Never Let Me Go (Inevitably You #2)

Chapter 1

1

GAVIN

Twenty-Two Years Old

T ake him down.

Take him down.

Take him down, you pathetic little pussy. You just gonna let him keep beating you?

Beck was on his hands and knees as I approached him from behind. His trapezius muscles were bunching and flexing, his triceps jumping, like he hated having his back to me.

Hated having to be this vulnerable.

Hated that Coach had paired us—again—without thought.

I fucking hated it, too.

Beck was five inches taller and fifty pounds heavier than me. At six foot six, he was a goddamn giant—but there were only fifteen of us on the wrestling team. I was the second largest person and the only one that stood a chance against Beck. He was fast, despite his size. Faster than anyone I knew. Faster than me.

I could never beat him anymore.

Coach was always—fucking always —making me spar with Beck during practice.

I’d asked him to switch it up a few times. His response was that he wanted the practice matches to be as fair as possible—and I was the captain, so I needed to step up and just do it. We didn’t have a big team; Paxton University in Gardiner was just a small satellite campus of the main one in Pittsburgh, so our resources and athlete count were much smaller.

I wished I’d gone to the main campus. Or to a different school entirely.

Then I wouldn’t have to see Beck every single fucking day.

I wouldn’t have to touch him.

Smell him.

Listen to him laugh and joke with the other guys.

I wouldn’t have to live in this torturous reality where he was always right fucking there .

At least I’d be out of here in a few months, and then I wouldn’t have to deal with him anymore.

A wave of nausea rolled over me.

“Forster! Let’s go!”

I cut my eyes to Coach Troutman, my lip lifting in a sneer, then looked back at Beck and moved to kneel behind him.

I could smell him. His sweat. The musk of his body odor. Could practically taste the disgust wafting from him in cloying waves, tinged with contempt and animosity.

Beck Bowman despised me with a scorching fury that ignited a firestorm of loathing in my soul—so intense it terrified me.

But I was used to being afraid, wasn’t I?

I wrapped my arms around all that muscle, all that heat, and Coach blew his whistle. Beck sprang up, dislodging my hands and turning around so quickly that I barely had time to get a hold on his calf.

But I did. I planted my foot on the ground and got on one knee as I held on, as I tried to drag him down again, as he hopped on his other foot and pushed against my head, yanking his leg free.

I jumped up, bouncing on the balls of my feet as he lunged at me, getting his big hand around my bicep and jerking me around until my back was to his chest.

It was too fucking easy for him.

As I tried to rip his hand off my arm, he slid his other hand between my legs, brushing against my cupped dick and grabbing onto my thigh from behind. All the breath in my lungs left me in a moment, my entire system freezing up at the feel of his hand between my legs. Beck let go of my bicep to wrap his arm around my waist, lifting me right off the fucking ground.

I grabbed onto the hand at my waist and slapped my other hand on his hip, using the leverage to try and push my weight to the right, to tip myself out of his hold. He let me lean precariously, then slammed me down onto my knees so hard the shock of hitting the floor reverberated through my bones.

He had me down on my stomach in less than a second, arms wrapped around my waist, grunting as he pushed his head into my back, his massive thighs locked around one of mine and squeezing, immobilizing me.

This was such a fucking joke, and I didn’t know why Coach kept making me humiliate myself like this.

Beck’s weight was crushing me, his body so hot I couldn’t breathe. My skin was itching as I struggled to crawl forward and escape, but he only moved his grip higher, curled himself around me like a fucking anaconda, squeezing and squeezing until my lungs felt like they would pop.

My breaking point was when he grabbed my wrists and pinned them by my head, digging his face into the back of my neck to hold me down.

I felt his lips on my skin, felt his panted breaths—as hot as the rest of him—hit the nape of my neck.

The fury that sparked inside of me was a violent flash fire that felt like someone had just touched me with a high voltage wire. I shouted and whipped my head back, smashing it into his face.

Beck growled in frustration, all the muscles in his body tensing, hardening; he’d wrapped himself around me so completely I could feel every single one. He shoved his forehead into the back of my head so hard he slammed my face into the ground, and his grip on me became punishing, his fingers squeezing my wrists tight enough to snap the bones, his legs crushing mine.

It fucking hurt, and now I actually couldn’t breathe.

