Offside: Rules of the Game Book 1

Could I have completed that essay a little faster? Probably. Was I motivated to speed up the process when James was in my bedroom, looking adorable as fuck on my bed? Not really.

When I got home from dropping off Bailey, Dallas was sprawled out on the living room couch, a bottle of beer in hand with his other arm draped around Shiv. In the dark, a horror film flashed on the oversized flatscreen, complete with revving chainsaws and splattering blood. Those two were a match made in weirdo horror-loving heaven. I wasn’t squeamish about guts and gore, but I never really got the appeal of scary movies. If I was going to sit through a movie, it either had to be funny or have lots of car chases and explosions. Or, well, be a naked movie.

I paused in the doorway to the living room. “Hey.”

In the background, there was a bloodcurdling scream from the TV.

Dallas picked up the remote and paused the movie. “How’s your ankle?”

“Hurts like a bitch, but it’s slowly getting better,” I said. “What are you two psychos watching this time?”

“Chainsaw Slaughter 6.” Shiv grabbed a handful of popcorn from the bowl beside her. “It’s the best one of the whole series. Wanna join?”

It sounded better than economic theory, but I had a quiz tomorrow, and Coach Miller had been watching me like a hawk since our little chat. He’d been cornering me on a weekly basis for updates, which was really code for trying to catch me in a lie since he’d already talked to my professors. If I wanted to keep playing, there wasn’t much room for error.

“I still have to finish some schoolwork, but thanks for the offer.”

Dallas tilted his head, studying me. “Schoolwork? Is this Bailey’s influence or what?”

“Coach is up my ass about my grades again.” I shrugged. “It’s buck up or get benched, and we all know you’re fucked without me.”

“Back to the Bailey thing,” he said emphatically, ignoring my jab and blatant attempt to change the subject. “You’ve seen her a lot lately. Taking this toying with Morrison thing pretty far, huh?”

“Nah, I like spending time with her.”

He pointed at me with the neck of his beer bottle. “Because you like her.”

Beside him, Shiv widened her eyes and gave a little shake of her head as if to say, “I didn’t tell.” I believed her. Unfortunately, Dallas was good at reading me. Plus, hanging around a girl this long without banging was basically a dead giveaway. The only other girl I was friends with was Shiv.

Besides, let’s be real—not even I believed my intentions with Bailey were platonic. But was that what Bailey wanted?

“Maybe.”

“Don’t even try to act cool. We already know, dumbass,” Dallas said. “But I wanted to make sure you did. You’re not always the most self-aware.”

Dammit.

Okay, whatever. I could own it.

“Fine,” I said. “I like her.”

“I like her too. Can we keep her?” Shiv gave me a puppy dog face.

“I have no idea,” I said honestly. With how often we had been talking lately, it was hard to imagine my life without Bailey in it. But I’d known her all of a month, and I wasn’t entirely sure where we were headed. For all I knew, she could get back with Morrison tomorrow and never speak to me again.

“She does seem cool,” Dallas agreed.

“She is.”

He smirked. “Which means you have no business with her.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, man.” I flipped him off before continuing upstairs to my room.

“Love you too,” he called.

When I got into bed later, it still smelled faintly like Bailey—something sweet, like her perfume, mixed with something else that I was pretty sure was just her. And hockey help me, I liked it.

I was so screwed.

Tuesday evening’s practice rolled around, and Coach Miller bag skated us for the first half as punishment for playing so poorly against New England U. He was sneaky that way. He hadn’t done it the day after the game or the day after that, so we thought we were in the clear. But midweek?

Surprise, motherfuckers.

Now everything hurt and I was dying. To make matters worse, I was dumb enough to carpool with Dallas and Ty, which meant I got dragged to O’Connor’s after practice. I mean, the pub part was fine. It was the crowd that frequented the pub that I was ambivalent about. O’Connor’s was puck bunny and former-hookup central.

“Solid practice,” Dallas said. He drained the last of his rum and coke and set it on the black laminate tabletop. “Aside from the part where half the team puked in the garbage can at center ice.”

“At least none of us did.” I shrugged, pushing my chair away from the table to stretch out my legs in front of me. My ankle still wasn’t 100 percent going into practice, and it was agonizing coming out. “Plus, by Miller’s standards, only half the team is practically a pass.”

Ty smirked, tipping back his beer. “And you even got a few shots past me during drills for once. Good for you, little buddy.”

“I guess your strategy of flopping has to work sometime,” I said.

“Maybe you should learn to lift the puck.”

