39

Adam

Hold The Card

Both Piper and I said no at the exact same time and turned to look at each other. My no was slower than hers, but I said it for obvious reasons. One, Piper wasn't my girlfriend. It was a fact. And two, Piper would rather have us ruin another RA conference than be my girlfriend.

But damn did she say it fast. With a little chuckle too.

I didn't expect that.

"Alright, Adam. I agree to your terms," Piper said with all the reluctance in the world. "And only those terms. If you tell me what you want too."

"Oh, really?" I raised an eyebrow but followed her down to the chip aisle.

"I like to know what my residents enjoy." She browsed among the selection, trying to dig behind the mismanaged shelves. "The RAs get budgets and I want to know what I can keep out when I work overnight shifts."

"Those sound like a bitch," I said, picking up a bag of black pepper jerky and flashing it for her to see. "Twenty-four hours of being stuck in the dorms. I don't know how you're going to do it. All those whiny freshmen, locking themselves out? I'd tell them to make a new key out of a coat hanger. Or I'd charge ten bucks a lockout. But if they got locked out for a stupid reason, I wouldn't even let them back in—"

"You wouldn't do that."

With a frown, I glanced back at her while she was busy inspecting the gummy candy shelf. "Yeah, I would."

"No, you wouldn't."

My frown deepened, and I scoffed. "Every noise complaint, I'd just shut off their power. Maybe I'd bring a water gun on my rounds. Any of them try to fuck around— bam —blasted with a water shooter."

Piper snorted. "Sure."

"You don't believe me?" I challenged.

"Not even a little bit."

"What part? I already have the water guns in my dorm."

"I think you like to think you're this big tough guy." She deepened her voice. " Oh, I'm Adam and feelings are for losers. " With a slow shake of her head, Piper shrugged. "You'd yell but you'd still unlock their doors."

"Bullshit," I said but I shot another glance at her.

I didn't like the way the conversation was heading. The truth was, I'd never felt exposed like how Piper casually operated on me. Back at the gum section, I'd been so convinced that I'd hang those kids out to dry. Now, the more I thought about it, the less sure I was.

"Whatever you tell yourself." Piper reached for another bag and popped it on top of the other stuff I was carrying around. "I like the Wave Side gummies. They're sea animals. They sell them at the aquarium that my mom researches with. It's a big nostalgia thing for me. If you ever mess up a room inspection, this is what you bring."

I stared at the spot Piper had been for a second too long after she walked to the next aisle. Shaking my head, I trailed behind her, struggling to come up with something to say as I grabbed another big bag of the sea animal gummies.

"You know what, Adam?" Piper asked.

No. And I don't want to find out.

"The swim coaches at Marrs are pretty strict about the locker rooms," I interjected, moving the conversation away from me.

Piper's eyebrows furrowed. "What?"

"You said you wanted to know about your residents? This is you finding out about your residents."

"Oh. Wait, can you repeat that?" She whipped out her phone. "What about the locker room?"

"The swim guys on your floor are put through a specific diet so they don't shit themselves in the pool."

"Too much information, Adam."

"So anything you put out on their days off, they'll be happy with. Get it?" I grabbed a few more items off the shelf, wracking my brain. "The track guys hate anything Wedson brand. One of their big donors is the son of the guy who invented the company. They get free Wedson shit all the time." I nodded. "And hockey players are garbage, so they eat garbage. Pure cannibalism."

"What about you?"

This was a subject about me that I could handle. I mulled it over while those gray eyes pierced me. There was a simple answer. I stopped by the cookies and picked up the classic pack. "I'm easy. Chocolate chip cookies."

Don't tell her you prefer homemade .

"And, uh…" I shrugged, picking up another thing of cookies for the car.

Don't tell her you prefer homemade because it sounds like you're asking for her to make you some .

"I prefer homemade," I said, as casually as I possibly could.

Goddammit .

