Score (Skin in the Game Book 1)

by Christine Bell

  Bee drew back with a gasp and I stood there blinking furiously, trying to adjust to the brightness. First thought? How had seven minutes gone by already? Second thought? How the hell had I lost track of the fact that we were at a frat party in a closet?

  My mind raced as I tugged Bee behind me to buy her a few seconds to get her shit together. When my eyes adjusted to the light a moment later, I noted Renee standing there, doorknob in hand. She glared at me for a second before wheeling around with a muttered curse. I made a grab for the door in an attempt to save Bee some embarrassment, but she was already pushing past me.

  I could still taste her lips, which somehow made me think of sunshine despite the dark basement. Everyone was staring at me expectantly, and I opted to make light, hoping the less I made of it, the less everyone else would too. I pasted on a goofy smile and called after Bee, “You sure you’re okay to leave, or are your knees too weak to walk?”

  She didn’t turn around at the chuckles and flipped me the bird over her shoulder.

  “Don’t flatter yourself,” she called as she grabbed her boots off the bar and jammed her feet into them. Then, she disappeared into the crowd, who laughed and “ooohed” playfully at her insult.

  I watched her go, covering my erection with both hands, wondering if I’d pissed her off again or if she was doing like I was and playing it off like a joke for the crowd. They’d had their fun and had already moved on with the game, so it had been a good strategy, but who knew? She was a hard one to read. Cold and then hot. First, she annoyed me, and then, she intrigued me. And now, I wasn’t sure whether to follow her or give her some space.

  As I stood there waiting for the hard on to end all hard on’s to subside, and her scent still filling my head, the only thing I was one hundred percent sure of?

  I wanted more Bee.

  A lot more.

  7

  Bee

  I kissed Callum Samskevitch.

  I’d gone to a frat party and had kissed Callum Samskevitch, right on the mouth.

  And then the asshole had made some cocky remark about my knees being weak.

  As if.

  But as I climbed the stairs to the main floor where the DJ was spinning dance music so loud it was shaking the whole house, I had to grab on to the railing.

  Air. I needed air.

  Weak knees. Guilty as charged.

  Holy shit. I kissed Callum Samskevitch.

  The truth was, I’d had plenty of kisses, but I’d never been kissed that way. In that totally breathless, hungry way. It felt so perfect. Like I’d stumbled into one of those sexy black-and-white picture-postcards of two people making out. Like we should’ve been on a bridge over the Seine, under an umbrella, instead of in a stuffy frat closet. I could still feel the electric jolt that coursed through my body when he’d touched my cheek. He’d tugged on my lips gently, using teeth action, which I’d previously thought was a big no-no. But holy cow, it was hot.

  When it came to kissing girls, Cal was a pro.

  Well, of course, I reminded myself. He’s probably done half the sorority girls in town.

  I made my way through the throngs of people, looking for the front door, when Flora hooked an arm through mine.

  “Oh. My. God,” she squealed. “Did my eyes deceive me, or did I see you going into a closet with Cal a little while ago?”

  “It wasn’t a big deal.” My knees knew I was lying again because they were knocking together like a schoolgirl’s. “He had to escape from some clingy ex-girlfriend. I was just trying to help him out.”

  “Oh, so you guys just sat in the closet and talked?” she shouted over the music, raising an eyebrow suggestively.

  “Yeah, obviously. He’s a football player, remember?” I wrinkled my nose in a further display of disgust but she could see through me like a pair of sunglasses.

  “Right.”

  Okay, yeah. Cal had been dead on when he said there probably weren’t many women who would’ve passed up the opportunity to take advantage of his nearly naked body. I flashed back to the way his hard chest had felt against my breasts—God, he had a perfect six pack, broad shoulders, corded muscles on his arms—and all of it had been within licking distance.

  I’d never had the urge to treat anyone like a lollipop until now.

  How could one kiss make me so crazy?

