Savage Royals (Boys of Oak Park Prep 1)

His lips were pursed as he concentrated, but I watched the pulse in his neck jump as he ran his hand up my thigh and held it there a second. Finally, he pulled his palm away and capped the container before he nodded.

“There. Now you should stop making those ridiculous hissing noises every time you try to move.”

I stared at him as I set down my right foot. “You heard that?”

“You’re not exactly quiet.” He laughed.

It was the first time I’d seen him laugh when it wasn’t directed at some misfortune I was experiencing. It brightened up his face and made him look almost angelic. The dimples on either side of his full lips were perfect mirrors of each other, and I had the sudden strange impulse to touch them, to caress his beautiful, tan skin. To absorb the sunshine he seemed to radiate in this moment.

I clenched my hands into fists just to make sure I wouldn’t be stupid enough to actually do it. Just like touching a butterfly’s wings, if I touched him now, it would kill the sunshine—turn it back to ash.

Resetting my position at the barre, I shook my head quickly and went back to practicing as he walked over and put away the container.

“How did you know to use that stuff?” I asked, peeking at him in the reflection of the mirror.

“I use it before and after every football practice. I’ve been playing since I was like ten, so by now my body is pretty shit.” He laughed again, running a hand through his hair. “You can only get hit so many times and not break a bone or dislocate things.”

“How many times have you gotten hurt like that?”

Finn counted quietly. “At least three or four times.”

I stared. “You’re kidding! What the fuck? I broke both my legs and that was all the pain I ever want to experience. How do you deal with it? Why does it keep happening?”

He waved a hand. “My dad can afford the best doctors, so they fix me right up. Then I get some really strong pain meds and spend a few weeks high out of my mind. You can’t be in pain if you take pills every five minutes and sleep all day. It hurts worst in the few weeks after I start practicing and playing football again, but I always try to get back as quick as I can after an injury. And it keeps happening because I’m the Oak Park quarterback. Every time I step onto the field someone’s dying to knock my legs out from under me.”

Damn, that’s intense.

I couldn’t imagine how hard that had to be, although I definitely knew what it felt like to constantly be the target of someone’s hatred. I wanted to point that out to him, but I decided not to push my luck. For once, he was talking to me like we weren’t mortal enemies, and I didn’t want the temporary peace to end yet.

“Shit. That sounds awful.”

He just shrugged, making a what are you gonna do face.

My legs still tingled slightly from the balm, and I shook them out before moving to the floor to work on a staggered bridge. I lay on my back and braced my hands next to my head, then pushed up from the floor, lifting and arching my spine as I extended one leg above me. This move didn’t hurt at all, but it challenged my strength and stretched my joints in a pleasant way.

Finn watched me, even craned his neck to get a better view. I bit my lip to hide a laugh as he checked me out. He almost seemed impressed.

“Jesus. Your body does some weird-ass shit.”

“It’s called flexibility.” I grinned, pointing and flexing my foot before lifting it a little higher. “And you need it to be a dancer.”

He whistled softly. “Damn, Legs. You’ve got me beat.”

I froze for a second in the process of switching feet, my heart lurching in my chest.

Finn and the other Princes usually called me Idaho, with the trash heavily implied. But when he called me Legs, it didn’t sound like an insult.

It sounded almost like a compliment.

I pulled my gaze away from him, going through a few more stretches in silence while I tried to get my pulse under control. It shouldn’t matter whether Finn was impressed or not; I shouldn’t care what he thought. And besides, this room was some kind of weird neutral territory outside the battleground of the school—like Switzerland. Anything he said in here didn’t count.

He was still watching me though, his eyes still full of that same warm curiosity and a dash of humor. It was unnerving me, disarming me, so I blurted the first thing I could think of to make him stop staring at me in silence.

“So, why do you do it then? Why do you keep playing football if you know you’re going to get hurt?”

Finn smiled, gazing past me. He seemed almost wistful, and that look made him even softer, more pure and real than I’d ever seen before. He shook his head.

“’Cause I love it. Why do anything, you know? Yeah, I might get hurt, but it’s so worth it. The minute I get out there on that field, the world is mine. I’m pumped and ready to go. I don’t know, there’s just something incredible about it. It’s like pure fucking freedom. I first picked up a ball when I was four, and every year after that I wanted to play. I joined the junior leagues, but I was too eager for them.”