Anger shot up my spine knowing that he’d put his hands on Felicity.
“Yeah, yeah, are we doing this or what?”
“Oh, we’re doing it. But you really should have brought reinforcements.” His lip twisted as a handful of other Eagles’ players stepped out from the shadows.
“Whoa, this isn’t what was agreed,” Grady said, edging closer to me.
Thatcher shrugged, yanking his hoodie and shirt clean off in one. “Yeah, well, the game just changed.”
My eyes ran over each of them; players I recognized. Players I’d gone head to head with on the field more times than I could count. Players who I knew would do anything for their captain and quarterback.
Even if he was a complete dickwad.
“The difference between me and you?” I said. “I refuse to take my players down with me.”
“The righteous Jason Ford everyone,” Thatcher swept his arm around him, “how fucking poetic.”
Letting out a fake yawn, I glanced at Grady. “Bored yet? I know I am.” Grabbing the hem of my hoodie and jersey, I pulled them off, throwing them down at my teammate’s feet.
Thatcher glanced back at his audience, ready to showboat a little more, but I was done talking. Head down, shoulder cocked, I tackled him to the ground. We landed with a thud, his grunts filling the air while I rammed my fists into his side.
“Motherfucker!” He roared, bucking and thrashing against me. His fist came up hard, crunching into the soft flesh of my neck and I rolled away, momentarily winded.
“Cheap shot, Ford,” he gritted out, clambering to his feet.
Before I could anticipate his next move, two of his teammates wrestled me to my feet, restraining my arms behind my back.
“Hey, hey,” Grady rushed over to us, “that wasn’t—” His head snapped back as Gallen’s fist caught his cheek, and the two of them began going at it.
“Is this how you win?” I seethed, “by playing dirty.”
“No,” Thatcher grinned, “this is how I end your season.” His fists slammed into my ribs. Over and over. Knocking the air clean out my lungs. Pain ricocheting through me. The hands restraining me loosened their grip and I dropped forward onto my knees, my hands breaking my fall.
“What’s the matter, Ford, cat got your tongue?”
Thatcher edged back, giving me space to clamber to my feet. I could already feel the bruising around my ribs, the damaged tissue. But I was used to a little pain, I thrived on it.
Wiping my bloody lip with the back of my hand, I lifted my chin in defiance. “It’ll take a lot more than that to put me down.” I threw all my weight up and forward, our bodies crashing together, bone on bone, skin on skin. Pure hatred on pure hatred.
“You’re a fucking lunatic,” I spat the words at him as he slammed his head into my mine, missing my nose and grazing my jaw. It stung something fierce, but I forced down the pain, locking it away where I’d deal with it later.
I’d had worse. Thatcher could do his worst but there was only one of us walking away from this in one piece, and it wasn’t him.
Chapter Thirty-One
Felicity
“We have got to find somewhere new to hang out on a Friday night,” Mya grumbled, her eyes running around The Alley.
“Hey, it’s not that bad.”
“Not that bad? Girl, I just watched two man-boys get excited over winning at air hockey. Not sexy.”
“I don’t know.” My shoulders lifted in a small shrug. “I kinda like it.” The Alley was familiar, like your favorite pair of sneakers. The ones you couldn’t bear to throw out no matter how worn and stinky they were.
“One day, I’m going to take you to the city.” Mya’s eyes lit up with promise. “Oh yeah, we could hit a club or two and find us a nice pair of—”
“You guys have got to come see this.” A guy rushed into the diner, breathless and red-faced. “Jason Ford and Lewis Thatcher are down by the river, beating the shit out of each other.”
The room spun, my hands gripping the edge of the counter so tight the blood drained from my fingers.
“Flick, breathe,” Mya’s voice called to me. “Just breathe.” Snapping out of my trance, I met her worried gaze. “It’s probably nothing. You know how rumors fly around here.”
It wasn’t nothing.
I felt it in my bones.
Just then, my cell phone blared to life. “It’s Hailee,” I said, staring at the screen, willing her to tell me it wasn’t true.
“Hails?” her name came out strangled.
“We’re on our way there now but you’re closer.”
“I can’t… I’m not…”
“Fee, baby,” Asher came over the line. “How’re you holding up?”
“I don’t… It’s true? He’s down there fighting Thatcher?”
“We’re not too sure what the fuck is happening right now which is why we need you to go down there. Now, Felicity.”
I couldn’t speak, the words lodged up against the giant lump in my throat.
“Asher? It’s Mya. She’s spaced out or something. Yeah, okay. We can do that. Should we call… No, okay. Got it.” She thrust the cell phone back at me.
“We need to leave, now.”
“But—”
“Pull yourself together, your man needs you.”
“He’s not—”
Mya slammed her hands down on the table, leaning over to shove her face in front of mine. “You need to get it together, okay?” I nodded. “Jason can hold his own, but Asher is worried… it doesn’t matter. We need to go stat. You can either stay here and freak out, or you can come with me and hope to God you can talk some sense into him before it’s too late.”
“The play-offs,” I shrieked, leaping to my feet. If Coach or Principal Finnigan found out about this, Jason could be forced to sit out of the play-offs.
Mya rolled her eyes dramatically. “Now she gets it. Come on, we’re wasting time.” She’d rolled up the sleeves on her jacket and pulled her spiral curls into a messy ponytail which made me wonder how often she did this kind of thing for Jermaine.
“Too many times,” she said as if she heard my thoughts. “Now let’s go. Jason needs you.”
I could barely see for the sea of people—Rixon and Rixon East kids—all mingled together, desperate to get a glimpse of Thatcher and Jason, their quarterback Kings going at it.
“What the hell are we supposed to do now?” I asked Mya, clutching onto her hand like it was my lifeline.
“Flick, over here,” Hailee’s voice settled some of the unease swimming in my stomach.
“Thank God,” I all but fell into her arms, taking comfort from her hug. “This is crazy. Hey, how’d you get here before me?”
“Asher drove like a crazy person.” She gave him a scowl. “But we’re here now, and the guys called the cavalry.”
“The cav—” the words died on my tongue as the entire team filtered in behind Asher and Cameron.