Page 3 of Second Position (Astor Hill #2)

“Think she’s just callin’ it like she sees it.

” Grant’s voice just slightly dips into that southern drawl of his as he teases his teammate, and my eyes can’t help but snap to his when I hear it.

He’s wearing a tight smirk that tells me he sees right through me and my throat feels thick at the thought that I clearly didn’t fool everyone.

“I have to agree with her,” Olivia begrudgingly admits, clinging onto Will’s arm just a little tighter than before and for once I’m happy that she’s here.

Will stares at me intently, and I feel like I’m going to combust. For maybe the first time, it’s not from infatuation—it’s from irritation. I witness his eyes shift and I know he’s doubting the lie. That it’s bothering him. He knows it isn’t true; or he thinks he knows.

I hold his gaze, waiting for him to disprove me.

To embarrass me in front of all of our peers.

He holds mine for longer than I expect, those mossy green eyes boring into me with startling intimacy.

It isn’t like me to keep things from him—it isn’t like us to have secrets from each other. We’ve always had secrets together.

He drops the eye contact first, rolling his shoulders back and pulling Olivia closer into his side before turning toward one of the hockey guys to ask him something about their use of the gym next week. Their proximity is nothing new, but right now it feels like a dig at me.

“Okay well, pick a new question. We can’t really answer that,” Andy says, pulling me out this silently heated moment with Will .

“ Fine ,” Scott starts. “Never have I ever… played strip poker. Wait—we should play strip poker.”

Will’s fresh laughter, suddenly unbothered, feels like a thread being snipped, and I’m grateful for an excuse to walk away as hot embarrassment throbs at the back of my neck, the feeling foreign.

I’m not usually this affected; the thick skin I’ve developed has gotten good use over the years.

Between the whispers and rumors in high school, the ones that had everyone believing I was just as promiscuous as my “husband-stealing” mother, and the dislike people landed on the second Olivia proclaimed it so, I’ve had to become unfazed.

And I actually am, for the most part, but it isn’t usually Will participating. Will’s always my shield. Always.

I casually get up from my seat, pretending like I’m getting a refill, when I spot Jean. My shoulders relax, until I see his eyes widen with something like shocked amusement.

“Did you just tell that whole group of people that you are in fact not a virgin?” Jean's jovial tone does not match the embarrassment now seeping through my every pore, knowing he, and likely others, saw what happened.

“Why are you always so late?” I whine, leaning back against the tree where he does the same. “This wouldn’t have happened if you were here.”

“Being this pretty takes time,” he quips. “Maybe now you can actually get laid. I mean Will’s gorgeous so I get the whole unrequited love situation to an extent . But no one is that hot.”

When I confided in Jean about my virginal status during a late rehearsal, his jaw dropped. He was shocked—mortified. He couldn’t believe I’d been wasting my youth chasing after a boy, or as he put it “ not sowing your hot ass wild oats. ”

Jean’s small gasp has my shoulders tensing again.

I know that sound. It’s the sound he makes when he has an idea , and those are almost always designed to make me jump out of my skin.

Like the time he wanted us to egg his ex-boyfriend’s front door at six o’clock in the morning as baby underclassmen who definitely could’ve gotten a reprimand for destroying on-campus housing.

They got back together the next day, like I knew they would.

“Now is so not the time—can we please go?”

“I just got here. And you don’t even know what I’m going to say!” he says, glee bursting through his gaze. I raise my brows, permitting him to continue. “You should do it.”

He stands there looking ready to burst as he waits for my response.

“Do what?” Tell Will how I feel? Tell him to fuck off? Lose my?—

“ Sleep with someone .”

My laugh is genuine as I shake my head. “Sure. Let me just pick someone out of the crowd!”

“Okay, don’t act like you literally couldn’t.”

“Jean,” I say, tilting my head.

“Gen,” he says back, mocking me. “There are a number of guys here who would have no problem sleeping with you. I’m sure some of them have fantasized about it.” His brows waggle obnoxiously, and I can’t help but giggle.

“Like who ?” I can’t help the smirk that spreads across my face, none of the angst or disappointment I felt sitting around that fire anywhere to be found now that Jean is here.

“Hear me out. Scott is like?—”

I gag loudly, bending over for effect. “Don’t even continue that statement. I hope your list gets better than this.”

“Whatever…Scott is hot in that, like, annoying, don’t sp eak or really look at me way. You know?” He shrugs, shifting his gaze away from Scott. “Andy would be game.”

