Lessons In Losing It (Study Abroad Book 4)

by Jessica Peterson

  I hear him laugh. I can’t understand what he’s saying, obviously, but from his tone I can tell he’s enjoying the conversation.

  My heart twists. That must be nice, having a fun conversation with your mom. I wouldn’t know. All my mom talks about during our weekly calls is how’s your GPA looking? and when are you going to sign up to take the MCAT study course? Time is running out…

  Needless to say, I get the worst stomachaches ever when I talk to her. A tiny part of me doesn’t even want to get this internship back at Meryton because I know I’ll have to call Mom and tell her. That call, if it happens at all, is going to be bad. Really, really bad.

  I check the time on the alarm clock next to Fred’s side of the bed. A little past eight. Whew. Luckily, I don’t have class until eleven on Tuesdays.

  I climb out of bed and head for the master bathroom, a giant expanse of white marble with a huge tub and even bigger shower. I pee, wash my hands, and brush my teeth with my toothbrush I “borrowed” from the vanity. When I’m done, I sneak out of the bedroom into the hall.

  I follow Fred’s voice through the living room. Pillows and cushions are everywhere; foil packets litter the coffee table.

  I wasn’t lying or blowing smoke up Fred’s ass when I told him he was the best lay of my life. I’ve never had sex like that—urgent, messy, intense sex that leaves its mark.

  The Madrileñas always talk about the crazy sex they have with studly Spaniards. I wanted to have that kind of sex, but I never have. Until last night, I guess I thought that maybe I just wasn’t the type of person who has crazy, delicious sex. Maybe I wasn’t sensual enough, or good enough at this stuff.

  But now I see my somewhat lackluster sex life wasn’t so much about me as it was about the guys I’ve been with. Being so turned on and so in synch with Fred last night showed me that. It’s like we were speaking the same language without having to say a word.

  I just wish I had a shot at being that forever person he’s looking for. I like Fred. Really, really like him.

  Maybe I’m starting to want him to be my forever person. Which scares the hell out of me, because we have lives on opposite sides of the Atlantic.

  Then again, I haven’t officially gotten the internship at Meryton yet. Fred did ask me to think about applying to the internship with his team here in Madrid.

  I’ve thought about it. Well—I’m thinking about it now, anyway.

  And I think I’m going to apply. Why the hell not?

  Am I an idiot to hope that Fred and I actually have a future together? I mean, I’ve only known the guy for a week. But he’s so deliciously different from everything and everyone I know. He stands out in all the best ways.

  He makes me feel like it’s safe to be myself. Makes me feel like it’s okay to be myself. All my life, I’ve pretended to be someone else. Someone who would make my mother happy. Proud. But when I’m with Fred—I can be who I really am.

  I love him for that. I don’t love him love him, obviously. I mean, hello, the sex may be great, but I have only known this guy for eight days. That kind of love—I can’t go there. Not yet.

  I pass a doorway and catch a glimpse of Fred. I immediately back up and turn into the kitchen.

  He looks as rumpled and bed-mussed as I do. His hair sticks up every which way; he’s wearing a pair of clear-framed glasses that make him look like the most adorable, most sexy smarty pants ever.

  God, I love guys who wear glasses.

  He is wearing a pair of white athletic shorts—emblazoned with his team’s logo, naturally—and nothing else.

  Let me repeat that: Fred Ohr is standing in his kitchen in his glasses and shorts and nothing else.

  The heaviness between my legs throbs.

  I try—and fail—not to stare at his naked torso. He’s ripped. So very ripped. Those muscles that dive between his hips and arrow down to his groin—Jesus Mother, they do something to me.

  He looks up when I enter the room and grins. His eyes get all squinty with pleasure. They look more green than blue today. I like how they’re always changing. Always different, depending on the light.

  Relief floods my chest. He doesn’t look angry, or regretful, or guilty.

  He looks blissed out.

  Something inside me tightens. Hurts. This guy—I always thought he was hot.

  But I was not prepared for how everything about him—his eyes and his grin and the sound of his voice—would full me with such sharp-edged longing.

