The Fly-Half (Lincoln Knights #2)

Chapter Six

CHAPTER SIX

Jonny

“You’ve got D&D tonight, right?” Devon asked from his spot on the bench beside me where he was lacing his boots. We were just getting changed to head out onto the training pitch for our afternoon session where we’d spend the next few hours running practice drills, doing some skills training, and whatever else our coaches had in mind.

Knowing Gavin, the sadistic bastard in charge of physical performance, it would be something nasty disguised as something fun.

“Yeah,” I said with a nod as I pulled on my hoodie over my long-sleeved training top. The November chill was biting hard and I didn’t want to freeze my nips off while I waited for the rest of me to warm up. Shorts I could do, but my legs seemed to have given up protesting about the cold years ago. “You should come sometime. I bet Ryan wouldn’t mind if you wanted to join us.”

“Maybe. It does sound fun.”

I grinned and nodded, happy that after months of talking about our campaign, I was finally getting closer to convincing Devon to take part. I knew he’d love it once he got going even if he was nervous to start with. He kept bringing up the fact he’d never played anything like Dungeons & Dragons before, but before August I hadn’t either! And now I was spending several hours a week as a dwarven rogue with a pet gosling and loving every single second.

“You’ll love it, I promise. And I’m sure Rory’s got some spare dice you can borrow. He’s got enough of them.”

Devon nodded as he tugged the tongue of his boot up, shooting me a half smile. “Sounds good. But, er, I can’t do tonight.”

“Why not?”

“I’m going out.”

I frowned. Devon never had plans unless they were with me. “Going out? With who?”

“Peaches,” he said quietly as he reached for his own hoodie.

“Peaches?”

“Yeah, we’re going to get a drink.”

I swallowed, trying to wash the taste of acid out of my mouth. “I didn’t realise you were still talking,” I said as I shoved my hands in my hoodie pocket, ignoring the way they’d balled into fists. I couldn’t believe Devon hadn’t told me he was going out with Peaches. Had he really thought I’d react that badly?

Clearly, he had.

I didn’t know why, though.

I wasn’t that much of a miserable git.

Just because I wanted to keep Devon safe from wankers didn’t mean he couldn’t tell me what he was up to. It wasn’t like I could forbid him from going out. I only wanted to know where he was so I could find him if anything went wrong.

“What?” Devon asked flatly, shooting me an offensive amount of side-eye, his dark eyes shining with stubbornness under the fluorescent lights of the changing room.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Would you like to tell your face that?”

“What about my face?”

“You look like I just slapped you,” Devon said sharply, his irritation clear. I sighed and rolled my shoulders, trying to force the rising tension out of my muscles.

“Sorry,” I said, but I knew it sounded fake. Devon huffed and let out a low growl of frustration as he stood.

“Yeah, you sound it.”

He tried to walk past me and I reached out to grab his arm, stopping him in his tracks. Even through his hoodie I could feel the warmth radiating out of his muscles, which were surprisingly firm. I hadn’t noticed that before. And even now it seemed like a weird thing for me to notice, especially when I was trying to convince Devon not to walk off.

“I am,” I said softly. “I know I’m being a wanker.”

“We’ve had this conversation, Jonny. You can’t protect me forever.” He looked up at me with sorrowful eyes and for a second it felt like there was more going on inside him than I knew. But then I blinked and it was gone, and I wondered if I’d imagined it. “Look, Ryan and Rory are friends with Peaches. If they say he’s a nice guy, then you should trust them.”

“I do.”

“No,” he said, a lingering sadness in his tone. “You don’t. And you don’t even realise it.”

I felt irritation rising inside me again, hot and sharp. It was like I’d poured a whole bag of sour sherbet onto my tongue, only somehow the feeling was in my chest, not my mouth. “What does that mean?”

“The only person you’ve ever trusted is yourself.”

“And you! I trust you.”

