Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
Breslin POV
I hated waking before my alarm went off. Consciousness crowbarred my brain back into reality, allowing a rush of thoughts to tear through—at lightning speed. And they were never anything I wanted to think about. Especially not at five-thirty two in the morning—when I didn't have to be up for another forty-three minutes.
“I'm sorry I won't make it to your big game.” Mom's pale blue eyes watered as she patted my hand.
I shoved that image aside. I had Economics homework to turn in today. I wanted to add ten pounds to my deadlifts.
“You'll be. A good man, Breslin.”
I growled into the silence of my dorm room, rolled over onto my side, and pulled my pillow over my head. “I'll do extra stretches for my hamstring. Dammit, forgot about that. I should probably wait to increase my?—”
“Leave us alone!” I shouted through the mists of rain. A face swam in my vision, blurred. Blood flowed over the knuckles of my hand.
I righted myself and clutched the sides of my head. I clenched my eyes shut. “Stop. Stop thinking. Make it stop.”
Those light-colored eyes flickered in the pale yellow streetlight. “I was hoping they'd draft you.”
Her. Yes. Let's think about her.
Heat thrummed from her body as I steered her, and her see-through shirt, close.
The breathy way she said my name.
“Breslin . . .”
I brought my hand down to my crotch. The mostly useless thing—at least for the past eighteen months—ached, hardened, begged to be touched.
“You know, I never properly thanked you.” She spoke in a low voice as she slid over my lap. My jersey, with number ten and my last name on the back, slipped from her shoulders. She wasn’t wearing a bra.
And because she was wrapped in my shirt, I wasn't. Her arms wound around my neck. Her hardened nipples scraped against my bare chest as she leaned into me.
“Your shirt, I love to wear it—and nothing else.” Her breath tickled my ear like it had that night.
My entire body tightened as my imagination took over—remixing the bits of memory into something completely different.
We weren’t at the Senior center, she was here, her thighs spread over mine. The heat from her bare sex teasing my length through my boxers . . .
I grumbled. If this was my fantasy, I should already be as naked as she was.
I freed my arousal from my shorts—hard as steel, the tip wet and wanting. I ran my fingers over the top, then down my length. Rough, coarse. Hers would be small and smooth. And her heat, her lips would slick against my shaft.
I blew out a breath as I worked my cock with my hand, fictional images flashing through my brain.
Her head tipped back, her mouth opened in a soft moan as my tip found her entrance. She sunk down, taking every inch of me. Those pink-tipped tits in my face. My mouth, my tongue all over them.
Pressure built low in my abdomen, like storm clouds gathering—charged with lightning. I held my breath, my hand tightened around my shaft, moving faster. I couldn't hold on to the fantasy I conjured any longer, my brain flipping through images of anything that would push me over the edge.
I pressed her in that wet shirt against the wall. Her legs wrapped around me as I thrust into her.
The pressure inside me crystallized. And for a glorious moment . . . I felt nothing. Weightless. A couple more strokes and I'd come. A moan escaped my lips. I gasped for air against the crushing weight. An unbearable heat. My entire body strung tight to the point of breaking.
I shattered, pitching forward, my lungs burning, gasping. Pleasure raced through me like stormwater across a desert plain, turning my insides into liquid euphoria. I shuddered as I came.
I lay there afterwards in a half-conscious state, drifting along—hopefully back to sleep. I should clean up the mess I'd made. I needed to get up and head off to morning strength training. But for this moment in time . . .
“Your shirt, Breslin.”
I huffed out a breath. No one called me that. Not anymore. Mr. Cooper or Coop was all I ever heard. Almost like the name Mom gave me died with her.
My heart panged—the pain echoing through my system. The real world had returned to torment my brain—already.
I let out a long breath that turned into a groan. Fuck. It was time to face the day.
“Breslin . . .”
Her voice and her hand on my arm pulled me to a dead halt just outside the training facility.
“I need to ask you something.” Her expression wasn't the usual so-pleased-with-herself look that she usually wore.
I ducked my head to peer over my sunglasses. “No comment.”
“Has anyone ever told you what an inspiring conversationalist you are? Your turns of phrase alone.” She waved a hand then fixed me with a dark glare. “Are complete garbage.”
Yeah, I liked the silent, naked version of her, better. “Go away.”
“I can't. This is important.” Her voice wavered, and her hand on my arm tightened. A warmth tingled through my skin.
“I know we're not . . . that you hate me, even though I've literally done nothing to deserve it. You're discriminating against me because of my work as a reporter.” She released my arm. “And while I get it, I do. I took it personally, as a Sabers fan, when—” She ran a hand over her forehead. “Not now. Maybe someday, but not yet.”
I didn't have time for this. But something was going on. She said it was important. “Are you here as a reporter or as Coach's filing assistant?”
