Wild Love
Rebecca Jenshak
Contents
1. Dakota
2. Johnny
3. Dakota
4. Dakota
5. Johnny
6. Dakota
7. Johnny
8. Dakota
9. Dakota
10. Dakota
11. Johnny
12. Johnny
13. Dakota
14. Johnny
15. Dakota
16. Dakota
17. Johnny
18. Dakota
19. Johnny
20. Dakota
21. Johnny
22. Dakota
23. Johnny
24. Dakota
25. Dakota
26. Johnny
27. Dakota
28. Johnny
29. Dakota
30. Dakota
31. Johnny
32. Dakota
33. Johnny
34. Dakota
35. Johnny
36. Dakota
37. Johnny
38. Dakota
39. Johnny
40. Dakota
41. Dakota
Epilogue
Playlist
Acknowledgments
Also By Rebecca Jenshak
About the Author
Copyright © 2021 by Rebecca Jenshak
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the US Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this book may be reproduced, distributed, transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without written permission from the author.
Rebecca Jenshak
www.rebeccajenshak.com
Cover Design by Lori Jackson Designs
Cover Photo by Michelle Lancaster
Editing by Edits in Blue and Ellie McLove at My Brother’s Editor
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Names, characters, places, and plots are a product of the author’s imagination. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Created with Vellum
1
Dakota
He’s ridiculous.
I’m getting back from my morning run when I spot him. The apartment complex is just starting to wake up. It’s the last week of the spring semester, and between finals and the nightly end-of-year parties, everyone is exhausted and ready for summer break. Me included.
I slow my run to a jog as I cut through the parking lot of my apartment. It’s hard to tear my eyes away from him, but I do as I navigate around cars and people. I pass a couple of fellow Valley U students heading out to their cars; backpacks slung over their shoulders, coffee in hand, eyes still bleary.
“Morning,” I chirp and receive mumbled greetings back.
At the sidewalk in front of my building, I let my gaze return to the walk of shame in progress from his first-floor apartment.
Johnny Maverick is shirtless, athletic shorts hanging low on trim hips, tattoos covering his chest and arms. Ridiculous, but undeniably hot.
The girls, because yes, there are two of them, cling to him like their rumpled dresses from last night hug their curves—one blonde, the other black, both stunning.
I bite back a smile at the three of them. Since he scored a hat trick in the final game of the Frozen Four, Maverick has been the center of attention at Valley U, and by the look on his face, he’s very much enjoying it.
I hang back as he says goodbye to his guests.
“Call us later?” the blonde asks after she kisses him on the cheek.
He says something I don’t catch, and the girls walk hand in hand away from his front door. His gaze lifts as he stares after them. When he spots me watching him, a sheepish grin pulls at his lips.
“Good morning, Kota,” he says, sounding far more awake than the people I tried to offer the same sentiment to in the parking lot.
I laugh. Yeah, I’ll bet he’s having a good morning. I wait until his guests are out of earshot. “Have fun last night?”
“Always. Missed you, though. I was looking for you.”
I ignore that remark. I see how much he missed me. Hey, I’m not blaming him. Johnny and I have a complicated relationship. Complicated but easily summed up as he hits on me, and I turn him down. Because clearly, he isn’t that serious.
“You’re up early,” he says, and his gaze rakes over my sweaty body. “Out for a run?”
I nod, feeling the sweat pool at my lower back. Despite having just rolled out of bed, he looks as handsome as always. His dark hair is messy, but his hazel eyes are bright, and his smile playful.
His French bulldog, Charli, races out of his apartment and circles my feet.
I lean down to stroke her soft fur and scratch behind her ears. “Hey, pretty girl. Did you have to avert your eyes all night long?”
Mav chuckles and runs a hand through his hair. The movement makes his abs contract and his bicep pop.
I scoop her up to distract myself from checking out her owner. She’s small but heavy. Her coat is white with splotches of black. She’s adorable. Charli licks my face, and I laugh and hand her over to her owner. Up this close, I can smell him, or rather the girls he was with.
“You smell like sex and vanilla.”
“Vanilla.” He snaps his fingers. “I was trying to place the smell all night. She smelled like vanilla!”
“Which one?” I glance back at the parking lot, but they’ve already disappeared from view.
“Blonde.”
“Does Blondie have a name?”
He squints one eye and smirks. “Do you really care if she does?”
“Good point.” I’m still standing close, and Charli rests a paw on my arm, looking for attention, which I absolutely give to her.
“Maybe you should let Charli stay with me when you’re entertaining.”
“Or maybe we cut the other girls, and you could stay at my place and keep us both company.”
I roll my eyes. See what I mean? Not serious. “I can’t believe any line that comes out of your mouth actually works.”