"Me too," Piper admitted. "My dad and I bake together. He travels a lot for work and the research teams and the grants but when he gets back home, it's the big thing we do together. Baking cookies." She smiled. "My parents send care packages all the time and there's always chocolate chip cookies in there."

Usually, when people talk about their parents, I swivel the conversation in another direction. It's better that way. If I don't find out about their parents, they don't need to ask about mine.

But with Piper, it was different. There was this whole secret world she existed in that was hidden from me. I wanted to know more.

And that wasn't going to happen. Not if the babysitting experiment was ending.

If .

I sidestepped Piper and easily blocked her way to the end of the aisle. "I've been thinking."

"Sounds dangerous."

"That's because you overthink, ice princess."

Piper raised her eyebrows, but a laugh escaped her. "And you don't think through anything. It evens out."

" Exactly ."

Suspicion touched her gaze. "What do you mean?"

I took the items out of Piper's arms, and even if she wanted to argue, we had a deal. She held onto them for a moment before I pried them away, my voice dropping low. "I think we work well together."

"Us?"

"Uh-huh."

"You and I?" Piper clarified, her voice dripping in disbelief. "The two people who ruined an RA conference? And…" Piper shook her head. "Is this an Adam joke? It's not funny."

"They're going to hire someone to watch over me. And I want it to be you."

Piper's eyes went wide. " Why? "

Because you see me like other people don't.

"Let's be realistic for a second," I said. "I wouldn't last being on good behavior for two hours with anybody else."

"You didn't even last that long with me! "

"But I think I can," I insisted. "I do. I want to give this a real shot."

Piper raised her eyebrows, with her you-can't-do-this stare. Honestly, that made it even better. A challenge. With the two of us together—and Piper calling me out on my bullshit—maybe I had a chance to land back on Coach Lawson's good side through spring training.

How hard could it be?

She sighed. "I don't know."

"What do you want?"

Piper chewed her lip walking over to the cash register with me, still considering. It made sense. What could I offer her? She already had her school paid, she already had her rent paid, and she didn't want my money.

But there were things that Piper couldn't reach that I could.

"You want to go to graduate school?"

She raised an eyebrow. "You know I do."

"And you want out of Roman Villa…and into Roman Hall."

I had Piper's attention in an instant. Roman Hall was our residential building for graduate students. It was nice as hell. I'd snuck in there plenty of times to motorboat older grad ladies, and the place was immaculate. They even had statues in the courtyards.

"You have to be a graduate student to be an RA there," she said slowly.

"The greatest thing about being a D1 athlete is people just give you shit when you ask." I grinned. "A recommendation letter from me? Pretty good. But a recommendation letter from the award-winning football coach on campus?" My grin widened. "Coach Lawson's recommendation letter? You could sell that online and make good money. Imagine what Roman Hall would say about it."

Piper set down the last bar of chocolate and stared down at everything on the counter. I had her. Holy shit did I have her. It wasn't that I was offering something for free, Piper wouldn't have taken it. My ice princess was hard-working. She wanted to earn that spot. And in this way, she still would.

"I will think about it."

"Fuck yeah."

"That's not a yes, Adam."

"Could be. That's what matters." I waited for the cashier to take Piper's credit card after he rang up most of the items. The moment he was finished though, I flashed my credit card instead. "Hey, kid. You want to make fifty bucks?"

The cashier glanced up. "What?"

"Adam." Piper gave me a hard look. "You said I could pay."

"I said you could hand him your card."

" What? "

"I didn't say anything about you paying." I nodded towards the card reader. "Kid, if you refuse her card, fifty bucks, cash back, all yours. What do you say?"

Piper huffed, but she didn't snatch my card and toss it to the ground. With as much eye-rolling as I'd ever seen, she finally let me pay the bill.

"Imagine how nice the dorms at Roman Hall are…" I tempted her, pushing open the door.

"Adam, I said I would think about it."