Need you Now (Top Shelf Romance Book 2)

by Laurelin Paige

  “Not too badly,” I whispered, looking into his hazel eyes. My escort pulled up at the curb and both of us turned toward it, but instead of walking away, Donovan pulled me into his arms.

  “Let me take care of you tonight.” With a nod, he sent the car away. Then he bent to his knees and pulled down my pants, pulled down my underwear, neither asking permission nor apologizing for his eagerness.

  But I wanted him there, so it was different than when Theo had forced me.

  The air was cold on my bare legs, but soon all I felt was the heat of his tongue between my folds. He licked up and down my slit aggressively several times, then thickened his tongue to a point and inserted it inside me.

  I came almost at once and slept soundly until morning.

  Whatever it was that Donovan did to me didn’t go away but I got better at dealing with it. I learned not to look him in the eye. I stopped sitting in the front row in class. I did what I always did—I smiled, I nodded, I went on.

  And at night, I continued to soothe my dreams with fantasies of him fingering and fucking me, usually in some strange version of my assault. Sometimes it would happen after he’d pulled Theo off me. Sometimes Theo wasn’t there at all. Sometimes I asked him to. Sometimes I begged.

  And sometimes—a lot of the time—he was as callous and cruel as Theo had been.

  Chapter 4

  “Sorry about that.”

  “No—” I did a double take at the guy who’d bumped into me as he was getting into the seat next to me. Weston King. “—problem,” I finished.

  I sat up straighter in my own chair and glanced down at what I was wearing. Jeans. Sweater. Ponytail. Boring. Ugh. Well, what did I expect? It was kind of hard to hide from someone like Donovan while still trying to be noticed by someone like Weston. Both were impossibilities, I’d decided in the three weeks since the Theo incident, because it seemed I always saw Donovan and Weston never saw me.

  Until today when, miracle of miracles, Weston happened to take a seat next to me.

  My heart was pounding a thousand beats a minute, my knee couldn’t stop bouncing. Eep! Our elbows were practically touching. Then there was the added glee I had when he pulled out a spiral notebook from his bag. He was a boy who took notes old-school style! Swoon!

  This was almost enough of a delight to distract me from the lecture Donovan had been giving before Weston had arrived. Unfortunately, the former still had a pull on me that I couldn’t deny. Especially when he was addressing issues that got me worked up such as the one he was tackling today—deregulation in the financial industry.

  I’d come a long way on this topic in my short time at Harvard. While I could see the hurdles and obstacles that regulation put on investment firms such as King-Kincaid, I was still a girl who came from the other side. It wasn’t the billionaires losing their pensions during the Great Recession. It wasn’t the rich having their homes and cars and lives taken away from them. Regulation was how ethics were implemented, as far as I was concerned, and I’d said as much in as many ways as possible in my last paper.

  As much as I believed in regulation, I knew that, as always, my annoyance at Donovan had less to do with what he was preaching and more to do with what he did to me in my thoughts on a daily basis in the bedroom. What he was doing even now, as much as I hated to admit it, drawing me to him. Commanding my attention. Demanding my focus.

  Damn, I hated him.

  “Fuckwaffle,” I said under my breath.

  Weston shifted in his seat next to me. “What did you say?”

  Oh my god. My face went red. “What?”

  He leaned in close so I could hear him without disturbing the class. “Did you just call Kincaid a fuckwaffle?”

  “I shouldn’t have said that.” But if that’s what it took to have Weston lean in to whisper in my ear then I’d consider saying it again. Maybe. After my embarrassment died down. Like, in the next century.

  “Don’t take it back!” Weston exclaimed quietly. “That’s awesome! I love it.”

  I spun my head toward him. “Aren’t you guys friends, or…?” Man, his eyes were even bluer this close up. And he had freckles—light ones—along his nose.

  “More like family, and I love him like a brother. But he’s a total fuckwaffle.” His brow rose. “And I don’t think I’ve called him that yet. Do you have a pen I could borrow?”

  “Uh…yeah.” I dug in my bag searching for one.

