Page 12 of Faking the Play

“My boyfriend—sorry,ex-boyfriend—took them a few months ago,” I said. “As far as I know, he’s the only one who’s ever had a copy. I don’t even have them on my phone.”

“But you could have deleted them,” Sonya suggested.

“I could have,” I agreed, “but I didn’t. Because I never had them.”

It went on like that for more than an hour, each question harsher than the last, filled with doubt and skepticism that cut to the bone. I couldn’t tell if they were doing it intentionally as some sort of tactic, or if they didn’t believe me. Either way, by the time they said that was all for now, I could barely breathe and my eyes blurred with unshed tears.

How I managed to keep myself together until I stumbled out of the building and away from that pair, I didn’t know. As soonas the wave of hot air hit me and I knew I’d made it out, I started looking for somewhere to hide where I could quietly fall apart.

Chapter seven

Ryan

English was going to kill me.

My sports management major only required one English course and I’d put it off for four years even though everyone told me not to. Now, I was in a class with a bunch of freshmen and a syllabus that was going to kick my ass. Ethan and Logan would help me out if I needed it, but they were doing their senior-level classes for their majors and needed to keep their grades up too. I couldn’t ask them to put their own futures at risk just because I was stupid.

In the back of my head, I heard Amelia’s voice yelling at me for calling myself dumb. She did it all the time when we were kids, and even after we stopped hanging out, it was her voice I heard whenever I got down on myself for not being smart.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a familiar figure. For a second, I thought my head made her up because I’d been thinking about her, but after I turned to get a better look, I saw it was Amelia after all. I opened my mouth to call out to her, but snapped it shut when I realized that something was wrong.

Fuck. She was crying.

Anger surged through me and I shoved my syllabus into my back pocket, my own problems already forgotten. If that asshole ex of hers had done something else, I didn’t care what happened to me. I’d find the prick and kick his ass.

“Lia,” I called out when I was just a few feet away, not wanting to startle her. When she looked up, I muttered a curse. When I went to sleep last night, she was fine.

“Hey, Ryan.” She tried for a smile but didn’t quite make it.

“You got somewhere to be?” I asked as I fell in step next to her. I wanted to put my arm around her, but I didn’t know if that’d just make matters worse since there were people watching.

She shook her head. “Just figuring out if it’d be better to hide in the library or risk going back to my dorm.”

“Come back to the apartment,” I said. “Coach gave us an off day. Or, as much of one as we get, anyway. The guys and I were just gonna eat and chill. No pizza tonight though. Just good food.”

“Ethan’s cooking?” she asked.

“Yeah, we still don’t let Logan near the kitchen.” I grinned and bumped her arm with my elbow. “Remember when he told us he knew how to make mac and cheese better than Ethan?”

She laughed and my heart damn near skipped a beat. “It took us three hours to get the kitchen to stop smelling like burnt macaroni.”

“That’s a yes?”

She nodded. “Okay. I’ll come over.”

The relief on her face hurt more than it should, considering how long it’d been since we’d seen each other before yesterday. I wasn’t the sort of guy who thought about my feelings too much though, so it was easy to push it aside.

“Come on,” I said. “It was too damn hot to walk this afternoon. I’m parked over here.” I glanced at her as we headed for my car. “Do you want to talk about it?”

She shook her head. “Not yet.”

I nodded, and neither of us said a word as I drove us to the apartment. Even though she was still clearly upset, the silence wasn’t awkward. It never had been with her. As much as she liked to talk, she didn’t have a problem being quiet either.

When we got out of the car, a handful of people I knew were hanging around the entrance. Even though none of them were CSU students, I knew they could’ve seen those damn pictures so I held my hand out to Amelia, offering the extra bit of protection that would come from me staking a claim. They didn’t need to know what that claim was. She took it immediately, lacing her fingers between mine as she gave me a grateful smile.

Still, she looked down as we walked, her dark hair hiding her face, either because she didn’t want them to recognize her or because she didn’t want anyone to see she’d been crying. Either option pissed me off, because none of it was her fault. Sure, some assholes would probably tell her that she shouldn’t have posed for nude pictures in the first place, but if you were gonna trust someone enough to have sex with them and be in a relationship with them, why the hell wouldn’t you think you could trust them with pictures?

“Hey, man,” Ethan called out from the kitchen as soon as I opened the door. “We got about thirty minutes before this is ready if you want to grab a shower or…” His voice trailed off as he turned toward me and saw I wasn’t alone. “Hey, Amelia.”

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