“What are you doing here?”
I looked sharply to my right. Rachel had hung back and positioned herself beside me as we descended the metal steps.
I shrugged. “Pepper asked me to come.”
Her darkly lined eyes stared hard at me. “No.”
It was a single word, but it dropped like a stone between us.
I stared at her for a moment, trying to think how to respond. I knew that I didn’t want to ask for elaboration. I was afraid what more she might say.
She continued anyway. “You’re like all the others, after a taste of him.” She looked me up and down before pushing past me, tossing the single word over her shoulder. “Pathetic.”
The words gouged me, and I hated it. Hated that I had become this insecure—this vulnerable. My breakup with Harris had stripped me and left me raw and bleeding. I’d been trying to patch myself back up ever since. Trying to figure myself out for the last couple months. There were days when I felt close to luring whoever I was, who I was supposed to be, who I wanted to be, out into the world. And then something like this happened that cut me back down.
Rachel’s words felt like a stab into the open wound.
I watched as she moved ahead, weaving her way down to the bottom of the bleachers and catching up with Reece and Pepper.
I TRAILED AT A sedate pace, determined to keep my distance from them as they approached the dugout. A chain link fence separated the players from the fans, but Reece’s deep voice carried as he called for Logan. I knew from Pepper it was important to Reece that Logan knew they came. That Logan knew they loved and supported him.
Logan’s head popped up at the sound of his name. His signature grin broke out and he separated himself from his teammates and stepped up to the fence to talk to his brother and Pepper. Rachel soon joined them, too.
Logan pushed back his cap on his head slightly, revealing more of his face. Still so good-looking it made my chest ache a little.
God. This was stupid. Me being here. I couldn’t take it back now, but I wasn’t going to rush to the fence and be the pathetic thing Rachel just claimed I was.
Logan nodded, smiling almost modestly, and I knew they must be congratulating him, insisting that he won the game. He shook his head and motioned behind him, probably insisting it was a team effort. I could read it in his body language. Logan might be one of the most self-aware guys I’d ever met, but he wasn’t full of himself.
He was looking at Pepper, listening to her when suddenly his posture changed. He head shot up, scanning the diminishing crowd, searching.
For me.
I ceased to breathe. Pepper must have mentioned that I’d joined them. Or maybe he just sensed me. I didn’t know. I only knew that he was looking for me. I knew it the second before his eyes jerked to a stop on me.
I moved slowly, my steps dragging, unwilling to meet up with them, but knowing I’d have to eventually. I couldn’t pass that spot without stopping. The polite thing to do would be to congratulate him, and I was all about politeness. Good manners had been mixed in with my baby cereal.
I’d have to face him and then I would see the same knowledge in his eyes that I had seen in Rachel’s. He would think I was pathetic, too. That I came here because I wanted another taste of him. Just like Rachel accused.
Then, miraculously, I was saved. The coach called for all the players.
Logan stared at me one moment longer, his blue eyes unreadable from this distance, before he turned and grabbed his stuff from the dugout alongside the rest of his team. They all trotted toward the locker room.
I stopped alongside Pepper and Reece. Pepper looked at me. “Hey, you just missed Logan. He had to go.”
I nodded, fixing my lips into a bland little smile.
Pepper turned to Reece. “Text him and see if he wants to grab dinner—”
“He has plans. Big after-party,” Rachel explained, looking at me. Of course, she would be looking at me.
“Oh, sure.” Pepper nodded in understanding. “Then it’s just us.”
We all started down the path that led past the concession stands. The fried goodness of funnel cakes filled the air.
“You stay out of trouble tonight, Rachel,” Reece said, sounding so much like a dad that I smiled.
“Always do.” With a flutter of her fingers, she headed for the parking lot, her hips doing that sexy slink again. I somehow felt certain she was headed for trouble.
Pepper tugged on Reece’s sleeve. “I want a funnel cake.”
