“It’s just—come on, Adam. You had it made through school and got exactly what you wanted. Now you’re complaining about it being hard work?” I asked with a scoff. “It just seems ridiculous to me.”
Well, that came out a hell of a lot bitchier than I meant it to. I downed the rest of my drink, hoping the alcohol would drown some of my embarrassment.
He pursed his lips together and practically glared at me and I glanced around the perimeter to see if Stacy had gotten her front row seat for me taking out years of frustration on him.
Thankfully, she hadn’t.
“I wasn’t complaining,” Adam said curtly before take a long swig of his beer. “And I’m very happy to be where I am now, but I disagree about ‘having it made’ through school. That’s quite a statement to make about someone you don’t even know.”
“Maybe we would know each other better if you had bothered to even look at me back then,” I fired back, immediately regretting my words when I saw his closed-off expression switch to something else entirely.
“Is that what this is about?” Adam asked, leaning closer to me so he could whisper without being overheard. “You’re mad because I didn’t notice you in school?”
I rolled my eyes and shook my head as I vehemently denied his words, even though they rang true.
“That’s not what I meant. I was saying that—”
“Because I did notice you, Brianna. I noticed you all the time, starting way back in freshman year.” He paused for a long moment—I wasn’t sure whether it was to let the words sink in or so he could choose his next ones. “But you always had your pretty little nose buried in a book. Maybe that’s why you never saw me looking at you.”
Something in my gut told me he was being genuine, but I still couldn’t fully convince myself to believe him. I had seen too much—watched him too closely—over the years. He was a shameless flirt and had never once needed a girl to show a sign of interest before moving in on her.
He hadn’t noticed me back then. If he had—he would have done something about it.
If anything, he was just noticing me now because of this stupid makeover and trying to ply me with whatever he thought I wanted to hear.
Pissed off for nearly allowing myself to be played by a man who I knew was a notorious player, I slid off the stool and growled, “Go fuck yourself, Adam.”
I was certain that the stunned look on his face was going to stick with me for the rest of my life. I smirked as I went in search of Stacy to tell her about my first—and likely last—conversation with The Body.
Chapter Seven
Adam
What the fuck just happened?
I could admit that I might have been a little short when I responded to her accusation of having it made, but I couldn’t for the life of me fathom what I had said that upset her enough to tell me to go fuck myself and run off.
Was it the pretty little nose comment? Was that somehow offensive?
I mean, her nose was cute. Surely, she knew that.
Or did she just not appreciate being called out for having her head in a book?
Or maybe—
“Hey, Adam!”
I nearly groaned in frustration at having my thoughts interrupted, even though I didn’t mind the source. I greeted my old teammate with a brotherly hug, spying a flash of red over his shoulder and tracking the movement like a hawk. I watched Brianna as she spoke in hushed whispers to another girl—one that looked somewhat familiar—before the two suddenly turned towards me.
I immediately looked away, feigning interest in catching up with Phillip. More old teammates and friends began to flank the area and I hoped to all things that were holy that Brianna wouldn’t leave before I had the chance to speak to her again.
Just in case, I made sure to angle myself within the group to have an excellent view of the exit. Satisfied that I’d be able to spot her if she tried to make a swift escape, I tuned back into the conversation and half-heartedly nodded along.
Nearly an hour later, I was chuckling to myself at just how right I had been about the reunion.
The friends I used to play football with in high school seemed to retain a little bit of hero worship—which saved me from being included in this bullshit—but it was still irritating to have to witness. Phillip and Doug had begun the metaphorical dick-measuring contest a while back, pulling in Johnny and his buddy once they had finally made their way inside.
I took another swig of my third beer, knowing that it would be my last. With the three beers and the glass of whiskey all within an hour, I knew my limitations well enough to know that I’d end up drunk if I kept going. So once the last of the amber liquid was drained from the bottle and I handed it off to a passing member of the wait staff, I shoved my hands in my coat pockets and waited for a perfect moment to excuse myself from the conversation.
That moment never arrived—at least not before a flash of red heading for the door grabbed my attention. I mumbled out a quick excuse before taking off in a jog, hoping to catch Brianna before she disappeared into the night and possibly for good.
I was so convinced that she was leaving altogether that I nearly body-checked her after flying out the double doors. The check-in table had been abandoned when the last of the alumni had shown up and the hall itself had also been emptied. Brianna spun around and looked up at me with surprise for a moment before it melted into annoyance.
“What do you want now?”
What I really wanted was to bend her over my knee and teach her a lesson about manners and tone.
But I doubted telling her that would have gone over very well, so I simply shrugged and said, “To talk. I think there’s been some kind of misunderstanding.”
“Really?” she sarcastically asked, tipping her head to the side and narrowing her eyes as she put her hands on her hips. “Because I’m pretty sure I read you loud and clear. And what I said to you was fairly straightforward.”
“But the reasoning behind it sure as hell wasn’t,” I said lowly, letting out a frustrated gust of breath as I raised my hands in the air. “Look, I give up. I’ll let you leave and promise to never speak to you again if you just tell me what the hell I said to piss you off so much.”