  “I need a beer.” I barely managed to squeeze the words past my too-dry throat as I stepped up to the bar. Snagging the keg tap, I filled a red plastic cup with beer and then pressed it to my lips. Warm piss, just like Cal said, but it didn’t stop me from downing the whole thing.

  A sour feeling settled in my stomach. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t tell Flora about the kiss. I’d spent pretty much all week telling her that football players were the scum of the earth.

  Not to mention, it meant nothing. We’d only gone into the closet for show and what happened while we were in there was probably because a stud like Cal didn’t know what else to do with a girl in the dark.

  It was a one off.

  And it would never happen again.

  The sourness inside quickly gave way to misery. Cal was out of my league, but that kiss. What if that kiss had ruined me for anyone in my league?

  No wonder they called that game Screw because that was exactly how I felt.

  Screwed.

  Desperate to stop thinking about him, I forced myself to change the subject. “How’d things go with that guy?”

  She rolled her eyes and then launched into this long account. Flora couldn’t tell a story without turning it into War and Peace, with hand gestures. I managed to pay attention for all of two seconds before my stupid mind wandered back to the way Cal’s mouth had felt on mine. I found my eyes trailing to the basement door. I wondered if he’d already forgotten about the kiss.

  And I missed just about all of Flora’s story.

  “…but then he led me into his bedroom and pulled out these handcuffs and I was like, hell no! I don’t know him like that. So I was outta there quicker than you could say ‘Mother, may I not sleep with danger.’”

  I blinked. “Wait, what?”

  “You know, that Lifetime movie? Mother May I Sleep with Danger? With the psycho boyfriend who kidnaps Tori Spelling?”

  I shook my head. “Must’ve missed that one.”

  She laughed. “So, anyways, that dream I had of us? Being the cutest couple since Jessica and Justin? Ka-boom.”

  She waved her hands to signify something exploding.

  “But whatever. Fuck ‘em. Time is short, and the guys are plenty.” She surveyed the dance floor. It was nuts, wall-to-wall people all throbbing to the same beat.

  I’d never understand how Flora could go from one obsession to the next without leaving any scars. I’d only wound up kissing Cal because he was trying to make Miss America leave him alone, and yet I just about had his name tattooed inside of a heart on my cerebellum.

  I wanted to bang my head repeatedly against a wall somewhere. Amnesia would be my friend.

  Instead, I grabbed another beer. Cal was right. After a while, it did start going down like water.

  Ugh. Forget what Cal says!

  The DJ started spinning a new Kanye mash-up, and everyone on the dance floor roared.

  “This is my song!” Flora squealed.

  She grabbed my hand and led me out to the center of the floor, where a few of the Kappa pledges were already dancing in a circle. Flora started to dance in a way only Flora could. She always put it all out there, shaking everything God gave her and looking super-hot in the process. The second she started, every male eye in a twenty-foot radius was on her. The Kappa pledges hooted and hollered. She danced, oblivious to all of them.

  I watched my bestie closely, trying to channel her Fuck ‘em attitude. The beer had definitely worked its way through my veins because everything was a little hazy in a good way. I began to wiggle my hips to the beat, imitating some of her moves.

  I lifted my arms over my head and spun
in a small circle, then closed my eyes and got lost in the music. Who the fuck cared where Cal was? I was young, free, strong, independent. I didn’t need some freaking football player to tell me my worth.

  So why could I still feel the pressure of his lips on mine? Why could I still feel the way his warm hands felt on the small of my back, exploring underneath my sweater?

  Why did I want more?

  By the end of the song, my whole body was buzzing. I opened my eyes and saw him there, like a mirage, standing at the edge of the dance floor. Clothed again, obviously, but his dark hair was kind of every which way, which somehow only made him hotter. I wasn’t sure how long he’d been staring at me but the fact was?

  He’d been staring at me.

  Not Miss America. Not Flora. Not anyone else.

  Me.

  There was no mistake because our eyes locked. He had a sexy, half-smile on his face, and there was a little glint of something dangerous in his eyes. And okay, I wasn’t an expert on guys at all, but I’d seen that look a time or two.