“I thought we were going to dinner.” He pointed toward the concession stand. “And that line is really long.”
She played with the hem of his shirt, flashing the world a glimpse of his super-cut abs. “They don’t serve funnel cakes at any restaurant I know.”
He relented with an exaggerated sigh, pulling her close and tucking her to his side. “This is true.” He looked at me. “Georgia? Want one?”
“No, thanks.” I inclined my head to the parking lot. “My mom called. I’m gonna call her back. I’ll wait by the car.”
Of course, I was lying. Needing to use the phone seemed like a good excuse. And I needed an excuse. I didn’t want to be stuck standing in line with them in case Logan came back. I couldn’t undo coming to this game, but if I could escape without talking to him, I would feel markedly better about the whole thing.
My shoes crunched over the gravel lot as I made my way to Reece’s Jeep. I leaned against the door and pulled out my phone and started thumbing through it. I was browsing my sister’s Instagram when a pair of baseball cleats stopped directly in my line of vision. I looked up, my gaze skimming Logan’s legs before stopping on his face. How did a guy so big move with ninjalike stealth? I hadn’t heard his approach, and Amber’s latest pictures of gummy bears and her freshly painted toenails wasn’t that riveting.
“No funnel cake for you?”
I shoved my phone back into my pocket. “Not in the mood.” At least my voice came out normal.
“Were you ‘not in the mood’ to tell me hello, too?”
Heat crawled over my face. “Hi,” I said lamely.
“Why’d you come?” That was direct. Nearly as direct as those piercing blue of his eyes.
I shifted my feet, opting for distraction. “Gr-great game.”
“Yeah, thanks.” He shrugged one shoulder, brushing it aside as if it were nothing, but his eyes were no less relentless, dismissing my attempt at distraction and demanding an answer.
“Really. It was an important game. Congratulations.”
“I know.” And yet he didn’t seem that eager to discuss it.
“Congratulations. You were—” Incredible. Amazing. Self-possessed and confident. “You won the game. Are you . . . sad a little? It was your last game.”
He shook his head once. “There will be other games. In college.”
“I heard you’re going to Kellison. Congratulations.” God. How many times was I going to say that?
A mocking smile played about his lips that made my belly flutter. He probably heard compliments all the time from any one of his countless groupies. I stepped back a pace, bumping into the door of the Jeep, suddenly not wanting to be confused with one of them. I glanced away, worried that he would see something in my face that I didn’t want him to see. The thing that Rachel had seen.
I looked across the parking lot, ready for Pepper and Reece to return. I spotted them. They were almost to the front of the concession line now. A woman stood at the counter, five little kids surrounding her as she placed an order. It was going to be a while yet.
I could go stand with them. Then I wouldn’t be alone here with Logan.
“Didn’t expect to see you here, Georgia. You’ve never been to a game with Reece and Pepper before.”
His voice drew my gaze back to his face. I’d never kissed him befor
e. Never thought about Reece’s little brother in the way I did now.
And that made me feel pathetic. Just like Rachel said. Harris called me boring. Rachel called me pathetic. I was two for two when it came to things I didn’t want to be.
“Yeah. Well, I didn’t have anything going on and Pepper invited me . . .” My voice faded and I felt so lame standing there. Acting like I didn’t want to come. That my being here was just a casual thing. After the other night, my being here felt so very obvious and I wanted to punch myself. Hard.
“Hey, Lo!” Another player walked down the row between cars, his bat bag slung over his shoulder. He came over and clapped Logan on the shoulder. “You headed to the after-party?”
The skinny kid looked like a teenager. An honest-to-God high school kid with angry-looking acne and a bobbing Adam’s apple. And this was one of Logan’s friends? A fellow peer? Mortification ripped through me. In that moment, I never felt the gulf between us so keenly. And I felt stupid . . . foolish standing there pretending I was here for any other reason than that our kiss had consumed my thoughts for days.