“Leave? I was going to the bathroom.”
“Oh,” I said, recognition dawning when I realized she had turned towards the hallway with the restrooms attached instead of heading straight down to the exit. “Sorry. Go ahead.”
The looked on her face was more amused than anything else as she turned and walked away, but I could see the lingering anger in the stiffness of her spine.
Five minutes into a conversation and I already botched it up. A personal best—mostly because I never botched it up. Normally, talking to women was easy as hell for me.
Not wanting to feel like a creep who was stalking her outside of the ladies room, I leaned against the wall just beside the gymnasium doors and waited for her to come out. It still felt pretty fucking creepy considering the halls were fairly dark and everyone else had gone inside, but I knew I couldn’t go back to the reunion without the possibility of being snagged again.
Brianna stepped out and froze, raising a brow as she said, “This is kind of weird.”
“My thoughts exactly,” I agreed as I pushed myself off the wall and made my way over to her. “But I really want to clear the air between us.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and defiantly stuck her chin up as she said, “I don’t appreciate being played.”
That was definitely not what I expected to hear.
“Played? What the hell are you talking about?”
“You!” she shouted, lowering her voice when it echoed down the empty hall. She gestured at my chest as she ranted, “You making things up about noticing me in school just to lure me into your trap. You didn’t notice me back in school—you just noticed me now because I’m wearing this stupid dress and you’ll say whatever it takes to get what you want.”
“Is that really what you think?” I
asked in disbelief. This girl was fucking nuts. “Because if it is—you’re way off.”
“I don’t think I am. I think I’m dead-on.”
Stubbornness looked rather adorable on her, but I needed to melt that look off her face if I was going to have any chance at going home with her tonight. I had long since decided on Brianna—nobody else in that entire gymnasium piqued my interest like she did. Not having any history with her was just icing on the metaphorical cake.
But I wasn’t lying when I said I’d noticed her before. I’d just never bothered to make a move on her and I had what I thought was a damn good reason for it.
She began to walk away when I let the silence stretch on too long, but before she reached the doors, I called out, “The first time I saw you was in ninth grade algebra. School was already a few weeks in and you were a new student, so Mr. Dickerson introduced you to the whole class. I’ve known your name since that day.”
I looked over my shoulder and saw that she was standing perfectly still, blinking at the doors as her hand hovered in mid-air. Slowly, she lowered her hand and turned towards me, giving me a look that I took as permission to continue.
“I’m not going to list all the classes we had together in high school because there were a ton of them. But every semester, I could pretty much count on having the pleasure of seeing you in at least one class,” I paused for a moment as I thought back to the memorable moments that had stuck in my mind. “My personal favorite was computer science class. You were always so damn quiet everywhere else, but it was pretty much a weekly occurrence for you to call out Mr. Delure and get into a massive debate about the legitimacy of what he was teaching students.”
Brianna looked stunned that I remembered that much, but I was pretty sure that everyone in that class would be able to recall it if asked. Mr. Delure’s face would get so red as he defended the literature he was teaching from as Brianna coolly disregarded it all—only getting heated when the teacher pointedly began to ignore her.
But when she did get heated... well, it was quite the sight to behold.
“You know he was a bus driver?” she asked, chuckling a little as she stepped closer and wrapped her arms around her waist. “He didn’t even have the qualifications to teach that class. The school system asked him to take a night course and gave him the job because they couldn’t find anyone else to fill it.”
“I didn’t know that.”
All those instances suddenly made a hell of a lot more sense. I was definitely grateful that I had listened more to what Brianna ‘taught’ than Mr. Delure. Not that I ever had much of a chance to put the knowledge to use.
When I noticed her moving her hands up and down her arms, I frowned and asked, “Are you cold?”
She nodded. “They really cranked up the A/C up for this thing and I didn’t exactly dress with that in mind.”
An idea hit me—one that would save both her and myself from the possibility of being dragged away by old classmates.
“Want to go for a walk? We can see if the doors to the quad are unlocked.”
Brianna bit her lower lip as she considered it, the movement drawing my attention instantly. I watched as she glanced back at the doors for a brief second before she finally turned back and said, “That sounds nice.”
I didn’t need to guide her considering she knew the way there as well as I did, but I still waited until she was beside me before I fell in line and placed my hand on the small of her back. She shivered slightly—just enough for me to catch it—and I could feel my luck beginning to turn around.
Brianna let out a happy squeal when she found the doors unlocked and pushed them open, stepping out into the hot Arizona air. I was glad to come outside and give her some relief, but I could already feel myself becoming uncomfortable in my suit.
When she turned around, the small smile fell off her face and her eyes widened as she saw me undoing my jacket.
“W-What are you doing?”
I smirked at her flushed face. “You might have been cold in there,” I said, jerking my thumb back towards the building. “But I’m hot as hell out here.”
“Oh,” she breathed out, relieved.