“Maybe you should—”

From out of nowhere, a soft hand touched the back of my neck and startled the crap out of me. I jumped in my seat and jerked around to find a pair of blue eyes with heavy eye makeup staring back at me.

“Hi, handsome.” Lindsay slid into my lap, looping an arm around my shoulders. She crossed her legs, causing her very short, very tight black skirt to hike up a little more.

I shifted my weight uncomfortably. Would it be rude to tell her to get off my lap? Diplomacy wasn’t exactly my strong suit. Even if I did mental gymnastics to justify this—like reminding myself that I was still technically single—it felt disloyal as hell.

“Hey.” My voice fell flat. In the background, Ty rolled his eyes and stood up to grab another beer.

“Long time no see,” she said breathily.

Objectively speaking, Lindsay was hot, albeit in a very overt, heavily made-up way. Earlier this year, I made it a mission to hit it and flirted with her like crazy. We did a whole back and forth thing and got pretty close, but it never quite came to fruition.

Despite that, there was zero response in my body to the events that were unfolding now. It was like watching the entire thing happen to someone else.

“Yeah. Been a while.”

“Are we going to pick up where we left off last time?” She bit her lip, tracing a pink fingernail along my chest. “Remember?”

I craned my neck and reached around her for my beer. “Er…no, not really.”

I hadn’t seen Lindsay since sometime this summer. Between hockey, school, and James, it felt like a decade had passed since then. I had no recollection of where we’d left things. I may or may not have been wasted at the time. Odds were, I was.

“About christening the bathroom next time we were here?”

Oh. That.

I’d been half-lit at the time, trying to close after we’d been making out off in the corner next to the pool tables. Lindsay was on the hook, too, until her friend passed out at the table and she had to take her home. I’d all but forgotten about that.

She nodded to the hallway behind us, lowering her voice. “You said you were going to tear off my panties and—”

I winced and held up my hand, cutting her off. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Or…” Lindsay angled closer, undeterred. Her breath was warm against my ear and smelled like some kind of fruity alcohol. “We could go back to my place with my friend Melanie over there. She loves hockey players.” She pointed to a busty brunette standing by the pool table, talking to a few other guys from the team. Her friend noticed us, and waved at flirtatiously.

August me would have considered this winning the hookup lottery, would have been all over it, would have been booking a ride home with both of them already.

October me would rather go home and watch SportsCenter. Or text James.

Was this seriously happening?

I shot Dallas a what the fuck look.

Dallas cleared his throat, leaning over the table. “Carter’s got a girlfriend, Linds.” He nodded at me.

She turned and gaped at me, expression a mixture of disbelief and irritation. “You have a girlfriend?”

I nodded because it did seem like the simplest way to let her down easy. “Yeah. It’s new.”

“Oh.” Her glossy lips formed an O for a moment as she paused. She tossed her dark hair and shrugged. “Well, she doesn’t have to know.”

Lord help me. She didn’t know how to take a hint. Or a flat-out rejection, apparently.

“I’m flattered, Lindsay. Really, I am.” I tried to push her off me while she resisted my efforts. “But I’m going to pass.”

Lindsay narrowed her eyes. “You’re serious right now? After the big game you talked last time?”

Funny how I pursued her for a while, doing the whole sexy cat and mouse thing, but the minute I lost interest, she wanted me immediately.

“Can’t do it.”

“Whatever, Carter.” She stood up, tossed her hair over her shoulder, and stormed away in a huff.

Once she was safely out of earshot, Dallas let out a low whistle. “Never thought I’d see the day.”

“Neither did I.”

His eyes jumped to the pool table behind me. “Guess your loss is Tyler’s gain.” I followed his line of sight to find Lindsay and her friend hanging off Ty at the bar. Cool. More power to him.

Lindsay shot me a defiant glare, like she expected me to be jealous. I smiled back because I seriously did not give a shit.

“But dude.” Dallas lowered his voice, giving me a look so probing I felt borderline violated. “What the hell is going on? Have you even made a move on Bailey?”

“Not really,” I said, peeling the label off my bottle. “You and your fucking bookshelf made sure of that.”

His mouth dropped open. “Oh my god.” He guffawed, shoulders shaking. “No wonder you seemed off when we got home. Sorry, man. I didn’t expect you to have company that early in the evening.”

“It’s fine,” I muttered.

“But you’re going to find your balls again and make a move, right?”

I nodded, taking a sip of my beer. “Yup.”

In theory.

“Soon.” He lowered his head and gave me a pointed look.

“Soon.”

But she’d just broken up with Morrison. And what if this feeling was one-sided? Or I scared her off by pushing too soon? Or I went for it and she rejected me?