  He’s still on the phone; he mouths “sorry”. I wave him away.

  Don’t rush, I want to tell him. I love hearing you talk to your mom.

  It’s adorable, for one thing. For another, its ordinariness is sort of soothing. Intimate. I love that I’m here, now, warm and cozy in Fred’s kitchen, instead of sweating over an essay in the library, or pacing my dorm room, worried sick about my future.

  It doesn’t hurt that hearing a guy speak a different language is really, really sexy. I wonder what other languages Fred knows; like a lot of Europeans, I bet he knows three, four, half a dozen. Makes me feel lame for being so proud of the fact that I’m fluent in Spanish.

  I settle onto a stool and hold my chin in my hand. My stomach growls. I’m not usually much of a breakfast person, but I guess I worked up an appetite having crazy floor sex last night.

  “All right, Mama,” Fred is saying, switching to English. “Okay. Yes. No, I’ve got plenty of undershirts…no, really, you don’t have to…yes, I did get the socks. Yes, they are very warm. Thank you for sending them. I love you too…yes, we all need to practice our English. Okay. Yes. Really, you don’t need to worry—I know I work too much…I’m fine, I promise. All right. Goodbye.”

  He hangs up and sets the phone on the counter. He looks up at me, fisting his hair in his hand. His bicep bulges; the muscles along the sides of his torso bunch and ripple. He’s huge in every way imaginable.

  I mean. My God.

  “Good morning,” he says, grinning.

  “Morning,” I say, suddenly shy. “Hi.”

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Good.” Turned on. Sore. Awed. “You?”

  “Bloody perfect.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re not just saying that to make me feel like less of a dick?

  “No. Why would you feel like a dick?”

  “Because things...uh, kind of got away from me last night. I was supposed to take it slow with you—I asked you to make out—and then we end up having crazy animal sex.”

  Fred moves around the island toward me. “Rachel,” he says.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I know how much sex means to you—”

  “Rachel.”

  “—and I swear, I didn’t come here with the sinister intention of, like, taking advantage of you or whatever. I want you to feel good about what we do together. I hate that I got so caught up in…in everything. In you. I know better—”

  “Rachel.”

  “—and I should’ve stopped us before things went too fa—”

  He takes the last half of that word into his mouth, pressing his lips to mine as he cups my face in his hands. For a second I remain rigid, too stunned to move. He tastes like toothpaste. Clean. Fresh.

  His tongue slips inside my mouth. I melt. How could I not?

  I moan when he pulls away. His face is an inch from mine. He’s so close I can see the individual hairs that make up his pale eyebrows; I can see each freckle dotting his nose and cheeks.

  “I feel good about what we did last night,” he says. My face is still in his hands. “In fact, I’d very much like to do it again.”

  “Oh,” I say, crumpling with relief against him. “Oh, thank God. I was so worried—”

  “I’m worried, too,” he says, softly. “But I’m not going to let that keep me from you. Last night—it was unbelievable.”

  A beat of silence passes between us. We’re playing with fire, like Laura said, and we both know it. But wh
at can we do?

  “How’s your back?” he asks at last.

  “Hurts a little. I’ll live.”

  “I’ll be more gentle next time.”

  “Please don’t. I kinda liked how intense you were. It was really hot. How are your knees? I imagine they’re in rough shape, too.”

  “Rug burn hurts less than a patellar dislocation, I’ll tell you that much.” He grins, running his fingers through my tangled hair. “Your hair looks an absolute state.”

  “So does yours. I like it.” I’m grinning now, too. “We forgot to eat dinner last night. Which means I’m kinda starving right now.”

  “Then we’ve got to feed you. I’m hungry, too.”

  “No rush—I don’t have class until eleven,” I say. “Was that your mom on the phone?”

  “It was. She’s hell bent on sending me socks and undershirts this winter. I told her I’m perfectly capable of buying my own, but she’s worried I ‘won’t be warm enough’.” He shrugs. “Piece of work, that one.”

