Deep End: A Bad Boy Sports Romance (3 page)

I don’t think the words are coming through clear. He’s saying something about finer po
ints, about it not being a done
deal, but all I’m hearing is that I’m going to the Olympics next year. No office work for me after college!

“Holy shit, I’m going to be a famous swimmer,” I say.

“While we are very excited about the
possibility
of having you on the team, Mr. B
elver, I want
to stress that, like I said,
the scout is going t
o need to see some
improvement
in…
”

“Gotcha,” I say. “No problem at all. It’s all been worked out already. I think I’m in the best shape of my life right now. I broke a personal record last practice during a mock race.”

“That’s
excellent
to hear, Mr. Belver,
but just remember, it’s not a closed-and-shut deal yet…”

“Awesome, thanks so much,” I say. “I’ll let my coach
k
now
that
the scout’s going to be there at the next meet.”

“Very well, Mr. Belver
. I’ll let you go now.”

I close the phone and let out a whoop. “
Yeee-haa
w
,” I yell, the sound echoing through the room I share with Dave in the swim house. The swim house is right on the edge of campus, although technically it’s not campus
property
. It’s a
house
that’s been pas
sed down from a long line of swim team
members
for the past
decade
. The landlord is just some old guy who lives
out of state, which is perfect, since he’s never around
to
bother us, or complain when we
have parties. Of course, since the house has been inhabited by nothing but swimmers for the last decade, it’s completely filthy.

“Shut the hell up!” yells Dave, throwing the covers off of himself. He’s on the other side of the room, in his bed, an erection pointing practically straight up to the ceiling. “What the hell are you so happy about, Anchor?”

“You’ve
been having a wet dream?” I say, laughing, and pointing to his erection. I take a little half-deflated basketball that’s been lying around the room and toss it over. Of course, it lands right on his dick.

“Don’t mess around,” says Dave. “I’m hung over as shit. What the hell happened last night? Did we have a party or something?”

“There’s no time for that right now, Dave. Listen, I made the Olympics!”

“Are you serious?” says Dav
e, the shock on his face making
him look a little more awake. He sits bolt upright in bed, facing me. “Are you sure?”

“I just got the call a minute ago. I just hung up with the guy… I’m going
to
be on the Olympic training team this
coming summer, after graduation.
”

Dave’s face calms down for a moment. “Listen, Anchor, that’s really great. But remember last time? You thought you were on the
team because the scout came to the meet and talked to you or something. It turns out he was just being friendly…”

“No, really, Dave. This is for real.”

“What did he say exactly?”

“He said they wanted me on the training team. Then he said som
ething about
needing to make sure my form was improved for the scout that’s coming to another meet. I forget which one.”

“You see? Dude, I’m happy for you. B
ut you’re always misinterpreting
things.”

“Why you got to be like that?” I say, getting angry. I can feel the anger boiling up inside me.

“Be like what?” says Dave, hopping out of bed. His erection is gone. He’s looking hung over and
mean, ready to fight. I wonder
if he remembers our fight last night. Something else happened last night, but I can’t remember what it was.
Some kind of prank.
I wish I could place it, because I’m sure it was hilarious, whatever it was we got up to.

Dave suddenly trips, going flying across the room.

Fortunately for him, he lands right on my bed next to me, bouncing a little on the cheap
mattress
.

“What the hell is that?” I say, bursting out laughing, as I look
down
at the floor to see what it is that Dave tripped over.

“Oh shit, dude,” says Dave. “That’s the
statue
!
The statue of what’s-his-name.
He was some kind of campus founder or something. Remember we stole it last night?”

“Oh yeah! Now I remember”
I start laughing uncontrollably
, doubling over with laughter. It’s the statue all right, lying face down on the floor, lengthwise. It’s the whole thing, looking like it’s about ten feet long. The bottom of it is completely sawn in half, somewhat crudely. I’ve got no idea how we did that. It would have taken hours of sawing that thing, and, anyway, what kind of saw would cut through stone like that?

“How did we even get that thing inside here, and up all
those
stairs?” says Dave.

“No idea,” I say, still laughing.

Dave’s not laughing though. His face is
stony
. “Shit, Anchor. We’re going to get in a lot of
trouble
for this.”

I’m not too worried. Maybe I should be, but I’m just not that
kind
of guy. “It’ll be fine,” I say, with a wave of my hand. “How are they going to find it in my room?”

“What about Spellman? He’s always on our case.”

“Shit…”
Spellman is
essentially the resident
snitch
, the resident
swimmer goody-two-shoes who doesn’t
seem to have anything better to do than to rat on the rest of us for having a good time. “We’ll just have to make sure he
doesn’t
s
ee it. Shouldn’t be that hard, right? Just don’t let him in our room. Don’t keep the door open.”

“It’s a good thing we don’t have
morning practice today,” says Dave, looking at the clock on the wall.

“But that reminds me,” I say, shaking my head a bit, trying to shake out some of the hangover.
“We’ve got class right now.”

“You’re right,” says Dave, getting up, and looking at himself in the mir
ror for a moment, before deciding
he looks just fine, hangover hairstyle and all.

