Holding Out for a Hero (15 page)

Ella felt a rising tide of heat. The urge to hurl the vases against the wall and watch them smash into a pile of ruby shards shook her to the core. Damn Rachel to hell.

Jake frowned. Ella had gone really pale and was looking at him like he’d just sprouted fangs. “Ella?”

“Yes, Jake,” she said, her voice trembling with roiling emotions, “they are.”

Jake looked at them again. “Yeah. I thought so. I always thought it was pretty cool how they refracted that weird red light around her room.”

“Oh God. Oh God. Oh God,” she moaned. The vain flicker of hope that maybe he’d just heard about the vases through grubby boys’ talk was brutally snuffed out.

She leaped out of bed, her mind scattering as she searched for something to put on. Jake’s coyness earlier about the experienced woman who had taken his virginity set ice running in her veins. Roger Hillman’s words from last night—
Come on, Jake, you know what Rachel was like
—caused a pain in her chest so severe she thought she was having a heart attack. She rubbed at it, trying to ease it.

She threw on Jake’s jersey. “Get out,” she said, crossing her arms around her middle to stop her hands from shaking. How could he have done this to her? How could he have touched her, made love to her, when he’d slept with her mother first?

Jake vaulted up. Jesus Christ, what had just happened? “What the hell?”

“Oh, Jake.” Ella fought against the urge to let her face crumple and bit back the emotion that rose on a high tide of despair. “Don’t be so bloody obtuse. The vases, Jake. The
vases
.”

It took a few more seconds of her bitter accusatory glare for it to click. Her horrifying assumption crashed over him.
She thought that he’d
…

“Oh, hang on,” he said after a moment, ripping back the sheets and scrabbling for his own clothes. “This is insane, Ella.”

Ella, her chest a cold block of ice, watched as Jake stepped commando into his jeans and reached for the zipper. She prayed his dick would get stuck in the vicious teeth, maybe then he’d know a bit of the pain that was tearing into her flesh. But he yanked it up without incident.

Ella’s breath hissed in and out of her lungs. “Just get out,” she commanded.

Jake couldn’t believe that they’d gone from post-coital bliss to bitter recrimination in a matter of seconds. “You think I slept with Rachel?”

She barely heard him, her brain too busy conjuring images that made her want to retch. She needed a shower. Even hearing him say the words was like an ice-pick to her heart. “Damn right I do, Jake.”

Jake raked a hand through his hair. He pulled his T-shirt over his head and stalked toward her. She seriously thought that of him? After everything they’d shared these last weeks? “This is bullshit, Ella.”

A noise came from the back of Ella’s throat that defied description. It was guttural and ugly, a cross between a roar and a mortally wounded whimper. “You have to have been in her room to know about the sunlight on the vases, Jake.”

It was one of the happier memories from her childhood, from when she was really little: lying in bed with her mother in the morning, waiting for the sun to get high enough to strike the vases. The sense of wonder as the room took on a mystical garnet hue. Her mother laughing with her, telling her how she had laid with
her
mother as a little girl, waiting for the very same thing.

She gave Jake’s chest an angry shove and he rocked back on his heels. “What do you think, Jake?” She shoved again, harder this time. “How do you rate me?” Another shove, which made no dent to the solid wall of his chest. “Was I as good as her? Was I?”

Jake reared back as if she’d struck him across the face instead of the rather paltry pushing. Her face was red, her eyes wild, her hair flying around her face with each enraged push she administered. She looked … crazed.

Unreasonable.

A little like that day in Huntley two years ago when she’d come to him, grieving for her mother and angry at the town over the vicious rumor surrounding her departure.

Jake grabbed her hands, which had fisted into his T-shirt, and pulled them off him, stepping back. Everything inside him froze. Everything that had been warm and loose just moments ago was now cold and tight. She seriously, seriously thought that he’d slept with her mother.

Surely, she knew him better than that?

Obviously not.

A white hot anger flared to life in the pit of his belly. The solution was an easy fix—just open his mouth and deny it. But the heat became a burn that licked through his veins and pride kept his mouth firmly shut.

If Ella could believe him capable of that, then he didn’t want anything to do with her. “I don’t have to put up with this crap,” he said softly.