Coach blew his whistle, and Beck let go of me and jumped to his feet. I lay there for a moment, still feeling the phantom weight of him crushing me.

“What the fuck was that, Forster? You plan on pulling that shit in a match?”

I pushed to my hands and knees, breathing hard. “No.”

“Then you don’t do it in practice!” Coach shook his head, then dismissed everyone from the floor. I heard muttering as the guys walked off, heading to the locker room.

Nobody on the team liked me anymore. The past three months, I’d been on a steady downward spiral when it came to the approval of my peers.

When it came to everything, really.

No one wanted to be around an unstable piece of shit.

I used to be a good captain. I used to have their respect. I used to be the best wrestler on this fucking team. But no matter what I did, Beck kept getting better and better, making me look like a fucking pansy.

I slapped my hand on the ground and glared up at Coach. “I’m sick of losing to him! It’s fucking embarrassing!”

“I’m not putting you up against him to embarrass you. And I don’t know what the fuck is going on between you two, but you keep it off the floor, got that?”

“Got it,” I gritted out, glaring at his back as he walked away.

Coach had been my biggest supporter through the years. He was a good man with good ideals and wanted to see every one of his athletes succeed, wanted to bring the best out in all of us, but lately…

Lately, he just yelled at me all the time. And I yelled back. It was a wonder he hadn’t kicked me off the team yet. Hadn’t taken away my captaincy. Although I wasn’t sure how much longer his grace would last.

I honestly didn’t care if he took it away from me. My dad would, though.

God, I was so tired of all of this.

So, so tired.

My stomach tightened as nausea slid through me again, and I gagged. Then I threw up, my abdomen clenching over and over again, my arms shaking as I heaved, as my stomach expelled everything—which was only water because I hadn’t eaten today. Had been too nauseous.

Tears sprang into my eyes, my face heating with the lack of oxygen, and by the time it was over, by the time I could breathe again, I was openly crying. My throat was burning, thick because of the tears, and as I gasped in a sharp breath, I heard the locker room doors open behind me.

I didn’t turn around, just started breathing through my nose, trying to get ahold of myself as I furiously wiped at the tears that kept falling.

A towel was thrown on my vomit, and when I glanced up, my eyes were level with Beck’s dick.

“Forgot my water,” he muttered. Then he turned and walked away, and I couldn’t stop myself from turning to watch his glutes flex, watch them bounce up and down with every step.

Couldn’t stop the pleasure curling through me at the tiny shred of attention he’d thrown my way. Couldn’t stop the anger that followed that good feeling.

I had no control over myself. Was just a car with faulty brakes, speeding toward the edge of a cliff.

“Fuck you, Beck!” I shouted. It echoed in the open, empty room, and Beck didn’t turn around. Didn’t acknowledge me. Just pushed through the double doors and disappeared into the locker room.

Panic started to set in, a wave of anxious thoughts piling on top of each other.

Did he suspect me? Would he tell Coach? Did he even care enough to mention it?

The answer to the last one was fuck no.

But if Beck suspected for a single second that I was abusing steroids, he’d run and tell Coach. I knew that for a fact. Beck had always followed the rules, always wanted to do the right thing, believed in honesty and integrity and all that shit.

I fucking hated him.

But not as much as I hated me .

Hated my own cowardice.

Hated that I would do anything my dad told me to. Hated that I was so afraid of him I was willing to destroy myself.

There wasn’t much of me left now.

My performance had started to suffer last fall, and Beck had slowly begun to overtake me in the rankings.

My dad would never stand for that. Told me no son of his would let a gay boy best him. Told me to do better— be better—or he’d wash his hands of me.

There was nothing I was more afraid of than being left all alone.

Nothing.

I’d already been abandoned by the one person that mattered most in my life, and I wouldn’t survive it if I had no one.

When he told me he’d gotten something that would help, when he told me this was the only way, I’d just gone with it. It wasn’t worth it to argue with him or defy him. I didn’t care what I had to do, I would do it.

I wished I’d cared.

The steroids were destroying me in the same way he did; they fucked with my mind and wrecked my body. They were changing me, turning me into the cruelest, most pitiful version of myself.

I thought I’d gone as low as I could go, but I learned pretty quickly that the bottom was just an illusion; it had no tangible end.

I was a monster on steroids. Absolute human garbage. They should just put me down like the animal I was. The rage that simmered inside me, a living thing that fed off pain, was growing and growing and growing, like a cancer.

