by Tabatha Kiss
It could all come crashing down at any moment. The mere thought of that burns. Every ounce of victory and satisfaction in me fades, replaced by nagging guilt and doubt.
It doesn’t change a damn thing, though.
I plop down onto my desk chair and twitch as something soft breaks my fall. I reach behind me and pull out that teddy bear from the arcade. It takes me back to that night and how cute she looked sitting in my car with it on her lap. It’s just a stupid stuffed animal, but it makes me grin like a damn idiot every time I look at it.
I’d do it all again. I’d throw everything else away for a minute of her in my bed.
Does that make me an asshole?
Screw it.
I’ll be an asshole.
CHAPTER 25
ALYSSA
What the hell was I thinking?
I had sex with Junior Morgan. My father’s new protégé. I was off-limits. He was out of bounds. But we went and scored, anyway.
If that wasn’t bad enough, we went and scored without a condom.
I sink a little lower into the passenger’s seat, hopefully obscuring myself from view as a few young women enter the pharmacy hand-in-hand. One of them is wearing a Chicago North Bearhawks sweater. If she’s really a sports fan, then it’s a good chance she knows who Cary Pierce is and, by extension, she’ll know who I am, too. All it takes is for someone to recognize me looking shifty in the family planning section for the rumor mill to ignite.
Finally, Grant emerges from the entrance doors and casually walks back to the car.
“Did they have it?” I ask before he even lowers himself inside.
He passes me the plastic bag. I look inside, exhaling with relief at the lone box of emergency contraceptive.
“Thank you,” I say. “Sorry about this.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he says as he fastens his seat belt. “Believe it or not, this is not the first time I’ve done this for somebody.”
“You’re a good friend, Grant,” I say, meaning every syllable.
“I know.” He smiles. “So you and the quarterback finally...”
“Yeah.”
“And you didn’t use protection?”
“We meant to,” I say. “It was there. He had condoms. They were right there, ready to be used. We just...” I scold myself with closed eyes. “I’m so stupid.”
“Hey, man, I get it. If Junior Morgan wanted to pump me full of cum, I’d let him do it, too.”
I grimace. “Grant.”
“What? Is that not what we’re talking about here?”
“I mean... yeah. It is.” I sigh, letting it go. “I can’t let this happen again.”
“Just use the condoms next time,” he says with a shrug. “You’ll be fine.”
“No, I mean there won’t be a next time. I’m ending this.”
He snorts. “Oh, no, you’re not.”
“Yes, I am. Once was enough. I can’t risk my father finding out.”
“Do you really think once was enough for Junior?”
“Once is always enough for Junior, isn’t it? He’s a player, in your own words. He’s hit it, now it’s time to quit it. He won’t mind.”
Grant tilts his head. “Why are the pretty ones always so dumb?”
“What?”
“Alyssa, the man watched our audition.”
“So?”
“He woke up at the asscrack of dawn on a Saturday morning and rushed to campus just to see the look on your face when you got the part.”
“And?”
He exhales. “And I don’t think he would have done all of that if he didn’t care about you.” He mimes an inch between his thumb and forefinger. “Just a little bit.”
I scoff. “He cared about getting laid. That’s all. It was always about the chase.”
“Somehow, I’m not sure anymore.”
“Well, you don’t know him.”
“And you do?”
“Yes.”
“Fine.” He presents his hands. “I yield.”
“Thank you.”
“But the next time you see him,” he says, “and the two of you make eye contact and his hungry eyes look you up and down and your heart flutters in your chest and you take the first opportunity you can to get alone together just so you can sneak one little kiss but that kiss is so mind-blowing that you feel it deep down in your knees and the only thing keeping you upright is his strong arms wrapped around you—”
“Grant.”
“You’ll think of me.”
“Doubtful.”
He starts the engine. “Yeah,” he mutters, looking smug. “You will.”
“No,” I say, meaning it. “Tomorrow, I’m going to remove myself from this situation. I’m going to tell him it’s over and that he should find himself a new tutor.”
“Why wait?”
“What?”
“Why wait?” he asks again. “If you’re so sure, then end it now. Text him.”
I twitch. “No.”
“No?”
“You...” I stutter. “You can’t break up with somebody over text, Grant. It’s rude.”
“If he’s really just a player, then yes, you can. It’s practically expected.”
I roll my eyes. “Whatever. Just get me home, please.”
Thankfully, he gives it up. “I will, but one more thing. It’s very important.”
“What?”
Grant looks at me, his gaze briefly falling to the plastic bag. “Are you okay?” he asks.
I smile. “Yes, I’m okay.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“Good.” He pats my knee before facing forward, then he pauses again. “One more question. It’s just as important.”
I sigh. “What?”
“You wanna get some Taco Bell?”
“Oh, hell yes,” I answer as I fasten my seat belt.
“It’s over,” I whisper to myself as I enter the library.
I’m going to tell Junior that it’s over.
We had fun. A lot of fun.
