How obnoxious.
“Well, you’re wearing Reco jeans, which points to the fact that you think you’re environmentally conscious but in reality it smacks of pretention, if you ask me.” I opened my mouth to tell him he could take his bullshit preconceptions and shove them straight where the sun don’t shine. But I didn’t get a chance because he just kept going.
“And then there’s that shirt. I’m sure you spent a long time stitching all those patches together. Does that make you feel better than everyone else? The fact that you sew your own clothes and wear pants made from plant shit? Because I bet you just feel really lonely. And sad. So you throw out this attitude and judgmental BS hoping no one calls you on it. And if they do, that only proves they aren’t worth your notice or your time.” Garrett delivered his stinging critique with an annoyingly blasé smile. Like he was commenting on the damn weather. When in truth, he was flaying me alive. I wanted to punch him in his stupidly attractive face. Because yes damn it, I suddenly realized he was pretty damn cute. And I hated him.
“Whatever,” I hissed getting to my feet. Garrett laughed and I realized I had reacted just as he expected me to. Well, who cares, I didn’t need this crap.
“Have fun dulling your senses and killing your brain cells,” I bit out as he pulled a joint from his pocket and lit up.
He pulled in a lung full of smoke and slowly exhaled. “And you enjoy standing up on your soap box while you dole out your all-important criticisms. I’m sure it’ll make for a fun evening,” he said drolly as he turned to a pretty girl who sat down beside him, taking the seat I had just vacated. She giggled and leaned into him as he slung an arm around her shoulders. He literally turned his back to me as though I had been dismissed.
What a dick!
I stood there fuming. No one out bantered Riley Walker. Especially not a guitar playing, pot smoking, needs a haircut in the worst way, jackass.
So I stormed off. It was only much later that I realized Garrett Bellows had done something more than piss me off and incited my urge to maim and kill. He had made me forget about Damien. And for the first time in a week I hadn’t been depressed and miserable.
Huh. Interesting.
I was on beer number four and I was teetering on the edge of full-blown drunkenness. I will admit to being a lightweight and embrace it, damn it! My liver was still intact and I didn’t binge on the weekends. Drinking wasn’t a recreational hobby that I indulged in often. So when I chose to imbibe, it never took me long to feel like a raging lush.
Though the alcohol did nothing to minimize my feelings of total and complete social awkwardness. When I say that the Generation Rejects after parties weren’t my scene, I wasn’t being hateful. Or just making excuses because I thought I was too good to hang out.
I sat on the couch in the worn and shabby living room, watching as people I either didn’t know, or only recognized in passing, engage in a variety of drunken shenanigans. These were people who lived to party. Who lived and breathed for this sort of debauched free for all.
Yeah, ladies and gents, that just ain’t me. And I knew I stuck out like a sore thumb. A great big, stick-in-the-mud thumb.
I could see Vivian sitting on the pool table with Cole stood between her legs. She made a show of pretending not to notice the way he continued to check out every other girl in the room while simultaneously stroking her leg. But even from my vantage point, I could see the tightening around her mouth and the cold steel in her eyes. This had the makings of an explosion of epic proportions. And while I felt bad for Vivian, my sympathy only extended so far. After all, she was the one her put herself in the same crappy situation over and over again with a guy who never intended to change his man whore ways.
Gracie was dancing in a circle across the room. I had spent all of ten minutes hanging out with her earlier before she ditched me for a guy with a buzzed head and gauges in his ears. I never took Gracie to dig the skinhead type but seeing the way she had been pawing the dude all evening, I deduced her tastes were varied in the penis department.
I downed the rest of my beer and prayed it would be enough to enjoy myself. Maysie plopped down beside me, and nudged me with her shoulder. “Your face is gonna freeze like that, just sayin’,” she warned, taking the empty bottle out of my hand and putting it on the coffee table. I plastered a smile on my face and widened my eyes dramatically.
“Better?” I asked through gritted teeth. Maysie grimaced.
“You look like an ax murderer, stop it!” My mouth relaxed and I sighed.
“Do you mind if I head out soon? I’m just not feeling this tonight,” I asked as a girl with too much makeup and had somehow lost half of her clothing, stepped on my foot as she walked by.
“Oh sorry,” she slurred, leaning down precariously to pat the top of my foot. I snatched it back and held up my hand.
“No big. It’s fine,” I said, not really meaning it. That had really hurt! The girl squinted at me as she swayed on her feet.
“Is your name Leah?” she asked suddenly. I glanced at Maysie who was looking amused.
“Can’t say it is,” I replied. The girl grinned and sat down beside me, leaning into my face.
“Good because if you were I’d have to kick your ass. That bitch slept with my boyfriend,” she said unevenly. She stuck her face within an inch of mine forcing me to lean back.
“Have you seen her? Cause I’ma gonna kicksh her ash,” the girl slurred. Jeesh, understanding her almost necessitated a translator.
I pointed over the girl’s shoulder. “I saw her go in there,” I said. Drunk girl fell forward, wrapping her arms around me in what I supposed was meant to be a hug.
“Thanksh so mush. I’ma gonna kicksh her ash,” she mumbled, getting unsteadily to her feet and hobbling in the direction I had sent her.