“Because he’s game with everyone . Is this seriously the list?” My abdominal muscles start to cramp with how much I’m laughing at Jean’s suggestions, today’s conditioning at the bar already having left me feeling bruised in the middle.

“A man with experience is definitely not what you should be worrying about,” he says, winking. He has a point.

“But he’s so goofy. I don’t know if goofy is my thing.”

“Bitch, you don’t have a thing or a type, beyond Will Chapman. Spare me.”

“Fair point,” I admit with a laugh. “But still a no. If I’ve waited this long, I’m going to be choosy.”

We stand there, crafting an imaginary list of one-night suitors like two old biddies. We go through the rosters on the hockey team, the lacrosse team, the swim team, and of course, basketball, but none of them are quite right for this hypothetical tryst.

“Now that we’ve dissected the rumored sexual prowess of every jock here,” I say, the heat from my continuous laughter leaving my chest slightly damp with sweat, “we should probably go.”

“Wait! I know.” His eyes lock on a figure standing close to the fire.

“Jean, I’m not actually?—”

“Grant Fielder would one thousand percent be perfect.” My vision focuses on him in the distance, having an amused conversation with none other than Ben Cabot—Will’s older brother and his best friend.

I cock my head at Jean, eyes narrowing as I wonder if he’s trying to be diabolical by suggesting I hook up with the only guy Will doesn’t seem to jive with, other than his brother.

But his gaze is pure excitement, and where I was quick to identify the problem with every other guy Jean listed, I’m now speechless.

I struggle to find something wrong with him, so I settle on whatever he thinks is wrong with me.

“Except that he probably hates me?”

“Hate by association—he can’t stand Will. And I don’t blame him,” he says with a ‘but let’s not get into that’ head tilt. “Anyway, everyone knows hate and lust are like different sides of the same coin.”

“He barely speaks to me,” I tell Jean, suddenly self-conscious.

“Wow—you are actually oblivious. There’s no way he is not thinking of what you look like naked with how often he just stares at you.”

I scoff, feeling my blush spread across my cheeks.

“Oh my god…Genevieve. Are you blushing?”

“No,” I rush to save face, facing forward rather than in toward him.

“You would do it,” he says in awe, like he finally struck gold.

And to be clear, hooking up with a guy, sort of at random in order to lose my virginity, is not how I wanted to do this but…

something like liberation slinks down my spine when I imagine that guy being Grant Fielder. Maybe I’m a masochist.

“ Let’s go ,” I urge Jean, sensing the chaotic edge of his energy ratcheting up.

“Grant!” he calls, waving an arm in the air, and I smack his arm before hiding mine behind my back. Panic rips through me as I catch the slight furrow of Grant’s brow.

“I didn’t think you were going to literally call him over here,” I whisper hiss. Jean casually shrugs, but I don’t miss the twinkle of mischief in his eye .

Grant makes his way to us, caution lining his figure against the fire behind him.

“You played great the other night. Didn’t he, Gen?” Jean nudges me, and I stand up from the trees, crossing my arms as I try to subtly glare at Jean and regard Grant with the same skepticism he usually gives me.

Except right now, he’s not looking at me like that. He’s looking at me with unsettling curiosity.

“Yeah,” I relent. “You did fine.” I just barely shrug my shoulder.

“Fine?” he asks, his amused smirk emitting a spark that feels like it skitters across my skin.

“Well, I can’t say I was paying attention to you in particular.” I watch his eyes search my face before he huffs a small laugh, just as Jean steps on my foot crossing to leave.

He shoots me a look and mouths just for me to see: “Now or never.” Then adds, for both of us to hear: “Oop—I see a keg stand. Find you later!”

I silently curse him, hoping he stubs his toe or spills beer all over his mock turtleneck, and school my features.

Because despite the fact that only Jean could propose a plan like this, I find myself incredibly tempted by the idea of just doing it.

I almost never do anything on a whim, and maybe that’s part of my problem.

This is crazy , is all I can think to myself as adrenaline courses through me.

And crazy as it is, I feel kind of invigorated?

Even if he says no, which is entirely possible, the thrill of the ask feels good right now.

Maybe it’s the endorphins from my conversation with Jean, maybe it's an uncharacteristic moment of insanity, or maybe it’s that Grant is undeniably handsome, even more-so when a scowl meant for Will isn’t plastered on his face.