could keep her hotdog. If I wanted one, I’d buy it myself.
“Graham, it’s just a dollar.” She placed her hand on my elbow and it was like resting my arm on a firebrand. Heat shot up my arm and straight to my chest. Cassidy didn’t seem to be affected the same way. Her expression softened as she looked innocently up at me. “Don’t make a big deal out of it. Next time, you can buy mine and we can call it even. Promise.”
I relaxed under her touch, the fight leaving my body as fast as it had arrived. She was right. It was just a silly hotdog. Not charity. I needed to chill.
“Okay, but I want mustard and relish.”
She gagged and stuck her tongue out. “Fine. But you’re sitting on the opposite end of the bleachers while you eat it.”
I chuckled beneath my breath as she headed out the door after Hannah. This was a weird turn of events. Only yesterday morning, Cassidy had hated me. And now, she was asking me to come to a football game with her. It was strange, but kind of nice. Were we friends now? Was I happy about that?
And what did she mean by saying next time I could buy her a hotdog? Was she already thinking about doing this again?
I shook my head, dislodging those annoying questions, and followed behind Hannah and Cassidy as we left the school and headed toward the stadium. It sat just beyond the full parking lot, the tall stadium lights already lit and the distant sound of the pep band warming up. We walked through the gate and stood in the long line at the concession stand.
Cassidy knew everyone there. She never ran out of people to talk to. I stood silently behind her the whole time, trying to focus on the smell of the food wafting from the open windows up ahead, instead of watching her interact with everyone like they were part of her family. It wasn’t easy. Cassidy was unlike anyone I’d ever spent time around. Her niceness was...real. She genuinely seemed to like everyone here. I didn’t understand how she could be the way she was. Most people I met didn’t like me.
Which was okay, because I didn’t like them, either.
When we finally got up to the window, Cassidy leaned toward the cashier and smiled. “Hey, Phil! Can I get two hotdogs, one plain, one with mustard and relish? Two Cokes and a box of popcorn?”
Phil looked young enough to be a freshman. His face flushed as Cassidy fixed him with a brilliant smile. “Uh, yeah, sure, Cassidy. Coming right up.”
She slid the cash over the counter and then turned that bright smile toward me. There was no denying that Cassidy had a smile that could make the whole world dissolve around you. Maybe that was why people liked her so much. Just looking at it made something jolt beneath my abs. I grimaced painfully back at Cassidy and then forced myself to look away. Instead, I found my gaze locked with Hannah’s. She was popping a kernel of popcorn into her mouth and watching me with an amused expression.
“Test number two, passed,” she said, holding up two fingers.
“What test?” Cassidy’s gaze bounced between us. “What’s going on?”
“Oh, nothing for you to worry your pretty little head about.” Hannah patted the top of Cassidy’s hair, smiled at me, and then turned and walked away.
All I could do was shrug cluelessly at Cassidy’s questioning expression. Her friend was seriously strange. There was no way I could begin to explain what was going on.
Luckily, at that moment, Phil came back with the food. Cassidy handed me my hotdog and one of the Cokes. She shuddered as I took three massive bites out of it, demolishing it before we could get far from the food stands.
“There. It’s gone,” I said, tossing the wrapper into a nearby trashcan.
“Thank goodness.” Cassidy handed me the box of popcorn to carry and led the way up the stairs to the stadium seating. “I was going to make you sit on the away side’s benches. When I was younger, my dad once fed me a cheese and relish sandwich. The thought of it still makes me gag.”
I made a face. “Cheese and relish? Are you serious?”
She paused her footsteps and smiled sadly at me. “Yeah. He was kind of new at the single dad thing. He got better, though.”
It was strange how strongly the grief shone in Cassidy’s eyes in that moment. And how quickly she was able to blink it away and replace it with a bigger smile. I’d never known that kind of sadness. I wondered how much strength it took to keep it pushed down all the time.
“I’ve only ever had my mom,” I said as we walked up the bleacher steps toward the top of the student section. “And my brother.”
“Where’s your dad?”
Cassidy sat on an empty bleacher and looked expectantly up at me. I stood there for a moment, torn between the question and the fact that I was supposed to just sit next to Cassidy Redmond at a football game and pretend like this wasn’t weird at all. It was. And if I wasn’t crazy, I was pretty sure a few pairs of curious eyes from the crowd had trailed us up to this spot. No one had expected to see an Oakie with a girl like Cassidy—even if it was just for a break between editing sessions. The citizens of Blue River were going to lose their minds.
“My dad’s been in prison since I was two years old,” I said, sitting down and leaving about a foot of safe space between us. “He and my mom split not long after that. He’s not really in the picture.”
“I’m sorry.” She looked so sincere looking at me like that, a little wrinkle forming between her eyebrows.
“Why?” I took a sip of the Coke. “I don’t care.”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s because I think you deserve better.”
I stared down into my cup, unsure whether to be pleased or insulted by her statement. Maybe I didn’t have a dad, but I still had a mom. A mom who wouldn’t give up on her boys. And I wouldn’t give up on her. That was the most important thing. Still, the idea that Cassidy thought I deserved anything other than hard prison time was kind of cool. Most people didn’t care what we deserved or what we wanted.