“Did you know who she was talking about?” Maysie asked after the girl had left.
I shook me head. “Hell no. I just needed my personal space back,” I retorted, digging my cell phone out of my pocket. “Mays, it’s already one in the morning, I really think I’m gonna head out,” I pleaded. Maysie patted my back.
“Okay, okay. I know when you’ve had your fill. Let me go find Jordan and he can give you a lift, you’ve had way too much to drink. He’ll be ready to get out of here anyway.” Maysie smiled at me and held up a finger. “Just give me one minute,” she promised.
“What about my car?” I asked in a panic, not wanting to leave my baby here. Who knows what these people would do to her? Okay, I talked about my car like it was an actual person. What can I say, I was attached to it.
Maysie rolled her eyes. “It’ll be fine. I’ll bring you back in the morning to get it,” she promised. “Now just hang tight, I’ll be right back.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Just make sure that one minute doesn’t turn into twenty. Or I’m hunting you down,” I warned. Maysie grinned and left me alone.
Well not for long.
“This seat taken?”
The cushion sagged under the weight of my new couch buddy. I looked over and had to suppress a groan. Garrett Bellows popped the top off a beer and handed it to me. Hadn’t we already said enough to each other earlier this evening? What could top being labeled a pretentious stuck up? Not much I’m sure.
“You’re lookin’ a little thirsty, sweetheart,” he said before opening his own drink and taking a swig. I held the frosty bottle in my hand, wondering what sort of horrible thing I had done in a past life to warrant these repeated forms of torture.
I wobbled a bit; feeling the full weight of alcohol hit my system. My tongue felt heavy and my lips sort of numb. I thought about saying something nasty right out of the gate, just to get the upper hand. But his following words caught my drunk girl brain off guard.
“It’s all sort of ridiculous, right?” he asked, his voice s
oft and barely audible over the noise. I squinted at him, feeling my beer goggles slip firmly in place. Because right now, Garrett Bellows was perhaps the best looking guy I had ever seen. Even when I was a hundred percent sober, I could sort of appreciate his looks. There was nothing conventional about the guy who sat beside me.
He was the epitome of everything I chose to stay away from. But right now, with him leaning into me, my heart still feeling the after effects of a world class bludgeoning, I forgot about why he bugged the shit out of me.
“What’s ridiculous?” I asked, clueless to his point, my nose filled with a scent that was at once unfamiliar but also absurdly tantalizing. Garrett smelled like musk and man and it was a total turn on.
In point two seconds the twisty thread of undeniable attraction took hold. I wasn’t expecting the way my hormones took over all rational thought. This was new. And at the moment, I kind of liked it.
My eyes were drooping a bit and I was having a hard time focusing on what he was saying. Mostly because I was suddenly and inexplicably horny.
Garrett cocked his eyebrow at me; as though he were picking up on the crazy amount of pheromones I was suddenly slinging his way. He looked amused but there was a heat in his eyes that I knew was for me alone.
He leaned in further until his lips were next to my ear and the warmth of his breath teased the hair at my neck. “All of this.” He gestured to the party around us. “I get tired of it all, you know? Sometimes I wish these people would just disappear.”
His words surprised me. “Well, why do it then? Why continue to have these things if you don’t want to?” I asked, genuinely curious.
Garrett pulled back and I was irrationally bereft at the sudden space between us.
He drank the rest of his beer and promptly opened another one. I recognized in him the same drunken looseness that I was currently feeling. The pair of us were a hot mess. Two sad drunks, feeling sorry for ourselves.
He sighed and looked at me again. His blue eyes were red and unfocused but in my current state of inebriation, I swore that he saw me better than anyone else ever could. Yes, alcohol clearly unleashed my inner poet. The hyperbole going through my head was completely over the top.
“It’s what everyone expects of me. And I guess I’d rather have people around than be by myself,” Garrett replied finally. I found myself nodding, understanding all too well this need to live up to some sort of twisted expectation you had for yourself. He was making a scary sort of sense right now.
After that we sat together in silence, watching the partygoers and drinking more beer. Finally after what felt like an hour, but was most likely only a few minutes, Garrett got to his feet and held out his hand. I looked at it as though it were a snake about to bite me.
Garrett chuckled, obviously finding my response funny as hell. He inclined his head toward the staircase behind him. “Come on. Let’s get away from all of this. So we can hear ourselves think.” His suggestion seemed, in that moment, to be totally logical.
But I caught the underlying meaning behind his words. Garrett Bellows wanted to have sex.
With me.
Oh crap. Did I want to have sex with him?
I drank in the sight of his chest (he had lost his shirt totally by this point), which was ripped and toned. I wanted to wrap my hands around his biceps and squeeze with all my girlie might.
Oh yeah. I could imagine what the rest of him looked like. I could almost taste the anticipation of getting him naked on my tongue. The edges of a tattoo wrapped around his side, disappearing behind his back. It looked like words in a script that was impossible to read at this distance.
I wanted to read it. I wanted to lick it. I wanted to eat this man whole with a side of screw me senseless.
So yep, Riley Walker was having sex tonight.
