Carter was talking to the other guy, but I couldn’t see who he was.
“Yeah,” the guy said gruffly, and there was something familiar about his voice.
Then Carter shifted just enough for me to clearly see the blond guy and the guy standing next to him with his eyes locked on my restrained body.
It was Jase.
My blood ran cold, and I started to scream, but Carter’s hand came back over my mouth, stifling my cries. He laughed, and I could see the blond guy laughing as his hand moved to his crotch and started massaging his bulge. He was getting off on this.
My eyes shifted to Jase, but he didn’t move. He stood there stock still, his shoulders rigid, his body tense.
Then before I knew what was happening, his fist flew out and connected with the blond guy’s temple, knocking him to the ground with a thud. He was out cold as far as I could tell. Then Jase advanced on Carter, whose attention had been on me, his hand still gripping my wrists. He turned when he heard his friend go down and didn’t even have time to react before Jase’s fist connected with his jaw.
“What the fuck, man?” Carter demanded, releasing my wrists and rubbing his jaw with his hand.
“Get off of her,” Jase demanded, his jaw tight, his fist tensed to strike again.
I realized then that he was going to help me. Whether he had that intention before he realized it was me or not, I didn’t care. In that moment, all I cared about was getting away.
“Relax,” Carter said. “You’ll get your turn when I’m done. She’s a virgin, so I get the first shot. That’s how this works.”
That’s how this works? How many times had he done this before?
Jase’s fist connected with Carter’s jaw before I could mull that thought over any longer, and this time it jostled him enough that I could twist out from under him. Jase punched him in the stomach, as I gained enough leverage to roll off the bed, falling to the floor in a heap and quickly scrambling to my feet as Jase’s fist slammed into Carter’s stomach once more, and he doubled over in pain.
“Come on,” Jase said quickly, his hand reaching for mine.
Without giving it a second thought, I took it and held onto it with everything I had as he led me out of the pool house and away from what would have been the worst thing to ever happen to me.
As soon as we emerged outside, the lights and sounds from the crowded, noisy pool area flooded my senses and a wave of intoxication wash over me. I stumbled, my hand still gripping Jase’s, and he stopped to look back at me. The alcohol was suddenly hitting me hard, and it wasn’t very forgiving. I knew I was going to be sick, so as much as I hated to do it, I yanked my hand from Jase’s and lurched around the side of the building before I fell to my knees at the edge of the grass.
I could tell the champagne was trying making a comeback, as I attempted to catch my breath. I felt Jase’s hand settle on my back. I braced myself with my hands and tried to breathe slowly, but I couldn’t hold it in. The champagne churned its way up my throat, and I vomited all over the grass in front of me. I was vaguely aware of Jase’s hands gathering my hair at the nape of my neck, but all I could focus on was the heaving that wouldn’t stop. For several minutes, I was consumed, as the remnants of every ounce of alcohol I’d drank that night emptied out of my system.
I finally gasped audibly, and sank to my knees. Jase’s arms were instantly around me, holding me back against his chest, as I fought to breathe. The tears started to flow freely, as I tried to put together the pieces of what had just happened. I could hear the noise from the party so close by, but that noise was soon drowned out by my sobbing and gasping for air. My lungs constricted, and I felt like if I could just stop crying, I could breathe normally, but the tears kept coming. My entire body shook from a combination of the crying, the utter fear that consumed me, and the cold and wet from the grass that was biting into my bare knees.
I closed my eyes, trying to push out the memory of Carter’s hands on me, his breath on my neck and his hands clasped around my wrists so tightly that I knew I would have bruises in the morning. I gagged when I remembered how he’d kissed me and touched me. The thought of what had almost happened would have made me sick if there had been anything left in my stomach.
“You’re okay. You’re okay,” Jase chanted softly in my ear. “I’m here. I won’t let anyone hurt you.”
And those were the last words I heard before I blacked out.
