“Hello?” Piper waves a hand in front of me, trying to draw me out of my post-coital stupor. “Are you really not going to say a word?”
“I want to.” I sigh as I look into her face. There he is, mocking me, his features coming in and out of focus like a poltergeist, and I’m forced to look away. “I mean, I would, but I can’t really...remember who it was.” There, my entire body sags with relief. Now, there’s a lie I can work with.
The three of them erupt into a collective gasp.
“Shit.” Scarlett slams a hand down onto the table so hard our cups all hop to the left an inch. “I knew I shouldn’t have left you there last night, pounding away at those daiquiris like they were Kool-Aid. You never could hold your liquor.”
Daisy grunts, incensed. Her blonde mane is just as curly-whirly as mine, but her features are knife-sharp and beautiful. “I will never let you out of my sight, girl.” Her eyes grow wild with rage. “And I swear to all that is holy, if I ever find that asshole, I’m going to tear what little he has and rip him a new one. Nobody, but nobody takes advantage of my friend that way.”
Piper plucks out her phone and starts tapping away in a fury.
“What are you doing?” I try to pull it forward in the event she’s summoning her big bro to play superhero, but she yanks it right back. Little does she know he played superhero into the wee hours in Hollow Brook.
“Contacting the student assault and violations center on campus,” she mutters mostly to herself, still intently hacking away. “If there’s some douche running around doping up girls and sleeping with them, we need to get the police involved.”
“Oh my shit!” I wrestle the phone from her and bury it deep inside my purse. Good God, she’ll have Cade arrested before breakfast. “You will not contact any such organization on my behalf, nor will the authorities be dragged into this unnecessarily. I swear to you all—up and down—what happened last night was more than consensual.”
“You just said you didn’t know his name!” Scarlett’s eyes bug out like king toads.
“Since when is that a crime?” Just the thought of me bedding some nameless frat brat makes my stomach twist in a hot revolution. I would never not know his name.
Piper chokes on her coffee. “Since it happened to my best friend.” My heart warms when she officially bestows me with the bestie moniker. “Now, can you pick him out of a lineup?”
“WTF!” Why do I get the feeling this snowball is going to avalanche into a heart-shaped disaster the likes of which Whitney Briggs has never seen?
Piper frowns. “Nobody actually says WTF, Cass. It’s what the fuck. Get your big girl panties on and say it—or did Mr. Dope You Up with My Love chew those off of you last night?”
Both Scarlett and Daisy growl at the panty-nibbling prospect. These girls are so whipped up, they’ll have Cade strapped to the electric chair by midnight and bring weenies of their own to roast right off his smoldering body.
Piper glances over my shoulder a moment. “Family!” She jumps up, and I cringe. Here it is. The moment of my reckoning coming a bit sooner than expected. I turn with all the enthusiasm of a dental drilling, only to find her clutching to a peppy little blonde.
“You guys remember Marley, right?” Piper runs her hand over the length of the girl as if she were a prize, and, for a moment, my dirty, dirty little mind envisions a larger-than-life version of her brother’s penis in her place.
Gah! See? I just want to slap myself into oblivion. That, right there, is exactly why it was a lousy idea to bed her brother—perhaps anybody’s brother. In my defense, Caila was haunting me with her piss-poor back alley ho ways, and I was left unsupervised.
The three of us offer somewhat subdued hellos as Piper pulls out a seat for her. Marley is a tall, blonde, beauty queen herself. She’s Piper’s half-brother’s significant other, so, in that respect, she totally qualifies as family.
“I was just running in for a quick cup.” Marley waves off the spare chair Daisy just pulled up. “I can’t stay. Wyatt’s here picking up some paperwork, and then we’re heading up past the Witch’s Cauldron for a quick little hike. What are you ladies up to?” She gives a few quick blinks as if calling us on our bull, and it’s all I can do to grin and bear it.
Piper falls back in her seat and glances over with that snotty little smirk that says the jig is up. “One of us took the walk of shame last night. She knows a detail or two, but she’s decided to hold back all of the valuable info. Don’t you think that a good friend would spill all the dirty deets?” She kicks me from under the table, and I kick her right back.
