Page 32 of Love to Hate You
Chapter Eleven
Carter
“Dude, that practice sucked ass.” Noah drops onto the bench that runs parallel to our lockers. “You heading back to the apartment after this?”
Most of our teammates are busy bitching and moaning about the grueling workout Coach just put us through, but not me. I welcome the suicides and hitting drills. I want my muscles to scream bloody murder when all is said and done. I want to be so freaking tired that when I fall into bed an exhausted heap, I won’t dwell on the girl sleeping twenty feet down the hall from me.
Or the curve-hugging tank top and short shorts she likes to torment me with.
I push those thoughts away and shake my head before they can do further damage. “Can’t.” I focus on the inside of my metal locker. “I need to stop at my parent’s house.”
Noah falls silent for a moment and then asks, “Do you want me to come with you?”
“Nah,” I mutter. That would only make matters worse. Just thinking about what I have to do makes my shoulders tense up.
He grabs a T-shirt from his locker and pulls it over his head. “Are you sure that you don’t want some company?”
Because I pride myself on not being a pussy and confronting matters head-on, I turn and meet his concerned gaze. “Yeah, it’ll be fine.”
“You know I’ll come with,” he reiterates in a lower voice. “It’s not a big deal.”
It takes a concerted effort to loosen my muscles and slow my heart rate. “I appreciate it, but it’s not necessary.”
I fucking hate going home, and Noah knows it. He’s one of the few people I trust enough with the truth. Which is exactly why Daisy is off-limits. The last thing I would ever do is destroy my friendship with Noah. He’s like a brother to me. His parents are like my family.
And you don’t fuck with family.
Period.
All I have to do is keep my distance from Daisy. It’s the only way I’ll get through the school year in one piece. But I can’t continue pushing her away or being a dick. It’s exhausting, and I don’t have it in me anymore. Not when all I want to do is tug her close and hold on tight.
The last few days have been cordial between us. This morning we actually made small talk about the unseasonably warm weather we’re experiencing.
Yeah…the weather.
It was the most stilted conversation I’ve ever been forced to participate in. After a while I started babbling about the importance of staying hydrated. Daisy cut me off saying that she had to meet up with Olivia and ran out of the apartment like her ass was on fire. She couldn’t flee fast enough. I’m not sure I’ve ever had a female try to escape my company so quickly. Daisy is the first.
Not exactly great for the ego.
I don’t know what’s worse. Awkward interactions like that or us sniping back and forth. I hate to admit it, but I kind of enjoy our verbal skirmishes. Daisy has a sharp tongue and a wry sense of humor.
With Daisy occupying my brain, Noah and I walk out of the locker room toward the parking lot near the stadium where practice is held.
Noah claps me on the shoulder and slips behind the wheel of his Jeep Wrangler. “If you need me, just call. Okay?”
I nod, even though I have no intention of doing anything of the sort. I don’t want anyone else witnessing my family at their worst. It only deepens the humiliation.
With those thoughts whirling through my head, I slide onto the leather seat of my Mustang and start the engine. The deep purr it makes as it roars to life is music to my ears, but it’s not enough to turn the tide of my darkening mood.
I always feel shitty when I head home.
When I was a kid, I clung to the notion that everything would improve once I escaped the house. But that hasn’t turned out to be the case. There are times when I have to remind myself that I’m not the scrawny eleven-year-old boy I used to be.
The drive home takes about forty-five minutes. Every mile of pavement the tires eat up makes my nerves stretch ever tauter. By the time I roll up to the guard shack and get waved through by a man in uniform, an uncomfortable pit sits in the bottom of my gut.
The gated community my parents reside in is affluent, with sprawling, well-manicured lawns. My parents’ massive brick-and-stone mansion is situated on two acres of land and is larger than the ones surrounding it because my father is the developer who built this subdivision of monstrosities.
With any luck, Dad won’t be home yet. He works at least sixty hours a week, so it’s entirely plausible that he’s still at a job site. If that’s the case, I can slip in before he’s made aware of my presence. Dad might not be home, but there are security cameras everywhere on the property, so he’ll know the moment I pull into the driveway.