-18-
I opened my eyes to sunlight streaming in them and blinked a few times in confusion. I wasn’t in my bed, and I wasn’t in Ethan’s bed. The angle of the light was all wrong. Where the hell was I?
Then panic flooded me as memories of the previous night raced back to me at full force, and I froze where I lay, terrified to look around. But then I remembered Jase coming to rescue me, and I relaxed infinitely. But I still had no idea where I was. What had happened after I’d blacked out? Why couldn’t I remember?
My head was pounding, and my body felt exhausted. I took a deep breath, and decided I needed to first figure out where I was, and then I needed to figure out how to get out of there. I needed to call Ethan. I needed to find a phone. Mine was in his car.
Shit! My phone was in his car. Did he even know where I was? He was going to kill me once he found out what happened. No, scratch that, he would kill Carter, and that might not be bad thing. Fucking asshole.
God dammit. This sucked. I closed my eyes again. I was so pissed off at myself for getting into such a bad situation. I was not usually that careless.
A knock on the door startled me and pulled me out of my head. My eyes snapped open, and I sat up quickly against the headboard behind me.
“You’re awake,” Jase said, just as I realized it was his room that I was in, and I stiffened as more memories from the night before came back to me.
“Do you think you can stand, Logan?”
We were outside Carter’s house when Jase had asked me that. He had carried me to his car after I’d passed out. I’d nodded my head, and he’d set me down on the ground, but I’d clung to him, my hands gripping the front of his shirt, not wanting him to leave me.
“Get away from her,” Ethan yelled sternly as he tore out of the house with Henley following close behind him. “Get the fuck away from her. Now.”
“She’s okay,” Jase said, and I was aware of his arms going around me. I was so tired, I just closed my eyes and leaned my head against his warm chest, inhaling his familiar scent, so comforting and so reassuring in that moment.
“Like hell she is,” Ethan fired back, his voice even closer. I felt him try to tug me away from Jase.
“No, Ethan,” I mumbled, holding tighter to Jase’s shirt.
“Logan, come on,” he insisted. “Shit, you’re really out of it.”
“I think he might have slipped her something,” Jase said.
“Who?” Ethan growled.
“Carter Jackson,” Jase said.
“No way,” Ethan said, and I could hear him getting territorial. Carter was his friend. “He wouldn’t do that.”
I opened my eyes to see Ethan advance on Jase, but Jase just hugged me closer and twisted me away from Ethan.
“It’s not the first time he’s done it,” Jase said, and I wondered how he knew that. Had he deciphered the same thing I had from Carter’s comment?
“Shut up, Jase,” Ethan said, glaring at him.
“He didn’t slip me anything,” I mumbled. “I just drank a lot.”
I was fairly positive that Carter hadn’t put anything in my drink. If he had, I wouldn’t have been as coherent the whole time, and I probably wouldn’t be standing. I was just really drunk.
I watched Henley come up next to Ethan, her eyes going wide as she drank me in. I think she was noticing that I had grass stains on my knees and was shoeless. She’d been hanging back, observing the guys, but now she was interjecting herself into their unproductive argument.
“Lo, what happened?” she asked, smoothing my hair
back from my face where it had fallen across my cheek. “Where are your shoes?”
“Carter,” I told her. “Pool house.”
“What did he do?” she asked.
“What did he do?!” Ethan repeated, his voice roaring. “Did he hurt you?”
Henley shushed him and swatted his arm.
I felt the tears prick my eyes as I remembered what had transpired in the pool house and what Carter had almost done.
“He didn’t do anything, right Logan?” Jase asked, his voice so close to my ear and so comforting. I completely forgot I wasn’t supposed to like him anymore, but then again, he had rescued me.
I shook my head and whispered, “Almost, but no.”
I’d been a willing participant until Carter had tried to take things too far.
“Son of a bitch!” Ethan roared. “I’m going to fucking kill him.”
“Ethan, he’s not a good guy,” I mumbled.
“Fuck him,” Ethan said, turning around to head back inside.