Marley’s face turns an instant shade of pomegranate. “Really?” Her eyes light up as if one of us were harboring a newborn puppy underneath our sweaters. “Which one? No, wait. Let me guess!” She slaps her knee as if this were the best new game to play. “It’s not Piper, or she would have never gone there with me. Plus, we all know whose sheets she’s wrinkling these days.” She gives a quick grimace. “Your brother would kill me if he ever heard those words come from my lips. If you try to quote me, I’ll deny, deny, deny.” She gives a hard wink. “So that leaves you three.” She examines us all in turn. “You girls in the back look a little peeved to me, but not nearly as vexed as this little precious thing right here.” She takes up one of my curls between her fingers and gives a little yank. “Winner, winner chicken dinner!”
The entire table breaks out in hoots and hollers, and, before I know it, half of the coffee house cranes their neck in my direction.
I give a beauty queen-worthy wave before slinking down in my seat.
“So, what gives?” Marley shrugs over at Piper. “You can’t stand to give the girl some breathing room? I promise you, nothing breaks up a relationship, or a friendship quicker than sex shaming. I’m sort of a qualified expert on the subject, a sexpert if you will.” She takes a tiny bow before turning her full attention to me. “Any time you want to talk about you-know-who—find me. My door and my inbox are always open to you. I happen to pen the Sex and the Coed article in the school paper. I used to have a room right here in Prescott Hall, but I’m living with Wyatt at the moment.”
“At the moment?” Piper pulls her back to get a better look at her in the event she should be reading between the broken-hearted lines. “Tell me there’s not trouble in paradise. Do I need to smack my brother into submission?” She swats Marley on the arm because, well, Piper is feisty that way.
“What? No!” Marley swats her right back.
“Speaking of my brother.” Piper stands, and my heart gives a horrific slam against my chest as I slowly turn around in anticipation of panic attack number two for the morning, but it’s not Cade she’s wrapped her thin limbs around. It’s his other lookalike, Marley’s handsome boyfriend, Wyatt. “When are you going to seal the legal deal and get hitched?” She’s quick to scold. “I swear, if I lose her because of some dumb move you make, there will be hell to pay.”
“Don’t you worry. There’s no way I’m letting this girl get away.” He pulls Marley in and buries a kiss over her cheek. Something about that tiny show of affection warms me right down to my toes as I envision Cade doing just that to me. He tried to kiss my left cheek, but I was quick to avert the tragedy. If he didn’t see my scar, he would have felt it, and I was in no mood to turn his stomach. Speaking of Cade’s kisses, that boy tried to bury one in a much more interesting place—a place no man has ever gone before, and just the thought of his hot mouth over that intimate part of me makes me shudder with pleasure all over again. Not that I actually shuddered with pleasure last night—not in the orgasmic sense anyway. But I’m sure if I had lingered, that boy would have been up for rounds two and three. I’m sure he would have set me sailing for that pleasure cruise sooner than later. He already had me at the brink.
“Just try getting rid of me.” Marley hikes up and smacks him with a kiss. It’s all so ridiculously sweet it makes my teeth ache just watching. “I’d better catch up with Baya and see what needs to be
done about the upcoming inventory.”
Piper pulls Marley back by the fingers. “This girl right here is the entrepreneur of the century. She literally took a few rags and stitched her way to riches.”
“Really?” I perk to attention. “I’d love to pick your brain some time. I’m dying to get into business for myself one day.” The sooner the better. My scholarships have been few and far between, and it’s been Caila filling in the financial gaps for me. Of course, she’s happy to do it. She made the offer herself multiple times before I ever agreed, but there’s not a scholastic day that goes by that I don’t feel a pang of guilt over the fact it’s her physical body that allows me to partake in the proverbial student body.
