Chapter Thirteen
Lindsay
My thoughts kept drifting from the words on my computer screen, my focus totally crap today. Whitney had mentioned that even after I’d left that Ryder had almost gotten into a fight with Brett, and while I’d told myself he was fine at least a hundred times, it didn’t stop me from worrying about him.
Like he needs me. I bet it took all of two seconds for one of those girls who’d been eye-humping him to approach and make it clear she’d actually deliver.
I knew how that went, because I’d swooped in to take advantage of a lonely hockey player before. All the self-loathing I thought I’d ridded myself of came rushing back. For so long I’d told myself I’d felt empowered, that I’d been the one in control, but I’d had morning afters where I beat myself up.
Then I’d wonder what drove me to need that validation from guys so much.
Confession #9: I have daddy issues. I hate that I do, but I’m aware that it factors into how hard I’ve sought out male attention in the past.
I didn’t know my dad, and the only father figures I had were the guys my mom clung on to for years here and there. Very few of them looked at me as more than an inconvenience, and when I got older, one of them looked at me a little too long. That was one time I definitely wanted less male attention.
Fortunately Mom noticed before I had to have that awkward conversation with her, and while I’d felt a bit of resentment from her when we moved out of his house, the important thing was she’d taken action and moved. For me. That was one reason I couldn’t bring myself to begrudge her for how I was raised, even though I didn’t want to live my life like that ever again. The other reasons involved the rough way she grew up, poor with an abusive father. She didn’t talk much about it, but she did what she needed to do to escape a bad situation, and she made sure no guy ever laid a hand on me.
Here’s the thing: everyone has issues of some kind. Contrary to popular belief, plenty of the other puck bunnies had loving fathers who paid attention to them. Some of them could also pull off a mutually beneficial no-strings-attached arrangement. For years I told myself that I could, but eventually I faced the truth that I’d acted my way through or regretted most of them.
But again, nobody gets out of this life without a few issues, and I could choose how I dealt with them.
“Lindsay.”
I jumped at Will’s voice, which was opposite of how I usually reacted to his lilting British accent. I put a hand over my racing heart. “Sorry. I didn’t realize you’d come in.”
“I noticed. I brought you some tea.” He placed a steaming cup in front of me and I wrapped my hands around it. Instead of heading for his computer to mainline his tea, like he often did as soon as he got in, he tilted his head and studied me. “What’s up with you? You’re in a bit of a nark, yeah?”
“Um…?” Since he didn’t always bother pronouncing his Rs, I took a shot at what sounded like naack and guessed he’d said narc. “Last I checked, narcing on people who OD’d on caffeinated substances would mean that everyone in the college—and pretty much everyone everywhere—would be locked up.”
He pinched his bottom lip between his fingers and shook his dirty blond mop of hair out of his eyes. “No, I mean like…grumpy. A bad mood. Worse than usual.”
Normally I liked that he gave it to me straight, but today I wasn’t so sure. “I’m often in a bad mood?”
He nodded, clearly not understanding his words had been a tad on the insulting side. “With all the deadlines and such, I get it. Plus, only a little over two months to go on classes, and I’m knackered all the time, too. But this”—he circled a hand around my face—“looks like there’s more than the usual stress.”
“It’s my math class,” I lied, although since I’d gone and ruined things with the one guy who could help me pass it, there was some truth in there, too. At least I’d done well on the quiz today before the inevitable dive my grades would take without Ryder in my life. “I might fail, and then I’ll be totally screwed.”
Will took off his messenger bag, knocking over my cup of pens in the process and sending them sprawling across my desk. I caught the ones I could as he scrambled to pick up the pens that had rolled off the far side and onto the floor.
Once that mess was picked up, he scooted a chair next to me and looked at me expectantly. After a couple of seconds, he said, “Well. Where’s the math? I’m not going to let you fail or get screwed.”
I bit back a laugh. Honestly, I was starting to think that I’d never get screwed again.
But over the next hour, I realized that the only thing harder to understand than math was math in a British accent from a nice guy who was clearly in over his head. I decided that I was quite screwed, and not in the fun way.
