Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 98023 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 490(@200wpm)___ 392(@250wpm)___ 327(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98023 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 490(@200wpm)___ 392(@250wpm)___ 327(@300wpm)
I can’t stop myself from wondering how everything is going for him. Wondering what football training has been like and if he thinks the team is ready for their first big game against Georgia next Saturday.
But all of my wondering stops abruptly when a girl with red hair and a flirty smile sidles up beside him and wraps her arm around his waist. He smiles down at her, and a shock of excruciating pain rolls through my chest so intensely that I look down to make sure a knife isn’t actually lodged in it.
The girl is laughing at something he says, and not once does he try to remove her arm from his waist. Is he with her?
Of course he’s with her. You told him to move on. So that’s what he’s doing…moving on.
Obviously, Blake is a popular guy on campus, and there’s a whole slew of girls who are desperate to have his attention. Moving on to someone new wouldn’t be a hard thing for him to achieve.
A rock of something I don’t understand forms at the base of my throat, and I swallow several times to try to clear it. But when my bottom lip starts to tremble and a sheen of tears coats my eyes, my vision goes hazy.
And I realize that all I want to do right now is cry.
Blake
“It’s so good to see you, Blake,” Carla says, her red-painted lips morphing into a flirtatious smile as she looks up at me. Her arm is wrapped around my waist, and I can literally feel her breast against my side.
Since she’s a SoCal native like me, I’ve known Carla since I was a fourteen-year-old boy. We went to high school together, even dated a little during our sophomore year, and despite the fact that we’ve both been at Dickson since we left California over two years ago, I rarely see her on campus.
But that’s most likely because we run in different social circles. I know she’s in a sorority, but I can’t for the life of me remember which one. I also know that she’s spent a lot of time fixated on most of the guys on the water polo team.
Word on the street is that she’s dated—bagged—nearly half of them.
“Good to see you too, Carla,” I say, my voice as kind as possible as I purposefully remove her arm from my waist. “How have things been for you at Dickson?”
“Oh my God,” she says, a purr to her words as her hand finds my bicep. “Life in New York is so different from back home, right?”
I nod.
She squeezes my arm. “But, like, good different.” Her smile takes on a seductive edge. “Lots more freedom. And things to do. Don’t you think?”
“New York is great, but I wouldn’t know about the whole concept of freedom,” I retort with a shrug. “I’m too busy on the field ninety-nine percent of the time.”
Her eyes take on the same doe-eyed look I’ve seen so many times on college girls who love getting the attention of star athletes on campus. “You know what I think that means, Blake?”
I quirk an eyebrow. “What?”
“I think that means you should,” she whispers, leaning closer to me so her lips are near my ear, “have more fun.”
Her words are harmless, but the way in which she says them has evidence of propositions of hookups and sex.
“I’m here at this party, aren’t I?”
“Oh, Blake.” She giggles, and her hand is back on my bicep again. “I didn’t mean fun like a party. I meant fun like with me.”
Apparently, there’s no more beating around the bush. Carla has chosen to make her advances clear as fucking day.
“You want to get out of here?” she asks, and just before I can find a way to let her down gently, my eyes catch sight of something across the room.
Actually, someone across the room.
Lexi.
She stands beside Ace and Julia and Finn and Scottie, and I’m shocked that she’s even here, at this frat party. Ace is dramatically telling a story with his usual outlandish hand gestures, and Julia is giggling and rolling her eyes. Finn and Scottie listen on with smiles on their faces. But Lexi isn’t engaged in anything that Ace is saying.
Her eyes are focused toward me.
Our gazes lock, and for the longest moment, I try to somehow gain the powers of telepathy to read her mind’s thoughts from across the room as I search her eyes for any inkling of what she’s thinking or feeling right now.
Her mouth is set in a firm line until she sucks her bottom lip into her mouth and digs her top teeth into it. Something’s off with her normally gorgeous eyes, and I rapidly realize by the hunched shape of her shoulders and the discomfort within her gaze that she’s upset.
Her eyes flit to the girl standing beside me, and I don’t miss how they home in on the way Carla’s hand is still gripping my bicep.