Uncomfortable (Undone Book 1)

by Vanessa Page

  What seems like only a moment later, Jace whispers into my ear, “Wake up, sweetheart. We’re here.”

  Sweetheart. The pet name fills me with warmth and tenderness. Not babe or hotness like Ryan used to call me. I’m Jace’s sweetheart. And the idea makes me absurdly giddy. I have to try hard to keep a silly grin from taking over my face as I peel my eyes open and turn on Jace’s lap to climb out of the vehicle. He helps unpack the luggage, and then loads up, carrying two bags slung over his shoulders and rolling a suitcase in each hand. Jameson is just as weighed down with bags, leaving me, Miranda, and Abby with nothing to carry. RJ, in typical RJ fashion is fast asleep with his face pressed against the back passenger-door window. A little trickle of drool has left a path from his squished lips all the way down to where the glass disappears into the door.

  “You guys don’t need to carry everything,” Abby says. “We’re not helpless, you know.” Her words have just the right amount of feminist flare, but lack conviction. Feminist or not, I appreciate not have to lug a heavy bag across a quad and up to the fourth floor.

  Jameson shrugs and keeps walking toward the dorms, while Jace says, “We could use the workout after slacking off all weekend. Coach will be livid if we show up to practice tomorrow having forgotten how to run.”

  And so, we let the guys carry our stuff up to our rooms. Jameson drops two of Abby’s bags he is carrying off outside our door and continues down the hall with Miranda to her room. “Think your roommate will be here?” I hear him ask suggestively as they leave.

  Abby grabs her stuff and heads into our room, leaving me alone in the surprisingly empty hallway with Jace. I lean against the wall, not quite ready to say goodbye yet. Truth be told, I’m kind of hoping for a kiss, or another sweetheart. Anything to indicate that we might be a couple now.

  Then I kick myself for acting like a lovesick girl. We had sex and this is the 21st century. It’s not like I’m ruined and he’s morally obligated to offer marriage or anything. Not that I would marry him after only knowing him for a few weeks and having sex a few, okay five, times last night.

  “Thanks,” I say and motion to my bags still in his possession. “For carrying my stuff up.”

  He looks down in surprise, like he’s forgotten the load he carries, then starts divesting himself of luggage. “Yeah, sure, no problem.”

  When his arms are free again, he takes a step toward me and leans in. “I’m glad you came this weekend.”

  I bite back a smile as butterflies tickle in the pit of my stomach. “Yeah, me too.”

  “So…” He looks down at his feet and drags the toe of his sneaker along the vinyl flooring in an almost nervous gesture.

  “So…” I prompt, and he looks up at me with a smile.

  “I’d like to take you out sometime.” He flashes me a shy smile.

  I pretend to think for a minute. “Only if you’re okay with me spilling water in your lap and then trying to rub it dry for you.”

  “I think I can handle that.”

  I push off the wall and close the space between us. “Then you’ve got yourself a date.”

  His only response is to slant his mouth over mine and pull me into a kiss so deep and captivating I may never surface again. I stretch up to better fit his kiss, while he leans down over me, gently, protectively. His tongue delves into my mouth and this kiss feels like we were made for one another. No kiss has ever been more perfect, I’m sure of it. When we finally come up for air, I find myself wishing Abby weren’t in our room right now, so I could pull him inside and have my wicked way with him. But I’ll have to wait.

  Jameson chooses that moment to emerge from Miranda’s dorm room and saunters down the hall toward us. Come on, Romeo, we gotta get RJ back to the house before he turns the inside of my SUV into a lake of drool.

  Ew.

  Jace grimaces and then turns to me. “I’ll call you later.”

  I nod and watch him go. I almost can’t believe how much things have changed in the last three weeks. Who’d have thought my ex posting nude photos of me online would lead me to a truly amazing guy?

  “Quit mooning over him and get in here and help me unpack. We have a crap-ton of laundry to do before class tomorrow.” Abby calls to me from inside our room.

  “Can’t I just go naked?” I whine and lug my bags in and toss them onto my bed.

  “If I thought for one second that you were serious, I would totally support you in that. But since I know you’re going to wake up complaining tomorrow about having nothing to wear—and you aren’t going to let me dress you in my clothes—we need to get this taken care of. I can’t be doing laundry all evening. I’ve got something to do tonight.”

  “Don’t you mean someone?” I tease. We both know, even if she hasn’t said it, that’s she’s planning to sneak off to get it on with RJ again.

