by Tee, Marian
“Are you avoiding me?”
Pinning a smile to her face, she whirled around, her headache gone but her stomach queasy when she found herself gazing into dark blue-gray eyes that always seemed to uncomfortably see through her.
Jaike quickly looked away before she could see more in those eyes. Everything in them was a danger to her, a threat to the self-control she had worked so hard for.
“Having a nice time avoiding me?” A lazy smile accompanied the words, turning them into an innuendo.
“I wasn’t avoiding you.” She hated how he made it seem like they were playing a game of hide-and-seek, like she wanted to run away so he could go after her.
“That’s too bad. I like the idea of running after you.” Derek paused meaningfully, as if wanting her to fully experience the electric current that went through her body at his words. “I’ve gotten good at it over the years.”
And she obviously had gotten worse at dodging him.
Derek Christopoulos was the guy every girl in the university dreamt of. But to Jaike, he was her worst nightmare simply because he made her feel so disloyal to Angelo. Even the emotions Derek evoked in her were different. Angelo filled her being with serene peace. He had made her feel safe and cherished – or at least he used to. But Derek was the opposite, disturbing her like an emotional tornado, one bent on exposing Jaike’s secret flawed side at any cost.
“Nothing to say to that?” Derek crowded her shamelessly, uncaring of the incredulous glances that went their way as he stalked her, forcing Jaike to move backward. He was a few inches taller than Angelo, but unlike Jaike’s sweet and gentle boyfriend Derek liked to use his intimidating height to his advantage.
He cornered her whenever she could, like he did now, as if wanting her to feel small and powerless next to him. Worse, she liked feeling that way, loved how he could so easily crush her but knowing he wouldn’t. And he knew it.
“You’re too close,” she said between clenched teeth. With Derek so near, all she could think of was how large he was, how hard---
A tiny cry escaped her when she bumped accidentally into something from behind. She turned her head around just in time to see a pyramid of empty beer cans toppling onto the table. When Jaike looked back, Derek had imprisoned her in the circle of his arms, his hands holding the edge of the table at each side of her.
“I’m serious.” And she was, even if she sounded a little too breathless than what was right.
Derek smirked. “Did you come alone?” Every word that dropped from his lips felt like an invitation to make love. He was so intensely sexual Jaike had trouble breathing normally around him.
“No.” It was so, so hard to keep her voice from shaking, and harder not to stare at Derek when he was this close. Hardest of all to ignore was the heat he exuded, enticing her to touch any part of his ruggedly toned body. He was muscled all over, and his tight black shirt and hip-hugging jeans made no secret of it.
He leaned close, his breath fanning her face as he whispered, “Want me to keep you company?”
That look, that voice, those words.
They were the reasons why Jaike hated being around Derek Christopoulos, would rather be anywhere else but near him. He made her feel clumsy and awkward, unable to decide where she should look or what was safe to touch.
“Nothing to say?” Look was such a tame word to describe how Derek’s eyes devoured her. There was never an instance he didn’t gaze at Jaike as if he possessed her, body and soul, and he was simply biding his time before he claimed ownership.
She needed to get away from Derek. Fast. Before her tumultuous emotions caused her to do something she’d forever regret.
“Get out of my way, Derek.” Jaike winced at how weak she sounded.
“Not until you say please.”
She bared her teeth. “Please.”
Several heartbeats passed before Derek slowly drew back, his arms releasing her from his prison. He gave her a heart-stopping grin. “That was the first time I heard a girl say ‘please’ like she wanted to kill me.”
Jaike scowled, just so she wouldn’t accidentally smile.
But he saw through her, and his laugh said as much.
When he didn’t show any signs of leaving, she almost pleaded, “Aren’t you supposed to be somewhere else?”
Derek raised a brow. “Why do you say that?”
She said baldly, “You don’t go to parties without a date.”
“That was before.” His gaze challenged her to ask the obvious follow-up question to his words.
She didn’t take up the gauntlet he tossed at her, but the silence that followed only made her feel more skittish. She wanted to look around for Marcy. Her friend’s vivaciousness would allow her to blend back into the background. Angelo was like that, too. He took care of small talk whenever they were out, and she liked it that way.
“So…” She felt like she had to say something again. “Were you here long?”
“Not that long.” A slow sexy wink followed. “But I would never mind waiting longer if I knew you’d be coming.”
“Stop saying things like that!” She scowled at him even as her body finally succumbed to the teasing seduction in Derek’s tone, her nipples hardening, her breasts aching for the unknown feel of his touch.
His eyes trailed down, causing her nipples to stretch longer, poking against the cups of her bra. “Oh, but I think I should.”
“You can’t say stuff like that. It’s not right,” she muttered, hating how only someone as insanely confident as Derek Christopoulos could say something like that without sounding cheesy.
Derek raised a brow. “What’s not right about it?”
“Because I have a boyfriend, that’s why!”
Derek stopped smiling.
The sight of it made Jaike instantly regret her words. It wasn’t his fault she was stressed out tonight. Jaike started to apologize, but the words remained stuck in her throat when a familiar figure had crossed her vision.