“But it’s over,” I say again as I cross the lobby toward the stairs.
I’m early for our twelve o’clock study session. I barely slept last night, trying to find the right words. It shouldn’t be this hard, though, right? It was just a casual fling. A total coach’s daughter with benefits situation. It should not be so difficult for me to look him in the eye and say, “This was fun. Bye now.”
Why do I care this much?
I reach the second floor with those two words still fresh on my tongue. It’s over. It’s over. It’s...
Junior.
I spot him before he sees me. He’s already here, sitting on a couch outside the study rooms with his phone. The door to room B is closed. Occupied. At least I’ll have another few extra minutes to figure this shit out.
Why do I care this much?
Junior doesn’t care this much. Grant is wrong about that. Junior Morgan only wanted what I so enthusiastically gave him last night. There are hundreds of young girl fishes in the campus sea, and he’ll be more than eager to make his way to the next one.
Junior looks up. He sees me standing at the top of the stairs. We make eye contact. His gaze drifts downward, taking me in. My heart flutters.
Fuck.
He smiles. It’s a brief smile. A sweet smile. One made for me.
I realize I’m smiling, too.
The door to Study Room B opens. Two guys walk out, their backpacks stuffed full and balanced on their backs. Junior rises from his chair and quickly strides toward the open room to claim it before someone else can.
I realize I’m still standing in the same spot. My heart is racing. Aching. Begging me to step forward. A deep urge takes hold of me and I forget the two words I came here to say.
A phantom thread pulls me in his direction, forcing me to enter the study room. As soon as I do, I close the door behind us, blocking out the world. It’s just him and me now. Me and Junior Morgan.
He looks at me, still smiling, and opens his mouth to say something.
I kiss him before he can. Our lips come together, firing a shockwave through my body. My knees tremble, but Junior wraps his arms around me and holds me against him. He kisses me back. We cling to each other in the silent room, our hearts beating together.
This isn’t over.
It’s barely even begun.
“Dammit, Grant,” I whisper.
Junior tilts his head, confused. “What?”
“Nothing.”
I kiss him again, leaning further into his arms as he wraps them even tighter around me.
CHAPTER 26
ALYSSA
October
“It’s over.”
I say it without blinking, without hesitation, and Junior stares at me from the other side of his bed with a blank expression on his face.
“I don’t accept that,” he replies.
I try not to look down at his naked abs. It’s a distraction I don’t need right now. Thankfully, his bedsheet obscures his groin, but if he even sneezed just right, it would fall down to expose his—
Focus, Alyssa.
This is important.
“I don’t care what you accept,” I whisper, forcing my eyes down to my shirt — or I should say his over-sized T-shirt that I’ve claimed as my own. “It’s over, we’re done. I can’t do this anymore.”
He sits up. “You’ve sung this song before, Nora. What makes this different than any other time you’ve run away from us in the last ten years?”
“It’s…” I clamp my jaw in frustration. “It’s the… shit. Line.”
Junior smirks and twists his wrist to flick the script open. “It’s the first time I’ve thought more with my head—”
“More with my head and not my heart!” I complete the line. “Dammit. Why can’t I remember that one?”
He tosses the script down. “From the top again?”
I sigh with amused frustration. “You’re not even looking at the script.”
“I don’t need to anymore.”
“You have it memorized?”
“I guess.”
I kick his chest with my bare foot. “I can’t believe you know this scene better than I do.”
Junior cradles my foot in his hands, putting soft pressure against my arch. “Well, maybe if you didn’t end up with my dick in your mouth every time you came over to run lines, you’d know it by now.”
My jaw drops, and he laughs. “Wow. You know what? I think you’re right, Junior. Maybe we shouldn’t hook up anymore.”
He drops my foot and points a finger at me. “I didn’t say that,” he argues. “I did not say that.”
“I see the light now.” I add more emotion to my voice. “Sex is a bad thing. It’s naughty and horrible for productivity.”
“But that’s why it’s fun.”
“It’s over,” I say, taking it from the top.
He smiles and leans forward, letting the sheet gently slip off his naked groin. “I don’t accept that.”
“I don’t care what you accept…” I slide beneath him as he crawls up my body. “It’s over, we’re done. I can’t do this anymore.”
Junior shifts between my willing thighs. “You’ve sung this song before, Nora…” He crushes his lips against mine, and I stretch toward his condom stash to grab one off the top. “What makes this different than any other time you’ve run away from us in the last ten years?”
“It’s the first time I’ve thought more with my head and not my heart,” I say, rolling the latex onto his stiff shaft. “This is the right thing for both of us, Danny. I know it.”
He adjusts my knees, pulling me closer to align us. “If this is right… why does it feel so wrong?”
I moan as he pushes inside, stretching me out with every thick inch of him. “It feels wrong…” He rocks me with quick, firm thrusts. I twitch with pleasure. “It feels… oh, fuck, Junior, that feels good.”
“That’s not your line.”
