FALSE 9: Red Card Series

by Erickson, Megan

  She waved a hand and again her expression faltered before she wiped her face clean. I hated that she felt like she had to do that around me. “It’s fine.”

  “Look, Bianca. You don’t have to tell me anything, but I don’t want you to think you have to fake being happy if something is bothering you. If you want to sit here and scowl at the pond or whatever for an hour, I’ll sit here and do it with you.”

  As I spoke, the blank mask was beginning to fall from her face. She opened her mouth but no words came out.

  “I’m just saying.” I toed at the mud along the bank. “You don’t have to fake it with me.”

  She crumpled. Her legs folded and her butt hit the ground and then her head flopped forward onto her bent knees.

  I sat down slowly beside her, listening to muffled sniffles. I wanted to touch her but I wasn’t sure if that was okay. My parents had taught me consent at a young age and even made me awkwardly role-play, with Dad wearing lipstick and a wig.

  I gently reached out and ran my fingers through the ends of her hair. When she leaned into my touch, I massaged her scalp. She made a small moaning noise, and then shifted toward me until her head lay in my lap. She faced the water and I continued to give her the best damn scalp massage ever. Dad taught me how to do it to him, because he wanted child labor.

  The air still smelled like morning dew, and a bird screeched above us. It’d been so long so I let myself just…stop. Be silent. Sitting here on the ground, my hands tangled in Bianca’s soft hair, was pretty much heaven.

  Finally, she spoke. “I haven’t been around anyone in a long time that I didn’t have to act fake for.”

  My fingers stilled. I didn’t care anymore about some stupid illusion of a date, of spending a hundred dollars on her to try to impress her.

  “For years,” she said, “I’ve felt about thirty years older than I am. Now I’m a college student, something I never thought I’d be, and I want to try all the things. I want to have that invincible attitude where I do things I’m not supposed to.”

  “Like swim in the campus pool after hours?”

  She laughed softly. “Yeah like that. I want to eat wings until I want to puke, and spend time with a guy who makes me laugh harder than I ever have in my life.”

  My heart slammed against my rib cage. “I hope you find him.”

  Her eyes slid to me, and she held my gaze meaningfully. “I did.”

  I tried to steady my breathing so I didn’t look like I was losing my shit. Was this her way of apologizing for last night? Because that was now a distant memory.

  “I meant want I said at the party, Lavin. I like you. I just wish I met you… at another point in my life. I’m a mess now.”

  “If you’re a mess, then I don’t know what you’d call seventy-five percent of the college population.”

  She laughed softly. “I’m sorry I can’t tell you everything, but thank you for being a place of realness for me. I wish I could give you more promises, and more…” her voice dropped out and she exhaled a puff of frustration.

  My hands left her hair and I braced them behind me. “Hey, it’s okay. I like hanging out with you. What we’re doing is fine. Coach can’t find out anyway.”

  Her hand squeezed my thigh. She rolled onto her back, and stretched her hands above her head, fingers grazing the grass. Her shirt lifted, showing a strip of skin, and I did not succeed at all in looking away.

  But the last half hour with her? My mind hadn’t been on sex. It hadn’t been about me. I’d been thinking about her. Was that also about being an adult?

  I picked at the grass, pulling out a few strands before stripping them like string cheese. “Can I ask you a question though?”

  “Sure.”

  “Is this like… are you…” I growled. I couldn’t think of how to ask this question without sounding like a punk. “Are you doing what we do… with someone else?”

  Silence met my words, and I finally risked a glance at her. Her smile would have buckled my knees if I wasn’t already sitting on my ass.

  “I know I haven’t given you much to go on, and I’m sorry that I have to keep some things private,” she said. I sucked in a breath and waited for the blow. “But there’s no one on this campus, or I think anywhere else, that I want to spend time like we do. It’s just you, Lavin.”

  My heart was going to burst out of my skin. I could barely hear her voice over the racket in my ears. “Okay. That’s… that’s good.”

  “Why, you got a bunch of girls you see on the side when I’m not around?” She was teasing, I could tell by the sparkle in her eye.