“Is that…” She tried to sidestep Derek, but he moved to block her way. “Hey! Let me pass.”
“Not until you say ‘sorry’.”
“Sorry.” Then she shoved him aside, taking Derek by surprise.
“Shit! Jaike, don’t---”
Jaike remembered the last time she had seen her boyfriend.
This morning, Angelo had visited her at her dorm, his eyes widening when he caught her stepping out of the shower with a towel wrapped around her body.
She had cried out in surprise, turning away to dress because it wasn’t like that between them. But Angelo had stopped her, his hold firm and commanding, and Jaike slowly faced him again.
“Sit,” he had told Jaike, drawing her to the velvet-cushioned stool in front of her dresser. And then taking the brush from her hand, he had brushed her hair ever so gently, as if he had all the time in the world and wanted to spend every moment of it caring for her.
That Angelo was gone, her memories now overlaid by another image, the present blackening out the past.
Angelo was here, a tall dark figure standing near the doors, a bottle in his hand, his head bent as he gazed at a girl wriggling her ass on his crotch.
The lascivious picture that Angelo and the unidentified girl painted hurled Jaike’s entire world into chaos. Angelo had been her rock, the one stable presence she depended on and looked up to. But now his role in her life had disintegrated, shattering with every second Angelo did nothing to stop the girl’s obscene take on booty shaking.
“You knew about this?” Jaike asked numbly, sensing Derek’s taut form as he stood next to her. Shame and hurt scalded her cheeks as her heartbeat slowed down into a dull throb.
“No.”
She believed him. In the three years she had known Derek, he had never lied to her, not even if it had been in his better interests to do so.
“I just got here a while ago and I saw him first with another girl. And then I saw you.”
“And then you tried to help him out,” she ended flatly.
Hands settled on her shoulders, forcing her to look back at Derek, whose beautiful face was cold in anger.
Girls were not the only ones who were lovelier when angry, Jaike mused absently. Derek Christopoulos was proof of it. Rage made the angles of his face more defined, his eyes deepening into the color of stormy clouds, and his beautiful lips thinned into a forbidding line.
“I don’t even care if he lives or not. It’s you I care about,” he gritted out.
The last words snatched Jaike out of the reverie she had lost herself in, flinging her back into the painful reality of the present. “I don’t need your pity!”
Derek met her gaze unflinchingly. “Pity is the last thing I feel for you, koukla mou. I’m just pissed that you had to see something like this.”
“I’m not your koukla, whatever that is, so stop calling me that.” It was an absurd thing to say, not to mention a lie, but right now Jaike needed to cling to the absurdities. She was desperate for anything that could blind her to how her boyfriend was practically banging another girl in public.
Derek didn’t reply, his gaze merely following hers, as did everybody else’s. Every person in this party had to know who Angelo was, and they had to have an idea who she was. But not one of them seemed incline to put a stop to Angelo’s source of private entertainment.
“You don’t need to talk to him.” Derek’s body vibrated with suppressed rage.
She knew what that coiled form meant. Just one word from her, and he would make a move against Angelo.
“Jaike?”
“No. I have to do this myself.” She forced herself to say the words even though all she wanted was to lean on Derek and let the inevitable happen.
Jaike pushed her way into the throng of couples crowding the poolside, stopping only when she stood half a foot away from Angelo and the unknown girl in his arms. Shouldn’t Angelo have sensed her presence by now? They were still oblivious, and that hurt even more. Angelo used to know the moment she came into a room he was in, no matter how many other people were with them, no matter how noisy, no matter how busy he was.
The pain of his betrayal began to sink in, and she struggled to control her chaotic emotions when the other girl enfolded Angelo in an embrace, pulling his head down for an open-mouthed kiss.
What now, she wondered. Should she scream and make a scene? Should she burst into tears like she wanted to and wait if Angelo would comfort or ditch her? In the end, all she could think of doing was…tap. Her fingers played on Angelo’s broad and hard shoulder like they were a piano.
Nothing.
She had to tap thrice.
Oh God, he was so into the other girl Jaike – his girlfriend - had to tap thrice!
Angelo finally tore his mouth away from the girl’s. When he turned to her, there wasn’t even a flicker of surprise, no sign of guilt or regret coloring his gaze.
The Angelo she knew had been the gentlest and sweetest man alive, a guy who always did what was best for her.
The Angelo in front of her was a stranger. He was still the tall, dark, handsome Italian-American Jaike had cared for, but those were the only things that she could recognize. Everything else was different. His eyes used to be so bright when looking at her, but now they were completely hard. Even his clothes were all wrong, with his gray silk polo unbuttoned almost all the way to his navel and even a bite mark in the middle of his bare chest. He wasn’t the typical flamboyant Latin lover, but now he could easily pass for a first-class gigolo.
“What’s wrong, caro?”
Jaike wanted to gag. Angelo had asked her to call him ‘caro’, too, which meant ‘darling’ in Italian. Now this girl was doing the same, in front of her, and in such a shrill voice that Jaike half-expected Angelo to curse right after.