Garrett’s eyes were hot pools of lust as they regarded me steadily and I felt myself flush. My inhibitions were noticeably absent and I for one was glad to see them go. Because I wanted to get my freak on with this fine specimen of male standing in front of me.
Looking up into his pretty blue eyes I put my hand in his and got unsteadily to my feet. I almost fell as I stood and Garrett’s arm was suddenly around my waist, holding me upright. I could feel his erection poking my thigh as he held me.
Time to take a ride on the Garrett Express all the way to Fuck Me town.
“Yeehaw!” I yelled a little louder than I intended to. People looked over at us and I should have been mortified by my scandalous lack of morality. But I was down with some One Night Stand action.
Garrett cocked his eyebrow and bit down on his lip as though he were trying not to laugh. He’d better not laugh at me, or I’d have to knee him in the balls. Which would be a pisser since I wanted to suck those sweet pieces of man meat into my mouth and make them my bitch.
“I think someone is ready to get ridden,” I purred. At least it sounded seductive in my own ears. Most likely I sounded more like Betty White than Jenna Jamison, but who cared.
Right now, I was Riley Walker Sex Goddess! And I wanted to play a few rounds of Mr. Wobbly Hides the Helmet!
Garrett shook his head and I wondered if he’d tell me to get lost. Crap, if this guy, of all people, rejected me, I think I’d have to put myself out of commission forever. Being told no by the guy with zero standards would be the worst insult imaginable.
Maybe I could just yell “gotcha” and then run out the back door.
Yes, that was a good plan.
But instead of kicking my drunk ass to the curb, Garrett took my empty beer bottle from my hand and dropped it in the trashcan as he led me out of the room and up the stairs.
I was going to do this.
I was going to have sex.
With Garrett freaking Bellows.
And I was going to enjoy it. I was going to have orgasms and slap his tight little ass until he made walking the next morning impossible.
This all made one hundred percent perfect sense as I followed him away from the party. Away from Maysie, who would be wondering where the hell I had gone. Away from any semblance of rational decision-making.
Because I was getting laid.
Yee-Haw!
I was being smothered! I literally could not get air in and out of my lungs. My brain was fuzzy. My head felt like it was being clenched in a vice and my eyes were having a hard time adjusting in the pitch-blackness.
Where the fuck was I?
I tried to sit up and realized that the reason I was having such a hard time drawing breath had to do with the heavy, sweaty male form lying prostrate over me.
And did I mention this male form was NAKED?
Oh God! I was NAKED!
I tried to roll from underneath the unidentified man but all I got for my efforts was to be squeezed even tighter against the hot, sweaty, NAKED guy.
I flopped back down on the bed, trying not to freak out at the feel of a very erect penis digging into my hip. Because it was quite obvious that I had engaged in drunken, monkey sex with my current bed partner.
And what was even more messed up was I had no idea who he was. My brain just couldn’t compute who I would have found myself in bed with.
Sober Riley wanted to kick Drunk Riley’s ass!
I couldn’t make out anything about him in the darkness. But his hair was tickling the hell out of my nose and I was trying really hard not to sneeze and blow snot all over him and thus making this awkward and mortifying experience all that much better.
The guy mumbled something in his sleep and he nuzzled his face into my neck. I was a rigid block of stone. I needed an escape plan.
Like two minutes ago.
But one thing was for sure. Whoever ambiguous sex dude was, he smelled good. We’re talking really, really good. Like musk and man and sort of
outdoorsy. The smell twinged my memory. As though I should remember who smelled like a hot lumberjack.
But I couldn’t give a shit if he smelled like chocolate and vomited up hundred dollar bills, I had made a decision last night based on too much alcohol and a bad case of rebounditis. And that made my feelings about the current situation bordering on hysteria.
I glanced over at the alarm clock on the small bedside table. It claimed to be five-thirty in the morning. Entirely too early to be up under normal circumstances. But this was anything but normal. Because I was living in morning after hell. And that was about as far from my normal as one could get.
Mr. Stiffy rolled his hips, grinding his ever-present erection into my side again. And Riley Walker Junior, who had been happily slumbering between my legs, began to stir.
Go back to sleep, you wanton slut! I screamed silently at my insolent vagina. She and I were not in agreement as to the best way to handle this.
Because even though my brain couldn’t remember my night of lust, other parts of my body obviously had crystal clear memories of it.
Once mystery guy settled back into sleep, I started the futile process of trying to wiggle out from underneath him. My hands pressed into surprisingly smooth and hard skin and I flattened my palms against a seemingly muscular chest in an effort to budge the massive amounts of man pinning me to the bed.
Even in my moment of self-mortifying disgust, I was pleased that my bed partner appeared to have a nice body. Glad to know that even in my drunken psychosis I could still be called on to pick a guy with a nice set of abs.
Get a grip, Riley! As if his body matters when you’re trying to walk of shame out of here! I scolded myself harshly.
After a few minutes, I grudgingly realized I was stuck. My ass wasn’t going anywhere. And now I had to pee. My bladder was being pressed painfully by the guy’s weight.
Ah, fuck it!
Perfect Regret ( BOOK 2) Page 4