  “I think it’s adorable.” I say. “So she really did forgive you for leaving, huh?”

  Fred nods, slipping his arms around my waist. Our groins meet, and for a minute I think I might faint. “Back when I was deciding whether or not to go to Munich, I was so worried my decision would make her unhappy. But now I understand her happiness is not in my hands. Mama will choose whether or not she is happy. Yeah, my decision upset her. She was disappointed. But she’s always been happy, and she stayed happy after I left. So now she is happy, and so am I.”

  A hand grips my heart and squeezes. “She sounds like a lovely person.”

  “This is what you’re struggling with, yeah? Worrying about making your mom unhappy if you choose sports medicine over plastic surgery?”

  “Good guess. Jeez, Fred, I thought those glasses only made you look smart, but now I see they’ve turned you into a real genius.”

  He uses his first finger to slide the glasses in question up the bridge of his nose. “A charming genius, surely?”

  I bite my lip. “You did charm my pants right off last night…”

  “I did. It was delightful.”

  “Very delightful. Want to do it again?”

  “Hm.” He looks down at my naked legs. “It appears my charm is still working. You aren’t wearing any pants.”

  I wiggle my eyebrows. “Nope. And right now I wish you weren’t, either.”

  “You’re starving.” He bends his neck and plants a quick kiss on my throat. “Let’s make breakfast, and then we can—you know. Take care of my pants situation. But how about some stuffed French toast first?”

  Chapter 13

  Fred

  I slice the stuffed French toast in half, and a thick slab of Nutella oozes out of the center. It looks heavenly and smells even better, if I don’t say so myself. I’ve never really loved breakfast, but now that Rachel is here and we’re both half-naked, cooking in my kitchen, I fucking adore it. I feel like I’m back at home on a Saturday morning, roused from bed by the delicious smells coming from downstairs.

  I feel…complete, I guess. So bloody happy it scares me.

  It should scare me. Because last night I decided I’d give in to my feelings for Rachel. I’d literally give myself to her. I’d let myself fall for this excellent human being.

  And being with her this morning, touching her, laughing, cooking breakfast together—it’s only making me fall harder.

  I want to be with her. I want to eat breakfast with her for more than just a couple weeks. I can’t stand the thought of letting her go. Of not having her here for dinner tonight, and breakfast again tomorrow, and a Tournament marathon every day after that.

  I can’t fucking let this girl go.

  “Holy moly, Fred,” Rachel says, eyes glued to the plate I set in front of her. “That looks amazing.”

  “It should. Only took us, what?” I toss a towel over my shoulder, glancing at the clock on the stove. “One and a half hours to make?”

  She smiles. “You were the one who suggested we ‘whip up’ stuffed French toast.”

  “Perhaps a tad ambitious of me, but I wanted to impress you with my culinary skills, so…”

  “So now your kitchen is covered in powdered sugar, your neighbors are pissed because we burned a batch and set off the fire alarm, and we’re both going to be late.”

  “But you are impressed, aren’t you?”

  Her dark eyes dance. “Hell yeah, I am.”

  Those same eyes roll back in her head as she chews on her first bite. Yeah, it’s probably going to take me a day and a half to clean up from this French toast fiasco, but seeing that expression on her face—that fucking smile of hers—makes it all worth it.

  “This is good, Fred,” Rachel says. “Really, really good.”

  “As good as the orgasms I gave you last night?”

  She looks at me, mischievously, from the corner of her eye. I’ve been sporting a half woody all morning, but that look has me fully hard in the space of half a heartbeat. “Almost. Those orgasms are pretty tough to beat, not gonna lie.”

  I swallow. The urge to pick her up and throw her on the counter and fuck her hard and fast and mercilessly is overwhelming. I know she’s wet, too; I can smell the faintest trace of her arousal.

  I know she’s not wearing underwear. Which means I could be inside her in two seconds.

  But she’s hungry, and I’m not about to send her home with an empty stomach. Plus my dick is a little sore from last night—she’s really tight—and my knees and hands really do sting from rug burn. Rachel and I could probably both use a little break.

