Bad Game: A Geeky New Adult Romance (Leveling Up In Love Book 2)

by Kat Alex Crystal

  Please, sir, may I have another!

  She faked a shrug and said sweetly, “I have no idea what you could mean.”

  “I’m kind of a twisted fuck, is what I mean. If you ask me. You have a backbone in bed, and it can spin a guy’s head around. Some of them like it, some don’t. Nick was a rare one who got it. Probably why we kept going so long.”

  Penny winced. It wasn’t fun to think of Nick with anyone else, let alone him having a good thing with them. For a long time. Even if it had been “twisted.” Even if he’d broken it off for her. “I don’t think this is any of your or my business. You should leave this to Nick. And besides, this is supposed to mean what to me?”

  “I mean,” Ashley said, “he likes girls, you know, taking the reins, so to speak. Being a little aggressive.”

  Penny almost spit out her orange juice and spent the next several moments coughing, which conveniently hid the laughter that had boiled out of her at the thought. That was what she thought Nick liked? Perhaps he did, but drunken Nick had seemed anything but submissive.

  “Look, I just… I wanted to warn you, ’cause that doesn’t seem like it would be your thing. I know it’s not my business, but I’ve been in more than one awkward relationship that went south when such tastes didn’t match up. That’s all.” Ashley patted her back as Penny tried to get the last bits of orange juice and champagne out of her airway.

  “But it’s your thing?” Penny finally choked out.

  Ash sighed. “Yeah. I mean, that’s what I mean. Hard to find guys for girls like me.”

  Recovered, Penny took a deep breath. “I’m sure you’ll find someone perfect. It’s a matter of time,” Penny said, enjoying the opportunity to dodge the topic. She doubted Ashley would actually let it slide.

  “If you want any pointers or something…” Ashley gave her a helpless shrug that almost seemed truly sincere. Probably a trick, but maybe…

  “No, no. I’m good.” The silly grin returned. She was so, so good. She would definitely have to broach this topic with Nick—surely Penny could find some way to give as good as she got if he truly enjoyed that—but she had a feeling Ashley was just off her rocker. She didn’t seem to have a clue about Nick’s true tastes. Penny had seen firsthand something entirely different.

  Hmm, could she get him to tie her up? She tucked that thought away for later.

  “Well, you know… when you get there or whatever… I’m here to talk, or if you have questions or anything.” Ashley downed the rest of her drink. Was she really trying to be helpful? “I could—”

  “I don’t want to know about any of that. But what I do want to know is, did you ever have any feelings for Nick? I mean, really. I won’t tell him.”

  Ashley met her eye and hesitated, gauging something. “I mean, there are feelings. Gratitude. Affection, respect. Appreciation. I’d like him to be happy. And fulfilled. But love is what you mean, isn’t it?”

  Penny nodded.

  “Then no. I wanted to, I really did. But no. You? How long have you guys been dating anyway?”

  Oh, Penny loved him. She didn’t know when exactly it had started but… there was no mistaking it now. But she wasn’t fool enough to tell that to Ashley before she’d told Nick. “I hope you can find somebody you love, Ash,” Penny dodged.

  “Me too, but—”

  “Oh, hell, no,” came a voice from behind them.

  Penny spun on the stool to see Nick standing behind them, shocked. No, pissed. His jaw was twitching, and he had that dark look again. Ashley, too, twisted on her stool, leaning her elbows on the bar and relaxing languidly against it. Penny did not miss the way the posture left her knees splayed in Nick’s direction, something about it saying, this is still available, you know.

  And to Penny’s chagrin, his eyes were entirely trained on Ashley, so maybe it was working.

  “Hey, Nick,” said Ashley, smiling.

  “Fuck off, Ash.” His eyes turned to Penny now, to her relief, and softened. “Hey, Pen.”

  She grinned and waved at him.

  “I asked you to leave us alone,” he said, eyes back on his ex now.

  Ash pouted. “What, I can’t catch up with an old friend just because you start fucking her?”