“I just want to go home,” I said to no one in particular, although Ethan was my ride.
Ethan spun on his heel and came back to where I was standing, but I could tell he was conflicted. He wanted nothing more than to level Carter in that moment, but he wouldn’t leave me.
“I’ll take her home,” Jase volunteered.
“No way,” Ethan countered. “I’ll take her home.”
“I’ll take care of her, Ethan,” Jase said, and I could hear the insistence in his voice. He wanted Ethan to know he wouldn’t hurt me, and I knew he wouldn’t.
“Fuck that,” Ethan spat. “After what just happened, and what you did a few years ago, no way am I letting her leave with you.”
“He didn’t do anything wrong,” I said, my voice sounding weak, and I felt Jase stiffen.
“What?” Ethan asked, his attention now focused on me.
“Jase got to me in time,” I insisted. “He’s a good guy. He didn’t do what you think he did. He’s good.”
“You believe me,” Jase whispered, and I nodded against his chest.
“You’re a good guy. I don’t believe that you could have done that to someone.”
“I didn’t,” Jase said, the relief palpable in his voice, as his whole body went slack.
“Bullshit,” Ethan said, but there wasn’t a lot of force behind his words.
“Ethan, I wasn’t there. I swear. Amanda Berlin was a good friend of mine, and I was talking to her in her room before it happened, but I left right before. Her boyfriend came in, and he thought something was going on between us, and he . . .” He let his words trail off, and I looked up at him just as his face fell. “Shit.”
“Fuck,” Ethan said, and I think they realized the same thing in that moment, because they both looked at each other.
“Carter Jackson was her boyfriend,” Jase said.
Ethan nodded in confirmation, looking a little bewildered by what he’d just figured out.
“I’m going to fucking kill him,” Jase seethed, and I knew he regretted the fact that he hadn’t hit Carter harder than he had.
“Not if I get to him first,” Ethan said. “He hurt Logan.”
“I got a few punches in, but I’d happily go back for more,” Jase said.
“Okay, so why don’t you boys go kick his butt or whatever, and I’ll call Logan and me a cab,” Henley suggested, and I thought her idea sounded perfect. Although, it would mean leaving Jase, and I suddenly didn’t want do that.
“I want Jase to take me home,” I mumbled. “Ethan can go kick Carter’s ass. Kick him in the nuts for me, will you?”
“I’ll take her home,” Jase said automatically.
“What?” Ethan asked, in confusion.
“I’m tired,” I said, “and I don’t want to be here anymore. I just want to go home. Please.”
“You need to go to the police,” Henley said.
I shook my head. “And tell them what? That I had too much to drink, willing followed a guy into his pool house and he attempted to have sex with me against my will after I started hooking up with him? It’ll be his word against mine, and he’ll deny it.”
“Logan,” Henley insisted, “if you don’t report him, he’s just going to do it again.”
“But he didn’t do anything that I didn’t let him do, and I got away before he could do anything else. Please. I’m fine. I just want to go home.”
“I think you should go to the police, Logan,” Jase said. “But you don’t have to go tonight, okay?”
“I just want to go to sleep,” I muttered, my eyelids so heavy.
That was the last thing I remembered before I woke up in Jase’s bed the next morning.
“How did I get here?” I asked him, my voice sounding scratchy, as he came to sit on the bed next to me.
Jase looked down at me, his bright green eyes flooded in the light that streamed in his bedroom window. In them I could see a mix of concern, relief, and a little bit of cautiousness that I was sure stemmed from the fact that I was in his bed and had been snubbing him for the past month.
“You fell asleep in my car, and I didn’t know how to get you into your dorm, so I brought you here. I hope that’s okay.”
I nodded, as I kept my gaze on him. He looked so concerned.
“Do you remember what happened?” he asked.
I sighed. “Yeah, I do, but I wish I didn’t.” I hugged my arms around myself, as I thought back to the night before once again. I was incredibly lucky, and I knew it.