  Cal wanted me. Not because we mashed together in the closet and what the hell. Like, he actually wanted me.

  Likely he was drunk, but still, there it was. And I was definitely drunk, because I didn’t freak out about it. The next song came on and I kept dancing, meeting and matching his gaze, until everyone else just melted away and we were the only two people in the room.

  White hot electricity zipped back and forth between us as my mind flooded with possibilities.

  And every single one of those possibilities had his mouth on mine again.

  “Hey, you okay, Bee?”

  I broke from the trance. A Rihanna song was playing now, and Flora was looking at me like I’d just puked on her shoes. I tried not to glance back at Cal again but failed miserably and she caught on, following my line of vision. She grinned and waved at him.

  Shit. Busted.

  All the Kappa pledges were staring now, too. Flora grinned in her feline way. I knew she’d open her mouth and call Cal and me lovebirds. That was all it took to drag me back to reality.

  The look he was giving me? It meant nothing. What difference did it make if he wanted to fuck me tonight? It didn’t change the fact that he was who he was, and I was who I was. If we hooked up, it would be like some sad, millennial Breakfast Club where the jock and misfit went about their lives and pretended it never happened.

  All well and good, except in a couple days, I’d have to face him in the locker room again.

  Whatever fantasies were running through my booze-muddled mind could never become reality.

  I had to jet before I made a bad situation worse.

  “I’m getting tired,” I told Flora. “I think I should go.”

  She’d been locked in a conversation with one of the pledges about the last season of The Bachelor and she paused mid-sentence and looked at me. “I’ll walk with you.”

  “Forget it. Have fun. I’ll text you when I get back to the house.”

  It was like a block away and I wasn’t about to wait for her to argue with me. I turned and raced for the door, pretending I didn’t hear her calling after me over the din of the music.

  Despite the snow, I jogged down the porch stairs without incident. When I reached the sidewalk, I paused to suck in big breaths of frigid air as I thought of what could have happened.

  I hated myself for the way he’d made me feel. Cal was a pro, but I was not. In fact, I was far from it. Strong? Confident? Ha. As tough of a façade as I put on, I was so not equipped to deflect the level of charm he was capable of throwing my way.

  The snow was coming down even harder now. I pulled the sleeves of my sweater over my hands, dug my chin into my chest, and started down the sidewalk.

  “Come on, Bee, don’t fly away already.”

  Embarrassingly, my head jerked up like I was a puppet on a string at the sound of his voice.

  I whirled on the snow-covered sidewalk and saw Cal walking toward me at the same moment I felt my boots start to lose traction. Before my feet could fly out from under me, he lunged forward and grabbed my arm. “Whoa. Steady there.”

  I could feel the heat of his hand on my arm, even through my sweater. Part of me wanted to push him away, but instead I just stood there, staring at it as snowflakes accumulated in the tiny hairs on his muscular forearm.

  “What are you doing out here?” he finally asked.

  The cold air had completely dissolved my buzz leaving behind only a strange hyperawareness. I couldn’t bring myself to meet his gaze.

  “What does it look like I’m doing? Going home.”

  “Shit, it’s cold.” He took his hand off my arm and dug them both into his back pockets, then rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet. “Why?”

  “I’m tired.”

  “Bah,” he waved the idea away. “It’s Saturday night. Sleep when you’re dead.”

  “Try telling my body that. It’s actually half-asleep right now.”

  He cupped his hands over his mouth and blew into them. “Shit, it’s Arctic. Come back inside where it’s warm.”

  “Well, I’m going to have to come out eventually. I can’t exactly sleep at the frat house. Duh.”

  He squinted at me. “Well, technically, you could. They have a couple spare rooms.”

  The very idea that he and I could stay warm in one of them made my whole body tingle, but I shut it down with the ruthlessness of a medieval executioner.

  “Yeah. As appetizing as sleeping on sheets that probably haven’t been washed since my freshman year sounds, I think I’ll just sleep in my own bed tonight.”