  He glared daggers at her. “Are you two done ‘catching up’?” he asked, his voice hard as stone.

  “We sure are.” Penny hopped off the barstool and stepped toward him. He slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her against him, a little roughly, but like this spot was the most natural place for her in the world. The aggressiveness of the gesture brought the heat of last night flushing back to her cheeks. Penny tried to ignore Ashley frowning at them. “See you later, okay, Ash?” She risked a glance over her shoulder as they started to walk away.

  “Wait—Penny—”

  Penny turned back. “Yes?”

  Ash had risen. “I… I really am happy for you. I mean that,” she said, ignoring Nick now.

  Penny paused, then swept back and pulled Ashley into a hug. “And I meant what I said, you’ll find someone,” Penny whispered into her ear. “The right someone.”

  Nodding, Ashley swiveled away. Penny took Nick’s hand, and they walked out, Nick glaring over his shoulder all the while.

  There was no reason to freak out. No reason at all. Penny was the same chipper woman as ever, bouncing by his side and swinging his hand back and forth between them like she might start skipping. She glowed in the late morning light. Happy. Content, even.

  There was no reason to worry that what had happened last night or her conversation with Ashley had tainted him in her eyes forever.

  Repeating it over and over didn’t seem to be helping him believe it.

  “How was class?” he said instead.

  “Fine,” she said on a sigh. “I’ll be glad to have it done with. This next one should be slightly more interesting, though. I wish I could get into it like Anka can. What are you doing so close to campus, by the way?”

  “Met with a professor about her wedding coming up in May. Gotta start lining them up early. It was supposed to be coffee in Hendricksberg, but she asked if I could meet her here at the last minute, and since I had just dropped you off…” He shrugged.

  She squeezed his hand.

  Were they really not going to talk about the elephant in the room?

  “Pen, I…” How to broach this delicate subject?… Penny, did my ex-girlfriend tell you all the deviant things I did with her that I’m kind of ashamed of but also thought were massively hot? At least some of them? Yes, you know, like the ones I did to you last night except I don’t entirely remember…

  “So… how did things end with you two again?” she said before he could go further.

  He raised an eyebrow. “I broke it off with her. Three months ago.”

  “Ah.” She grew quiet for a moment, eyes on her toes. “Did you ever wish you two were exclusive?”

  He frowned. This certainly wasn’t what he had expected. “At first I did. But to be honest with you, I was just happy to be getting any.” He sighed at his former, foolish self. “Kinda stupid. Sophomore me had a few more… insecurities.” And had still been kind of shocked any girl wanted him. “On the other hand, I pretty much was exclusive. I went on a few dates but not much more than that. But wishing we were exclusive… that may have been more like jealousy than actual caring. Or competitiveness. She was always scoring more points. After a while, I kinda stopped caring. Maybe the sting wore off. Or maybe I just quit paying attention to it.”

  “And so in the end you just got bored? Quit texting?”

  He laughed. “If only.” She wanted more details about this? That couldn’t be good. “You know Ash. I had tried that before, and it hadn’t worked. It was more I told her it was over, I wasn’t going to see her anymore. She burned some of my stuff.”

  “Ouch. So it was your choice?”

  “My choice. Penny, why are you asking about this?” He stopped, gripping her arm. “Was it something she said?�
�

  “Nothing she said. I can tell she still wants you, that’s all.” She looked all around the street before meeting his eyes.

  “Oh.” He hadn’t really been paying much attention. Ash wanted everybody, it seemed. Didn’t she? But he had secretly suspected her conversation with Penny might have been designed to break them up and get him back. He’d just been hoping that was wildly self-centered of him. Perhaps not.

  “You’ve been visiting Bob at the center for, what, four months?” Penny said.

  A smile stole into his face. “Heh. Yep.”

  “You broke it off because of me?”

  “Well, I should have really done it long before that. But you were the catalyst that made me actually bother to deal with the bullshit.” He squeezed her arm.