I was a cancer.

I tried to stop. One morning, I’d looked at myself in the mirror as I held the syringe. I looked at the stranger staring back at me, daring him to drop it, daring him to find even a sliver of courage and do the right thing.

For once in my life, I did. But it didn’t last long. The coward in me caved three hours later when the most overwhelming feelings of terror and despair began seesawing with an anger so volatile I’d punched a hole in my wall.

I couldn’t stop. And if my dad ever found out I’d tried, he’d fucking leave me. But not before leaving me with a reminder I would wear forever of how much I disgusted and disappointed him.

Fuck everything.

With shaking hands, I mopped up my vomit with the towel Beck had dropped over it. Then I threw it in the garbage and headed into the locker room, hoping everyone was already gone.

But of course I wasn’t that lucky. All the guys were still milling around, talking loudly, laughing, changing, showering.

I clenched my jaw and kept my eyes down as I made my way to my locker. I didn’t want anyone to see my pathetic fucking face, didn’t want them looking at me and wondering why my eyes were red.

God, I was such a pathetic mess of a person.

When I got to my locker and pulled it open, I couldn’t stop myself from glancing left.

Beck was sitting on the bench, still in his singlet, every inch of him on full display. Every perfectly sculpted muscle right there , ten feet away from me. He was resting his elbows on his thighs and holding his head in his hands, fingers speared through his tight blond ringlet curls.

My fingers twitched on the cold metal of my locker door, wanting to touch them, to see for myself if they were still as soft as they used to be.

And then, as if he felt me staring at him, he moved his hand and turned his head to the side, those dark blue eyes piercing me with a sharp intensity that clawed at my lungs. It was like he’d stabbed a million little holes into them, and I couldn’t breathe anymore.

Those eyes drifted down to my chest, raking over the plain white shirt I wore beneath my singlet, then lower. I felt them like a touch as they brushed over my dick, and when they cut back to mine, heat started gathering between my legs.

Except, I knew I wouldn’t get hard. It was impossible for me to get an erection anymore, not since starting the steroids.

With a frustrated growl, I tried to slam my locker door shut, but it just whipped violently into the metal frame and then bounced quickly back open.

“Hey! Forster, get in my office. Now .”

My chest was heaving as I turned to the right and saw Coach Troutman by the water fountain, hands on his hips as he gave me a hard look. My teeth started grinding as I dug my fingers into the skin of my palms. I could feel my blood pulsing through my veins, thick and heavy and throbbing with every beat of my raging heart.

I wanted to hit someone.

I wanted to hit Beck .

Fuck you, Beck.

I threw a glare at him, but he wasn’t even looking at me anymore. He was already dragging the shoulders of his singlet down his arms, getting ready to take a shower. Completely ignoring me.

As fucking usual.

I wasn’t even worth the effort it took to say, “Fuck you, Gavin.” I was worth nothing to him. He would gladly walk right past me on the street if I was lying there, bleeding out on the side of the road.

He’d walk right on by, never once sparing me a glance or a thought.

“ Forster !”

I jerked my head to the right, where Coach was glaring at me from his open doorway.

I’d told him a million times not to call me by my last name, but he never fucking listened.

I ground my molars together and stalked over to him, wishing I could be anywhere but fucking here.

Coach held the door and I trudged inside, letting myself fall into the hard plastic chair sitting across from his messy desk. The door clicked shut behind me, and then Coach Troutman sat wearily, sighing so hard a piece of paper blew off his desk.

“Goddammit, Gavin,” he said, rubbing his temples.

It was a fact of life, at this point, that all I did was give everyone around me a headache. A hard time. An abundance of disappointment.

That was me. Just a useless waste of space, breathing precious oxygen better given to people who actually deserved it.

“What the hell is going on with you? Beck told me you threw up, are you sick?”

Of course he fucking did, that little rat prick. Fuck!

I raised my eyes to Coach’s, trying to tamp down all the simmering anger that wouldn’t abate, no matter how hard I tried to get it to. It just sat there, bubbling and frothing, swirling in violent whorls.

“Nothing’s going on with me,” I muttered. “I’m just sick of grappling with Beck and I wish you’d let me practice with someone else. These guys can fucking do it. They’ll be fine.”