A tear slipped down my cheek, and Jase reached out with his thumb to brush it away. “You’re okay,” he soothed. “I’d never let anyone hurt you.”
I took a deep breath in an attempt to center myself. “How did you know where I was?” I asked, remembering how he’d come into the pool house with the blond guy.
Although I had feared when I first saw him there that he had an ulterior motive, I was pretty sure he’d arranged to be there so he could stop Carter.
He cringed. “Owen, the other guy who was there, asked me if I wanted in on some female action with him and Carter, and I just knew he was talking about you since I’d seen you go into the pool house with Carter. Logan, it took everything in me not to level him right when he asked, but I knew I’d never get into the pool house without him. He had the code, and I knew I had to get to you. I was so afraid I wouldn’t get there in time.”
“They’ve done that kind of thing before, right?”
He let out a deep sigh and shook his head, and his gaze shifted away. Then he brought his searing gaze back to me. “You know, I think Amanda was the first, but I would venture to guess they’ve done this multiple times over the years. Owen and I used to be friends back in high school, and we sort of bonded over the whole thing with Amanda, since he was one of the guys who they initially thought was involved, but he wasn’t – like me. We hung out for about a year after it happened, but then we lost touch, but whenever I saw him he’d always brag about some girl he and Carter had double-teamed. I just figured they were into threesomes, but now I’m not so sure.”
I shivered at the thought of other girls having been through what I’d gone through the night before – and worse. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to repay Jase for coming after me, especially after I’d been such a bitch to him.
I swallowed hard. “Why did they ask you to join them? You haven’t done anything like that before, have you?”
My heart started pounding as I remembered Carter telling Owen to ask ‘Superstar’ to join them. I realized when he walked into the pool house that they’d been talking about Jase.
Jase’s face was suddenly shrouded in horror. “No, absolutely not! Logan, come on, you should know me better than that.”
He was visibly hurt by what I’d just asked him, and I felt like shit for even asking. I did know him better than that. I reached for his hand, but he pulled away from me.
“I’m sorry,” I said, letting my head fall into my hands. I lifted it back up, so I
could look at him, so he could see the sincerity in my eyes. All I could see in his were pain and betrayal as he angled away from me. “You’re right, I do know you, and I know you would never do something like that. It just threw me when you walked in and Carter assumed you wanted in on what they were planning to do. I’m sorry. Okay? I’m sorry.”
Jase took a deep breath, and when he let it out it was shaky. “I have no idea why they asked me to join them – Owen and I aren’t even friends anymore – but I’m so glad they did. I don’t really care about the reason. I just – I know what would have happened if I hadn’t come in, and I – I’m just glad I was there.”
“Me too,” I said, reaching for his hand again. That time he let me take it.
“I should have hit them both until they were unconscious,” Jase said, shaking his head again, his gaze unfocused on a point on the wall.
“Ethan probably took care of that for you,” I reasoned, and Jase nodded in agreement. “I’m so lucky to have you both in my life.”
“Am I in your life?” he asked cautiously, and it seemed like he’d forgiven me for what I’d asked.
“Yes,” I said softly, squeezing his hand and lacing it with mine.
“Good,” he said, as he looked down at our joined hands.
I followed his gaze and realized that I was dressed in an oversized yellow t-shirt. I looked down to see ‘Lakers’ scrawled across the front in purple script. Under the covers, I felt below my waist to discover I was also wearing a pair of cotton boxers.
“I’m wearing different clothes.”
He nodded. “I wanted you to be comfortable while you slept.”
I gave him a small smile. “Thank you. Where’s my dress?”
“I sent it out with Gary this morning. He stopped by to get my dry cleaning. I hope that’s okay.”
I breathed out, long and slow. “It’s Henley’s, so I want to make sure she gets it back.”
“She will,” he said, squeezing my hand. He leaned down and kissed my forehead. “I’m so glad you’re okay. You scared me last night, Logan.”
I felt a lump in my throat at the sincerity behind his words.
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