Total pages in book: 167
Estimated words: 164557 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 823(@200wpm)___ 658(@250wpm)___ 549(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 164557 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 823(@200wpm)___ 658(@250wpm)___ 549(@300wpm)
“Meant to be?”
“Yeah, like fate.”
“I don’t believe in fate.”
“Really. So. For six weeks, you and I have been working with other lab partners and never exchanged one word with each other. Then we unknowingly match on the app mere days before our partners write a Romeo and Juliet letter demanding they be paired together. And now I’m your lab partner, and it turns out you’re the one I matched with and who Beckett and I are obsessed with.”
She blinks. “Obsessed?”
“Yes. Goddamn. We’ve been dying to meet you.”
Wariness creeps into her expression. “Why?”
“Because you’re awesome.” I lean closer to whisper in her ear. “And you’re hot as fuck.”
I don’t miss the way she shivers.
“You have no idea how many times we’ve jerked off to you.”
Her head snaps up, gaze finding mine. “Like, together?”
I chuckle. “No, separately. We don’t chat with you at the same time.”
“How does it work then?”
“Kingston, Larsen!” Monica chides from her table. “Less talk, more work.”
We busy ourselves with our results again, only the roles are now reversed. Charlotte is diligently recording everything, while I can’t focus on a damn thing.
“Charlotte,” I murmur. “Come on. Talk to me.”
Her body language conveys pure reluctance as she brings her gaze back to mine. “You still haven’t promised you won’t tell anyone we’ve been chatting.”
“I won’t. I promise. But…what about that drink?”
The invitation Beck and I proposed on the app hangs between us. Dangling like the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden.
I want her to take a bite. A big fucking bite.
But she simply shakes her head. “We’re not having drinks. I don’t even like your stupid friend.”
“Beck’s not stupid.” I grin.
“He annoys me.”
“You didn’t seem annoyed when you guys were chatting about him unwrapping you like a present.”
Her cheeks turn bright red. This girl cannot disguise a blush to save her life. I almost feel bad for her, except I don’t because it helps me read her. She’s trying hard not to show me how tempted she is. How badly she wants to see this thing through. But I can see it in the way she bites her plump bottom lip. In the way her pulse hammers at the base of her throat.
But she’s out of reach now. For the remaining twenty minutes of class, she goes out of her way to keep it professional. Focus on the cell samples. Record the results. No chitchat. And absolutely no eye contact. Charlotte—Charlie—has determined that eye contact is too dangerous.
When class ends, she gathers her stuff so fast, I barely have time to blink. I race to catch up to her in the busy hallway where I pull her toward the wall to let a group of people pass.
“C’mon, Charlie,” I say in a low voice. “You want this. You wanted to meet us.”
She’s quick to deny it. “No. I didn’t. It was just chatting, okay?”
“You asked for face pics. You said you needed that before you agreed to meet.”
“Exactly.” She gives me a pointed look. “I never agreed to meet. I only asked for the pics because I was curious. I never planned on following through.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I don’t care what you believe.”
“Why are you fighting it so hard?” Frustration tightens my chest as I stare at her for a moment. “You don’t seem anything like the girl from this app.” I hold up my own phone as if to punctuate that. “Where is this girl?”
“She doesn’t exist, Will. I was playing a part.”
“Were you?”
“Yes.”
Her vehemence gives me pause. I know better than anyone what it’s like to play a role. To be two people. I plaster on my bland, politician’s son smile for my dad’s constituents on the campaign trail. To my friends, I let them see my easygoing-with-a-side-of-sarcastic-quips side. But very few people are privy to a deeper look. Case, sometimes, but these days, it’s mostly Beckett. He sees the intensity I like to keep under wraps. He hears the thoughts and fantasies I’ve never shared with anybody else.
I wonder what parts of Charlotte Kingston are real and what parts are the act. She’s either the good-girl A student in the sweater sets, or she’s the sexy risk-taker who can make me laugh just as much as she turns me on. But I don’t think she’s both.
“Are you going to tell Beckett?” she asks, looking unhappy at the notion.
I nod. “Of course.”
“Do you have to?”
“I’m sorry, but it’s his account too. And I don’t keep secrets from my roommate.”
“Your roommate.”
“Roommate. Teammate. Best friend. Whatever you want to call it. I promise he won’t say anything, though.”
“Really? Because I know all about athletes and their locker room talk.”
“Some athletes. Not us. It’s nobody’s business what we do. Don’t get me wrong, people talk about us sometimes. But I promise they won’t talk about you.”
“Thank you,” she says, and my frustration returns when I realize this conversation isn’t going at all as I’d hoped.