As much as I liked that he was into me, this couldn’t last forever.
I was me, and he was him.
Ezra McDuff was the star football player, and when that football playing status was taken away, he turned into the town’s beloved football coach. He was the biggest catch that all of Texas had to offer, since he was offered coaching positions at three of the biggest universities in the country, as well as an assistant coaching position at the professional NFL team in Longview, Texas. And he’d chosen to teach at his hometown high school.
People knew that he was a good man, and women, in general, wanted to make him theirs.
I was just one woman in a long line of women that would likely be only a notch on his bedpost.
“Not a date because I wasn’t asked on one. I saw her at the store. She asked me a question about some restaurant. I answered. Then I left.” Ezra paused, his voice making my skin tingle. “What are you thinking about so hard up there?”
“Nothing,” I lied. “Just hoping that the school doesn’t have any hidden cameras that I don’t know about.”
He snorted. “We’d know about it if they had them. It’s an invasion of privacy, and that little thief that keeps stealing all the science lab’s supplies would be found already.”
I didn’t know what he was talking about. “What science lab supplies?”
Ezra stayed right behind me, making sure that I was covered, while also guiding me where he wanted me to go, taking back hallways that I never would’ve thought to take to get to his office.
“Stuff in the labs is coming up missing. Acid. Beakers. Test tubes. Shit like that. The school board even had a police detective come in and do a little investigating. He wasn’t able to find out who it was, either. But we’re assuming it’s one of the students since ol’ Mrs. Hammersmith can barely walk in and out of the school as it is.”
“I hadn’t heard any of that,” I paused. “But then again, nobody but you likes to talk to me anyway.”
That didn’t sound sad at all, did it?
“I like talking to you,” he said. “And Camryn likes talking to you.”
I rolled my eyes. “Camryn and I came in at the same time and had the same ‘don’t talk to me’ experience from all the teachers. They looked at us like we were outsiders because we were hired when all of the other teachers were fired the year before due to cut backs.”
“I always wondered how you were hired,” he offered from behind me as he stopped me before I could pass a non-descript door. “It was kind of odd that we had over ten teachers fired, and then y’all two were hired the following year instead of them hiring back the previous teachers.”
I stepped back into him as he bid me to do with his hands on my hips, and he opened the door and pushed me inside the next instant, surprising me.
“Where are w—” He turned on the lights and I was looking at a back way into the gym that I’d never seen before in my life. “Where did this come from?”
Ezra laughed, taking the lead. “It’s not used all that often because it leads under the bleachers, and ninety percent of the time the bleachers are closed making this door useless. But since we had a pep rally last week for the baseball game, they were open.”
I blinked as I followed behind him, making sure to stay close.
Being under the bleachers always freaked me out, which was why I started to jabber as I practically ran to keep up with him.
“Camryn and I don’t know why we were hired,” I said. “Apparently, there were just two openings. We both applied and got the jobs. We weren’t even aware that the layoffs had happened until we were at the beginning of the year orientation for the staff. Since we’d been away that summer, we literally walked right into chaos. It didn’t help that I replaced a teacher that was very loved and adored by not just the faculty, but the student body as well.”
Ezra grunted. “Mrs. Peabody was a bitch. She was liked by everyone because she didn’t teach her class, and always had students passing her classes because she was too lazy to actually teach like she was supposed to. I used to share classrooms with her. Trust me when I say we are better off now that she’s gone.”
I’d heard that, too. At least by a few other people that were on the outs with the rest of the staff like I was.
“Camryn is hard not to like, though,” I said. “Consequently, when she puts her mind to something, she fits in. Me, on the other hand? I’ve been here for years now, and I still don’t feel like I belong.”