  She stepped closer and slipped her arms around his waist, resting her head against his shoulder for a moment. Then she looked up and smiled. “Let’s keep going.”

  “What did Ashley say?” He forced out the words.

  “Oh, a few things.” Penny studied the pavement and waved it off as if it was all of no great importance. Hopefully she was right. She was smiling now, at least. “She offered her congratulations. Tried to pump me for details. Wanted to know if I’d sacrificed my virginity on your altar yet.”

  “Your choice of words or hers?”

  She grinned. “Mine. But I don’t think about it like that. Just… role-playing I guess?”

  If he hadn’t already been sure he loved her, that moment might have done it. “Well, you can make a sacrifice at my altar anytime.” He winked.

  “Look, I have to get to this last class, and then I’ve got tons of studying for my exam on Thursday. And my sister is stopping over later. So we may have to wait till the weekend or something…”

  “How about after your exam?” He grinned. “After I get off work Thursday. Pretty please?”

  “Oh, all right. I’ll text you?” Her bright smile, even as a cold wind whipped around them, eased him a little. Even if his logical mind thought it didn’t make any sense.

  He leaned down and gave her a quick kiss. “Have a good class, Pen. Later.”

  And she walked off, arms swinging like she didn’t have a care in the world. Hopefully, she was right.

  Chapter 10

  Penny groaned and shoved the textbook aside. Another minute of studying, and she was going to go insane. The exam was tomorrow morning. She had gone over everything in triplicate. Maybe it would be enough for now… Or maybe she’d just take a short break and get back at it again.

  Her mind drifted back to Anka’s party—or more specifically its aftermath. Tomorrow she’d have time to see Nick again, and perhaps they could revisit some of those… activities. Nick hadn’t seemed quite himself afterward, though. A little stunned and freaked out. How could she show him she’d enjoyed the encounter as much—if not more than—he had?

  She wandered into her bedroom and pushed around a few boxes like a bad Tetris game. There. Halloween decorations—and costumes.

  Zipping off the packing tape, she dug to the bottom of the box, looking for a costume Ash had talked her into freshman year. Sexy policewoman. It sure had had the boys drooling then. And Penny blushing and Ashley laughing at her pink cheeks.

  Not her fondest college memories. But that wasn’t the point. There—found them! Handcuffs! Nice ones too, Ash had commented, not the usual cheap costume kind. That had been more of an accident than intentional, as Penny had ordered them online a little hastily.

  Perhaps it had been fate.

  She shook her head now, thinking of Ash’s reactions. She should have guessed her friend’s “tastes and proclivities” sooner.

  Closing up the box, she sat the cuffs on the dresser. That’d be a surprise for Nick—one that might push him in the right direction.

  She shuffled back out into the living room and flopped down on the couch. Her study break needed to be at least a little longer. Her eye caught on the quarter she’d been using to play around with the I Ching for next week’s club meeting. What was better for a study break than a little meditation… or meditative fortune-telling?

  She picked up the cold, smooth disc of the quarter. She needed a question.

  How about… what lay in store for her and Nick? Tell me the future, little coin.

  Six tosses, six lines recorded on her little notepad, and she had a hexagram to punch into the app on her phone that included the sixty-four hexagram library. Hexagram thirty-one…

  Hexagram thirty-one was called Wooing. She snorted at the phone. Mutual Attraction. Well, that was apt. The joyful lake meets the stable energy of mountain, she read. The masculine takes the initiative, then submits to the feminine. The lake’s water nourishes the mountain, while the mountain causes the rain to fall. Thus is the balance of heaven and earth, the dance of courtship, two more complete when together than without.

  Well, she couldn’t argue with that. Nice to get a happy outcome once in a while.

  A knock on the door broke through her thoughts.

  “Cass!” she called. “You’re early.”

  Her sister greeted her with a half-hearted smile. “Sorry. Lyle came home early for once, since he knew I was coming over here, and I just had to get out. Ready for some ‘me’ time?”

