Sidelined Read Online Free PDF Page B

times where Jack is involved. Just in a very, very different context.
    “So, why are you here?” Amy leans forward, pushing Cal back.
    “Because, funnily enough, I’m a little anti-relationship after my boyfriend knocked up my cousin,” I snap.
    “Well, I get that, but Jack Carr. Hell. Jack. Carr.”
    “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you had a thing for him, Aims,” Cal says nonchalantly.
    She sputters.
    Seeing the beginning of a dispute, I get up, saying, “Know what? I’m going to Leah’s.”

I left her the half-empty pizza box outside her apartment door, because if she wants to be a bitch, I’m sure as fuck gonna be a dick.
    I have no idea what Macey’s problem with me is, but I’m not gonna play bullshit games. If she truly believes I couldn’t walk into a c offee shop right now and walk out with a chick on my arm, she’s delusional. Shit, man. I could walk into a fucking nunnery and still pull.
    So if she thinks for one motherfucking second I’m going to chase her gorgeous, blow-job-loving ass until she gives in, she has a shit-ton of thinks coming her way, and soon.
    “So you tell her you’re bringing pizza, imply you’re going to fuck her, and she bolts?” Corey confirms.
    “Basically.”
    “You weren’t clear enough on the fucking part, bro. Fuck the pizza. If you’d told her that you’d be fucking her into next week, I bet she’d have been there waiting.”
    “Oh, please!” Leah slaps her hands against the kitchen counter. “You really believe that, Corey?”
    “If I told you that, wouldn’t you be there waiting?”
    Leah looks to the ceiling and mouths, “One, two, three.”
    “Well?”
    “Corey, honey,” she says slowly. “We are in a relationship, and since you practically manhandled my ass into moving in here an hour after giving me your house key, yes, I would be waiting. But Jack and Macey are not in a relationship, certainly not a living-together one, and Macey and I are very, very, very different.”
    “Thank fuck,” I mutter.
    Relationships, living together—that shit doesn’t work. Kudos to Corey and Leah for trying it. It might work out for them, but it sure as fuck didn’t for me. Walking in on my ex in our fucking apartment with some random freshman the day I got drafted for the Vipers all but shattered my trust in anything more solid than one night. I could have given Lucy a fucking certain future, but she decided she’d rather shack up with some eighteen-year-old cock who’d probably had more action with his hand than a real woman.
    “Right,” Corey adds. “Macey doesn’t give a fuck about anything. She’s way more open than you.”
    Leah looks at him flatly. “Watch what you’re saying here, cowboy.”
    “I don’t mean it in a bad way, babe,” he answers. “But ain’t you noticed how she hates men but fucks them happily?”
    Leah sucks her lip into her mouth.
    “Leah?” I ask.
    “Look,” she sighs, walking from the kitchen to the living room. “Macey’s business is Macey’s business, okay? She’s one of my best friends, and I’m not gonna tell you what she hasn’t. She has her reasons for the way she is, and you know what? They’re justifiable. Totally. If I were her, I can’t say I’d be any different.”
    My eyes narrow, because fuck. Why do girls gotta be so damn cryptic? And that secret shit. Man, it pisses me off. You got a problem, you say it. You don’t sit all pretty, biting your lip, avoiding the question.
    Guys don’t do that crap. If we have a problem, we’ll tell you. If you piss us off, we’ll tell you. If we think you’re being a fucking idiot, we’ll tell you.
    At least, I don’t do it. Fairies and ballerinas flounce around the truth with a barrage of denial weighing their butts down, and I’m neither a fairy nor a ballerina. I’m a football player, and if I have a problem, I’m gonna ram it into you the way I ram into the other team’s defense when they think they can block my run.
    The doorbell rings