  “Fair enough,” he said, a crooked grin tugging at his lips. “But this weather blows.”

  “Then go inside. I gotta Stolpa.” I turned around and started down the sidewalk again. The snow was already so deep I could feel it trickling under the tops of my boots.

  He followed. “Stolpa?”

  “Kappa talk. You know, for the Lifetime movie? The Stolpas? Forget it.”

  He laughed. “I’m shocked that you talk Kappa. You seem different than all of them.”

  “I thought I was. And yet somehow I ended up at a frat party tonight.”

  “Oh, but you had fun.”

  “Maybe.” I couldn’t tell him that it was more than fun. That he’d pretty much blown to oblivion every previous sexual experience I’d ever had with one kiss. “What are you doing?”

  He shrugged. “You shouldn’t be out alone at night. I’ll walk you.”

  Trying to hide my surprise, I nodded and moved aside. We walked in silence for a little bit.

  When we were almost on Sorority Row, the tension became too much. “I can take it from here,” I said with a forced smile. “Go back. You might hurt your knee worse if you slip or something.”

  Plus, there was so much snow everywhere that even demented rapists probably didn’t want to be out in it. I’d be fine for the next hundred yards.

  “Nope,” he said, shivering. His voice was hollow, and his words were clipped. “My doctor said not to baby it, anyway. Walking keeps me from getting stiff. Nothing less than door-to-door service. I’m a gentleman.”

  “A gentleman who’s about three seconds from turning into an icicle,” I observed, still not meeting his eyes as I tried not to let my mind drift back to the parts of him that had been stiff just a few minutes earlier. God, he’d felt so good…

  “What do you do when you’re on the field, and it’s like, zero degrees out?”

  “It never bothers me then. It’s like adrenaline, I guess. It kind of makes everything else fade to the background but that excitement. Sort of like I felt earlier.”

  I couldn’t help but look at him, but only for a second. Was he talking about our kiss? Maybe, but what difference did it make? I’d felt his erection against my stomach. His body had reacted to me because that’s what guy bodies do. So what if I got his blood pumping?

  My body obviously thought it was a big deal, though, because even tho
ugh it was cold as ass outside, I started to blush again. And then I started thinking about his lips again…

  Shit.

  By then we were at the steps to Kappa, thank god. I wasn’t sure what I was capable of in this unfamiliar state. I said, “Thanks.”

  “Therapy, Monday night? Seven?”

  I nodded and climbed up the stairs holding the railing so I wouldn’t do a repeat performance of the day I’d met him. That would be grounds for leaving the country and moving to Mexico.

  When I closed the door, I ran upstairs and peered out my bedroom window, but he’d already gone.

  I stared outside for a long moment until my phone buzzed with a text from Flora checking to make sure I got home okay. I turned away from the window with a sigh and tapped out a quick reply. Then, I got dressed for bed and climbed beneath the covers and snapped off the light.

  This was it. I was going to sleep and putting an end to the oddest, most twisting, turning day of my life. I refused to spend my whole night rehashing every second I’d spent with Callum Samskevitch. It was an exercise in futility. Putting it all out of my head was the best course of action. And, after a good night’s sleep, everything would be back to normal.

  But as I forced myself to close my eyes, I had the sinking feeling that normal just wasn’t going to be enough anymore.

  8

  Cal

  I woke up on Monday with a pounding headache despite the fact that I hadn’t had a thing to drink since Saturday night.

  After I’d left Bee at her house, I couldn’t make myself go back to the party. It seemed so pointless. So I’d gone back to my apartment and had spent most of the night lying awake, looking up at the ceiling.

  I should’ve kissed her again. I’d wanted to. Fuck, seeing her dancing like that, lips parted, the soft, full curves of her hips moving in slow circles to the rhythm of the music…all I wanted to do was grab her and kiss her senseless, right there. Screw who saw.

  How could I have ever thought she was plain, before? No question about it. Bee Mitchell was damn sexy.