Trust in Me

makeup, because her face was . . . fresh. Natural. I liked it. Her gaze met mine and then flickered away.

“I was explaining to her how I go by two names,” Ollie said.

“Oh yeah?” I caught up with them, dropping my arm over her shoulders. Her feet tripped up, and I tightened my arm, tucking her against my side. In the back of my head, I thought she fit perfectly. “Whoa, sweetheart, almost lost you there.”

“Look at you.” Ollie hopped down the stairs like a frog. “Got the girl tripping all over her feet.”

I laughed, keeping an arm around her as I slid the cap backward. “I can’t help it. It’s my magnetic charm.”

“Or it could be your smell.” Ollie grinned. “I’m not sure I heard a shower this morning.”

I gasped. “Do I smell bad, Avery?”

“You smell great,” she said, and then a red flush quickened across her cheeks. “I mean, you don’t smell bad.”

Instinct told me she meant something completely different. “Heading to class?”

Shortcake didn’t say anything as we walked down the stairs, but her face was pinched as if she was in deep thought about something.

“Avery?”

She squirmed away, and my eyes narrowed as she hurried off. “Yeah, I’m heading to art. What about you guys?”

Catching up with her on the third floor, I’d be damned if she got away that easily. “We’re going out to breakfast. You should skip and join us.”

She tightened her grip on her bag. “I think I’ve done enough skipping this week.”

“I’m skipping,” Ollie announced, “but Cam doesn’t have a class until this afternoon, so he’s a good boy.”

“And you’re a bad boy?” she asked.

He grinned at Shortcake, the kind of smile I’d seen him give countless girls. “Oh, I’m a bad, bad boy.”

My skin prickled as I shot Ollie a look. “Yeah, as in bad at spelling, math, English, cleaning up after yourself, talking to people, and I could go on.”

“But I’m good at the things that count,” Ollie replied.

“And what are those things?” I asked as we stepped out under clouds fat with rain. It was going to be one of those days.

Ollie faced us, walking backward. A red truck started to back up, but he kept going, forcing the truck to grind to a halt. I shook my head. He held up a tanned hand and started ticking off his fingers. “Drinking, socializing, snowboarding, and soccer—remember that sport, Cam? Soccer?”

I stared at him. “Yeah, I remember it, asshole.”

Ollie, probably having no idea what he’d just done, spun around and headed for my truck. A muscle started to tick in my jaw. I shoved my hands in my jeans as I glanced at Shortcake. “See you around, Avery.”

Leaving her, I joined Ollie by my truck. Instead of hitting the unlock button to all the doors, I only did mine and climbed in, slamming the door shut behind me.

“Hello,” came Ollie’s muffled voice.

Ignoring him, I turned on the truck. A big, fat raindrop hit the windshield, and I smiled, looking up at the sky.

“Hey!”

Slowly, I raised my hand, giving him the finger.

Ollie jumped when the sky opened up in a torrential downpour, howling like a wounded animal. Only when his hair was plastered to his skull did I unlock his door.

He climbed in, shivering. “What the fuck, man?”

“You deserved it.” I shifted into reverse, backing out. One look at Ollie’s creased forehead told me he was racking his brain for what he did. I sighed. “You really need to lay off the pot.”

“If I’ve heard that once, I’ve heard that a million times, but Mary Jane loves me, and she’s the only girl I love.”

Smoothing my hand over the baseball cap, I shook my head. “Fucking hippie.”

Ollie shook his head like a wet dog, spraying the interior with droplets of chilly water. He must’ve knocked something loose in his brain, because he fell back against the seat. “Shit, man. I wasn’t thinking.”

I coughed out a laugh as I pulled out of the parking lot, a car behind Shortcake. “That’s a huge surprise.”

Ollie stared ahead, the normal smile he wore gone. “I forget sometimes, you know? It seems like forever ago.”

Shit, I wished I could forget, especially now, as I watched Shortcake’s car hang a left, heading toward campus.

He glanced at me. “I’m sorry, man. Truly. I know how much soccer meant to you.”

I nodded absently as I turned right, heading for the bypass that would take us into Charles Town. Soccer had been my life since the moment Dad enrolled me in the local peewee league, and over years, I’d honed my skills as a striker, the middle scoring position. I was damn good, too, and it was no secret that when I registered for Shepherd and made their soccer team three years ago, I had no plans on staying here. I was biding my time before I could score a tryout with D.C. United. Soccer was how I met Jase and Ollie. Soccer had been my sanity.

But the only thing I was doing with soccer now was coaching a summer rec league program as community service. There would be no more soccer. At least for the foreseeable future, and one act of anger had ensured that.

Most people my age spent Friday night drinking and hanging out with friends. I spent my Friday night sitting in a circle—yes, a fucking circle—listening to people’s problems. Some of the guys in the group weren’t bad. Like Henry. He got drunk one night and got into a fight at a bar. He wasn’t a psychopath. Neither was Aaron, who apparently had some road-rage problems. A couple of the other guys, and that one chick with the pasty-white makeup and heavy black eyeliner, I wasn’t so sure about. They were kind of scary.

Screwed-up thing was that I wasn’t the youngest person here. Not by far.

I only had . . . ten more motherfucking months of this.

I could do this. Seriously. I could easily do this.

“Cameron?” Dr. Bale cleared his throat, and I wanted to punch myself in the throat. “Is there anything you would like to share tonight?”

This was the part I couldn’t do. The talking-about-me shit with a whole bunch of strangers staring at me. I looked up, and a sympathetic look crossed Henry’s face before looking away.

“No,” I said. “Not really.”

Goth chick—who apparently had a penchant for knives—threw herself back in her seat, crossing her arms covered in black ink. “He never shares anything.”

I pressed my lips together to keep from getting stabbed.

“That is true.” Dr. Bale adjusted his wire-frame glasses. “You barely contribute to the group, Cameron.”

Shrugging, I sat back and slid the baseball cap down lower. “I’m just taking it all in.”

Henry jumped in, thankfully, diverting the attention, and I floated under the radar until the end of the session, but when I got up to leave, Dr. Bale summoned me.

Great.

As everyone filed out of the room, I dropped back in the metal folding chair and leaned forward, resting my elbows on my knees. “What’s up?

Dr. Bale leaned over, picking out a folder from the plastic bin beside him. “I wanted to make sure you were getting something out of these meetings, Cameron.”

Uh. No. No, I was not. “I am.”

He eyed me as he hooked his leg over a knee as he leaned back in his chair. “You’ve barely spoken about