“I don’t usually have to run lines. I mean, look at me. All this could be yours.” He grins as if he knows how absurd he sounds.
“At least shower off the last girl… I’m sorry, girls, before you hit on me.”
He smiles at me, which always makes me feel a little off balance. Not just because he’s totally hot. Maverick has this way about him that, despite all reasoning, he makes people feel important and seen. Or he does me, anyway.
Our attention is drawn upstairs as the apartment door above his opens, and my best friend and roommate, Reagan, and her boyfriend Adam tumble out. Arms around her waist, Adam walks her backward toward our apartment across the breezeway. He presses her against it, devouring her mouth.
“I gotta go,” he says but keeps kissing her. Mav and I are frozen, staring at them. The air crackles with the chemistry between them. A flight of stairs separates us, but I can feel how desperate they are for each other.
“Just ten more minutes.” Reagan opens our door, and they disappear into it, slamming the door behind them.
Mav’s deep chuckle sounds beside me. “Want to come in for a few minutes?”
“Not really,” I mumble but follow him.
“What is it with everyone this week? They’re…” I pause, searching for words.
Mav drops Charli in the living room and continues into the kitchen. “Fucking like the world is ending?”
“Yeah, that.” I scan his living area for evidence from last night. I don’t want to sit anywhere that he had sex in the past twenty-four hours.
“It’s the end of an er
a. People are graduating, moving on…” He holds out a Powerade and a bottle of water. I take the first, and he motions toward the couch.
“I think I’d rather sit outside.”
He cackles like he knows what I’m thinking. If he did, he’d be repulsed with himself and not smiling like a guy… well, like a guy who just had a threesome. To be clear, I’m not anti-threesomes. I’m not really anti-anything when it comes to sex. I’m just so over all of it right now. All of my friends are deliriously in love, and I feel like I’m the last single person. I might not be ready for my own happily ever after, but can’t a girl find a decent guy to date?
The last few guys I’ve met think foreplay is sexting, and dating is meeting up when it’s convenient for them to get drunk and then go back to their place.
“How far did you run this morning?” he asks, holding the door open for me.
I push past him and sit on the second step leading up to my apartment. He falls into the narrow space beside me.
“Just two miles. I have a tour at the Hall of Fame this morning. Some hockey guy named Toby Russo.”
“Oh, right. Coach is salivating over that kid.”
“Not you?”
He takes a long drink from the bottle in his hands and then leans forward so that his elbows rest on his thighs. “He’ll be an asset wherever he goes, but something about him rubs me the wrong way.”
“You’ve met him?”
“Yeah, he was at the Frozen Four. He came up to me after our first game and gave me some tips.”
I snort. “He gave you tips? Seriously?” Maverick is one of the best college hockey players. I’m not just saying that because we’re friends, there’s a list.
“Yeah.” He nods his dark head.
“What’d you do?”
“I told him thanks and walked off.”
“That’s it?”
“I’ve gotten really good at letting criticism and condescending assholes roll off my back.”
I think he means his father. I don’t know a lot about John Maverick Sr., but I know that the few times Mav has talked about him, he lost a little of the playful, fun demeanor that he’s known for.
“Well, I think you’re doing okay. Plenty of people are waiting in line to ease the burden of your success and celebrate by getting naked. In pairs, apparently.”
He grins. “Could have been you. We all hung out upstairs and then went to The Hideout. I was looking for you. Where were you?”
“I went out for a little while, then crashed so I could get up early and run before work.”
“Date?”
“Yeah.” A guy I met online—total waste of time. I knew within seconds we weren’t compatible. I sigh. “I cannot tell one more guy my favorite color or pretend to care about the places he wants to travel to someday. I’m so over it. I need a change of scenery.” I spent twenty dollars on drinks last night, and for what?
“What are you doing this summer?” He leans back on one elbow.
“I applied for some internships, but so far, nothing. It looks like I’ll be staying in Valley and working at the Hall of Fame.” I bump my shoulder against his. “Maybe I could start a coffee and dry-cleaning service for the chicks that come out of your apartment in the morning.”
“Not unless you’re moving to Minnesota.”
“What?” I pause, bottle to my lips.
“That’s why I was looking for you last night. I wanted to talk to you.”
I stare at him, trying to make sense of the words coming out of his mouth. “Talk to me about what?”
“I, uh, signed with the Wildcats,” he says.
Maverick came to Valley already drafted by the NHL team, the Wildcats. This isn’t news. Except. “Oh my gosh! Signed as in…”
His eyes hold mine. “I’m not coming back next year.”
I text the girls for an emergency group lunch, and we meet up on my hour break between work and classes so that I can fill them in on the Maverick news.
“I can’t believe it.” Reagan digs through her purse for gum and then offers it around the table. “When did this happen?”
