Binding 13

"Thanks," I replied, squirming.

"Are you sure you don’t want to come?" he asked then. "I won't be drinking so I can give you a spin home when you want to go –"

"Cap," one of his teammates called out then. "Get your ass over here, lad, and lift this fucking cup."

"I'm fucking talking here, Pierce," Joh

"Your friends are calling you," I hurried to say, knowing that I needed to get away from this boy before I did something incredibly stupid like accept his invitation.

Because I wanted to.

I really, really wanted to.

And if I stayed here and kept looking at him, I knew I would.

"I better go," I added, giving Joh

I didn’t wait to hear his response.

Instead, I turned on my heels and hurried away with my heart hammering around in my chest.

"Are you sure you don’t want to come for an hour?" I heard Joh

"I'm sure," I called back over my shoulder as I hurried away. "Bye, Joh

"Yeah, uh, bye, Sha

The sound of boys laughing and snickering behind me filled my ears, but I didn’t dare look back.

Instead, I did the sensible thing and removed myself from temptation with Claire's words ringing in my ears.

"Boys with pretty eyes and big muscles mess everything up for girls."

How right she was.

It was a little after eight when I finally got home from school that evening.

Three miles from Tommen and the bus had broken down.

For two hours, we were forced to remain on the bus while another bus from Cork City was sent out to transport us home.

It was ridiculous.

I had spent every minute of those two hours mentally kicking myself for not taking Joh

What the hell was wrong with me?

I liked him.

I really liked him.

He asked me if I was going to a party, offered to drive me home from said party, and I turned around and practically ran away from him.

No, correct that to: I did run away from him.

In my defense, I had been completely taken aback by him.

Never once in the weeks that had passed since my accident had either of us approached the other.

He broke the imaginary rule that had been enforced between us.

He threw me by talking to me and I was still very much thrown now.

All evening my mind continued to churn the encounter round and round until I was blue in the face from thinking about it and thoroughly disgusted with myself.

I should have gone to the party.

If I had, I wouldn’t have spent two hours on a freezing cold bus in semi-arctic conditions.

At least, if had gone to the party, being late would have been worth it.

Because the look on my father's face when I walked into the house assured me that the two hours I'd spent sitting alone on a broken-down bus certainly wasn’t.

"Where were you?" Dad demanded, watching me like a hawk from his perch at the kitchen table when I walked through the doorway.

The familiar swell of panic built inside of me.

My father was a powerful looking man, clocking in at six feet, with dark blond hair, and an athletic build that had stuck since his days of hurling.

He too had played for Cork, but unlike my brothers, my father's merits and achievements weren't something I openly spoke about.

Because I wasn’t proud of the man staring back at me.

I wasn’t sure if I even loved him anymore.

Or if I ever had.

Not when he terrified me worse than any of the bullies at school ever had…

"Well?" he pressed, tone tight. He was replacing the rubber grip on what looked like Ollie's hurley and the sight of him holding the wooden hurl caused a tremor of panic to roll down my spine. "You're late!"

I was suddenly very grateful that I had ran away from Joh

A shudder rolled through my body at the thought of what my father might do if I had accepted his invitation.

"The bus broke down," I squeezed out as I gingerly set my bag down against the wall. "We had to wait for two hours for another bus to pick us up."

My father gave me a hard stare.

I remained exactly where I was, not daring to breathe.

Finally, he nodded his head.

"Fucking buses," my father muttered, turning his attention back to his task.

The air I had been holding in released from my lungs in a loud gasp.

It's okay, Sha