  Weston peered over my shoulder. “That one. That Sharpie would be awesome.”

  We grabbed it simultaneously, our fingers brushing, and I had to bite my lip not to gasp.

  “Thanks,” he said, smiling just enough to show that wicked dimple. Jesus, I could fall inside that dimple and never crawl back out. That dimple was going to be the death of me.

  I watched as he flipped through his notebook. The pages had single words written across them, all landscape. Tool, Shitstick, Asshat, Douchebag, Buttmunch, Jizztissue. He stopped on a blank page and took the top of the black Sharpie off with his mouth. I was seriously going to make out with that Sharpie lid later. Then he started writing: Fuck—

  “What are you doing?” I asked, suddenly both nervous and excited like I was about to be privy to something that might be a little bit bad but not so bad that words like expulsion or policeman could be brought up. The kind of bad that always seemed like it might be fun but also might be addictive.

  “I always write notes for Donovan when he teaches to let him know how he’s doing. Fuckwaffle is not a note I’ve given him before.” When he finished writing the word, he held up the notebook as if he was scoring an event.

  I was seriously giddy. “And you do this every class?”

  “When Velasquez isn’t here. Well, sometimes when he is here I try to sneak in a note too.” Some other students in the row across the aisle flagged Weston so he’d show them today’s note.

  How had I missed this before today?

  Weston brought the notebook back in front of him and waved it around a few more times for Donovan, who didn’t even blink in our direction. If we were sitting farther up in the hall, I’d wonder if he could read it, but we weren’t that far from the front and the black Sharpie made it pretty clear.

  Genius.

  “Does he ever acknowledge you?” I asked, amazed at how stoic Donovan remained.

  “Nope.” Weston closed the notebook and tucked it back into his bag. “It never gets old either. I must have a nine-year-old’s sense of humor or something. It’s like when you go to Buckingham Palace and try to get the guards to smile, you know?”

  The farthest place I’d ever been from home was here. Even our one family trip to Mexico had been closer. “I’ve never been to Buckingham Palace.”

  He looked at me then, really looked at me. Judged me, maybe, for never having been to England—the most basic of rich people places in the world. Did that matter to a guy like him?

  A smile eased across his full lips. Ah, that dimple. “Then I’ll have to take you there.” He leaned close again and tugged my ponytail. “I’m Weston.”

  I almost forgot how to breathe. “I know who you are. I come to your parties.” Or I used to. “I’m Sabrina.”

  Almost simultaneously as I introduced myself, my name rang out across the hall in Donovan’s baritone timbre. “Sabrina. Care to share your thoughts on regulation and ethics? I know you have quite a few.”

  My stomach dropped. I hated talking in front of a class, but more importantly, Donovan never called on students. Never. What the hell was his problem? We weren’t the first kids to be caught chatting during his lecture, surely.

  “Fuckwaffle,” Weston whispered next to me, sending me into a fit of nervous giggles.

  Thankfully, Donovan noticed the time. “Saved by the figurative bell. It looks like class is over.” The resentment in his tone was thick. “Grades for your corporate strategy and ethics awareness assignment will be on the portal by the end of the week. Remember this thesis will count for half your grade.”
He seemed to be staring at me as he said this, most likely because he was still sore that I’d disrupted his lesson.

  I scowled. I hated it when he looked at me like that, but I wondered right then if I’d miss it if he suddenly stopped. I had a feeling I would.

  I wondered if he’d miss it if I stopped staring back.

  “Do you have another class now?” Weston asked.

  I pulled myself away from Donovan’s piercing gaze and found Weston holding my bag out for me. “Thank you. And nope. Break until two.” I shuffled into the aisle after him. “You?”

  “I usually meet up with a friend for lunch.”

  I nodded. I’d thought for a moment he was going somewhere with his questioning. Guess he was just being polite.

  But then he cocked his head in my direction. “Join us?”