…
The fact that I was heading into the library to take my chances with Jeremy—or hell at this point, I’d even take Brittany—showed the level of desperation I’d reached over the past week.
Just as I’d started to grasp the last concept the professor had taught that built on the one our quiz had been on, he thought it was time to throw a whole new one into the mix. He’d barely lectured on it, assigned a butt-load of homework, and left us to his TA, who was one of those smarmy types who thought he was practically a professor. Since the guy was incapable of answering a question without dripping his words in condescension, I was incapable of talking to him without wanting to punch him in the face.
I doubted that’d earn me a passing grade, so after work I’d swallowed my pride and made my way to the tutoring center. Before I committed to stepping through the open doorway, I made sure the coast was clear of any tall, intense hockey players whose killer smiles and sharp wit might strip me of my common sense.
Once I was sure it was safe, I settled at a table near the back and pulled out my books.
“Back again, I see,” Jeremy said with a wide grin on his face, and Brittany fired daggers from her eyes, all aimed at me, not the guy being semi-flirtatious.
Even in the non-sports world, we as women had trouble placing blame where it was due.
“Are you and Brittany an item?” I wasn’t sure why I was suddenly talking like an eighty-year-old, but it was a weird situation, and I didn’t know the proper etiquette for asking a math tutor if he was banging his fellow math tutor.
Pinky up while holding my pencil, maybe?
I laughed at my own joke, and when Jeremy looked at me like I might be losing my mind, I thought there was a good chance he was right. This past week had kicked my ass and come back to gloat.
“We’re, um, hanging out here and there,” he said.
Translation: even I, a scrawny math nerd, am a college guy who doesn’t want to fully commit.
Looked like no guys were safe, so it was a good thing I’d decided to abort any attempt at flirting or casual fun for the rest of the semester. It was just me, my studies, and the paper until mid-May.
Jeremy sat in the chair next to mine and proceeded to “help” me with my homework. I wasn’t sure who was harder to understand—Will, with his British accent and computer coding similes, as if they’d make me go ah, like when you type on the computer and make impossible things happen. I totally get it now! Or Jeremy, with his pencil chewing, elvish speaking ways.
When he left me to work on a problem while he moved to help someone else for a bit, Brittany came over.
The desperation responsible for my being here nudged me closer to the dark side. “Can I, uh, ask you a question about my homework?”
She crossed her arms and looked down her nose at me. “Can you, uh, not hit on my boyfriend?”
“I’ll do my best, but he’s just so sexy.” I batted my eyes and threw my hands over my heart. “I think he ate a whole pencil while he helped me.”
With a loud huff, she spun around and left me alone.
Yeah, I suppose I deserved that. Stupid big mouth and my inability to keep it shut. I’d be the type to talk muggers into killing me. I dropped my head on the table. Gave it a light bump for good measure.
I wonder if the paper will let me stay on as editor if I can’t graduate this year. With only one class left to conquer, I could get a full-time job, and then maybe I could afford one more semester.
If I don’t eat, that is, and who needs food?
Good-bye, hard-to-get internship that took so much string pulling that there aren’t any left.
I let my head knock against the table again, not caring if Jeremy and Brittany were discussing my nervous breakdown.
“Having some trouble?” The deep, familiar voice sent fuzzy tingles through my body, because every inch of me was determined to commit mutiny right now.
I was afraid of what I’d feel if I glanced up at Ryder. Afraid I’d see judgment in his eyes, and I wasn’t sure my ego could take him looking at me differently than he used to right now.
Since I could still feel his hulking presence, making me fairly confident he wouldn’t leave until I responded, I lifted my head.
My heart caught as I peered into his ocean-blue eyes. I didn’t see any judgment. More like a softening I didn’t deserve, and I thought that might be worse. Tears crawled up my throat, and if they burst free, I’d just drop out of college and run away and join the circus.
Or whatever the equivalent of the circus was nowadays.
A strip club’s daytime shift, probably. A whimper escaped at that thought and concern flickered through Ryder’s features. He sat in the chair next to me, facing me so that his knees were on either side of me.
“Yes,” I said.
“Yes to what?”
To everything. To whatever you want. To you. “Yes, I am having some trouble.”