“I don’t care.” I raise my knees and he drapes them over his shoulders the way I like it. His tip presses against my most sensitive spot and my back arches off the mattress as I squirm on him.
Junior grins down at me. “Nora,” he continues, keeping hard, consistent thrusts, “I don’t give a good goddamn what your head thinks. All I care about is what that beautiful heart of yours feels.” He leans down, flashing his best, melodramatic eyes at me. “It feels the same as mine. I love you. I’ve always loved you since the day I saw you and I refuse to let you go.”
I laugh from the bottom of my gut. “You fucking show-off!”
He chuckles, breaking character. “I think I may have missed my calling with this acting stuff.”
“You think so?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t think you’re handsome enough to be an actor.”
He halts his thrust. “Oh, those are some fighting words, Alyssa Pierce.”
“What are you gonna do about it?”
His eyes narrow, firing down at me with intense, playful revenge. “Okay, then—”
I laugh out loud as he takes hold of me and spins me around onto my stomach.
He’s back inside of me in seconds, entering me from behind as he pins me to the bed. I tremble, feeling the weight of his body against my back. He takes my hair in his fist and pulls my head up to expose my neck for his bites while pounding me hard and fast.
I grip the pillow beneath my head, moaning into it with each breath. His lips graze my ear and his warm touch tickles my spine.
“Are you going to take it back?” he teases, grinding me a little harder.
Fire burns inside, almost ready to explode. I open my mouth to speak, but nothing but pleasure falls from my tongue.
“Ally…”
He stops thrusting, and I whine beneath him. “No, keep going—”
“Take it back and I’ll let you come…”
I grit my teeth in dissatisfaction. “You son-of-a—”
He twists my neck, guiding my face back to kiss me. “Take it back and I’ll make you come all over this cock.”
I whimper. “I take it back—”
“Take what back?”
“You’re handsome.” I laugh. “Born for the stage.”
He slaps my ass. “Good girl.”
The pleasant pain charges through my lower back. I moan as he resumes his domination of me. He has me so close again within minutes, and he groans with me as he races me to the edge.
“I want to own this tight little body.” He wraps my hair tighter around his fist. I kindle at the deep growl of his voice. “Let me own you…”
I moan, fueled by his perfect, dirty mouth. He reaches for my hips and guides me to raise my ass, sending his cock deeper. I gasp at the extra pleasure. “Right there! Don’t stop.”
He bites my neck, etching a line into my skin. “I’m not stopping until you’re coming on my dick,” he teases into my ear, “and then I’m going to come all over your ass.”
He reaches around me to cradle my clit between two fingers, rubbing and fucking me until I’m purring like a damn kitten in heat.
“You’re mine, Ally,” he says. I spasm with lust. “Tell me that no one else makes you feel like this.”
“No one—!” I gasp, barely able to speak.
Climax takes over, crashing around me like a fierce ocean wave and there’s nothing I can do but lie here and drown in it.
Junior kisses my neck as I come, chuckling softly in my ear as he does every time I submit to him.
I settle against the pillow and he pushes off. I hear him tear the condom off before his bare tip touches my ass, dripping and shaking as he strokes himself with a tight fist.
He lets out a final grunt and drops his cock, letting it twitch against his thigh. “Goddamn, I love this beautiful ass…” he says, slapping me again with his open palm.
“It’s not that impressive,” I say.
“Never tone down y
our strengths.” He raises a finger at me. “Even if you have to fake it.”
I cringe. “Quoting my father probably isn’t the best thing to do after coming on my ass, Junior.”
“Shit, you’re right. Sorry.” He gives my cheek another tap before climbing off the bed and retrieving a rag from the nightstand to clean me up with.
I lie still, watching the sweat glisten on his skin as he moves across the room. “Did you mean what you said?”
“About what?”
“About owning me?”
“I say that because it’s what you like to hear,” he says as he wipes me down. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but every time I say it, you come within seconds. I certainly have.”
“But did you mean it?”
He folds up the towel and tosses it across the room, easily landing it in his laundry basket in the corner. His eyes trail up my body to mine, but he quickly looks away. “I don’t know how to answer that.”
I shift onto my side. “Why not?”
He hesitates.
“Answer the question, Junior.”
“Yes, of course. I meant it,” he spits. “But no one could ever own you, Ally. That’s why I want to.”
I let the words sink in and my brow furrows.
“Look—” he says, overruling my chance to react. “Don’t read into that. What we’ve got going on right now is more than enough for me.”
I push the disappointment aside. “Is it?”
“Yeah. I enjoy having fun with you. There’s no reason that should change.”
I nod, playing the part. “I agree.”
His eyes shift to his bedside clock, and he sighs. “I gotta get to practice.”
“Hope I didn’t wear you out too much,” I say with a grin.
“Eh.” He shrugs. “That ass is always worth it.”
“What are you doing later?”
He snatches a fresh pair of underwear from his dresser. “I need to study for tomorrow’s geometry test.”
“Need me to help you?”
He laughs. “No amount of real studying will happen if I say yes to that.”