Page 4 of The Play

He’d claim he didn’t know why, but that would be a lie.

Maybe he wouldn’t have looked twice at the guy if he walked by him, but he’d gotten to know him. And he was so smart. Funny and clever and charming, in a completely understated way that had won Deacon over.

Even more, he really gave a shit about Deacon’s grade in statistics, and not just because of the money Deacon had given him.

Deacon didn’t think he’d ever met Grant’s awkwardly-earnest-but-undeniably-charming equal.

“Look at that!” Grant crowed with obvious pleasure as Deacon set his latest test on the desk. “A B+! That’s awesome, Deac.”

Deacon was used to people using his nickname. People who didn’t even know him called him Deac. Being on the football team and relatively well-known around campus meant that lots of students believed they could claim him as a friend.

But it felt like nobody ever called him Deac in that intimate, proud way that Grant did. Like he not only felt entitled to use the nickname, but also that he intended to earn that privilege one day at a time.

He’s not your friend. He’s your freaking tutor. Get it together, Harris.

But getting it together wasn’t going to be happening any time soon. Deacon’s heart rate accelerated just from taking a seat opposite the guy.

If Grant had been like any other guy—or girl—around campus, he’d have made his move ages ago, not worrying about acceptance or rejection. But Grant wasn’t like anyone else. He was fucking brilliant. He was so ridiculously smart Deacon might normally be intimidated by the size of the brain across from him, but Grant never let him feel that way. Never rubbed it in that even though Deacon was struggling to pass statistics, Grant had aced the class years ago.

What had stopped him from asking him out? Partly that, for sure. Because even though he was not the big dumb football player he knew Grant had assumed up front, he was nowhere near Grant’s league.

Even though they spent most of their time focused on Deacon’s tutoring, Grant had opened up a little about his graduate work and his internet security project, and from the excited, impassioned way Grant had discussed it, it was readily obvious that the guy was going places. Major places.

It’s not like you aren’t either, Deacon reminded himself. Think of how many NFL scouts were at the last game.

Yes, he would undoubtedly get drafted, high in the first or second rounds. He’d head to the NFL and Grant would go on to reinvent the whole concept of online security. Their orbits were going to collide, briefly, now, and then that would be the end of it.

That was that, and Deacon just had to accept it.

But two months into their tutoring arrangement, with two to go, Deacon didn’t want to accept it, the way he once had.

“Let’s go to chapter thirteen. That’s what the syllabus says you’re starting this week. Standard deviations.”

“Did you know you’re even more brutal a taskmaster than some of my football coaches?” Deacon teased him.

“Maybe next time we’ll meet at the practice field and I’ll make you . . .” Grant hesitated. Like he wasn’t sure what kind of physical task would prove to be difficult enough.

Deacon chuckled. “You’d make me run stairs? Do sprints? A hundred pull-ups?”

It wasn’t easy to make Grant flush. He had a quiet composure that Deacon really admired. But of course that made Deacon even more determined to mess him up, just a little.

“A hundred?” Grant asked, with wide eyes. “You can do a hundred pull-ups?”

“Two hundred, baby,” Deacon said, flexing with a grin.

Yep, there it was. That faint reddish glow on Grant’s cheeks. And he kept looking everywhere except at Deacon. Specifically anywhere that wasn’t Deacon’s arms.

Okay, yes, he was showing off a little.

Could anyone blame him when faced with this guy?

“Ah, well, uh, there’s some good studies relating physical exertion to mental capacity,” Grant stammered out.

Deacon leaned forward. Caught Grant’s eye. Maybe nothing would ever come of this. He’d told himself a hundred times—maybe even a thousand—that was true. And most of the time, he was okay with that. Alright, not okay, but resigned to it. He wasn’t even sure Grant was interested, though any one of his friends would have told him he was being stupid. He was Deacon Harris. He didn’t usually have to work to get anyone, which was probably why he didn’t really find any of those relationships worth continuing past a few nights.

“Maybe worth testing out some of them?” Deacon suggested.

“With your pull-ups?” Grant dished right back, all stammer gone, and a knowing gleam in his green eyes.

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