  “That too,” she says cheekily and dumps out her entire suitcase onto the floor. “Laundry time!”

  Half an hour later, we’re sitting side-by-side in hard plastic chairs in the laundromat when my cell phone vibrates in my pocket. I pull it out to find a text from Jace.

  Jace: Can you come over? I have a surprise for you.

  I lean against the washing machine next to me, take a selfie and send it to him.

  Me: doing laundry. Gonna be here a while. Abby has a wardrobe big enough for two people.

  Jace: Yeah, I remember. I carried it up to your room for you.

  Me: Try lugging it around in laundry sacks.

  Jace: Pass

  Jace: What time do you think you’ll be done?

  I look at the four machines Abby has running. The one with the most time left says thirty-seven minutes. Then it all has to dry. Luckily Abby doesn’t fold anything, ever, so we can shove it all back into our bags and trek back to our dorm.

  Me: I’ll be done and back to my dorm in a couple hours. I can come over then.

  Jace: Cool. See you in a couple hours.

  ~

  Three hours and twenty-two minutes later, Abby and I step onto the front stoop of the Zeta house. The place is surprisingly quiet for the middle of the afternoon on a Sunday. Though, I’m not sure what I expected. I’m also not sure why Abby came with me. She insisted after we dropped our laundry off in our room. I’m not sure if she’s here for moral support in case I run into Ryan, or if she’s here hoping to run into RJ. They spent pretty much the entire weekend fucking like rabbits, but she hasn’t mentioned his name once since we got home. Are they a thing? Are they still enemies? I can’t tell.

  Abby struts right to the front door and knocks loudly. The door opens almost immediately, and there stands Jace, looking even hotter than when I last saw him just a few hours ago. If that’s even possible. He’s grinning excitedly, and wastes no time reaching out for my hand and tugging me gently inside. Abby comes in too, but doesn’t follow us when Jace leads me toward the stairs. Instead she strolls off into the next room.

  “I have something to show you.” Jace tells me, energy and excitement suffusing his voice.

  I follow willingly, interested to see what the surprise might be. I expect him to take me to his room, but he doesn’t. He takes me to the one bedroom I’ve actually been into. Ryan’s. As he stops outside Ryan’s door, I’m suddenly not at all interested in this surprise he wants to show me. Having no desire to come face to face with my horrible ex, I attempt to pull my hand out of Jace’s, but he holds firm.

  His grip is gently, but unyielding. “It’s okay,” he tells me softly.

  “No, please. I don’t want to see him.”

  “That’s just it,” Jace says and reaches for the doorknob, turns it. “You don’t have to.

  The door swings open, and I fight the urge to rip my arm out of his grasp and run for the stairs. Instead, I focus on the room on the other side of the door. Blink. Attempt to wrap my mind around what I’m seeing.

  The room is empty. No, not empty. Barren. No sheets on the bed, no posters on the wall, no personal items whatsoever. Al
l signs that Ryan ever lived in this room are gone.

  “He’s gone.” Jace’s voice is soft, reassuring.

  “Gone?” I still can’t quite comprehend what I’m seeing, or what it means.

  “I told the chapter president what Ryan did. We have a zero-tolerance policy. They kicked him out.”

  It finally clicks in my brain. “He’s not a zeta anymore.”

  Jace wraps an arm around my shoulder and leads me away from the room that had been the scene of the pictures that had so humiliated me. “And I personally let him know that if I get so much as a hint that he’s even looked at those pictures of you again, let alone posted them, I’m going to personally go to the dean and have him kicked out of school.”

  “You know the dean?” I can’t come up with more intelligent questions. My brain is muddled, and I’m having trouble keeping up with the fact that my trouble with Ryan, and those pictures, is well and truly over. I follow Jace into another bedroom, his I assume, and he shuts the door behind us, leans against it, motions for me to sit on the edge of the bed.

  Jace smirks. “No. But I would find a way to get an audience with him if it means keeping that douchebag from posting those pictures of you again. The only people who should get to see you naked are the ones you want to see you naked.”

  And that might be the sexiest thing I’ve ever heard a guy say. I smile at him and lower myself to his mattress, lean back on my hands. “What if the only person I want seeing me naked is you?”

  His eyes darken and he pushes away from the door to join me on the bed. “Well, then… I guess I’ll have to oblige you.”

  And oblige me, he does.