  “If you can call baking that.”

  “I do! When it’s with you.”

  “Then absolutely.”

  Nick waved goodbye to Carl as he zipped up his black pea coat. “Have a good rest of the night, Carl!”

  “You too, Nick. Enjoy your Thursday.”

  The icy air hit him like a bucket of water as he stepped outside, and he dug into his pocket for his keys, rushing to get to the car just as someone stepped in front of him.

  “You stay away from my sister.”

  Nick stopped short, looking up from the coat to see none other than Cass. He could only stare for a long moment. “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me. I want you to leave Penny alone.”

  “I care about Penny. What’s this about, Cass?”

  “You care about her? Oh really? I’m her family. I’ve been looking out for her a lot longer than you have. And I want you to stay away from her.”

  “No way—”

  “Penny needs someone that can provide for her. Not some two-bit kid with a photography hobby and a part-time job.”

  He covered his shock with a cough. “Isn’t that up to her to decide? Maybe you should stop pushing her around and meddling in her life. She can take care of herself.”

  “Oh really? Is that what these are for then? Letting her take care of herself?” Silver flashed as Cassie pulled something from her pocket—handcuffs.

  Nick’s blood went cold. “What—where did you get those?”

  “Penny’s. I found them when I stopped over yesterday. Blatantly sitting on her dresser, no less.”

  He’d never… had he somehow left them there that night after Anka’s party? But he would never have—he couldn’t have— He groped for something to say to defend himself, but came up with nothing. Exclaiming they couldn’t possibly be his didn’t seem like that’d convince anyone.

  “It seems to me like you’re the one pushing her around, if this is any indication. My sister would never have had these before you came around. I’m telling you—stay away from my sister, you sick, twisted fuck.”

  For a moment, he could only stare, blinking. Then the situation fell on him with its real weight, like a wrecking ball to the skull. He’d tried to push the darkness down, he’d tried to hide it, but his secret had escaped anyway. In a way worse than he’d ever imagined.

  “But I can’t just disappear,” he started. “Penny will wonder—”

  “You can, or I’ll tell this whole town about your dirty little hobby. Is it because she looks so young and innocent? Or just that she does what she’s told?”

  “What? Jesus, it’s none of that. Just wait a minute, Cass, I love Penny, I’m not—”

  “You will, or yo
u’ll never work in this town again.”

  Nick drove home in a zombie-like trance, each turn a fresh cut of pain. He should have been on his way to Penny’s by now. He should be there by now.

  Nick sank down on his bed and looked for a way out. Anything. Nothing came to him.

  If it had been just the handcuffs… maybe he could have talked to Penny about it. They needed to talk about it anyway, much as he’d been putting it off. And he doubted Cass could tell that many people his secret, if she’d even follow through on the threat. Mortifying as hell, but he’d probably survive. Maybe move to another town, worst-case scenario.

  But it wasn’t just the mysterious handcuffs. Not really.

  Penny had already made it clear that she would listen to her family on most things. Important things. Painful things. He couldn’t imagine his mother telling him to give up photography, but if she did… Well, he couldn’t imagine listening. But Penny wouldn’t move to follow him if Cass ruined Nick’s career here.

  Maybe Penny just loved her family more than he did. As if she would choose him over her family? Fat chance. And he didn’t want to make her choose. That’d be an asshole move if he’d ever heard of one. Not that it had been his idea.

  Fucking Cass.

  But the truth was… Penny would abide by their wishes. She had before, and she’d do it again. And therefore, so would he.

  Sorry, can’t make it tonight.

  He typed the text and sent it as quickly as he could, like ripping off a Band-Aid. If doing so tore open a horrible, gaping wound.

  The text didn’t make any sense. She’d have to wonder what was going on. But that was inevitable, because his breaking things off didn’t make any sense. If he just didn’t show up, she’d think something had happened until she finally got in touch with him, so at least the text would minimize that confusion.