She straightened. “Neither. Right now, I'm just me.” One eyebrow went up. “Please, Coop. I have to know something. Off the record, I swear.”
I let her tug my arm a few steps away. A weird burning-tingling sensation dug clawed into my stomach. I don't like this.
I pulled my sunglasses up to look her in the eyes. Red veins stood out more prominently than they should. And her makeup couldn't hide the puffiness. The claws in my abdomen stabbed deeper. “What is it?”
“Please tell me you didn't.” She crossed her arms but ducked her head. “God, I don't know how to say this, but if I don't.”
“Speak. Now.”
“I don't believe it was you.” The words whooshed out in a rush.
“What?”
“Someone hacked the ECON testbank.” She cringed with her whole body.
“ECON Test bank. What?” I tried to connect words into something that made sense. “Wait, hacked?”
“A source turned over a record of accesses. You're there. Not just there-there, but like?—”
“Wait, hold up, stop.” Brain clicked and whirred. “You think I’m a hacker ?”
“No, I don't. I don't . That's why I'm here.”
“I don't get this.” I shook my head. The claws in my stomach began to burn. “What the fuck?”
She pulled me a few more yards away from the door. “One of the devices registered to you, is pinging or beaconing? Something like that?”
“I'm not following.”
“Someone is cheating.”
“It sure as shit isn't me!” The world vibrated around me in living color.
“Calm down. It's hard to explain, but someone called in a tip that several athletes had an advanced copy of the ECON test. That it was being emailed around.”
Blood pounded in my ears, but it didn't drown out the sound of her voice.
“I have my own person digging into the um, logs. The forensics, I think it's called.” She looked up at me, eyes glassy, her brow pinched. “But the first look, when she matched the address to the tracker, your name was the one that?—”
“Dammit, if you're trying to?” What? What was this? “I can't believe this. What the hell, Milline?”
“It's not me.” She shook her head vigorously. “It's Rivers Reyes and his source or something.”
“I have no idea who that is.”
“Reporter for the cyber beat. But like I've been saying, I have my—Cathy combing through everything. I'm out of my depth on this, but it would help to know if anyone had access to your phone, your computer? Do you have a roommate or?—”
“No roommate.” I paced a few steps and ran a hand through my hair. My fingers shook. “I don't think anyone's borrowed my phone. I don't remember. I leave it in the locker during practice? But I lock it up.”
“Any strange emails? Odd device in your dorm or?—”
“No, nothing.” I dropped my hand. My brain raced through the past few days. “Wait, I did. I got an email. I dunno, it seemed odd at the time.”
“Can I see it?”
“Yeah. I asked a couple of people about it, but forgot to ask Nevins. I just.” I unlocked my phone and pulled up the email from “Coach Nevins”.
She looked at it, tapped and then spread her fingers across the screen. “I'm going to send this to my friend. She can look through message headers and?—”
“I know how all that works.”
“That's actually not in your favor.” My phone whooshed in her hands. She held it out to me. “Would you let us take a look through your phone and computer? As soon as you're finished, here, I mean.”
“How do I know you won't, that you're not just . . . ?” I couldn't finish the rest of the sentence. But she knew what I was asking. I didn't need to say it.
She closed her eyes, her shoulders dropped and her chin hit her chest. It was like she . . . deflated. “That's really your opinion of me?”
No. But cheating was no joke and would be the absolute end of everything. Every dream, every sacrifice. Every minute I didn’t spend with her.
“Cathy will be there.”
“I'll bring my own witness.”
She nodded. “Sure.”
“Where do I, uh, meet you?”
“La Reunion Dorm. Number 342. Bring anything that connects to the internet. I have class, so, depending, I may not be there.” She kept her gaze on the floor. “Probably best that way.”
My chest tightened and my brain conjured the image of her from this morning, straddling my lap. “I . . .” But before I could speak actual words, she took off at a jog.
Leaving me behind.
And she never looked back.
A red-haired girl answered the door and let us in. Me and the bobblehead that was the only person I maybe didn't wholly distrust.
She gave us a bleary-eyed look. “Hey Antonio.”
He gave her a salute with two fingers.
“I’ll take those.” She held out her hands toward my armful of jumbled tech shit: laptop, phone, wifi repeater, streaming stick, and fitness watch. I glanced at Jimenez. He crossed his arms and took a deep breath.
“Stop being an idiot, ‘mano. Cat’s trying to help you.” He smiled at her. “Thanks, chica. We owe you one.”
A tug at the corner of her lips. “It's the job. You can sit over there while you wait to see if Hilda stops by.” Her gaze settled on me, and she cleared her throat. “Before the caffeine wears off. Again.” She wiggled her fingers at the jumble of stuff. I sighed and handed her my phone and watch. She shook her head when I tried to hand her the streaming stick.
