Chapter 11
ZEB
I fucked up. I knew it the second I saw Trout approach my girl when she came down the stairs. I shouldn’t have left her alone. If I’d been there, Trout wouldn’t have gotten in her face.
I had no idea what they’d been talking about, but I hadn’t liked the look of fear in Cammie’s eyes. Trout said something that scared her.
I hated the guy. Ever since freshman year when we lived on the same floor in the same dorm. He was a dick. Treated girls like shit. Felt like he was better than anyone else. The fact that he played football like he was on the way to the pros only inflated his ego even bigger.
He was also from Devil’s Ditch. We hadn’t gone to high school together; he’d been shipped to some fancy boarding school in Vermont or New Hampshire, just like his older brother Rocky, which was short for Rockford or something equally stupid.
His father owned the Two Rivers Ranch and was a total dick.
The list of things the Trout family–or friends of theirs–had done to people I cared about was as long as my arm.
I didn’t trust any of them, but if I wanted to keep playing ball, I had to deal with Chase because he was a really good player.
I could handle him, but no way was I letting him anywhere near my girl.
When I got over to them, Trout was all bro this and bro that. He’d said Cammie saw him at the stadium, but had been mistaken. So? I wanted to hear what she had to say, to know her side of the story because if he’d done something to her… touched her… he was gonna die.
But he’d pulled the stupid team bullshit and I couldn’t piss off the best wide receiver on the team. I needed him, so did the entire team, if we were going to keep winning games. I couldn’t piss him off because he had a hair trigger as it was.
So when I didn’t answer his question about who I believed and tossed him a compliment to keep him from losing his shit, I’d messed up.
Something happened between my girl and Trout earlier in the day.
Something enough for him to confront her.
To have him make me pick sides knowing that if I chose wrong, he was gonna fuck up our chances at another run to a bowl game.
And it would be my fault. The entire team, with all their hard work over the past few months would pay the price.
Then I got called to play beer pong, the dumbass game where players bounced a stupid ping pong ball into loaded beer cups and drank. And I’d been stuck with Trout as a partner. I lasted ten minutes before I grabbed Nixon, a tight end, to cover my spot.
Then I left. Headed right for Van Hoff Hall and Cammie. Because while I had to play stupid-ass politics when it came to my football team, I wasn’t fucking around with her.