The grin that spread across my face was nothing short of wicked. I couldn’t resist the urge to push her a little further, just so I could gauge her reaction. After all—I’d never had the chance to be this close to her before and it wasn’t for lack of want.
“Don’t worry, darling,” I cockily said, pausing to pull the jacket off my shoulders and toss it on the bench beside me. As I rolled up the sleeves of my dress shirt, I met her eyes and heatedly said, “I wouldn’t dream of fucking you out here unless you asked nicely first.”
Her mouth fell open and even with only the moonlight illuminating her, I could see the redness of her cheeks as she furiously blushed. Her eyes darted down to the front of my slacks like she couldn’t stop herself from looking and I stifled a short groan as my cock twitched.
It was time to seal the deal. I smiled when I realized that being intimate with her was something I really wanted to do—even more than I wanted a bed to crash in for the night.
That didn’t happen very often for me. At least not in this town.
“Sit down,” I told her, gesturing to the bench. She moved to take the empty end and I shook my head, stopping her with a loose hold on her elbow. “You can sit on my jacket. Don’t want you to ruin your dress.”
She swallowed hard, looking from my hand on her elbow to my eyes and finally down to the jacket that I had laid out for her. After a quick moistening of her lips, she sat down and modestly crossed her legs.
If I had my way, those legs wouldn’t be together for long. I cleared my throat and sat beside her, angling my body so I could face her as I spoke.
“I did listen to your speech at graduation, by the way. I’m sorry that you caught me when I was looking at my phone. I was dealing with some… family drama that day.”
Brianna looked at me with a raised eyebrow. “You mean your family isn’t as perfect as you are?”
“I don’t know where you got this idea that I’m perfect from, but I can promise you that it’s bullshit. And no, my family is far from perfect. About as far as you can get from it,” I muttered as an afterthought.
“I find that hard to believe.”
Brianna clearly wasn’t going to give up her false ideas about me, but the last thing I wanted to do tonight was talk about the people I was trying to avoid.
“What about you? You got a perfect family?”
Brianna snorted. “Hardly, but they’re good people. Could be worse.”
“Were they proud of you? For getting valedictorian.”
“Of course. Wasn’t your family proud of you?”
“For graduating?”
She smiled at my confusion. “That and for getting drafted so quickly.”
I shrugged. It wasn’t really an answer, but how did one explain that not a single member of my family showed up for my graduation because they didn’t give a shit and the only calls I got when I was drafted were from the ones looking for money?
Of course, there was also the call I got from Dale, which was even worse.
“I guess. But if it’s all the same to you, I’d rather not talk about myself,” I told her before I playfully added, “You seem to know quite a bit already whereas I know very little about you.”
Brianna shrugged and looked away. “There’s not much to know.”
With a grin, I parroted her words back at her. “I find that hard to believe.”
“Well, what do you want to know?”
This was a chance to ask her pretty much anything I wanted to and a hundred things sprung to mind, but I knew what the most pressing question was, at least for the night.
“Are you single?”
“Seriously?” she asked with a chuckle. “That’s the first thing that came to your mind?”
I hummed thoughtfully. “Maybe not the first, but it is a rather important question.”
“Why?”
“Because if you’re already spoken for, it’s not my place to make a move.”
Her hands twisted together nervously and she stared down at them, clearly torn about how to answer. I barely heard her soft voice as she asked, “And if I’m not spoken for?”
“Then I’d love to spend the night getting to know you better,” I said lowly, trying to keep the implication clear in my voice, but the words themselves subtle.
“You—You mean...” she trailed off, finally looking up with wide eyes to meet mine.
Screw subtle. If she wanted it spelled out, I would happily do that for her.
“I’d really like to spend the night learning your body and making you come over and over again.”
Her lips slightly parted and there was something in her expression that made me regret trying to push her so quickly, but her hesitation gave way to determination and she let out a long, shaky breath before she asked, “Your place?”
“I’m staying with my mother for the week. If you’re comfortable with looking her in the eye over breakfast after I spend the whole night making you scream, then I suppose I could oblige you.”
It was an empty threat—it always was—but it also always worked. Her cheeks turned scarlet as she rapidly shook her head back and forth.
“My place it is.”
“Did you drive?”
“No.”
“Perfect,” I said, standing up and offering her my hand. “I’ll drive then.”
She accepted my hand and after she was standing, I picked up my suit jacket and shook it off. I didn’t bother putting it back on considering I knew it’d only be a matter of time before I shucked it again, so I hooked it on my index finger and slung it over my shoulder.
We were heading back towards the entrance of the building when I abruptly gripped her elbow and swung her back around to face me.
“What is it?” she nervously asked, her eyes darting around the quad in a panic.
“Nothing. Just a preview.”
“Wha—”
I cut her off by smashing my lips against hers, taking advantage of her surprised gasp and sliding my tongue between her parted lips. The moment she gathered her bearings and began kissing me back, I slowly stepped forward and backed her up against the closed door.
The Body Page 4