“Anytime!” Marley touches a hand to my shoulder before her eyes round out at the sight of my scar. I don’t go the extra mile to hide it from estrogen card-carrying members, and Wyatt, well, he’s taken. She clears her throat as her face brims with color once again. “And that other thing you might like to talk about—that would be the perfect time to kill two birds with one stone.”
The two of them take off in semi-coital bliss with their arms wrapped tight around their waists, their lips pecking at one another at least a dozen times before heading out the door.
“That, right there, is what I want someday,” I whisper mostly to myself, but when I come to, I note all three of my best friends gawking at me with marked sadness. I know what they’re thinking—the walk of shame seldom leads to places like that. They’re right, of course. But, for me, it’s pretty doubtful any road will ever lead me to that storybook happily ever after.
A week drifts by, and the new semester begins with a rainstorm walloping us from every angle. It’s a dark and angry day with growling charcoal skies, winds battering us at exhausting speeds. You need to lead with your head just to force your way through nature’s fury.
I’ve laid low for the last few days, as in sequestering myself to my dorm, with the exception of a quick trip to the grocery store to build my stockpile of Twinkies and Ding Dongs. I can’t help it. I eat when I’m nervous, and that little tryst with Cade has me tangled up in a bungee cord of emotions. What if he’s on the lookout for me? What if the big trio was so impressed they’re just itching to make some music again? They want to play the vagina—mine to be exact. We did have a good rhythm going there—albeit a rather short one. And, dear God, did I just refer to my girl parts as an instrument? That’s ridiculous, of course. But, if it were an instrument, it would definitely be a wind—something I didn’t exactly give city boy an opportunity to blow for the evening.
I finally tried out that big blue bugle Caila gave me, and it sure put some pep in my step, but nothing like my flesh-covered bed warmer was capable of. Piper found the vile plastic penis lying on a towel yesterday and got after me to put “Papa Smurf” away asap. Honestly, I thought it was hilarious the way she raged on and on about the dangers of self-inflicted injuries caused by nefarious penile weaponry. A part of me wanted to laugh and let her know that her brother wielded the naughtiest, most vaginally destructive weapon of them all.
Come Monday, my first class of the morning is Applied Business Theory. I give a quick glance around the enormous stadium seating-sized room and find a near empty row near the front. I’ve found most of the people here at WB are in love with the anonymity of the back row where they’re free to live-stream music right into their ears, or shop lazily on Amazon while the professor drones on, but I can’t see my attention straying. I need to zero in on what’s being preached from the scholastic pulpit. I’ve got one rickety scholarship, one shot to get this right, and I’m taking that degree gold all the way home to Tennessee. My phone slips out of my hand as I navigate my way through the folded-up theater seats and nosedives into the row ahead of me.
“Excuse me,” I whisper to the girl seated down below with a dark head of curls and a pencil at the ready. She glances up with her smooth skin and glassy green eyes that echo those of Scarlett’s. She looks sweet enough, with her heart-shaped face and sugary smile. Most people at WB are friendly to a fault, and I’m glad about it. “I seem to have dropped my phone.” I point to the glittery blue bit of technology sitting on her jacket, out of place like a mermaid washed ashore.
“Oh!” She snaps it up and hands it over. “I can’t help but notice your accent!” she strums it out with a touch of an accent of her own. “I love it! I used to live in Franklin about a million years ago.”
“Really? I’m from Beckem, just a spit and a kick from Nashville. Nice to meet you!”
“Sammy!” She scoots her hand toward me, and I’m quick to shake it.
“Cassidy.”
The professor swoops in, and I quickly take a seat, jotting down every word he says regarding all things business.
Once the hour is through, I rush to my second class of the day, Basic Principles of Marketing, up one flight of stairs and down the hall. By the time I scuttle inside, half of the seats are taken. It’s just one oversized classroom with traditional wooden desks, not the stadium seating and the comfy cushioned goodness of the last hour. I scoot up front and find a few spare seats near the window. Just as I’m about to excuse my way down a very crowded row, everything in me freezes.
Oh God, oh God, oh God! Instinctively, I take a careful step back, readying to retrace my steps and bolt straight for the library where I can drop this class with a modicum of dignity with the aid of my laptop.