  “A bunch? B, I got a whole fleet. I’m in demand.”

  She laughed, her eyes crinkling. She heaved a contented sigh and closed her eyes, face turned toward the sun. I stared at her a little too long, fascinated by her long lashes and full lips, the soft skin of her cheeks that were flushed from her laughter. I went back to picking grass, feeling lighter than I had for days now that I knew my place a little better in Bianca’s life.

  After awhile, soft fingers on my hand drew my attention. Slowly, Bianca shifted her shirt higher and placed my hand on her bare stomach. I stared at my fingers on her skin, unsure what to do, how to move. All I knew was that I was touching her. Me. Lavin. Touching her skin that was normally covered by clothes.

  I locked eyes with her, and she was watching me, her bottom lip tucked between her teeth. The corners of her mouth tilted up and she arched her back slightly, which then drew my attention to her nipples as they strained through the thin material of her shirt.

  I swallowed thickly. “Bianca.” Holy shit, my voice sounded deeper.

  She let her lip go. “Yeah?”

  “Can I move my hand?”

  “Where do you want to move it?”

  Her voice was doing that breathy thing, and I was hard. Painfully so. “Um, north.”

  She raised perfectly shaped eyebrows. “Which way is north? Do you have a compass?”

  “I mean, up.”

  “Toward the sky?” Her tongue touched the corner of her mouth in a little smirk. She was enjoying this.

  I growled and a shudder ran down her body. “I want to see you.”

  “What do you want to see?”

  I’d never really been forward like this, but everything about Bianca made me want to grow the fuck up and be the man she deserved. “Under your shirt.”

  She ran light fingers down her neck and across her chest, then dipped an index finger below the neckline. “Do you want to touch too?”

  I was going to combust. “Yes.”

  “What about taste?”

  “Fuck yes, I want to taste you.”

  One minute, she was laying in my lap, the next I was flat on my back, Bianca straddling me, as she lifted her shirt over her head in one swift move. She tossed it to the side as her hair fell over her one shoulder. I… had never ever seen anything like her.

  She wore a plain black bra, but it was still the most erotic thing I’d seen in my life. Which was saying something because hello, see earlier reference about my porn collection.

  “You’re beautiful,” I said on a whisper. “I’m sure you get that all the time, so I wish there was a word to describe like… sight and circumstances.” Fuck, I was kinda rambling. “Because it’s not just how you look, it’s your presence too.” She reached out and slid her fingers along my jaw, over the healing scratch on my chin. I wasn’t done rambling apparently. “Beau-sence. There, I made up a word.”

  She ran her tongue over her upper teeth. “Use it in a sentence.”

  I cleared my throat and deepened my voice. “Beau-sence. Origin: Parksburg, Pennsylvania. Definition: Noun. Beau-sence. Bianca Santos has a beau-sence that is unique and that makes me want to be around her and see her happy. Beau-sence.” I grinned. “What do you think?”

  Her chest heaved as she inhaled slightly and for a split second of doom, I swore she’d call me a dork. My seduction skills needed work if I turned a potential make-out
with the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen into a goddamn spelling bee.

  She ran her tongue over her lower lip, and smiled. “Alternate sentence: Lavin Saint has no idea he has beau-sence too.” Wrapping slim fingers around my wrist, she placed my hand on her hip. I glanced up at her, and she was watching my face closely as I swiped my thumb over her soft skin. “So which way are you heading?”

  “North.” My voice was a croak.

  She laughed softly as she hooked a chunk of hair behind her ear.

  I ran the back of my hand up her stomach, which trembled a little beneath my touch. She shifted her hips, which reminded me I was hard, and said hard dick was inches away from the Holy Grail, separated only by a few layers of clothing.

  I tried to muffle my groan, but I didn’t succeed. Bianca tilted back her head, the ends of her hair brushing my thighs as she slowly began to roll her hips.

