by Casey Diam
“Are you hurt that I won this time? It was fair.”
Yes, yes, yes . . .
“You are taller than I am.”
I caught her hand as she was about to touch me, biting my lip and trying to silence my thoughts, even though it was exactly what I wanted.
I wanted to spend the night with her, but not like she’d implied earlier.
She looked up, a twinkle in her eyes and a smile on her lips. Releasing her hand, I swallowed.
“What?” she asked.
I missed you.
My cock twitched in my pants, and I ignored it with the stronger urge to find out everything that I’d missed in the last two and a half years.
“Nothing.”
“Okay.”
As she walked off, I found a spot on a couch with Ash, and not even two seconds later, Gabby’s soft lips consumed my thoughts.
“Put that away,” Ash said.
“What?”
“Your dick. I think that girl just took a picture of it.”
I glanced down at the bulge inside my jeans, resting snug against my left hipbone, and then up at a few girls checking me out, phones vertical in their hands.
I wasn’t a gentleman like my dude-bros though. I was a man, which meant my dick was going to get hard whether I wanted it to or not, so there was no point in fumbling to hide it unless there was a giant tent in my pants about to poke at something, and since there wasn’t . . .
I shrugged. “If they’ve never seen a dick print before, then who am I to deny them?”
“How about when you’re a pro football player and it’s all over social media because they sold it to the highest bidder?” He arched an eyebrow, and he had a point there, but fuck it.
“Then the ladies will know I’m gifted in more ways than one.” I grinned.
He chuckled. “Dude, not everyone wants to see that.”
“Well, if they don’t want to see it, then they shouldn’t fucking look at it or take pictures of it.”
“How are we even related?” He laughed, giving me a shove as he got up.
Chapter 19
Gabby
I pressed the answer button instead of ignore and cursed under my breath, pressing my phone to my ear. “What do you want, Jax?” I wasn’t drunk, but I felt good, and the last thing I wanted was to be on the phone with him. Seriously— “I told you to stop calling.”
Making my way to the hallway on the first floor, I found a spot less crowded and noisy and leaned against the wall, covering my other ear to block out some of the music.
“Please, don’t hang up. It’s just that I saw a picture of you on Instagram at his party. You said you didn’t hook up with him, and I’m finding that hard to believe when all you’ve been doing is hanging out with him.”
“I don’t care what you believe, and what I do is no longer your business. Yeah, I get it, you’re sorry, but it doesn’t change anything. We’re done, and this is the last time I’m going to tell you to stop calling me.”
“Gabby, Gabby, I swear if you hook up with that asshole, I’m going to make sure he loses everything. No football. No college. Everyone saw what he did to me at that party. All I need to do is go to the station.”
“What? Are you insane? You can’t do that!”
“He doesn’t deserve you, Gabby. You really don’t think he isn’t going to sleep with the next girl on his mind before you can even turn your head? You know I’m right, and unless you promise that you aren’t going to be with him, then I’ll do whatever is necessary. He broke my fucking nose, and he should be in jail, not partying and trying to take what’s mine.”
My heart pounded in my chest, and I had the urge to call my brothers because Jax had just lost his freaking mind.
“I’m not yours, Jax. And I’m hanging up now.”
With my hands shaking, I ended the call.
“Hey! What are you doing back here?” Averie asked with a smile that fell into a frown when she saw my face.
“Nothing, I just—” I inhaled a steady breath. “Jax keeps calling me. And, like an idiot, I answered.”
She tucked a few strands of her light-brown hair behind her ear. “What did he say?”
I pressed the back of my head against the wall, rolling it from side to side in an attempt to massage away the sudden pressure there.
“He threatened me—well, not me, Ryker.”
“No?”
“Yup.” I told her everything.
“You need to tell Ryker.”
“Are you kidding? He wouldn’t take this lightly.”
“Exactly, no one should! This is insane.”
I hesitated. “I don’t want to get Ryker in trouble. He leaves the day after tomorrow. Maybe I should just go home. After this, I—I don’t know.”
“No.” She pouted. “Everything was just getting good with you and him.”
“I know.”
Folding her arms across her chest, she leaned a shoulder against the wall. “That’s why you should tell him.”
I spent a moment thinking about it before I agreed.
We walked back out to the living room where the smell of marijuana was considerably stronger.
The party had escalated in the past hour. Brody’s friends were now hanging out with Tyler’s. Weed was being smoked inside the cabin, and the last I’d heard before I took that call was that Tyler was sniffing cocaine off some girl’s stomach in the lounge area upstairs.
Nerves ran through me as I spotted Ryker perched on the arm of the couch, his attention on Eddie, who seemed to be in the middle of a story. As I neared, I overheard something about a stolen mascot suit.
Ryker’s head turned, and as if sensing my distress, his eyes narrowed.
“I need to tell you something, but you have to promise you won’t do anything.”
His head slanted, and his eyes did a quick scan of my body as if he’d find the problem there. “What is it?”
“Promise?”
“I can’t do that.”
Trying to be in control of this, I wanted to stomp my feet like a four-year-old and demand he just agree, even though Jax’s harassment was freaking me out.