  Then again, I’m not sure I can keep my hands off her much longer. Her lips are still swollen, and her hair is all over the place. She looks so bloody fuckable right now I can hardly stand it.

  I want to be with her.

  I turn off the hood and sit down at the island beside Rachel to eat.

  As we eat our French toast in companionable silence, I compose a grand speech in my head: I’ll start off by telling her how much I enjoy doing new things with her, and how she’s pushed me to expand my world, and what an absolute joy she is to be around. I’ll tell her how sexy she is. How I’ll support her dreams in any way I can. I’ll tell her how much I admire her for chasing down what she wants, even though her mom wants her to do something completely different. I’ll say I can’t keep my hands off her and that only having three weeks together is a fucking terrible joke and we both know it.

  Then I’ll ask her to be my girlfriend. I’ll ask her to take a stab at forever with me. I’ll ask her if she’s thought any more about applying to the internship with the squad.

  Rachel looks up from her plate at me. Grins. She’s got some Nutella on the edge of her mouth. I don’t tell her, because she looks adorable.

  In that tiny bit of time, between on heartbeat and the next, my speech goes out the window. I don’t want to waste another second.

  So instead I blurt, “Be with me.”

  “Be with you?” She’s still grinning. “I am. I’m with you right now.”

  “You know what I mean. Be with me, Rachel, for real. I don’t want to be with anyone else, and I hope you don’t either. So let’s make this exclusive. Let’s make it real. Be my girlfriend.”

  Her brows come together when she realizes that I’m being serious. She draws a sharp breath but doesn’t let it out. “You’re talking about making this—us—a long term thing, even though there’s absolutely no guarantee we’ll have any time together past the end of December.”

  “Not if you apply to the internship here in Madrid.”

  Rachel takes another breath. This time she lets it out. Swivels her head to look at me. Her hair falls over her shoulder onto her chest.

  “Have you thought any more about that?” I ask.

  “I have,” she says.

  My heart skips a beat. “And?”

  She grins. “And I’m going to apply.”

  Before I know what I’m
doing, I’m pulling her to me, wrapping her in my arms as I give her a tight squeeze.

  Holy shit.

  Holy shit this might actually happen.

  Rachel might actually stay in Spain with me.

  My chest is going to explode.

  “Don’t get ahead of yourself,” she says, laughing as she pulls away. “I still have to do some research—I know the deadline is coming up. And the program is really tough to get into. But I’m willing to give it a shot.”

  “You’re willing to give us a shot,” I say. I reach over and swipe away the Nutella from her lips with my thumb. Then I bring my thumb to my mouth. “Be with me.”

  A beat passes between us. Her grin broadens. Reaches her eyes.

  “Okay,” she says. “It’s crazy, but yes. Yes, I’ll be with you.”

  I’m leaning in to kiss her when I hear it—the unmistakable chime of a mobile.

  Rachel pulls back. “That’s my phone. I think I left it in my bag last night? I’m actually waiting to hear…”

  She gets up and runs to the hall outside the kitchen.

  I look down at my French toast. I know I’m smiling, probably a big, goofy smile, but I don’t care.

  Rachel is my girlfriend. We are going to try to make this work.

  We are going to be together.

  I look up when Rachel comes back into the kitchen. She’s holding her phone in her hand. She looks up at me.

  She’s got this stunned expression on her face.

  My stomach twists.

  “Everything all right?” I ask.

  “Yeah. Yes,” she says, setting her phone down next to her plate. She looks away. “I just…um. I got the sports medicine internship at Meryton. They called me earlier and left a voicemail—guess I didn’t hear it ring.”

  My stomach twists again, harder this time. She meets my eyes. This means—

  We both know what this means. The chances of Rachel leaving Spain for good at the end of the semester just got bigger. Much bigger.

  Which means the chances of us having a real shot at something long-term got much smaller.

  I can’t ask her to pass on such a brilliant opportunity. I never would. But Christ do I wish that opportunity was a bit closer to Madrid.