Angelo hated shrill voices, and it had been one of his few explicit requests that Jaike speak with him in a soft voice all the time because it soothed his ears. But the seconds ticked past, and Angelo still hadn’t spoken, didn’t even seem to hear the girl freaking out next to him.
“Do you want me to talk to her?” the girl demanded more shrilly when Angelo still hadn’t uttered a word. She turned to Jaike, chin jutting upward aggressively.
Recognition instantly hit her and Jaike’s eyes widened in disbelief. Rosie Parsley? Angelo was cheating her with Rosie Parsley? Sure, everyone knew Rosie was a hot lay, but that was the problem itself. Everyone knew the fact firsthand, and she couldn’t imagine someone as possessive as Angelo wanting a girl who liked being every male’s common property. He used to brood all the time when Derek so much as glanced at her, but now he was cheating on her with someone who practically did everyone on the varsity squad. For three sports.
Rosie’s gaze insolently traveled over Jaike’s form from head to toe. “Are you just going to stand there or what?”
Jaike forced herself to look away from the other girl, focusing on Angelo. Her voice shook as she asked, “Angelo? Can we talk?”
“No, you can’t,” Rosie snapped.
Jaike didn’t even look at her, keeping her gaze at Angelo. “Please, Angelo?” She wasn’t above begging. She needed him so, so badly.
Angelo’s eyes darkened with something that so closely resembled regret it sparked a light of hope inside Jaike. But then it was gone, his gaze cold once more and Jaike knew she could have only imagined it out of desperation.
Just when she thought he would leave her hanging, Angelo said quietly, “Later. Just go home and we’ll talk about it later.”
A part of her, Jaike realized sickly, wanted to do just that. She had never disobeyed anything Angelo asked of her, never. She had craved Angelo’s controlling nature the way a junkie needed to be high. If he was in control, she was in control. It was that simple. But now it wasn’t.
“I need to know why you’re doing this now.”
“You really want to do this now? Here?”
“Yes.” She had barely finished answering when Angelo gave her what she asked.
“You’re the coldest, most boring prude I’ve had the misfortune to date.” Angelo raised a brow. “Is that reason enough for you?”
Numbness wrapped around her heart, the shock so great she couldn’t even feel hurt by his words. Tears stung her eyes as she stared at Angelo, but his face didn’t soften. He had always been gentle with her, never raising his voice, never losing his temper or patience. The most he did was frown to show his disappointment, and she would be so damn eager to make it up to him.
Jaike no longer felt. She simply existed.
Angelo’s arm went around Rosie’s waist. “Now that you’ve---”
“Jaike?”
She spun so fast at the sound of that voice she almost stumbled. It was a sound she used to run away from but now it was that one and only sound she could cling to.
Derek stood before her, utterly at ease being the cynosure of everyone’s eyes. He gazed at her like she was the center of his world, uncaring of the silent and expectant crowd that had gathered around them. His beautiful face showed no clue to his thoughts and feelings, making the next words that came out from his mouth all the more surprising.
“Is everything all right, baby?”
Derek crossed to her side immediately, his jaw clenching hard at the sight of Jaike’s tear-stained eyes.
Jaike numbly watched a small frown crease Derek’s forehead as he bent close. It was only when he cradled her face, wi
ping her tears away with his thumbs, that she realized she had been crying. “I’m here, baby,” he whispered, concern mingled with fury darkening his gaze.
“Who the hell are you calling baby, Christopoulos?” Angelo roared from behind, but Jaike couldn’t see him, with Derek’s tall and lean form blocking almost everyone from her view.
“My girlfriend, who else?”
Jaike’s eyes flew to Derek, stunned at his words. He gazed back at her expressionlessly, as if leaving it to her to accept or denounce his claim. Her lips parted, but no words came out.
He gave her a tender smile, as if reassuring her that there wasn’t any rush. “Are you okay?”
Even as Jaike nodded, her body started to tremble, the shock of what had just transpired finally catching up with the rest of her. Derek moved away reluctantly, stepping back to stand at her side.
The first thing Jaike saw was the distance suddenly separating Angelo and Rosie, the other girl fuming when she reached out for Angelo’s hand and he batted it away instead. The second was the look of betrayal in Angelo’s dark gaze, sending a shaft of such acute distress through her that she almost cried out.
Even though a part of her wanted to go to Angelo, she held herself stiffly in place, her hand instinctively searching for Derek’s and gripping it as tightly as she could. Why was Angelo looking at her like she had hurt him when he had been the one to break them apart? His unexpected betrayal was like a chainsaw that had hacked her heart into pieces, something she didn’t know how to survive without Derek at her side.
“Baby?” The aching sweetness in Derek’s voice made her look at him, unconsciously pleading for something she couldn’t put a label to. All she knew was that Derek was the only one who could give it to her.
The look of surrender in Jaike’s eyes nearly had Derek undone, but he managed to keep his control even though all he wanted was to snatch her into his arms and finally have a taste of her lips. Keeping his voice gentle, he asked, “Did you tell him then?”