Again?
“I sound efficient because I am.” I kept my tone airy, but my heart was pounding.Jealous? Was he serious?“Unless, of course, you’d rather explain to the Academic Committee why you’re suddenly refusing help in the one class you’re failing, too busy making shady phone calls.”
For the first time, Dante looked at me like I might actually be dangerous.
He leaned back slowly, eyes narrowing. “You’ve got teeth, Savage.”
“And you,” I said sweetly, “have more to lose than I do.” It was a complete bluff and a risky gamble.
His smile was tight, but it was there. “Do I? Does Daddy know about the art shed?”
My stomach dipped when he spoke, his eyes hard and cold. But the look was gone as quickly as it came, and the media playboy was back. “If you’re going to play this game, Sav, remember — I’m better at it than you are.”
“Guess we’ll see.”
He gathered his stuff, but before he left, he stopped beside my chair, leaning over, his breath on my ear, the heat from his body warming me, he was so close. “You’ve got a cut from the glass on your hand,” he said quietly.
I glanced down. A thin red line stretched across my knuckle — a slip from the glass cutter earlier. I hadn’t even noticed.
His gaze lingered a moment longer than necessary, something unreadable in it, before he finally walked away.
It was only when I packed up my own things that I realized I’d never told him I worked with glass.
Chapter 10
Dante
Winter workouts had their own brand of misery. No roaring crowds, no scoreboard, no adrenaline spike from a two-minute drill. Just the sound of plates clanging, guys grunting, and Coach’s voice cracking across the weight room like a whip.
“Lower, Spence. You’re not half-assing my sled pushes.”
I dropped lower, digging my cleats into the turf, ignoring the dull heat that licked across my shoulder. I’d taken a pill earlier, but still felt that lingering ache. I’d stopped mentioning it to the trainers two weeks ago. Last thing I needed was to be ‘held out’ like I was breakable.
At Wrighton, breakable meant replaceable.
The shoulder would heal. I’d make sure it did. The painkiller would tide me over in the meantime.
The sled scraped over the turf, and I pushed through the last few yards before letting it go. I rolled my shoulder once, twice, hoping no one noticed. The ache eased but didn’t leave.
“Hydrate,” Coach barked, and the room broke into small clusters around water jugs.
I reached for a bottle and caught voices from the squat racks to my left.
“I told you to keep it quiet.”
The guy speaking was a redshirt junior, built like he ate barbells for breakfast. His spotter gave a short, sharp laugh.
“Quiet? Like the payouts last year? That quiet?”
The first guy’s head whipped around. His gaze swept the room and landed on me. The conversation cut off like someone had hit mute.
I took a slow drink, never looking away. “Something I should know?”
“Nah, QB10,” the spotter said, quick and easy, like the words had been sitting on his tongue, ready. “Just old news.”
Old news didn’t make guys tense up like they were waiting for a shoe to drop.
Payoutswasn’t a casual word. Not here. Not when the NCAA loved nothing more than to dig through receipts and ruin a season.