He turned and gathered the rest of his belongings, hardening his heart to the tiny whimpering noises he could hear gurgling at the back of her throat. But when he turned back she looked so devastated that his earlier resolve faltered. He couldn’t leave her like this. She was trembling all over, standing in his jersey, her arms around her waist pulling it higher till it barely reached her thighs. She was sniffing and biting her lip.

Then he sighed, stepping closer. “Ella.”

She retreated a step, but forced herself to look at him. The man who had done something he’d known she’d never forgive him for but had gone ahead and slept with her anyway. “Just leave the money on the table on your way out.”

Jake sucked in a breath and his lips flattened into two thin slashes in his face. He opened the door without a backward glance and left.

Ella’s legs collapsed beneath her and she slid down the wall. Tears came to her eyes but she suppressed them. They clogged her throat, tingled like a thousand needles in her nose but she pushed them back. She would not cry twice in as many days. So she hugged her knees to her chest, laid her cheek against them and rocked.

*

Jake was watching the Demons do drills on Thursday afternoon. He’d been working them hard all week, having brought them down from the high of their first win on Monday morning with brutal honesty, hammering in to them that the comp would get harder—and the Schools Cup would be hardest of all.

They’d looked at the video from the match over and over, pointing out each player’s weaknesses and strengths, their errors, and he and Pete had spent the week running endless drills targeting specific areas. The fact that he’d been pissed since storming out of Ella’s house on Sunday had certainly kept the fire burning in his gut. He’d seen her only a few times at a distance and frankly, he didn’t care if he never saw her again.

So, they fucked like they were made for each other? Sex he could get—with uncomplicated women. Women who wanted to say they’d screwed a legend and didn’t give a shit about the piss-ant town he’d grown up in nor who he’d bedded while he lived there. He didn’t need someone from his past messing up his future. He was the coach and she was the principal. It was a line they should never have crossed.

He tracked Cameron around the field for a bit as he worked on his passing. The boy had loads of stamina, but he was a ball hogger, relying on his bulk to bust through the opposition’s front line instead of using his brains and his team members. He watched some of the other guys working with Pete on their tackling. They needed some training machines. Hanniford High had no equipment and no budget to buy any. The Demons’ training sessions seemed archaic compared to the high-tech sessions during his professional career. It put them at a disadvantage and, God knew, they were already handicapped enough. He could probably apply for a disabled parking space for the team bus. Not that they had one of those either.
Fuck!

“Pass the goddamned ball, Cameron,” he shouted from the sidelines.

He made a mental note to start getting some basic stuff. What the hell else was he going to do with his money? The teams they were up against had equipment, top-class equipment, he’d wager. If Ella wanted to win, wanted him to coach Hanniford High to victory, then he needed the right tools.

“Jake!”

Jake turned to find Miranda bounding along the sideline with all her usual indefatigable vigor. Honestly, if he hadn’t had seen her feet as she’d emerged into the world fifteen years ago he’d swear she’d been born with springs instead.

She enveloped him in her usual enthusiastic hug as Trish brought up the rear. “Miranda. Stop it. You know you’re not supposed to hug Jake at school.”

Jake grinned at Trish, an older version of her daughter, her step still springy despite the march of time. He kissed her on the cheek and they chatted briefly about the debut game before Miranda spat out what it was that had her shifting from foot to foot like a Cocker Spaniel on speed.

“I want to form a cheer squad.”

Jake glanced sharply at Trish. The years fell away between them and he could see her in her little bitty skirt, her ponytail bouncing as she did the splits in midair, the team logo emblazoned across her tight blue and white shirt. “You okay with this?” he asked.

“Course she is,” Miranda jumped in. “Mum even said she’d train us.”

Trish held up her hands and shrugged. “I’ve tried to talk her out of it.”

Jake looked at Miranda again, not comfortable with the idea of her flashing her legs and shaking her chest in front of a bunch of horny teenage boys. As a professional, he understood that a cheer squad was all part of the showbiz of the game. The razzamatazz. But cheerleading wasn’t all pom-poms and routines. He and Trish knew that better than anyone.

