7. Callan
CHAPTER SEVEN
CALLAN
Nine years ago
T he bus dropped me off ten minutes from the school. Using my phone for directions, I followed the road that seemed to go on forever and finally started to see other kids in the same uniform I now had to wear. To play football, I’d do anything. Even go to some fancy stupid private school on a scholarship where the uniform was mandatory.
The houses started to get bigger and more modern the nearer to the school I got. I tried not to stare at anyone. Tried not to look like I didn’t belong and was actually grateful we all had to wear the same clothes. Just a quick glance at the designer backpacks and iPhones told me most of these kids, unlike me, were not here on a football scholarship.
Drimwhinnie Academy was in Cramond. I had to take two buses to get here from Sighthill. The school itself was architecturally newer than I’d expected when I’d come here to discuss the scholarship. I’d had to bribe my dad with money he’d given me at Christmas to come here and sign me up to the school. He and my stepmum, Ashley, were uninterested in me. I could live with that. I only had two more years before I was an adult and could get out on my own, anyway.
Striding through the gates, I started to feel the stares, but I ignored them. Acted like I was too good to acknowledge them. It worked at my old school, and I had to hope rich kids were programmed the same way. I followed signs for reception, wondering what my mum and stepdad would think of me being here.
They’d be proud. Really proud.
My chest tightened with pain that had dulled but never left me since I was twelve years old.
A receptionist looked up as I wandered into the office.
“Callan Keen. This is my first day.”
It was going all right, I supposed. They’d assigned a pupil called Aaron to show me around because he was on the football team too. He spoke with the poshest Scottish accent I’d ever heard. But he seemed all right. Maybe a wee bit too eager to get to know me. I didn’t want anyone to know me. I just wanted to play football. Problem was, you had to gel with your teammates. So when Aaron peppered me with questions about my life, I found myself lying. Instead of telling him I lived with my waste-of-space dad and stepmum in Sighthill, I told him I lived with my mum and stepdad in Leith. My mum had been a risk analyst at a big financial institution in the city center and my stepdad, who had raised me so he was just Dad, had been a high school maths teacher. It was the life I wished I still had, so I lied and pretended I did.
Aaron didn’t question it.
Like my old school where all my real mates were, Aaron explained that fifth and sixth year pupils shared classes, depending on what key stage they were at.
That’s how I met her.
I’d gotten to the history class early. I wasn’t really academic, but I liked history. I was good at maths because it came easy, but I was shit at subjects like English and geography. Problem was, I had to keep my grades up to keep the football scholarship. And this football scholarship was going to put me in front of professional league football teams looking for under 18s to nurture.
Taking the first seat I saw, I slumped down at the table and pulled out the iPad the head teacher had handed me. She’d warned me I wouldn’t be assigned another. Then she’d shown me where to find the digital “jotters” on the device. I tapped on the screen with the pen it came with. I’d heard some of the wealthier schools were switching to digital, but at my old school, we still used paper jotters and ink pens.
The chair next to me stayed empty as the class filled up.
“Everyone here?” the bloke standing in front of the whiteboard asked. “Right, let’s get started.”
That’s when she came practically barreling into the room. “Sorry I’m late, Mr. Fisher. Mrs. Ellis asked me to help her pull out her old projector.”
The teacher said something, but I wasn’t paying attention to anything but her.
She was fit as fuck.
Like, I think I stopped breathing.
“Fine. Take a seat.”
“Or you could sit on my lap.” A lad near the front grinned cockily at her. “Give me a wee lap dance.”
“Oliver …,” the teacher warned.
The gorgeous girl grimaced. “I’d sit on a hornet’s nest before I’d sit on your lap.”
“I don’t know. I think you’d like what you found in my lap.”
“Considering I’d need a microscope to find what’s in your lap, I think I’ll pass.”
My lips twitched at her comeback as the class laughed, and she coolly searched the room for an empty seat. Her attention landed on the empty chair next to me.
“Don’t say another word, Olly, or you’re out of my class,” the teacher warned as the girl started coming toward me, her long legs eating up the distance. Like most of the other lassies, she wore a tight black miniskirt with black tights along with her school shirt, tie, and blazer.
Her long, dark blond hair spilled down her shoulders in waves.
I held my breath as she dumped her backpack and slid into the chair beside me. She smelled like flowers.
She turned to look at me, and her stunning catlike pale blue eyes widened ever so slightly. “Hi,” she whispered, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
Somehow I managed to force out a hi in return.
The girl seemed to shake herself as she leaned down to pull her iPad from her backpack, along with a textbook I did not have. She seemed to realize that and leaned in to whisper, “Are you new?”
I nodded.
Her hand shot straight up.
“Yes, Beth?”
Beth.
Her name was Beth.
“My tablemate here is new, Mr. Fisher, and doesn’t have a textbook.”
I dragged my eyes off her gorgeous face to meet the teacher’s gaze.
“Oh. Right.” He glanced down at the computer screen on his desk. “Callan Keen, is that right?”
I cleared my throat. “Yes, sir.”
The teacher nodded, strolled into a walk-in cupboard behind his desk, and returned with a brand-new textbook. He brought it over, laying it down on the table. “See me after class so I can give you what you need to catch up.”
Every teacher had said the same so far, and I was trying not to panic at all the work that was going to interfere with football.
Mr. Fisher started talking to the class, and although I was aware (mostly from the textbook title) that we were learning about World War II and the Road to Appeasement, I was mostly aware of Beth.
My skin prickled with heat, and I couldn’t seem to regulate my breathing.
I’d fancied lassies in the past, of course, even had sex with a few, but … I’d never felt this hyperawareness for a complete bloody stranger.
Suddenly, the noise level in the room went up and Beth turned to me. “Are you okay to work with me on it?”
On what?
Instead of trying to cover, I smirked and shrugged. “I spaced. What are we supposed to be doing?”
Beth frowned, though a smile teased her full lips. “Concentrating. Can you do that, Callum?”
“It’s Call an ,” I corrected her.
“Oh.” She held out a hand, and I glanced down to see her nails were perfectly manicured in a bright purple and she wore an Apple Watch. No doubt, Beth came from money. “I’m Beth Carmichael. Fourth year, but I’ll be sixteen in February.”
A year younger, then. Her height made her look older.
“Callan Keen. Fifth year. I’m seventeen in February.”
Her smile was gorgeous and flirty as fuck. My gut tightened. “Well, birthday-month twin, what brings you to Drimwhinnie Academy this late in the game?”
I couldn’t help but smile back. “Football.”
Nose wrinkling adorably, she asked, “What does that mean?”
“It means they wanted me to play for their team, so I’m here on a football scholarship.” She might as well know now I didn’t have the kind of money she and her friends probably had.
“Really?” Beth looked visibly impressed. “You know, I’ve never liked football.”
Well, that wouldn’t do. “I’ll have to change your mind, then.”
Her gaze moved between mine. “Okay. I’ll let you try. But only because you have gorgeous eyes.”
I let out a huff at her flirting and rubbed the nape of my neck. I liked how confident and outspoken she was, even if I wasn’t quite sure how to respond to her. “Aye, okay.”
“Aren’t you going to return the compliment?” she teased.
Chuckling, I shook my head. “I think you already know you’re fucking gorgeous.”
She grinned, delighted. “Now I do.”
This sensation gripped my chest, like my heart was turning over inside it. It momentarily paralyzed me, and all I could do was stare at her.
I barely knew her, but somehow I knew even then at sixteen, Beth Carmichael would ruin me. Either in a good way … or the worst way imaginable.