Logan nodded. “Yeah. See you there.”
The boy looked at me curiously, the interest keen in his eyes, before he walked away.
“God,” I muttered softly.
Logan must have heard me. His head whipped back around and he stared at me, his eyes alert and sharp like he could read my thoughts.
Thankfully, I spotted Reece and Pepper headed our way. “I gotta go,” I said hurriedly, turning to walk around the Jeep, ready to climb in the backseat, not even caring how obvious I was in trying to put distance between us by unnecessarily circling around the vehicle.
I felt him move behind me before I felt his hands on my arms. “No, you don’t,” he growled. “You don’t get to run away again.”
I squeaked as he hauled me back against his chest. My spine stiffened iron-rod straight against the wall of his broad chest. I felt my eyes go huge in my face. He was touching me. Again. And I was freaking out on the inside. I sucked in a deep breath, determined that my freak-out stayed internal only.
“Let me go. They’re coming.” My heart hammered violently in my chest and I didn’t know if it was because we were about to get busted by my friends or because his body felt so unbelievable against mine. Okay, fine. It was both.
His mouth brushed my ear as he spoke, spiking sensation to every nerve in my body. “Are you embarrassed, Georgia? You don’t want them to see me with you? Don’t want Pepper and Reece to know about us?”
“There is no ‘us.’ ”
“Oh, but there will be. We both know why you came tonight.” His fingers flexed, each digit a burning imprint on my forearms.
“Yeah?” Was that breathy croak my voice? “Why?”
“Because you haven’t been able to forget what it felt like to kiss me, and you want to know if the rest of it will be that good, too.” He bit down on my earlobe and a whimper escaped my lips. “It will be.”
An invisible band squeezed around my chest. I swallowed against my constricting throat. “Arrogant much?”
“It’s okay. I haven’t been able to forget either. I can still remember the way you taste.”
Oh. My. God.
I swallowed a moan and lurched free from him. Swinging around, I faced him and felt my knees go weak at the look in his eyes. Heavy-lidded and deep, his blue eyes looked almost indigo as they stared down at me.
“I know you probably think it’d be some great joke to bang one of your brother’s friends, but I’m not going to be another notch on your bedpost . . . some girl you screw once and forget about the next—”
He moved fast then, closing the space that I had established between us. Oh, yeah. He was a jock with ninja-fast reflexes. I needed to remember that.
I gasped as his hand slid around my neck, fingers burying in the hair at the base of my scalp. He lowered his head, dropping his forehead against mine until our breaths clashed and mingled. His fingers pressed and massaged the back of my head, shooting sensation straight to the core of me. Holy hell. Was that some kind of secret pressure point?
His words gusted over my mouth. “You think we’d fuck just once?”
My stomach plummeted at his blunt words.
He took my hand and dragged it between us, pressing my palm to his crotch—against the outline of his cock in his tight baseball pants. It hardened, growing beneath my touch and I felt an answering ache clench between my thighs. God, it had been so long.
“This doesn’t feel like a joke to me. You don’t,” he growled in a tight voice. “I want to do things to you . . . things a clean, vanilla girl like you never dreamed of. Things that tool boyfriend of yours never came close to doing to you.”
“Ex-boyfriend,” I replied automatically.
At my response, Logan pushed my palm harder against him, rubbing the hard ridge of him. A tiny moan escaped me as the ache squeezed between my legs.
He angled his head. “I think you want me to do dirty things to you, Georgia.”
My mouth sagged. No one had ever talked to me like that. He shocked every part of me—shocked, horrified . . . and turned me on. I’d never known this with Harris. With any guy. Never wanted sex so badly that I felt like I could weep for the lack of it.
That had to make this just a little bit okay. Right?
I sighed. But not enough to erase the wrong factor. I could not have a fling with Logan Mulvaney.
“No,” I said, hating me right then. Hating that even though my lips formed the word no, I was thinking yes in my head. Yes. YES. “I don’t want that.”