“That’s not the point,” he said, leaning back in his chair and watching me with shrewd eyes.

“Then what is the point?” I snapped. “To make me as miserable as possible?”

His brows drew together as he studied me, and I wanted to disappear. To crawl away into some dark corner, to hide from the world until I could act like a normal person.

I’d be hiding forever.

“Is there something going on? You used to talk to me. You know you still can, right? I feel like you’ve been really on edge lately, and the rest of the team can sense it. What you do affects everyone else and you know that, so maybe talking about it will help.”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” I said. Even I could hear the bitterness in my voice.

Coach sighed again, and his next words made me want to throw up.

“Okay. A lot of the guys have come to me with complaints about your behavior, and I’ve made the decision to let them vote and give the captaincy to someone else. It belongs to someone that the rest of the team can respect and trust to lead them with a professionalism that you’ve been lacking of late. I’m sorry, Gavin. I was hoping you’d be able to turn things around and show them you’re capable of being a captain, but it doesn’t seem like you are. Especially not after that stunt you pulled out there today. What made you think it was okay to smash your head into Beck’s face? Huh? What was that?”

I had no answer because all I could focus on was the fact that they would be voting for a new captain. I was being ousted, and I already knew exactly who the title would be given to.

Icy fingers trailed down my spine.

“I didn’t—that’s fucking bullshit , Coach!” I spat, leaning forward and fixing a nasty glare on him.

His features hardened and he leaned forward, too. “Speak to me like that again and you’re off this team, you hear me? This right here is exactly why I’m letting them vote for someone else. I don’t know what’s going on with you, but I’m tired of dealing with your godawful attitude.” He shook his head in disgust. “Get out of here. Take a few days to get your shit together and come back to practice on Friday.”

My eyes widened, and for the first time today, fear won out over all that anger. It was Sunday. He was banning me from four days of practice. There was no way my dad wouldn’t find out. “No, I’m sorry, I’ll try and be better, please don’t kick me out of practice, Coach. I’ll?—”

“It’s too late. I don’t want to see you until Friday. Go get your ducks in a row, Gavin. Come back rested and reliable. And with a shit ton more respect than you’ve shown everyone today.”

He turned away from me and opened his laptop, dismissing me.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck !

I stood on shaking legs and left his office, shutting the door softly behind me. I walked in a daze to my locker, but the shock of being barred from four practices wore off quickly. Anger slithered in to take its place, and I grabbed my hoodie, sweats, and duffel from my locker, then slammed it shut. I yanked on my sweatpants and sweatshirt, slipped into my sneakers without bothering to put my socks on, slung my bag over my shoulder, and stalked out of the locker room, out of the gym, and out of the school.

It was snowing when I got outside.

Of course it was fucking snowing, as if the universe was thinking of everything it could to make my day even shittier.

I hunched my shoulders against the cold, making my way toward Hudson Street. The white flakes were fat and many, falling quickly and heavily. It was cold enough to stick easily to the ground, and there was already an inch of icy snow crunching under my feet. The cold wormed its way through my thin clothes with the help of a frigid wind. I threw my hood up and stared at the ground to avoid being blasted in the face with snow.

This was one of the few times I wished I had a car. But that was a luxury I wasn’t worthy of, according to my dad. And he refused to let me get a job, too, despite me begging once I’d turned sixteen and was old enough to work in most places. I’d wanted some sort of independence, something to make me feel like I wasn’t wholly dependent on him and only him for everything in my life.

But of course he didn’t let me. Said I needed to focus on school, wrestling, and jiu-jitsu, to keep making him proud. As if my only purpose was to make him look good.

Well, once he learned that I was no longer captain and the title had been given to Beck, he might actually do what he’d been threatening to do all these years.

Leave me to rot on my own.

Two steps later I was falling to my hands and knees in the snow, dry heaving on the sidewalk right in front of someone’s house. Despite nothing coming up, my body kept trying to get something to come up, making me heave and retch over and over again.

The tears were back. My heart was slamming against my ribcage, my lungs constricting, and when my stomach finally settled down again, I let myself fall onto my side, not giving a single shit how cold the snow was, how it was soaking into my clothes, into my soul.

I felt like maybe I could just lie here, freeze here, and maybe it might not be such a bad thing.

I closed my eyes and thought of the only person that had ever made me feel like I was worthy of existing.