Tutoring the Player (Campus Wallflowers #1)(72)

“Cybil? She’s harmless.”

“I’m talking about you. What the fuck are you doing here, wasted off your ass?”

“I think you just answered your own question.” I hold up the bottle then remember it’s empty. “Why are you here anyway? Weren’t you going out with…” I wave my hand in the air. I still haven’t met or even learned the name of the guy he’s dating.

“I had a bad feeling when you bailed on your classes today, and you haven’t answered any of my texts.”

“Sucks to be ignored, doesn’t it?” I’ve sent Daisy like twenty texts, and every single one has gone unanswered. I even dropped by her house earlier this week, hoping she’d let me in so we could talk in person. No answer there either. She’s made it clear that she wants nothing to do with me.

“Up.” Something in his tone gets me to my feet. He wraps an arm around me like he’s going to carry me out.

“I can walk,” I insist. I don’t bother fighting him on leaving. I’m tired anyway.

He motions for me to go ahead of him, and I lead us through the party and out the front door.

“What time is it?” I ask as he opens the passenger side door for me. The parking lot is dark and quiet.

“You have about four hours until our morning workout.”

Damn. Where did the day go? I groan as I heave myself up into the truck.

He shuts me in and jogs around the front. I close my eyes on the short drive back to campus. A week of shitty sleep and an entire day of drinking has caught up with me.

Liam wakes me when we’re back at the dorm. My head swims with the alcohol and fragmented memories of Daisy. Her smile, her laugh, the blush she gets high on her cheeks when she’s embarrassed or turned on. Fuck, I miss her.

I stumble into my buddy as we walk through the front door of the dorm. “This is all your fault.”

Liam grunts and steadies me. “How do you figure?”

I let my full weight lean against him, and he shuffles us up the stairs.

“She wanted you. You two make sense. Me and her…” I shake my head side to side. “I don’t know what the hell I was thinking. Daisy is so… well, you know. And I’m, well…”

“Drunk?”

“Yeah, that too.” Damn, am I tired.

He lets me ramble more nonsense as he helps me into our room. He grabs a water and thrusts it at me. “Drink this.”

“You’re fucking bossy tonight.”

“I’m tired, and we have a quiz in the morning.”

“Fuck that. I’m not going.”

He growls and musses his perfect hair. “You know what was really great about you the past couple of months?”

My brain works slowly. I can think of a lot of really great things from the past two months, but none of them are me.

“You actually applied yourself.”

“I was keeping her from you.” Saying the words out loud are like a punch to the gut.

“No.” A muscle in his jaw ticks. “Maybe that’s how it started, but you were different.”

I don’t know anymore. Not even sure it matters since either way, she’s not here.

He keeps going. “She made you want to be better. You’ve been skirting by, drinking too much, barely studying.”

“We’re not all dean’s list material.”

“Fuck that. You’re smarter than me. Always have been, but after Mark died, you stopped giving a shit about everything but partying and hockey.”

I narrow my gaze at him in warning. “No, I just let go of the bullshit, like perfect grades. As long as I keep my GPA high enough to play hockey, that’s all that matters. And I always do, Captain.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Nothing matters because if it did, you might have to risk caring about something else and it not working out. Failing, losing people—it sucks.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Fine, but what I do know is that since you started hanging out with Daisy, you quit the constant partying, you went to class, and you found other things to fill your time without being wasted or on the ice. And you were fucking happy.”

Ignoring him, I uncap the water and chug all of it.

The asshole won’t let it alone. “You love her. Tell me I’m wrong?”

“Love is bullshit. I wish I’d never met her.”

Liam curses under his breath, pins me up against the wall with a forearm, brings his other hand up to my face, and smacks me. Hard.

The sting radiates down my cheek, and I work my jaw back and forth. I’m stunned.

“What the fuck was that for?”

“For saying dumb shit that you don’t mean.” He pushes off me. “You love her, and tomorrow you’re going to remember spewing nonsense and wish you’d have done it yourself.”

“So I should thank you?” I rub my fingers over my cheek. “Damn, that really hurt. Are you gonna punch me next?”

The motherfucker grins. “Don’t tempt me. Go to bed, Thatch. Then wake up and use that big brain of yours to figure out how you’re going to get her back because you’re a miserable son of a bitch without her.”





I make it through Friday on Tums and energy drinks. I crash after my last class and wake up to voices on the other side of the wall in the common area.