“I’m not sure,” I say, pushing away my plate. My stomach is a ball of knots. “He told me this morning. None of you knew?”
Ginny raises a hand. “Heath told me after the championship game. I would have said something, but he made me promise not to until Maverick announced it.”
Her boyfriend and Maverick are best friends, so it makes sense he knew before the rest of us. Still, I hate that I’m just now finding out. The championship game was weeks ago.
“Did anyone else know?” Reagan asks. “I don’t think Adam did because he’s terrible at keeping secrets from me.”
“I did.” Sienna raises her hand from the table the same way Ginny did. She’s dating Rhett and the newest addition to our friend group. Newest, but no less important. I don’t know what I’d do without these three.
“That’s why he went to Minnesota,” she adds, and the pieces start to fall in place as I think back to Maverick’s actions over the past month. If he were anyone else, the signs would have been obvious. The trip to Minnesota, the extra partying, doubling up on girls.
I can’t imagine him not living downstairs from me or hanging out with all of us upstairs. He routinely makes me roll my eyes at his incessant flirting and over-the-top shenanigans, but he’s part of our friend group. An integral part.
All my friends are dating hockey players. I live next to them, I party with them, I even work with them doing recruitment tours at the Hall of Fame.
It really is the end of an era.
“Is Heath leaving too?” Reagan asks Ginny, her gaze narrowed.
She shakes her head and fingers the end of her long, blonde braid. “No. He wants to finish school.”
“And hang out with his awesome girlfriend,” I point out. Heath and Ginny have been inseparable since they started dating last fall, and I can’t imagine a world in which he goes anywhere without her.
“That too.” She smiles, a little smitten and doe eyed.
The three of them talk about all the changes happening while I’m lost in my thoughts. There is this underlying excitement as they talk about it, even though their words are sad, and lunch includes no less than five group hugs. Sienna graduates next week with Rhett and Adam, and now that I know Maverick is leaving too, I feel an odd pang of sorrow.
Up until this moment, I’ve had a hard time feeling the same sadness as my friends that things were changing, maybe because I’m so ready for change myself that I couldn’t wrap my brain around what they were feeling.
No matter where Sienna goes, we’ll stay friends, and being friends with her, I’ll also get tabs on Rhett. And since Adam is staying in Valley for medical school and dating my roommate, I know I’ll see him too. Things were changing, but they didn’t seem so permanent as Maverick leaving does.
Ginny leans forward and rests her palms on the table. “Heath is throwing him a party tonight at the apartment. Shirts are optional, but fun is not.”
I feel my brows lift. “I’m sorry, what?”
She giggles, and her brown eyes light up with humor and excitement. “It’s seriously the tagline for tonight. And you should see the amount of Mad Dog we bought.”
A party where MD 20/20 is the drink of choice and shirts are discouraged? The knot in my stomach loosens at the ridiculousness that I’ve come to love about our group. “Only a party for Maverick would require a tagline.”
2
Johnny
A knock at the front door sends Charli running toward it, barking.
Heath’s voice calls from the other side. “Mav? Are you home?”
I pull open the door and step back to let him in. My buddy sets a large box on the coffee table in the living room.
“I think I got everything, but I’m going to do another pass to make sure.”
I move forward and open one of the flaps to see inside. “What is all this?”
“Your shit.”
He plops down on the leather couch. “Video games, headphones, books.” He shakes his head. “I had no idea I was hoarding so much of your stuff. You should see how empty my room looks now.”
I pull out a pair of Beats headphones. “I gave these to you.”
“Loaned,” he says definitively. He has a hard time accepting gifts, which is too bad for him because I like giving them.
“I thought you might say that.” I walk over to the kitchen counter and pull a new pair of headphones out of the box they shipped in yesterday. I toss them at him.
He sits up and cradles the box, turning them over and then sliding the headphones out. “No way!” He smiles, but his excitement is short lived. He sets them on the table next to the box. “Mav, no. I can’t accept these. They’re like three hundred dollars.”
“So?”
“So?” He chuckles.
“Take your pick, but I’m leaving one of them behind. And whatever is in that box is yours too. The less I have to move, the better.”
He sits back on the couch and glances around the apartment. It was never very lived in. I spent most of my time hanging out at his apartment with Rauthruss and Scott upstairs, but it’s been home for the past year, the dorms the year before that. Two years I’ve been at Valley U, two of the best of my life, and now I’m leaving. It’s surreal.
Classes are done Wednesday, and when everyone’s done partying and heads off for the summer, I will too. I don’t need to be in Minnesota for another two weeks, but I’ve already signed a lease on an apartment, and Coach Miller said I could start using the workout and practice facilities as soon as I want.
Wild Love (Campus Nights Book 4) Page 1