“Get to your practice, Mr. Ayers. Come Monday you’ll find a new schedule of classes.”
When I try to maneuver around him, he steps in my way, glaring down at me and pulling his lip ring between his teeth. It’s downright impossible not to gaze at it with a hitch in my breath.
“You won’t do that,” he mumbles.
“Trust me. I will.” Again, when I try to step around him, he stops me.
This time, he leans closer, so close I smell the mint of his gum as he whispers. “Life has gotten a little boring, hasn’t it? Your job was boring, so you picked a new one. Going home alone on a Friday night, eye-fucking a bunch of college students because I’m guessing your Wednesday night date was too boring to put out, wasn’t he?”
I gasp, wrinkling my forehead at him. “Cullen—"
“So, you won’t change my classes because seeing me again is the most excitement you’ve seen in…what, eight years?”
Hatred seeps through every word he utters, and I feel it in his gaze on me too. I hate that he’s right. I am bored. Life is so boring now I almost enjoy the way seeing him again makes me feel, remembering the excitement of my past life when I was somebody, someone who accomplished something, someone people listened to and cared about. Now…I am nothing. And feeling Cullen’s disdain for me is the most I’ve felt from another person in almost a decade, so yeah he’s right. I probably won’t change him out of my class because then my life would go back to nothingness.
“Ayers! You comin’?” one of his teammates shouts across the lot, and I suddenly clear my throat, moving away so we don’t look so suspicious standing close to each other like this.
With one last menacing chuckle, Cullen turns and walks away, jogging across to the rugby field, and I can’t help myself when I look up and gaze at his back, the muscles rippling in the sunlight as he runs.
Standing alone near my car, I try to let my heartbeat regulate in his absence, but I am too shaken up. I don’t want to get in my car now. I have no desire to go home alone and be pathetic and boring anymore, because that little asshole was right. Fuck, I am bored.
The shouting from the field draws my curiosity, so as I pass my car I head toward the field. It’s much like a soccer field with bleachers on each side and a long grass pitch the guys huddle in formation on. Once I get to the bleachers, I lean against the metal braces and cross my arms as I watch them.
There are a couple dozen guys warming up and running drills on the grass. Two coaches talk on the sidelines, and it’s nearly impossible to miss Cullen with his tan skin, tattoos, and bleach blond hair.
I don’t know why, but I stand there and watch them practice. It just seems like the best way to spend my Friday evening, and there’s nothing weird about a new professor showing interest in the school’s rugby team. It’s not until about forty minutes into the scrimmage on the field that Cullen catches me watching.
Instead of smiling, he looks momentarily caught off guard, and I love the way he takes a double glance. Then, maybe I’m imagining things, but he seems to put a little more into his practice. He runs faster, tackles harder, and dodges hits with more agility.
I catch myself biting my lip and noticing the way sweat cascades down his rippled abs and the way his shorts hang a little lower than his tan line, showing off the pale skin of his ass.
He is eighteen, I remind myself. I’m a grown ass woman in my thirties, and I have absolutely no place gawking at a teenage boy like a fucking cougar, but Cullen doesn’t act like a boy. He wants to toy with me, so I’m going to toy with him.
The coach smiles up at me a few times, even sending me a quick wave before he calls the players and they quickly huddle together on the field. And he’s not a bad looking man, probably a few years older than me, but there are no sparks there.
Not like there are with my student—
Stop, I scold myself.
Just as I turn back toward my car, ready to call it a night, thinking about the merlot dinner I have planned, I hear someone call my name.
“Miss West, right?”
Spinning around, I smile politely while grimacing on the inside as the coach chases after me. “Yes, but please call me Everly.”
“Coach Prescott, but call me Eric,” he says cheerfully as he puts out a hand for me to shake. “So, you like rugby?”
Nope, just tormenting my student-slash-enemy, I think in my head. “Yes, I love rugby,” I lie.
“Well, I hope you come to our first game tomorrow. It’s at Kings College at one. First game of the season, and I think you’ll be impressed with the team this year. They’re coming out strong.”
My eyes dance over to the players behind him, and I catch the way Cullen is watching, his brow pinched together skeptically. I plaster a bright smile on my face, hoping he sees it. I want him to think I’m flirting with his coach. “I would love to. Thank you for the invite!”
Eric smiles back at me, a small blush rising to his cheeks. “It’s nice to see the new teachers showing interest in our sports program.” His gaze drifts down to my lips, and I realize I’m biting the bottom one between my teeth and fiddling with the necklace hanging from my neck.
Fuck, I am flirting so much right now, but by the looks of it, he’s into it. Seeing him up close, I’m starting to realize he’s definitely about ten years older than me, with thinning blond hair and wrinkles around his eyes, but I’d still take him home for at least a night. He’s got a nice enough body, broad shoulders, and thick arms, and let’s face it—beggars can’t really be choosers at this point.
“I’m looking forward to it,” I reply, smiling a little brighter, knowing it’s creating dimples in my cheeks. I keep my eyes on him as I retreat to my car, and just before I wave and turn away, I catch Cullen watching again. Letting my smile fade, I glare at him for a moment.
I wasn’t really planning to go to the game, but the more I think about it now, I realize it wouldn’t be so bad. Again, it’s not weird for a new teacher on campus to go to one of the games, and it’s not like I have anything better to do with my weekend.
Once I reach my car, I notice something hanging from the driver’s side mirror, and I freeze. My heart nearly falls to the concrete parking lot when I recognize the pearl necklace.
Glancing back at the field, I notice neither Cullen nor the coach are looking my way anymore. As I take the necklace off the mirror, I feel my hands start to tremble. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out who left this here. Nearly every photo ever taken of Valerie Ayers had one thing in common—a signature pearl necklace around her neck.
After the pill bottle and now this…it’s very clear Cullen is not playing a game. He’s doing this to threaten and scare me…and I hate to admit it, but it’s working.
4
Cullen
Coach Prescott is such an asshole. I know it’s his fault she’s sitting in the stands on the Florence side. She did just about everything other than flash her pussy at him yesterday after practice, and it makes me sick.
And now here she is, those dark brown eyes fixed on me through the whole game. I was supposed to be getting into her head, and now she’s in mine. It doesn’t hurt too much because we’re in the lead, and I’m making passes better and faster than normal.