My Darling Arrow (St. Mary's Rebels 1)

But that is it.

That is all they’re ever going to know.

It’s better that my team hate me for punching Ben than they think I’m a fool.

Last season, our leftwing striker found out that his wife had been cheating on him and he had no clue. And I wondered how.

How the fuck did he not know?

Shouldn’t a man know these things? It made me wonder about his ability to play on the field. If he’s so clueless in his personal life, how the fuck do I know he’s going to give one hundred percent on the field? And I wasn’t the only one. A few pitied him, others thought that he was stupid.

I’m not going to be in the same position.

I’m The Blond fucking Arrow.

No one is going to question my judgement on the field.

I knew Sarah would never open her mouth because her reputation is everything to her. She won’t have people thinking that she spread her legs for someone else while she was with me. I also knew Ben would never say anything either; it would make him look less of a victim.

Besides, my mother loves Sarah. She is the daughter my mom never had, and I can’t break that illusion for her.

I can’t hurt her that way.

I can’t disappoint her any more than I have.

“Duly noted, Mom,” I reply sardonically even though I can barely keep my eyes on her. “I think you should go back to sleep now or you’ll be late for your flight tomorrow.”

“I was against your relationship with her from the beginning. But you proved yourself. You proved your worth. But I guess I should’ve trusted my gut. I should’ve known that a girl would make you lose focus and screw up everything that we’ve worked for. I’m not going to let you kill your father again, do you hear me? He’s not going to die again because you were foolish enough to lose your focus. Do you understand me? Do what you have to do so you can go back and fulfill your father’s dream,” she says and leaves me in darkness.

My father’s dream.

To play in the European League. The dream that remained unfulfilled because he died.

As I step into the night, I fish out cigarettes from my jeans pocket. I light one up and puff out a huge cloud of smoke into the sky.

Sometimes I wonder if my father hadn’t seen that dream with his own eyes, would it have become mine?

Sometimes I wonder if… if I could ever have other dreams. My dreams.

Or if every son inherits his father’s dreams by default.

There’s a little mailbox outside his office.

It has a thin slot where you can slide the letters and internal office documents and memos in. It also has a little lock on it, a shiny silver lock where he can put his key in to open the box and retrieve all the mail people have left him.

That’s where I plan to leave him a note – a tiny little note – on Monday before classes start.

It’s the first note in a long series of notes that I’m hoping to send him. Notes designed to weaken his resolve.

And seduce him.

Yes, I’ve never seduced anyone. Or at least I hadn’t, not until the night we kissed.

The kiss that rocked my world and turned me into a horny, greedy girl who also humped his leg and came like a firecracker.

But that’s beside the point.

The point is that I don’t really know the art of seduction. Whatever I did that night was pure instinct.

That’s what I’m going to do now too.

I’m going to follow my gut and seduce him by leaving him little notes. That seems like the obvious, most natural choice, right?

I’ve written him letters for years.

I’m used to telling him things on paper, and there are a few things that I’d like to tell him now as well.

Things like he can use me for whatever he wants and that won’t make him an asshole. Or the fact that if he just tells me what he wants in a perfect rebound girl, I’ll give it to him.

But there’s a problem.

Which doesn’t occur to me until I rush upstairs to the second floor where his office is, with the letter in my pocket.

The problem that I’m basically seducing my soccer coach.

The other problems, I was aware of. Problems like my sister would freak out if she knew. She’d call me names and she’d hate me. But she already hates me, doesn’t she?

Or the fact that Leah might have an objection as well.

She loves Sarah and Arrow together, as evidenced by her dinner plan. So she’s not going to like that I – the bad, rule-breaking sister – am planning to seduce her son. It was a miracle she didn’t see us kiss in her backyard, for which I’ve been thanking my lucky stars for the past two days.