Page 34 of Hating On Riot

I’ve been looking forward to this since I saw her walk onto the field, hesitancy in her steps and uncertainty on her face. Arie was scared, and all I wanted to do was hold her tight to me with one arm slung across her lower back and my other hand clasping her head to my chest.

Our hearts would beat in tandem. At first, the beats would be fast from how I held her possessively, yet gently, to me. Then contentment would settle over us, and our heartbeats would slow. Our heartbeats would fall in tandem because our hearts would be in sync, like we were fated lovers.

I shake my head.

Poetry lives in my head whenever I’m with this beautiful, kind, smart woman.

I open my arms, ready to sweep Arie off her feet. She has something else in mind.

13

Riot

She does the unexpected, destroying the mental image of how this moment played out in my head over the years.

She shoves me back, her small palms pressing against my chest. I don’t budge. She glances up, desperation in her eyes. “Keep your word, Riot. We’ve done enough in public. People will wonder about you and me. Cooper and I have been holding hands on campus.”

I grit my teeth. Don’t I know it. I’ve witnessed how chummy he is with Arie with my own eyes.

“Then the rumors will start. It’ll get to my brothers, and they’ll hurt you.”

Let them, I want to say. I’m not that skinny, lanky seventeen-year-old kid, three months shy of becoming a man at eighteen. I’m bigger, stronger, faster, and I protect what’s mine. I should’ve stood up to Tony and Cameron. But standing up to them would bring me more pain from their fists.

It took a lot from me that day to keep Merrick and Grayson from going after her brothers, and they weren’t gonna use their fists. Nah, my big bros are all about the upper hand. They’d fight dirty using brass knuckles and baseball bats.

Tired of the past, worried about the present when our brothers catch wind of the situation—and they will—I wrap my fingers around her dainty wrists, keeping her hands firmly on my chest. The heat from her skin seeps through my shirt, burning me like a brand. I stare at her dainty fingers and fragile wrist bones. The urge to protect her is strong. I’ve never felt this way about any girl.

I take a deep breath and suddenly choke up when I think about the inevitable. We’ll go our separate ways after the Nerf War game is over. We’ll go back to being strangers, though we’re more than that. I’m loyal to my brothers. Arie’s brothers are her whole world. There’s no separating family. Blood is thicker than water. Me and Arie are doomed from the start.

We’ll part. Live separate lives. Eventually, we’ll forget one another. Isn’t that how life works?

That’s how it worked out for Grayson and Merrick. They warned me never to fall hard for a girl. Women are superficial, liars, and cheaters, and even the good ones with good hearts can wreck a man’s heart.

I should listen to them. I will listen to their advice, damn it. I don’t want a broken heart. I don’t want to fall for Arie. Falling for her will distract me from playing the game at my best. It will distract me from my studies. I have to graduate. Schoolwork doesn’t come easily to me. I have to stick to my guns and keep Arie at arm’s length. Yeah, that’s what I’ll do. But it’s hard when her face softens as if she understands my struggle and is struggling too.

Going with the flow, the moment, and whatever the fucked-up universe wanted to happen when it put Arie and me in the same class during the last year of our final year together, I clear my throat, my Adam’s apple bobbing as I swallow past the knot of emotion and run my thumbs over her wrists and tug her closer until our bodies are flush.

Can she feel how fast and hard my heart beats for her when I place her palm above my heart? Can she detect the hitch in my breathing when her small fingers knead my heated flesh through my shirt?

I still her kneading. “I am keeping my word.” She and Cooper in public. Me and her in private.

I push the thought of our brothers and rumors to the back of my mind. Us here isn’t about them. It’s about Arie and me.

“I’m welcoming the new water girl to the team. That’s all. Innocent enough, don’t you think?” I lower my head and whisper in her ear, “Do I get a hug too?” I let go of her wrists and open my arms.

She bites her bottom lip. Her dark eyebrows knit.

I crook my index finger. “Come to Daddy.”

Arie frowns, then bursts out laughing, catching me off guard. Now it’s my turn to frown.

“Come to Daddy?” she sputters with laughter. “I—” she doubles over, her arms crisscrossed over her stomach. “Where did you . . . I—” she howls with laughter.

Crossing my arms, I tap my foot and wait for her to finish having the time of her life at my expense. After a good minute of boisterous laughter, which I’m ready to join in on, my ego bruised but still alive and kicking, we walk side by side toward the front entrance.

“What’s so funny about ‘come to Daddy’?” I ask, glancing sidelong at her.

The stands have emptied, and the players have gone home or to work. I’m lucky to have come to DU on a rugby scholarship. I’m also lucky that the stock market is doing well. What I earn over the summer working for my brothers in their construction business further cushions my savings. I live frugally, unlike some of the rich son-of-a-bitches on the team.