“The game’s about to start.” Hannah suddenly appeared on my left, stepped over me, and moved to the other side of Cassidy to sit.
Somewhere along the way from the concession stands to the stadium, she’d found a fake face tattoo of a sparkly heart filled in with the school colors of blue and white. She cheered as the football team ran out onto the field, breaking through a paper banner the cheerleaders held up for them.
“Doesn’t Matthew Dalton live on the ranch with you?” Cassidy asked, pointing at number sixty-three.
I nodded. Sometimes I forgot that he played. “Yeah, that’s Matty. He’s a tight end.”
“A tight end with a nice tight end,” Hannah added, wagging her eyebrows.
Cassidy and I both groaned at the same time, caught each other’s eyes, and then broke out into laughter. We talked about random stuff for several minutes as the team captains flipped a coin to decide who would kickoff first. Hannah kept the uniform comparisons to a minimum and I was grateful for it. The game hadn’t even begun and I had already started to think that this football thing wasn’t so bad, after all. Neither was spending some time with Cassidy outside of the pressure of the project. She was pretty cool. She wasn’t the stuck-up snob I’d expected her to be. And maybe I wasn’t what she expected, either.
“Miss Redmond, how nice to see you here.”
A blond man with thinning hair stepped in front of us, blocking the field as the boys lined up for the kickoff. I would’ve put him at just about six feet tall, his shoulders broad and the slight pooch of a belly hidden beneath a Blue River High School football t-shirt. He wore a smile, but the warmth didn’t make it all the way up to his light blue eyes.
“Hi, Mr. Cook.” Cassidy smiled warily at him and slid just a tad bit closer on the bleacher to me. “Nice to see you, too.”
His head tilted to the side and he put on a sugar-coated condescending tone. “I heard a rumor on the council that you’re going around interviewing people for some project. Now, you wouldn’t be wanting to cause any trouble for the city, would you?”
Cassidy’s fake smile only grew wider. “I guess that depends on what you call trouble. Forcing poor people out of their homes? That sounds like the real trouble, if you ask me.”
I glanced back and forth between the two of them, wondering why my gut was telling me that Cassidy needed someone to intervene here. What was going on? Why would anyone talk to her like that?
Then realization smacked me in the head that the man standing in front of us was Derek Cook’s dad. The man who Cassidy was working to defeat with her senior project. It made sense now why he was staring at her like she was a piece of gum on the bottom of his expensive shoes. It was the same expression his son wore that day by the gazebo when he talked to Cassidy. Anger flared inside my chest as I stared at the man who’d raised that creep.
“You’re just a kid,” Mr. Cook said to her, his smile still plastered to his face. “You don’t understand these grown-up things.”
“I understand more than you think,” she answered. “I understand the difference between right and wrong, for starters.”
A flush worked its way up Mr. Cook’s neck. He laughed and glanced around at the people sitting nearby, as if to make sure no one was watching. And then he leaned toward us. “You need to stop this shameful behavior, Cassidy. I’m sure it won’t look good on your college transcripts. Imagine if someone at one of those administration offices were to find out how you spent your free time? I very much doubt they’d want a troublemaker in their school. I’m looking out for your best interests, here, young lady. T
rust me.”
Little red dots popped up on Cassidy’s face as she boldly met his stare head-on. I saw Hannah cover her mouth in shock from where she sat on Cassidy’s other side. Rage simmered beneath my sternum, making me clasp my Coke so tight that the lip popped off. That had sounded way too much like a threat to me. Men like Mr. Cook thought they could bully their way into anything. He had another thing coming.
“Back off, dude,” I said, putting my cup down. My hands curled into tight fists and I rested them tensely on my knees, at the ready. “Before I make you.”
Mr. Cook’s calculating blue gaze darted in my direction and it took all of two seconds for a superior smile to form on his lips. “Oh, great, the Oakie boy. My son mentioned you. I can see that your first reaction to any sort of disagreement is physical violence. It’s no wonder Cassidy is behaving in such a manner. It’s really not her fault, when it comes down to it. With company like you, how could anyone expect anything better?”
That rage that had just been simmering up to this point went on a full-tilt boil. My muscles were taut, my head screaming at me to just start swinging. I had the feeling a man like Mr. Cook was owed a pummeling or two. The only thing that kept me in my seat was Cassidy’s hand gently covering my right fist. I looked over at her and she was still staring up at Mr. Cook.
“I’m sorry to disappoint you, but the project was already in motion before Graham came on the team. He’s got nothing to do with any trouble.”
Mr. Cook straightened up, the anger in his eyes snapping. He snorted with forced laughter and straightened his t-shirt. “Ms. Redmond, you’ve got your priorities mixed up. I’m afraid that if you continue to keep such company, you will find yourself going down a dark rabbit hole. I will admit that I was quite fond of you when Derek first asked you out. It saddens me greatly to see you like this. It saddens Derek, too. If you ever need any help, please feel free to reach out to our family.”
Cowboy Crush : A Small Town, Enemies-to-Lovers YA Romance (Sweet Oak Teen Ranch Book 1) Page 9