Chapter 23 #3
“Is it normal for you to drop in and visit your sister?”
He looked me over. “You saying I’m a shit brother?”
Wow. “I’m saying you don’t seem the type to be here considering—”
“Considering this is where I crashed and burned?” His eyes glittered with darkness. “Yeah, well I wouldn’t be, but my sister decided to work here, and I don’t fucking like her being here, so . . . I check.”
Which made sense. “Risky for you.”
He grunted. “Is it?”
“Maybe not for you, but for Briar? You’re putting her on the map by coming to see her, no?”
The glare turned deadlier. “When I want your opinion, I’ll let you know. Until then, shut the fuck up.”
Possibly fair.
“It’s just you want to protect her, but you being here puts her at risk. I wondered if you’d thought it through. That’s all.”
He looked like he wanted to punch me, and then his face cleared as he considered me. “You’re worried about her?”
“She’s risking a lot,” I answered gruffly.
“She is.” He didn’t move. “Interesting that you seem to share the concern.”
I felt like I was being dissected, and then the look was gone.
“If you move, I’ll head out,” he told me.
I started to step aside, and stopped myself. This might be the stupidest thing I’d ever done “You feeling crazy?”
He looked at me with a scheming gleam in his eye, but under it the wariness and hostility were still there, both of us circling each other like two fighters in the ring. “Does it involve Bri?”
“Nope.”
“Does it involve fucking shit up?”
I hesitated, because this was the part where I could shut my mouth and brush it off like I changed my mind, or hand a volatile guy — a guy I didn’t really know — a ticking bomb.
But I was standing in a stairwell with Mason Sterling looking at me like he’d already decided to hear me out and nobody in this whole school needed the program burned down more than he did, and nobody had less left to lose by lighting the match.
Everyone else I could bring into this had a season, a scholarship, a future to protect.
Mason had already had all of that taken from him.
He was the one person who could set fire to the thing and walk away whistling, because they’d already stolen everything a fire could cost him.
And I just knew he’d be pissed I didn’t let him in on it.
What Hadley and I were doing was risky; was Mason what we needed to ensure the risk we were taking would pay off? Was trusting him with this worth it? Only time would tell. Or the feeling in my gut that said he was.
“You turned mute?” His look was hard, and the look of wariness hadn’t left him.
“Can you keep your mouth shut?”
The look of wariness changed to one of speculation. “You look like you want to tell me something, Matthews. Do I want to know?”
“Yeah. I think you might.”
He didn’t look away from me. “Has it got anything to do with you being benched for the spring game?”
I tilted my head as I considered him. “News travels fast.”
“Gossip travels fast.” He saw my look. “Diana talks.”
Diana? “You’re that close with Diana?”
“When it suits.” He shrugged and the gleam in his eye sharpened into something with an edge to it. “Enough to know whose bed she’s in when she’s not in mine.”
What the fuck? He knew she was sleeping with Coach Hembry?
And I realized what he’d just done — he’d just laid a card on the table face up, on purpose. He knew about Diana and Coach Hembry. He knew I knew, or was betting I did. And he’d said it out loud, to me, which meant he was handing me something that I could use that tied back to him.
And he wanted me to do the same.
This was a transaction. Not an offer of friendship, not even trust, well, not the clean kind.
We were two men who each recognized something in the other because we both carried a darkness inside of us.
Instead of pointing at each other, we could agree to point the knives in the same direction.
It was the most honest handshake I’d been offered since I got here.
Because revenge was best served cold — and Mason Sterling had been kept on ice for a long time.
But all I said was, “Huh.” I let him see that I understood the subtext and the corner of his mouth lifted slightly.
“So. What we fucking up?”
“Can we go to Briar’s?”
He hesitated, and the threat came back to his eyes, quiet and complete. “If you don’t tell, I won’t.”
I followed him up the stairs, and at her door, he hesitated. “Just so you know, I already know what you know, so whatever you think you’ve uncovered, you haven’t.”
Blunt and to the point, I liked that. “Let’s see what we both think we know then.”
He gave a sharp nod. “Stay away from Briar, or this beautiful new friendship we’re forming will knock your teeth out.” The look in his eyes was as wicked as his grin, and it wasn’t a joke, not entirely.
I didn’t argue. I wasn’t going to stay away, and Mason probably knew that too.
“Say what you mean, why don’t you?” I thought about yesterday. “I won’t be anywhere near your sister.”
He pushed the door open with a chuckle, and we went inside, and that’s how I got Mason Sterling in on my plan.