“Do you?” Devon levelled me with a hard stare, his challenge clear. “Because you’re not acting like it! It’s like you think I’m a fucking teenager or something. Fuck’s sake, man, I’m twenty-seven. You don’t get to decide shit for me because I’ve dated some assholes in the past. Yeah, I’ve fucked up, but that doesn’t mean you get to be a dickhead about it.”

His voice was cold and I realised the rest of the changing room had gone deathly silent. Everyone was pretending they weren’t watching us. I was pretty sure Bailey was trying to lace his feet up instead of the boots that were still on the bench beside him.

“You’re right,” I said, gently relaxing the grip on his arm. “I don’t. I’m sorry. I hope you have fun.”

Devon hummed and I didn’t think he believed me.

But I wasn’t sure I was telling the truth either.

“What was all that about?” asked Matty as Devon stalked off towards the changing room door, letting in a blast of cold air as he shoved it open.

“Nothing,” I said, trying to ignore the unimpressed look on our captain’s face. He believed me as much as Devon did.

“Yeah, and my toddler didn’t strip butt naked and cover himself in jam this morning. Don’t lie to me, Jonny. I’m deep into gentle parenting and I will use everything I’ve learned on you.”

I chuckled wryly. “I have no idea what you just said.”

“I spend half my life watching people talking about parenting so I can attempt to make sure my son turns into some semblance of a good person,” Matty said. “And I will use that knowledge to make you apologise to Devon.”

“But I didn’t do anything.”

“Yeah? Then why did he walk off looking like you kicked his favourite puppy?” Matty asked, folding his arms. “I don’t think Devon’s gonna go all John Wick on us, but still, I’m not having division in my squad.”

“Is this because of Peaches?” West asked as he appeared behind Matty like a ghost out of the shadows, which was pretty fucking impressive considering the sheer bloody size of the man.

“Peaches? Like the fruit?” Matty looked between West and me with bemusement while I secretly wondered if it was possible to suddenly develop Force powers and strangle West with my mind. Not enough to kill him, but enough to make him stop talking.

“Nah, he’s a friend of Rory’s,” West said casually. “He and Devon have been chatting and Jonny’s mad about it.”

“I’m not mad!”

“Yeah, right,” West said, looking far more amused than he had any right to be. He tilted his head at me. “Jonny thinks Peaches is gonna break Devon’s heart or something, but Devon can’t get hurt if he doesn’t go out with him.”

“All right, thank you, Mr Russell,” I said as I tried to clap my hand across his mouth. But West just licked my palm and stuck his tongue between my fingers, making me yelp, and I suddenly had flashbacks of doing this to my brother, Aiden. Only he used to bite. “What the fuck? Are you twelve?”

“Are you?”

“Knock it off, the pair of you,” Matty said and smacked both of us on the arm. “And get your asses outside. All of you.” The rest of the changing room suddenly jumped to attention and I snorted as I watched Bailey realise he hadn’t actually put his boots on. Beside him, Hunter was still in his underwear, which was bright blue and patterned with bananas.

I turned to leave and Matty threw his hand across my stomach. “Not you.”

“But I—”

“Save it,” Matty said as Hunter scurried past pulling on his shirt, his laces still undone and trailing across the floor. “Look, I don’t know what the hell is going on between you and Devon, but you can’t bring your personal shit in here. And I’ll say the same to him. You two are close, I get that, but what happens outside, stays there.”

“I know,” I said. He was right. I had to keep my head straight and not let Devon’s private life get in the way of doing my job, whatever my personal feelings were.

“Good.” Matty dropped his hand. “But Jonny… don’t push him. I get that he’s your friend, but you can’t run his life for him. If you do, you’ll end up pushing him away. Then one day you’ll look back and realise you’re strangers and wonder how the hell you got there. And it’ll be too late to change it.”

“Another parenting lesson?”

“No,” Matty said quietly. “Just personal experience.”

I nodded and hummed politely as I walked towards the dressing room door.

I’d been right in my assessment that Gavin would be a sadist.