“Let’s get going,” I say, grabbing my keys, and changing my t-shirt quickly.

I open the door to our room a few inches, trying to see if anyone is out in the hallway. I don’t want someone passing by to see the statue we’ve stolen. Spellman
has a way of finding out everything
, but as
long
as we don’t let the news get out at all, we should be fine.

Dave is behind me, standing on a pile of crushed beer cans. “Is the coast clear?”

“Looks good,” I say, opening the door a little more.

The hallway se
ems deserted as I step into it.
Dave
is
behind me in the doorway, in the middle of pulling the door closed behind him.

“Anchor, you bastard!” yells
someone
, a high pitch feminine
voice, coming out of seemingly nowhere.

I spin around,
causing
confusion, looking for the woman speaking. I knock into Dave a bit, and he falls down, crashing down into the heap of empty beer cans.

“Asshole,” yells Dave, as he goes down.

Now I see her. It’s another senior. I don’t think she’s on
t
he
swim team
since I don’t recognize her face, although something about her does seem a little
familiar
.

“Another fan, eh?” I say, looking at her. She’s quite cute, or even hot. She’s stacked, with a nice set on her. She’s not wearing much, although it looks like she’s slept in the few clothes that she does have on. “You been partying with one of the swim boys all night, and wanted to come pay your tributes to the team captain?”

“You’re such an asshole, Anchor,”
s
he says, puckering up her lips, and spitting a big gob of spit right in my face.

I
wipe
it off slowly. Somehow, I’m not mad. There’s little a woman that hot can do to make me really mad.

“I didn’t know my reputation was preceding me so much,” I say, making a fake little bow to the woman.

“You
d
on’t remember any of it, do you?”

“Remember what?”

“You
really
don’t have any idea who I am? I didn’t think you were that drunk.”

“I wasn’t. I’m barely
hung over
right now,” I say, shaking my head and growling a little, to demonstrate the top physical condition that I’m in at the moment.

“We slept together last
night, asshole,” she says, her
eyebrows
practically reaching her
hairline
, and her eyes burning with anger.

“Nice,” I say, looking at her carefully up and down, soaking her body in.

“Gross,” she says, catching my look.

Dave is
finally
to his feet, his hair
tousled
again, and a beer can somehow stuck to his shirt.

“Nice,” says Dave, poking me in the ribs and eyeing the woman, up and down just like I did.

“Pigs,” says the woman, giving
Dave and I
a nasty look together. “You don’t remember how you made me help you carry that statue up into your room before we fucked?”

I shake my head. “I wouldn’t mention that…” I start to say, lowering my voice.

“What?” says the woman, raising her
voice.
She seems to understand that I don’t want anyone to know about the statue. And she wants revenge. This isn’t a good combination.
“You say that you stole a famous campus statue, Anchor? You stole a statue?”

A few swimmers are walking down the hall.

“What’s this ab
out a statue, Anchor?” says one of them.

To
my horror it’s Spellman
himself. He already has a super
ior look plastered across his f
ace.

“Nothing,” I say. “Nothing to see here, Spellman. Don’t want to be late to class, you know?”

“
He stole
the Friedman statue,” says the chick, the one who I apparently slept with. I’m not so pleased now with my decision. She’s a real peace of work. What, just because I
slept with her and don’t
remember her name—why is that enough to make her so mad she wants to rat me out to Spellman, the biggest rat of them all?

“Well, well, well,” says
Spellman
, licking his lips, and pushing his way past Dave to look into our room. He’s gotten a look before I can stop him. “That’s the statue all right.
What were you thinking
,
Anchor
? Coach is going to love this one.”

“We got a little drun
k,” I say. “What’s the big deal?
We’ll put it back.”

“It’s sawed in half. There’s no way it’s going back on.”

“Why you got to be such a dick, Spellman?
” I say.

“Why do you think you can break all the
rules
you want without
consequences
,
Anchor?” says Spellman, a shit-eating grin on his face.

I give him a sho
v
e in the chest, but he’s no pipsqueak. No one on the
swim team
is, really. He stands his ground, and we look at each other eye
to
eye. I want to fight him, and my blood is getting hot, basically about to boil over. But if we fight now… I don’t want to screw up my chances for the Olympics. I’ve got to hold it together. I don’t know how much longer I can hold out, though, with this piece of shit rat staring me in the face, with that smug look of infuriating fake
superiority
.

“Let’s get out of here, Anchor,” says Dave, pulling me as hard as he can, and closing our door behind him.

He drags me down the hallway, away from Spellman.

“There’s nothing we can do now, man,” says Dave.

The woman’s cackle follows us down the hall, through the doors to the outside. I can hear it running through my head. Why’s she so pissed at me?
Just because I can’t remember her name?

I take a deep breath before walking into the swimming building. I’ve never once covered a sports story on campus, and I’m surprised to find myself nervous. I’ve always considered myself the epitome of the cool, calm, collected reporter.
I don’t exactly know why I’m nervous, but it h
a
s something to do with my hatred for jocks of all types. How have I let myself be tricked into doing this? I know
Beaumont
means the best, but I’m not sure I’m the right girl for the job.