  The friend, it turned out, was Brett Larrabee. I’d been aware of Brett from the parties at The Keep, but we’d never officially met, and I was glad for the introduction. An extremely extroverted, politically conservative, openly homosexual African American, Brett was an oxymoron, and I found him absolutely intriguing.

  He was also quite a talker. He’d led us to a small Japanese café, that was surprisingly not busy considering how good the food was, and proceeded to monopolize the majority of the conversation while we ate.

  I didn’t mind. I was happy just to be included on the excursion. Every few minutes I had to remind myself I was awake, that this wasn’t a dream. That I was actually sitting at a table making a fool of myself with chopsticks in front of Weston King.

  “The DOW is down, the DOW is down, the DOW is down,” Brett said with weary distress as he scrolled through his financial app on his phone. Even though he talked a lot, he still managed to eat the fastest. He’d finished and had been playing on his cell for the last five minutes. “The Fed better not raise interest rates. It is not the time.”

  “Dad says it’s coming soon,” Weston said, pushing away his plate.

  “Oh!” Brett’s head popped up with the news of something he’d just remembered. “Did you hear about Theodore Sheridan?”

  Theo. I dropped my sticks at the mention of his name. Fortunately, I’d dropped them so many times, no one noticed. Hopefully no one noticed my hands shaking as I took a sip of my water, my throat suddenly dry.

  Weston considered a minute. “Nothing interesting I can think of.”

  Then you didn’t hear the one where he almost raped a girl in front of your own porch? At least it was reassuring to know that Donovan hadn’t told all his roomies. Not that I’d thought he was much of the sharing type.

  Brett bent over the table and lowered his voice. “He got busted with more than a kilo of coke.”

  “And you’re just mentioning this now?” Weston asked, as if reading my mind. Maybe Theo wasn’t a close enough friend for him to consider it headline news, but it was to me.

  That wasn’t something I cared for anyone to know, though, so I kept my head low, scooting noodles around in my bowl. I’d lost any appetite that remained the minute I’d heard his name.

  “Huh,” Weston said, running his hand through his hair. “I knew he had a problem with blow, but what the fuck was he doing to draw attention to himself?”

  “I don’t know, but he was charged with intent to sell.”

  “Theo doesn’t need money. He got his entire trust fund at eighteen.”

  “He’s saying it’s all cooked up charges or something. Whatever. Daddy Sheridan will get him off, but he’s out for the year here.”

  “Crazy.”

  While it was a relief to think that Theo wouldn’t be around anymore, I didn’t get too excited by the thought that he’d face any prison time. Brett was right—his money and his privilege would get him off. Whether it was drugs or rape, he had the get out of jail free card.

  Brett, seeming to be done with the Theo scandal, was ready for other gossip. “Did Numbnuts teach today?” he asked, leaning his chair back onto two legs.

  “Actually,” Weston said, raising a brow in my direction, “it was Fuckwaffle.”

  “That’s a nice one.” Brett turned his admiration to me. “You don’t like Donovan? I have to hear this."

  Did I like Donovan? What a loaded question. My emotions where Donovan was concerned were like paperclips—I couldn’t pick up one without several others coming with it. I was grateful to him and resentful. Angry and preoccupied.

  It wasn’t something I could begin to explain to myself, let alone someone I’d just formally met. Tugging on my ponytail, I tried to think like a typical disgruntled student. “He’s just…you know. A pompous, egotistical know-it-all. What about you guys? You live with him.”

  Weston exchanged a glance with Brett. “That we do. And like I said, I love him like a brother. But sometimes brothers are hard to love. Do you have one?”

  It was a smooth change of subject, one I wasn’t about to contest. Brett went back to playing with his phone, so I focused my answer just to Weston. “I have a sister. Audrey. But she’s easy to love. She’s thirteen and awkward and adoring.”

  Weston sat back in his chair, crossed his arms over his chest, and crossed his legs at his ankles. “She probably puts her eighteen-year-old sister up on a pedestal.”

  “Seventeen,” I corrected.

  “Seventeen?”

  “I graduated high school early.”

  “Kudos. That’s impressive.”