Since we had a match on Saturday afternoon, we were supposed to be taking things slightly easier to avoid any sort of strain or injury. So Gavin had decided that instead of doing drills, we were going to play games. And I couldn’t think of anything worse.

Currently, we’d split into four teams of eight or nine players each, since there were thirty-four of us on the Knights squad in total, with two teams given one-half of the training pitch and the other two at the opposite end. The game was called something like ball tag—which was a terrible name—and the rules seemed fairly simple but if I was honest, I hadn’t been listening when they’d been explained.

Instead I’d been trying not to stare at Devon, who was on the opposite team with a yellow bib thrown over his hoodie. I knew he was angry even if he was doing everything he could to disguise it. It was clear in the way he rolled his head and the tightness of his lips, the way he put his hands on his hips and occasionally rocked onto his toes. Anyone else who looked at him might think he wanted to get going, but I knew better.

Devon only fidgeted like that when he was pissed.

He hadn’t believed my apology, which was probably good since I hadn’t meant it. But I almost wished he had because then we could pretend everything was normal instead of whatever the hell was currently going on.

Anger boiled in my chest, tension flooding my muscles, and as I flexed my hand my knuckles popped. I didn’t even know why I was angry, but I was and nothing seemed to cool it.

“Are you ready?” Tommy, who was refereeing our game, asked. There was a smattering of agreement and excited claps from around the group. “Okay, Devon and Charlie, you’re the first two taggers, so grab a ball each. Everyone else spread out. Last two to get tagged are first up next time.”

I still wasn’t sure of the rules, but I guessed the aim was to avoid being tagged for as long as possible. Fine by me. I was fast and my footwork was solid.

Tommy blew the whistle and we scattered across the pitch as Devon and Charlie broke fast, aiming for those closest to them. Charlie tagged Ollie and then Bailey, who’d mistimed his turn and found himself cornered. Devon had gone straight for George and missed but managed to catch Jaden instead. And now there were five of them against nine of us on half a pitch and suddenly the odds felt a lot more balanced.

I jogged along the edge of the pitch, watching as much as I could. Charlie was quick while Devon was sneaky and the numbers of untagged were dwindling rapidly. Danny was still holding out on the opposite side, but he was the fastest guy on the team, so that made sense.

Jaden charged towards me and I took off down the pitch, changing direction as much as I could. But Jaden seemed to have gotten the teamwork part of the game down and I could hear him calling to George and Ollie to cut me off. They were going to try and corner me, so I did the only logical thing. I ran straight towards them.

They were only half expecting it and by the time they’d reached out to grab me, I’d just about managed to slip through their fingers.

But in my desperate attempt to avoid them, I’d forgotten about Devon.

And as I glanced over my shoulder at Ollie, I heard another set of boots on the turf beside me. I flicked my head back too late and skidded as Devon appeared in front of me, the ball clutched between his fingers and a joyous smirk on his face, which quickly faded when he realised I wasn’t stopping.

I clattered into him, my arms half-outstretched to break my fall as we hit the deck with a thunderous crash. I landed on my back, the coldness of the earth sinking into my skin and my chest heaving as I stared up at Devon, who was sprawled across me. His weight was heavy on my thighs but not uncomfortable. I didn’t feel trapped. And it didn’t feel like I’d been tackled either.

He sat up and laughed, his knees either side of my thighs as he lowered the ball to tap it against my chest, a victorious grin lighting up his face. “Got you.”

“Yeah, I guess you did.”

A moment of silence stretched out between us, the sounds of the rest of the team fading into the background like someone had turned the volume down on the world. All I could hear was the thundering of my heart and the sound of Devon’s breathing as our eyes locked together.

“Are you going to get off me?” I asked eventually, the words so quiet I wasn’t sure I’d said them until Devon startled like a rabbit in headlights and launched himself into the air.

“Shit, yeah, sorry.”

“You’re fine,” I said as I hauled myself to my feet. “You okay?”

“Yeah, all good.”

He wouldn’t look at me, though. And from where I was standing, his face was tinted pink.

But I didn’t think it was because he was out of breath.