Then the unthinkable happens, and he looks up. There he is—Cade in all his Piper James’s glory.
His eyes fix on mine for one strangling moment before he breaks out into that killer grin and offers a friendly wave over. How can I ever deny that boy?
“Good grief,” I whisper, hiking over backpacks and gangly limbs as I traverse my way in his direction. For a hot second, I thought he couldn’t place me—perhaps the best-case scenario. For a hot second, I thought he might remember and want to bolt himself.
“Hey,” I whisper, opting for the seat two away from him, on the left, of course—I may be avoiding that lap rocket he’s hiding in his pants, but I’m pretty sure I don’t want him gaping at the left side of my face for the next four months. Cade frowns at my current locale, and is quick to pat the desk next to him, nodding me over in such a friendly manner I’d be a jackass not to follow.
“I don’t bite.” He lets loose one of his toothy grins again, and those vampire-like fangs beg to differ. “Unless you want me to,” he says that last part so low I wonder if he meant for me to hear at all. I settle next to him as his cologne saturates the two of us in its spicy, manly goodness. It smells luscious, again most definitely expensive, and thanks to that one naughty romp, it smells decidedly like sweet, delicious sex.
“I’m the TA.” He playfully butts his shoulder into mine, and as much as I want to dislike him, relegate him to the frat brat pile and wallow in self-righteous regret, I can’t help but note that Cade James is an all-around nice guy.
“I guess that means I get an automatic A.” My face burns with heat because I’m pretty sure he has almost zero say in what grade I get. It was simply a moronic stab at adding levity to an already awkward situation.
His dimples press in as his eyes roam freely over me. Thankfully, it’s an easy feat to keep my neck twisted to the side this way. It’s shocking at how prolific I’ve become in hiding these ropey worms that lie frozen on the side of my face. That’s what I thought they were for so long when I was a kid—twisted worms listing in my flesh as I slept. Needless to say, I didn’t sleep much.
“I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” Cade thumps his pen over my desk. His knee finds mine and warms it. A sizzle of electricity shakes through me at his rather innocent touch, and my body begs for what it never got that night with him, completion.
“Well, I’ve been all over campus,” I offer a cheesy grin with the lie. “I guess you’re not a very good stalker after all.” Good God! Why don’t I just come out and draw him a map to my dorm room? What was I think
ing sending him a formal invite to stalk me? It’s practically a challenge, and everyone knows the people of the penis are wary to let a challenge slip by. That way, when Piper opens the door to our room and finds her brother with nothing but a Valentine over his privates, she can stab a knife through both of our coital-loving hearts.
He leans in, those powerfully persuasive velvet eyes pin themselves to mine, and my insides implode with oven-hot heat. “I know where you’ll be every Monday and Wednesday. My lecture is on Thursday, so I know where you’ll be then, too. Still looking like an amateur to you?”
A tiny giggle works its way up my throat, but I swallow it right back down. “So, you’ve got me during my waking hours, but how about all those lonely nights?” Again? WTF!
“That’s easy.” He leans back with that cocky grin fading to black. “My place.”
My entire body catches fire. “No unicorns in your neck of the woods yet, huh?”
The professor steps in, a tall gray-haired gentleman, and rambles about the rain as he gets settled.
“No unicorns.” Cade swallows hard, dipping his gaze to my cleavage and back. I’ve always loved a low-cut V-neck, but only because I can’t stand that strangling feeling a higher neckline affords. The trade off, of course, being that you get ogled ten times more than should ever be allowed. But something about his gaze warms me, and I don’t mind so much the ogling for once. “How about you?” His thick, deep voice strums over me like the rattle of a steel drum straight down to my achy-breaky bones. “Any unicorns pointing their horns your way?”
I make a face. “I see what your horny self did there. Let’s say I’ve got one or two roaming the vicinity.” Mostly I’m a liar, but since I’m new to both sleeping with my roommate’s brother and the art of bending the truth, I decide to cut myself a little slack.
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