  “Thank you.” I averted my eyes, embarrassed by the compliment, and sighed. “I’m still not sure I did the right thing deciding to come to school so far away from home.”

  “Where are you from?” he asked and it almost felt like more than small talk, like he really wanted to know.

  “Colorado, but it’s not really the distance that’s the thing. It’s that my mother died when I was twelve, and I feel bad leaving my dad and Audrey alone.” I knew he probably didn’t get it. He was from a world of nannies and chauffeurs and housekeepers and tutors. There was no such thing as alone. “What about you? Do you have siblings? Not like Donovan, but blood related?”

  He’d started nodding before I’d finished the question. “I have a sister. She’s ten, and we’re in completely different worlds.” He puckered his lips as he thought, which was ridiculously unfair, since I was already on hormone overload. “I really grew up closer to Donovan, even though he’s four years older than me. We went to the same school, were on the same chess teams. We row together. Our families vacation together. I’ve always had him to look up to.” He sat up straighter, leaning in as if confiding in me. “I guess I idolized him growing up.”

  “But not now?”

  “It’s different now.”

  He let that hang, and I searched for the right words to prod further while, at the same time, trying to understand exactly why I wanted to know more—because the answer said something about Weston? Or because it said something about Donovan?

  I decided not to prod.

  But then Brett said, “He’s not the same since Amanda died. I’m a sophomore, so I didn’t know him very long before that.”

  “Amanda?” Okay. I was definitely interested.

  “Brett—” Weston warned.

  Brett glared at him in return. “What? Are we not allowed to talk about it ever? He’s not even here.”

  Weston paused for a beat. “Amanda was Donovan’s girlfriend. She died in a car accident a year ago. Around this time of year. Coming back to school after Thanksgiving, actually.”

  The air left my lungs. “Oh my god! What happened?”

  “Another driver didn’t check his blind spot. He drove into her lane and pushed her into oncoming traffic. They said she died instantly. She was closer to campus when it happened, so it was Donovan who had to identify her body.”

  “That’s awful. I feel awful.” It was the kind of thing I’d say after hearing any sort of tragic tale, but I really meant it right now in a way I usually didn’t. In a way I couldn’t explain.

  “They were the r
eal deal, too,” Weston went on. “He wanted the house, the kids, the whole nine yards. He’d planned to ask her to marry him for Christmas. I think he might have even bought her the ring.”

  She had to be the blonde in the picture on his mantle. He’d seen me looking at it just before he’d turned cold.

  “Is that why he’s so…?” I searched for the word I was looking for. What was it exactly that Donovan was? Distant? Cut-off? Alone?

  Weston seemed to get what I meant. “He wasn’t ever what I’d call friendly before that, but he’s harder now. Sharper too. In some ways I think he’s become a better businessman, if that makes sense.”

  “I think it does. It’s like when you lose one sense and so your others become more acute.” I had my mother’s death to draw on as experience, but it was my assault that I was thinking of now. How had I changed since then? Was I harder or sharper or more business savvy?

  And what about the thoughts I had at night now, the dirty thoughts with Donovan?

  “Yeah. Like that,” Weston said as the waiter set down the check.

  I reached for my bag, but Weston shook his head. “No, I’ve got this.” He dimpled at me as he handed his card off.

  “Thank you. That’s really nice.” It came off halfhearted, though, because I was still thinking about Donovan. I was pained by his pain, for whatever foolish reason. He certainly hadn’t shown any concern for mine. But more interestingly, I was fascinated by his pain. I could imagine how he carried it, where he stuffed the details of his misery. Inside this bottle of scotch. Under that heartless remark. Behind this wall of indifference.

  He knew the secret I hid behind smiles and nods, and now I knew the agony he hid behind ice and steel.

  Maybe we were finally even.

  “Well,” I said, forcing my attention back to Weston, “you sound like you’ve been a good friend to him.”

  “Because I give him notes as he lectures in class?” His tone was sarcastic, but I heard the hint of helplessness underneath. He really didn’t know how to help his friend, his brother.