Clipped by Love (Bellevue Bullies #2) Read online

  When the side door opens, I look up to see Jude coming out and down the stairs with his stick. He tried to talk to me last night, but I shut that down quickly and stayed locked up in my room. I tried to sleep, but all I could do was see the hurt in her eyes, the shock and deceit that was in them when I said what I did. I regret it. I wish I had talked to her about what I was feeling. I’m sure she might have agreed with me, but then I felt like she was too gone. I wish I could have been man enough to tell her that we shouldn’t do it and trust that I could walk her out. Instead, everything blew up in my face when all I was trying to do was do right by her.

  If I could, I’d do it all over again, and this time, I would have been honest.

  Not a fucking coward like she said.

  When he taps the ground with his stick, I look up, seeing that Jude is by the goal. I send the puck hard to him and he redirects it into the goal with ease. We’ve been doing this since we were kids; I’d be completely surprised if he had missed. When his arms go up, I shake my head. He’s such a showboat.

  “And the crowd goes wild!” he says in an announcer’s voice. “Those Sinclair brothers are lethal!”

  We were, before he moved, but I won’t tell him that, he’s trying to cheer me up. So with a forced grin, I move a puck back and forth then take a shot, this time missing the pipe altogether, the puck slamming into the house. Making sure it didn’t damage anything—thank God it didn’t—I reach for another puck.

  “Working on your wrist shot, I see?”

  I nod, throwing another puck to the goal, hitting the crossbar this time. “Yup. Was told it sucks.”

  He nods. “It does, but you can lay a dude out and slap shot like a dream, so I’m sure no one really pays attention.”

  My mouth pulls up at the side as I shoot again. Baylor noticed. Feeling like a dog that’s been kicked a few times, I shoot over and over again, taking turns with Jude. He doesn’t say much, especially when I keep looking down the driveway, hoping to see Baylor walking up.

  “How ya holding up?” he finally asks and I shrug.

  “Ah, I’ll be okay.”

  “You look sick.”

  I smile. “I’m hungover. Too much Jack.”

  “Yeah,” he agrees. “You got yourself a nice little bruise there too.”

  Reaching up, I rub the tender spot on my jaw and I want to laugh. We both have matching bruises. I gave her hers and she gave me mine. Kind of masochistic in a way, I guess.

  “Yeah.”

  He looks over at me, but I ignore his knowing look as I shoot again. “Hey Jay, so surely I’m wrong, but you aren’t waiting for her, are you?”

  I shrug, looking over at him. “Why would you ask that?”

  “Well, I heard the date being made during the showdown of beer pong, and you’ve been out here since ten this morning. Your shoulders are burnt, and you look like a kid waiting for the ice cream truck.”

  He’s right, but I don’t care. “I don’t know.”

  “You know she isn’t coming, right?”

  “You don’t know that,” I say, reaching for another puck and shooting. When the door opens again, we both look up to see Jace and Delanie coming down the stairs. It’s the first we’ve seen of them, and I’ve been waiting. But when she looks at me, I know the answer to my next question.

  “Hey, have you talked to you Baylor?”

  “Yeah,” she says with a nod, glaring at me and sending me to the fiery depths of hell with her eyes. “And just in case you are confused on how to fuck off, it’s quite easy. Go throw yourself off a bridge or something.”

  Well, then.

  Glancing over at Jude, I say, “I guess you’re right, she isn’t going to come play.”

  “She’ll never want to speak to you again,” Delanie says, and I nod. “She’ll kill you if she ever sees you again!”

  “Yeah, I got that,” I say, letting out a breath. I don’t miss the tap against my shin though from Jude.

  “You’re a dick,” is her decision and I shrug.

  “That’s the rumor on the street,” I say, exhaling a breath as Jace steals back her attention.

  Thankfully.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I watch as she leans over, kissing him fully on the lips. “I’m sorry your brother is a dick. You’re great though.”

  He smacks her ass before pulling her in tight. “Not my problem, those two. But you were great last night and this morning.”

  “Aw,” she says, cupping his face. “I just want to bottle you up and carry you around.”

  “He gets an aw for having a one-night stand, and I try to be a gentleman and get a bruised jaw,” I mutter to Jude, which causes him chuckle.

  “Girls be nuts.”

  “True that,” I say, rolling the puck off my blade, missing the crossbar but getting it in the net.

  “Call me if you ever get to Nashville, okay?”

  “For sure,” she agrees, pressing her lips to his once more. Since they are disgusting, I shoot the puck, hitting it off the side of the pipe. Jude taps me on the shin before taking the puck and shooting himself, getting it smack-dab in the middle. Delanie then says bye to Jude but flips me off as she walks away, and I can’t help but laugh.

  “I’m not a bad dude,” I say out loud, more to myself than my brothers.

  But both of them nod. “You’re not,” Jude says. “And I don’t admit that much.”

  “What the hell happened? Baylor called, pulling Delanie out of bed. I had at least another two hours of nasty time.”

  Sending him a look of little sympathy, I say, “Sorry for ruining that.”

  “It’s fine. What happened?”

  Letting out another breath, I lean on my stick and explain to my younger brother what happened. I really don’t think he cares, but when I finish, he shakes his head.

  “Bitches be crazy, man, and she was hundred shades of it. I didn’t trust her from the beginning,” he says, reaching for a spare stick and grabbing a puck.

  And that bugs me. “’Cause you don’t know her. She’s really great.”

  “How can you say that when she punched you and called you out like she did? You don’t have daddy issues, and she’s lucky you even wanted to touch her.”

  Shaking my head, I look up at the sky, drawing a breath in through my nose. “Because she was different. I deserved it.”

  “How did you deserve it? You were trying to do right by her.”

  Jude rolls his eyes. “Jace, were you listening? He didn’t tell her the truth; he covered it up because she was so mad. She wasn’t listening to reason. She was drunk.”

  “Oh,” Jace says then with a shrug. “Well, who the fuck cares? You won’t ever see her again. No reason to let her ruin the rest of our vacation. Plenty of hot sexy bitches left.”

  “Ah, to be young and not care one bit about anyone else’s feelings,” I mutter, receiving a glare from him.

  “It isn’t that I don’t care, it’s that you are allowing her to have too much power over you. Her loss, man, let it go. Let’s go parasailing or something,” he says with a shrug.

  But I don’t want to go parasailing. I want to make this better, but I’m not sure how. I’m actually half tempted to go by their house and see if I can see her. To apologize. But I doubt she’ll see me. She’d probably try to drown me in the ocean.

  Shooting the puck, Jude says, “I’m sorry, dude. I know you really liked her.”

  Looking over at Jude, I tap his shin. The manly hockey way of saying thanks and a billion other things. “Thanks.”

  “Fuck, you two are my role models? Two crybabies?” Jace says then, visibly annoyed with us.

  “Hey, fuck you, you little shit. We are great role models,” Jude says, standing up a little taller.

  “In every aspect of life except girls.”

  “What does that mean? I have a great relationship,” Jude says back, scrunching his face up, and even I’m confused by Jace’s little outburst.

  “Yeah, but you cried ove