Page 12 of Obsessed with my Temptation

Watching him enter Masy’s and join us at our table was the last thing I thought would be happening this afternoon. I’d been silent and fuming on the inside, too shocked to instantly react. I should have fucking known Layla was cooking something up when he asked me about the Prince. She’d had a glint in her eye that spelled trouble, and, lo and behold, trouble had come to find me in the form of a hot charming Prince created just to torture me.

I should have kept my mouth shut.Last Saturday, I should have just let Scott leave when he wanted to. But instead, I’d exploded, angry and jealous over a guy I didn’t even know.

It was fucked up.

I tried to refocus on my punches, on how the impacts reverberated through my body, on the inner calm that came to me when I was boxing. Usually, that did the trick, my heavy breaths and the stereo sound of other people training enough to put me in a zen state, but today, it was futile.

The image of Scott, with his blond, slightly curly hair and those sky blue eyes staring at me, wide and surprised—but also noticeably aroused as I suggested he fell to his knees for me— flashed before my eyes as I hit the bag harder.

Three punches in quick succession.

I’d been aware of Scott Matthews for some time. There was a version of him that he showed to most people—his perfect Prince charming persona. Then there was another side of him, the one he was with his friends, more open and less aware of himself, the line of his shoulders relaxed.

And then there was the version of him that watched me, stubborn and helpless, hunger clear in his eyes.

Jab. Shot. Hook. Punch.

He was even more handsome up close.

Fuck.

I needed to concentrate.

As if he could smell the lack of focus in the air, Coach called my name from the other side of the gym.

“Ashford!” I stilled my movements and turned in his direction. His tall bulky frame greeted me, a slight frown on his rugged face. “To the office.”

Stopping the swinging bag, I exhaled roughly, willing my heartbeat to calm. Andy caught my gaze, brows raised from beside his own bag, and I gave him a one-shoulder shrug before going after Coach, taking off my gloves.

His office was mostly tidy, no bigger than a matchbox, but with enough space for a desk, some shelves, and several cups and framed pictures. Some were of him as a young boxer, and others were with some of the students—I was in several of them.

“What’s up, Coach?”

He was sitting on his desk, thick arms crossed over his chest, watching me.

“What’s up withyou, Ashford? You’ve been flagging.”

I clenched my jaw, not really surprised at this sudden call out. “I’m still better than most people over here,” I said, because I wasn’t really going to pretend like I hadn’t been.

Not just today. Today I was distracted and it was the last drop in an already full glass.

“You might be now, but you won’t be forever. And with how you’re going, a boxer from Redwood might come and knock you on your ass before you’ve had time to regret it.”

Redwood was our rival university, one whose boxing team we’d be competing against in just a few months.

An amateur match for charity.

But one that would feel real, just the same.

“I’mstillthe fucking best, and I think I’ve proven it to you often enough not to doubt me like this, Coach,” I said, defensiveness clear in my voice.

Coach sighed.

“Look, I’m not scolding you just for the fun of it. You’re losing focus, faster than ever before, and I want to stop it before it gets bad.”

My shoulders were still tense enough you could break a brick with them, but something inside me tried to loosen.

Coach had always been on my side. I’d never had much of a father figure and he was the closest thing to one I had. He’d been the one to support me, to cheer me on, to dare me to prove everyone back in my hometown—to prove myfather— wrong about being a useless kid with a somber future, someone who could never do better than work at a gas station and who’d get in too many fights to ever be on the right side of the law.

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