“Liar,” he said mildly.
He brushed a strand of hair back off my shoulder and the simple touch rocked a shiver through me.
I pressed my fingers to his chest and gave him a slight push away. “Don’t touch me. In fact, just stay away from me.” God. Was that desperate little rasp really my voice?
He stepped back then, the deep blue of his eyes turning chilly. “Fine. Sure. I won’t touch you again. It’s all on you now.”
All on me? What was that supposed to mean? He was leaving it up to me to ask him to touch me? No worries there. I never initiate sex. I never had. In fact, the only time I had ever taken charge and initiated anything had been the one time I kissed Logan. And that was never happening again.
That crooked grin appeared on his face again, belying the hard intensity of his eyes. “Any time you want me to make you scream, just let me know, Pearls.”
“Oh.” It was barely a word. More like a gasp. A sudden image of him and me together, his powerful body driving into mine, branded itself on my mind and my mouth dried. Heat flushed over my body.
“Hey, Logan,” Reece called out, suddenly there, almost to the Jeep. I jumped a little. I had actually forgotten they were approaching. It was Logan. He rattled my brain.
With a final wink at me, Logan swung his bat bag around so that it hid the erection pushing against the front of his pants.
I stared after him, feeling rattled and shaken and doing my best to disguise it.
Pepper balanced a sugar-drenched funnel cake in one hand and held on to Reece’s hand with the other one. Grin firmly in place, Logan turned to face Reece and Pepper. With no invitation, Logan snatched a chunk of funnel cake from her plate. The latticework of fried bread dangled from his fingers before breaking.
I watched, mesmerized, as he tilted back his head, opened his mouth wide, and dropped the food in. The tendons in his throat, the muscles flexing in his square jaw—all served to make my belly dip.
“Nice,” Pepper complained. “That was like half of it.”
He picked at another piece and she swatted his hand.
“Great game, Logan.” Reece looked at his brother almost earnestly, as if he was trying to convey something . . . be family for him, everything, the parent he so obviousl
y lacked. “Seriously, man. I’m proud of you.”
Logan shrugged like it was no big thing. “Will you be at the new Mulvaney’s tomorrow?”
“Yeah, I’ll be there. You’re working afternoon to close at the old location, right? Mike’s going to open.”
Logan nodded. “Yeah. I gotta go.”
Reece moved in for that half-body hug guys did.
“Thanks for coming.” Logan’s glance skipped to Pepper, clearly including her in the thanks. Me, not so much. I just stood there, feeling as out of place as ever.
Logan’s gaze slid to me, warming me all over again. “See you around, Pearls.”
Logan walked away then, heading off to his after-party where he would likely use his charm to nail some other girl.
“Pearls?” Pepper inquired next to me around a mouthful of funnel cake.
I lifted one shoulder. “Yeah. It’s just a thing . . . he calls me.”
“Cute.”
I felt Reece’s stare on my face, but refused to look, too worried I would see confirmation in his eyes that he knew I was slightly infatuated with his player of a brother.
Climbing inside Reece’s Jeep, I wrapped myself in this knowledge that nothing more would happen between Logan and me. First of all, I would have to ask for it and that would be like me asking Mom to share stories about my real father with me. Yeah. Not in this lifetime.
Second, I was leaving soon. When I returned in the fall he would be at Kellison. I would see him less often and not face the temptation of his presence.
I could almost convince myself I was glad about this.
Chapter 6
I KNOCKED ONCE ON my advisor’s door before stepping inside. The office smelled like musty books and Taco Bell burritos. A quick glance at the overfull trash bin confirmed that Dr. Chase ate most of his meals there. “You wanted to see me, Dr. Chase?”
He’d written a note on my last paper for me to come see him during his office hours. I’d enjoyed his class this semester. As much as one could enjoy Labor Law and Policy. It just spoke to his teaching ability that he made the course work interesting.
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