  “Holy shit.” I didn’t make it north. I gave it the old college try, but she was derailing me with every thrust of her hips. Gripping her thighs as she rocked on top of me, I no longer had control of my muscles. Everything was focused on the feel of her on top of me. That beautiful body undulating, her full C-cups spilling out of her bra. She leaned down, brushing her lips against mine, and I knew that I needed to taste her. I needed to feel her tongue on mine again, and not in a creepy cemetery at night, or in a pool.

  She opened for me immediately and I swept my tongue inside, moaning into her mouth. Thank God that part of me worked, because I needed to show her how good this felt, how much this meant to me.

  She lifted up the bottom of my shirt and mumbled against my lips. “How about I go south?”

  Which way was that? My internal compass was fucked, since my brain was on the fritz. But when she tugged softly at my waistband, my synapses kicked into gear. “Yeah.” I breathed out, my voice a little high for my liking. “South sounds great.”

  Her hand slipped into my shorts, and slim fingers wrapped around my dick, which had become the epicenter of my entire body. I could smell nothing but her hair, taste nothing but her skin on my tongue, feel nothing but her hand stroking me.

  I opened up my mouth because oh God, it was here, fucking here, but no sound came out as my dick pulsed and I was coming, coming so hard my vision blurred. I came back into my body, slowly and immediately my eyes popped open, meeting her dark gaze.

  I’d come. In about ten seconds. In my shorts.

  I stared at her as she hovered above me. I barely blinked, barely breathed, because I didn’t know much, but I was pretty sure this was not good. I licked my dry lips as I tried to read her expression. “That, uh, that wasn’t supposed to happen.”

  At my words, her face lit up, and her mouth stretched into a beautiful smile that held a hint of pride. “That was exactly what was supposed to happen.”

  I shook my head. “No no, I’m pretty sure I was supposed to make you come first, and then I was supposed to impress you with my stamina as I powerfully plunged into you with my soccer-honed thighs. And you were supposed to scream my name and tell me I’m the best you’ve ever had.” I took a deep breath as her face didn’t change. “I think that was what was supposed to happen. Not me coming in my pants as soon as you touched my dick.”

  She slipped her hand out of my shorts and curled it around my hip, while she shifted slightly over me. Her other hand came up and flicked the hair on my forehead out of my eyes. She laughed, and my dick gave a good ol’ college try jerk in its persistence to get hard again. Jesus Fucking Christ, could I be any more of a virgin?

  But those fingers were on my face now, stroking my forehead, my brow, over my cheekbones. Her eyes were huge and dark and a little wet. I’d never had anyone look at me like that before.

  “It doesn’t matter what was supposed to happen,” she said softly. “What happened felt good, right?”

  “Uh, I can’t remember my name.” I flopped my hands ineffectually at my sides, unsure what to do now. “But I want to make you feel good.”

  She grinned. “And it made me feel good to make you feel good.”

  “I don’t think it works like that?”

  She shrugged and sat up. “Says who?”

  I didn’t know the answer to that, so I just stared at her. She blinked and for one of the few times since I met her, vulnerability crossed over her face in a flash. “Look, with you, I don’t feel like I have to be anything but me. And I know you don’t know much about me yet, but please know it means the world to me. You aren’t trying to figure out an angle to get what you can out of me or what you can get me to do. You aren’t doing flashy shit to impress me so I’ll be on your arm for everyone to see.”

  Her words made me feel two things, happiness I did that for her, and fucking anger that other people had made her feel like she was a commodity. “Bianca, I—”

  “I’m tired of everything feeling like an exchange. That every interaction I have, every nice thing that’s done for me, I have to always be thinking, great, now what do they want in return?” She tore apart a piece of grass. “So, yeah, you got off, and I got to make the decision to do it.” She shrugged. “So maybe that was an exchange, but at least I finally felt like I had a say in one.”

  I didn’t know the right thing to say. “Then, I’m glad.”

  “I don’t feel like you’re trying to impress me by being someone you aren’t.”

  I winced. “Well, I have tried to impress you and pretend like I’m some awesome dude who’s really good at sexing, so I guess I failed.”

  She threw back her head and laughed while the sun shone on her hair. Fuck, she was beautiful. And her voice… I could listen to her voice and her laugh every day.