He’d hate to see history repeating itself. Hate to see Miranda crushed like her mother had been. But he didn’t have the heart to tell her no. He’d never been able to say no to her. Then a sudden thought had him smiling. Ella could do his dirty work for him.

“Okay. But you have to get Ella’s permission first.”

Miranda squealed and grabbed him around the neck. “Oh thank you, Jake. Thank you, thank you.”

Jake chuckled as he pulled her arms off his neck. “Yeah, well, don’t count your chickens.”

“Could you come with me, Jake? Ms. Lucas has been a real grouch all week and she likes you.”

Liked him? Liked to castrate him, maybe. “Grouchy, huh?”

“Cameron thinks she might be, you know … going through the change.”

Jake saw Trish roll her eyes and threw back his head as a huge belly laugh escaped. Considering Ella was two years younger than him and still in her thirties, he doubted her ovaries were in any immediate danger of ceasing to function. “Best not mention that to her.”

“So you’ll help me? Tomorrow before training?”

It was on the tip of Jake’s tongue to tell her no. He doubted whether his presence would do much for her cause. But wasn’t that what he wanted? He sighed. “Okay. Sure.”

“Yes.” Miranda squealed again. “You’re the best, Jake.” And she ran back to a group of girls who huddled together and then all started squealing together.

“Oh God,’ he said to Trish. “I’ve created a monster.”

*

Ella, already well and truly shitty with the world, was tearing up another letter that had arrived in an ominous yellow envelope when the knock came. “Come in,” she called.

She looked up to see Miranda Jones entering and smiled. Jake followed her in and the smile died. She hadn’t spoken with him since Sunday and had, frankly, been dreading the prospect.

Which, apparently, was now.

She’d lived that moment over and over in her mind, that dreadful sinking moment when she’d realized Jake had been in Rachel’s room. Men had gone into Rachel’s room for one reason only—and Jake had been one of them. It didn’t matter how hot he looked right now in his grey Nike singlet, screwing her mother was unforgiveable. She didn’t know why she held Jake to a higher standard. She just did.

Miranda shifted nervously in front of her and Ella dragged her mind away from the weekend’s humiliation. The young woman gave her a shy smile and Ella wondered where peppy Miranda had gone.

“Can I help you with something, Miranda?” She saw Jake flinch a little at her deliberate snub. She only wished it made her feel better.

“I asked Jake yesterday if we could form a cheer squad and he said you had to give your permission first. So I’m here to ask your permission.”

Ella frowned. Her gaze cut to Jake. What the hell was he playing at? He knew how she felt about cheerleaders. “Oh. I see,” Ella murmured looking back at Miranda, steepling her fingers, buying some time.

“My mum said she’d train us,” Miranda added into the growing silence. “We can train in the afternoons on the oval.”

“Your mother?”

Miranda nodded her head enthusiastically. “She was a professional cheerleader. That’s where she met Jake.”

Ella saw Jake close his eyes briefly and her fingers collapsed. She scrutinized his face and he looked guilty as hell. Aha! She’d always wondered about their story. Had Trish and Jake been lovers?

She got up and sauntered over to the window, wondering if there were any women on this planet—
and their mothers
—who hadn’t ended up between his sheets. A train was waiting at the station opposite and she studied it for a second, choosing her words carefully, before turning.

“I have to be honest with you, Miranda. I’m not in favor of this. At all.”

“Oh but, Miss—”

Ella held up her hand. “Have you heard of Emmeline Pankhurst, Miranda?”

Miranda looked affronted. “Of course.  She was a British suffragette,” Miranda expanded. “She rocks.”

“And how do you think she’d feel to see young women prancing around in itty-bitty costumes providing sexual entertainment for males at sports events?"

Miranda frowned. “I know there’s a huge debate about cheerleaders and feminism, Ms. Lucas. I’m a feminist, just ask Mr. Deacon—he gave me an A for my
Beyond the Female Eunuch
essay. But I like to think that feminism came about to fight for our right to make our own choices.”

Ella blinked at Miranda’s eloquence. She even felt a rush of optimism that young women were still thinking, still aware of the issues. In her peripheral vision she saw Jake hide a smile with a stubble rub.

“But what about the message cheerleading sends to younger, less informed girls? That women are just there to prop up male egos while they chase a stupid ball around a ground—”