Was it fear of seeming opportunistic about her breakup with Luke holding me back? Or fear that I’d scare her off if I was flat-out wrong about things? Or was it the fear of rejection? That was something I’d never dealt with before, and it was scarier than I wanted to admit.

Maybe it was all of the above.

BAILEY

I was having a fantastic day. First, I convinced my astronomy instructor to let me unofficially switch class times, citing unforeseen (and nonexistent) school newspaper conflicts. I would still have to write the final exam with my actual class—including Luke—but Professor Walsh agreed to let me sit in on the Thursday morning lectures instead. I practically danced out of his office. It was like a gigantic meteor had been lifted from my shoulders.

Then Noelle drove Zara and me to our favorite lunch place off campus to enjoy overpriced but delicious chopped salads the size of our heads.

“You didn’t have to buy me lunch,” I said to Zara, and I meant it. Fifteen-dollar salads were hard to justify, but my gigantic chicken Caesar was heaven in a bowl. Somehow, salads always tasted better when someone else made them.

She shrugged, taking a bite of her spicy Thai noodle salad. “It’s the least I could do after you agreed to cover the volleyball game tomorrow night on short notice. Again.”

“I don’t mind.”

Technically, I had plans with Chase. He invited me over for Tyler’s birthday, but he understood when I told him I’d be late. It was an early game at least, so it wouldn’t eat into the night too much.

“You know I would have taken one for the team if I could,” she said. “But no one wants to read a sports article written by me. My knowledge starts and ends with the fact that the ball goes over the net.”

I laughed. “It’s okay. You have a date tomorrow night anyway, don’t you? How are things with Caleb?”

Caleb was her Tinder date from last week, a slightly older veterinarian with a three-year-old daughter. Different from her usual type, but maybe that was a good thing. Usually Zara gravitated toward bad boys, with bad outcomes as a result.

“Amazing.” Zara’s eyes sparkled. I’d never seen her so excited about someone.

“It’s their third date,” Noelle said in a sing-song voice. “Someone’s going to get lucky.”

Zara blushed, which was the first time I had ever seen her look bashful. “Well, maybe. We’re kind of taking it slow.”

I wasn’t sure it could be much slower than Chase and me, who’d yet to even establish our intentions. I was pretty sure he almost kissed me the other day, but now I was second-guessing myself. Maybe he really did see me as just a friend, and the flirting was for fun. It was hard to tell with him sometimes.

Ugh.

This limbo we were in was both exhilarating and exhausting.

“I’ll wear ear plugs tonight in case,” Noelle said.

Zara’s cheeks turned a deeper shade of red. “It’s not my fault the walls are thin.”

“Speaking of that,” I said. “This might seem a little out of left field, but have you guys given any thought to living arrangements for next year?”

A gust of wind from the open door blew in, chilling us all. I pulled on my plaid scarf, wishing we had grabbed a table closer to the back.

“Not really.” Noelle shook her head. “That’s still so far away. Depends on what happens with our rent, I guess. Last year our landlord raised it 10 percent, so if she does that again, we might look for something else. How come?”

I swallowed a bite of food. “I was wondering if you might want to get a three bedroom.”

“That would be awesome,” Noelle said. “We would have so much fun.”

Zara took a sip of iced tea, nodding. She set down the glass as a confused frown crossed her face. “But wait. Why don’t you want to stay with Amelia and Jillian?”

“Uh…We aren’t really getting along lately.”

“Really?” Noelle frowned. “What’s going on?”

“What’s not?” I snorted. “Everyone hates me because of Luke. And they’re using Chase as an excuse, since he’s supposedly enemy number one.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. Luke broke up with you. And you’re a free person.” Zara stabbed at her noodle salad aggressively.

“Tell me about it,” I said. “But it’s so uncomfortable I don’t even want to be there anymore. If I could afford a place on my own, I would be out tomorrow.”

Noelle winced. “That sucks, B. I’m sorry. I don’t know why they would be so shitty.”

“Luke is the ringleader, I guess. What he says goes.”

“But what about your brother?” Zara asked. “Doesn’t he stick up for you?”

I sighed. “No…That’s its own story entirely.”

Definitely didn’t want to get into that right now. Or ever. I was still hoping Derek would come to his senses and end things with Jillian. As it was, I couldn’t look either of them in the eye.

“Anyway,” I said, “if you know anyone who needs a roommate, let me know. I would legitimately consider it. It’s pretty brutal at home.”

Noelle grinned. “Good thing you’ve got Chase to distract you.”

Now it was my turn to blush. “We’re just friends.”

I think.