  She gently tapped her lips. “You didn’t fail. I like how you kiss.”

  “Really?”

  “You have… beau-sense in your kiss.” She pulled her shirt back down over her head and shot me a grin.

  “I think we might have to send that sentence to the judges,” I said sternly.

  She rose above me and I was about to stand up when I remembered I had, uh, a situation. With no other options, I pulled my shirt off, cleaned myself up, and then balled it up in my fist. When I stood beside her, I wore only my shorts and my shoes. Bianca widened her eyes at me as she ran her gaze down my body. “Well then, I guess I should make you come in your shorts more often.”

  “Uh, give me like ten minutes and we’re good to go.”

  She wrapped her arms around my waist and kissed me, laughing into my mouth.

  And as she led me to her car, I wondered what the fuck had just happened. And when I’d get the chance to repay the favor.

  Shit, I was going to have to ask Dre for tips. This was going to be awkward.

  Seven

  Sex Expert and Cock Master

  Bianca: Miss me?

  With every breath

  Lavin: Sorry, who’s this?

  Bianca: Ha. Ha. Funny man.

  Lavin: Where’ve you been? I got the fucking desk again.

  Bianca: sorry, something came up. Boooo to the bad desk. Poor baby.

  Lavin: it was awful. you should pity me real bad

  Bianca: I do. I’ll make it up to you ;)

  I sat on my bed and stared at my phone for a long time. What exactly did she mean by making it up to me? Coupled with a winky face emoji?

  I hadn’t seen her since that the day in the field. She’d missed the class we had together that week, both times. It was now Saturday, and my mind should have been on the game we were supposed to play later that day. Instead it was on Bianca.

  It was killing me that I knew next to nothing about her. Hell, she could have a zillion Lavins around campus and was currently kissing the fuck out of him. The thought made me want to smash something.

  “Yo.”

  I glanced up to see Dre standing with his hands braced in the trim above my doorway. Fuck, his biceps were huge. “Hey.”

  “Game time soon.”

  I glanced back at my phone and fire
d off a quick message to Bianca. Looking forward to it.

  After tossing my phone on my desk, I turned to Dre, who was now examining a dent in my wall. “How did that happen? I’m not about losing my security deposit on this place.”

  “Shane and I were being idiots. That was my elbow. I’ll patch it, man. Chill out.”

  “You better.”

  My phone beeped.

  Bianca: Bring your A game.

  My A game? I didn’t fucking have an X, Y, or Z game. Just that kiss had me thinking I was going to blow in my pants. Sure, I’d made out with girls. I’d had hands jobs, blow jobs, all kinds of jobs that weren’t, well, pussy jobs. Still, this was Bianca, a girl who drove me fucking insane with one look. What if she expected me to be some sexual god? I was going to be a huge fucking disappointment.

  I turned desperate eyes to Dre, who was now standing in front of my full-length mirror on my closet, flexing his quads. I eyed him, and thought about all the girls who left his room some mornings looking hella happy. “Uh, so Dre.”

  “Yeah.” He didn’t turn around.

  Shit, how the fuck did I even bring this up? Sure guys talked about fucking around, but it was always in context of, her tits were perfect, and she let me hit it from behind. I needed actual goddamn advice. “So like, what makes a guy a good fuck?”

  He turned around so fast, I thought he was going to get whiplash. “What?”

  My face was on fire. I didn’t even want to know what I looked like. “Do I need to read magazines or some shit? I don’t want to just get laid to get laid. I want to be good at it.”

  He stared at me like I’d lost my goddamned mind. Then he was all action. “Castle!” He hollered at the top of his lungs.

  I waved my hands frantically, shaking my head. “No,” I stage-whispered.

  “What?” Shane yelled from downstairs.

  “Dre—”

  “Get up here! House meeting in Saint’s room!”

  “Dre!” I said through gritted teeth. “What the fuck?”

  “I need all hands on deck,” he said, and I had never seen him so damn serious in my life. “I don’t want to be solely responsible for this.”