“She said everything?—”
“That one has some safeguards on it. Would require a bit more skill than the one we're after.”
“Sure. So, where do you want this?” I held up the repeater and laptop.
She pointed at the computer. “I’ll take that first. Bring it this way. I assume you’re the infamous Cooper.”
I followed her to her desk, work area, whatever. And refrained from asking about the 'infamous' remark.
“Which device did you first open the email on?”
“My phone.”
She nodded as she plugged a bluetooth receiver into my laptop. “Did you open it on your computer later?”
I ran a hand over my hair and winced. “Yeah.”
“Preview pane on?” She sat down.
“Yeah.”
She powered on my device. “Password?” She called out over her shoulder. I got the impression she asked for it out of courtesy more than necessity.
I spelled out the alphanumeric code as she typed.
“Click anything?”
“I don’t remember. I should know better, but I might have enabled the content when it asked. The message said it was from Coach Nevins which seemed a bit off.”
“Did you report it?”
“No, I went to ask him about it, but he wasn’t around at the time. Kinda forgot after that.” My stomach twisted as it sank. “He uh took his computer to the help desk. That's why he wasn't around that day.”
“I’ll call help desk and ask. Could be something.”
“Ok.” I ran a hand through my hair and paced. My twisted-up stomach sank lower—pulling a bunch of nerves in my chest. I didn't like this. Any of it. But the red-headed chick . . . She did seem like she was trying to help.
“You can take the phone and the rest of your stuff.” Her head tilted in the direction of the door. “The MAC address of your laptop matches the asset tracker.”
“Oh.” I stopped pacing.
“You can go. I’ve got this.” Her fingers typed at a speed sprinters would admire. Commands, lines of python scripting plastered one screen. Outputs I didn't understand crawled across the other.
“I don’t know you.”
“It’s really better if you didn’t.”
I glanced at Jimenez. He was sprawled out on the couch like he owned the place. What the fuck?
He shrugged. “She’s just gonna be typing and shit. Probably talking to herself and flirting with the help desk supervisor to get what she needs.”
“Not flirting. It's called social engineering.”
He smirked. “You giggled last time, chica. I heard it.”
I looked from her to Jimenez and back, trying to guess their connection. “You know her?”
“She’s my future wife’s roommate.” He tucked his hands behind his head. “Her and our Reporter Chica. Yeah, we’re tight, eh, Cat?”
“I like you. Liv likes you. The future wife?” She tilted her head. “Eh, you’ve got work to do, ‘mano.”
Jimenez sighed. “She’ll come around one of these days.”
“Speaking of around, that one needs to be not around.” She waved a hand at me like she was shooing me away.
“That’s code for: you should go.” Jimenez tipped his head toward the door.
“Why can you stay and I can't?”
“Because the more I look at your face, the less I want to help.” The red-haired chick called out amidst some rapid-fire typing.
“Wow.” The word escaped my lips.
“Eh, she’s president of the blunt club.” Jimenez shrugged.
“I’m president of the Liv fan club, and he’s an asshole.”
Was she serious? I glanced at her back. She didn't know me. I was the one that was?—
“You’ve got class, right?” Jimenez's voice pulled me from my thoughts.
“She has my machine, possibly my baseball career and my whole life . . .” I searched but couldn't come up with the words I wanted. So I settled for: “Not leaving.”
“First off: she’s got this.” He sat up. “Second, as a friend and a guy who loves baseball like family. It ain’t your life.”
“It is my life .” I crossed my arms. “Which is why I’ll make it to the majors when the rest of our team won’t.” I wasn't including him in that assessment. That's why I'd asked him. Because he, more than anyone, would understand.
He laughed. A deep, resounding chuckle. “You really think that don’t you? Oh man, your ego is king!” He slapped the sofa cushion. The dip in his brow over that full-mouthed grin . . . looked menacing. The twisted, knotted thing that used to be my stomach flipped over.
“Guess Tanner was right, you do need to be taken down a few hundred pegs. Hey Cat, let this ungrateful motherfucker figure it out himself.”
I stared. “What? But she?—”
“Sorry Antonio. I’m under orders from Liv.”
Every nerve ending sizzled as I looked from one to the other. What the fuck's going on? I didn't do anything wrong.
“That’s right, ‘mano.” He sneered. “Your baseball career . Your whole life? It’s out of your control.”
My heart crashed into my ribcage as my stomach finished sinking to the ground. It tried to pull me with it. What could I do? Bring my computer to Coach and plead my case? Hope to God something on the blasted thing pointed a finger somewhere else? I could code, I'd messed around with jailbreaking devices, with mixed results. But everything seemed like a lifetime ago. Here, in this place, my path so far from where I'd hoped and planned to be. I hurtled along some trajectory I didn't know.
“So now what'll you do, eh, Coop ?”