Ryker’s hand slid around the nape of my neck, his thumb brushing over my cheek. “Who fucked with you?”
I drew in a breath as his gaze grew so intense that I could practically see a tornado coming to life behind his once calm ice-grays.
“Jax.” As he was about to stand, I stopped him.
“I’m going to kill him.”
“You can’t.”
As my phone began to ring, I pulled it out of my back pocket, my face falling as I saw who it was, again.
“Is that him?”
“Uh.” I began pressing my phone screen to my chest, but before I could get out any other word, he snatched the phone from my hand and hit the answer button on the screen.
“Ryker, no,” I whisper-yelled.
“Hey, douchebag, how’s your face?” Ryker said, catching my hand as I tried to take the phone back. “Listen, you call this number or bother Gabby again, and I’m going to find you and fuck you up. And in case you were wondering, this is Ryker Stanley, bitch. Remember it for when I become your living fucking nightmare.”
And with that, he hung up.
“Ryker!” I looked down at my phone. Oh my God. “You shouldn’t have done that. You really shouldn’t have done that.”
“Why not? I meant every word.”
“He said he’s going to report you, and now that he knows I’m here with you, he’s going to get the wrong idea—”
“Hey, take a breath.” His lips twitched into a smile. “I forgot how to decrypt what you’re trying to say when you’re freaking out.”
I rolled my eyes, but I did slow down and explain the situation, and what did he do? He shrugged. Shrugged. This was his future we were talking about. “You’re not worried? What if you get a record and you lose your scholarship? I can’t let you go to jail because of me.”
“
A week ago, you’d probably say I deserved it.”
“I wouldn’t.”
He stared at me, an eyebrow arching.
“Okay,” I confessed. “I’d let you think that. But I wouldn’t want anything like that to happen to you. You’ve worked so hard.”
I knew for one how hard he’d been working for this his whole life, as he had always felt like he was competing with his brother. They played different positions, but Ash was the best quarterback in this town, actually, if we’re being factual, this state had ever seen.
It might have been a long time ago, but he’d once confided in me about not being good enough for his dad, and I never forgot it.
Feeling slightly awkward and out of place for that slip up, I touched my neck and dropped my gaze. “I’m going to call my brothers.”
As I was about to step away, his arm snaked around my waist and tugged me closer, the previous storm clouds behind his eyes shifting to concern. “I don’t know where that psycho is, so don’t go wandering off, okay?”
I nodded and pulled in a small breath as his fingers smoothed over the exposed skin at the small of my back, sending sparks through my veins and tingles across my nipples.
As his pupils dilated, I bit my lip, my eyes lowering to his pink lips. They’d felt so good, and I was already longing to feel them on mine again.
“Do you want me to go with you?” he asked
“Huh?”
His lips pulled into a smile. “To make that call.”
“Oh, um, no, it’s okay, I just, uh, I can tell them tomorrow, but I do think I need another shot. I’m not much in the party mood anymore.”
“What kind of a mood would you be in if I found that asshole and kicked his ass?”
Need spread between my thighs.
Gathering my wits, I said, “You promised you wouldn’t.”
“Did I?”
No.
“I want to come up with you, but it’s late, and you know my reputation. I don’t want people thinking that—you know?”
“That we’re sleeping together?”
My chest ached and for stupid reasons, because this was my wanting to be one of those girls again, who he kissed the shit out of in public, who he wanted to fuck.
“Don’t with that look.” His palm patted my back. “Your reputation is still solid, Gabby, and you hanging out with me is starting to turn heads.”
“Honestly, I don’t care what people think.”
“Honestly, I taught you that.”
I laughed, and he did too.
“And in that case—” He stood, and with one hand still at my waist, he yanked me into his body, his free hand cupping the back of my neck as he leaned down, crushing his lips to mine.
My shock melted into longing as his lips moved away for a split-second before capturing mine once more.
After the fact that we were smack-dab in the middle of the living room filtered through my thoughts, I broke the kiss, but before I could glance around, he was leading me upstairs.
Once he locked the door behind us in the room, his lips came down on mine again as he guided me back to the bed, and then on top of it where he lay down next to me.
He peered into my eyes. “I didn’t mean to be a dick to you earlier or yesterday or any other time. I’m sorry.”
“I know.”
“After tonight, I only have one more night here before I’m on my way to Oklahoma.”
“I know.”
He sighed and took a lock of my hair between his fingers. “I wish you hadn’t stayed away.”
“My timing always sucks, doesn’t it?”
He grinned. “Not always. Just ninety-nine percent of the time.”
I smiled at the dimples in his cheeks before my eyes flitted back to his heart-melting grays.
“I’m not gonna lie, Gabby. I want my cock buried so deep inside you that you’ll never forget what I feel like. I want to fuck you until you’re so exhausted from coming that you just fall asleep, but you’re a virgin.”
When my lips rubbed together, he added, “And even if you weren’t, my fucking you would still change everything. You’re so innocent and free.”
I eased up enough from the bed to lean over and press my lips to his. They softened beneath mine as he kissed me back. His tongue slid between my lips as they parted, and my thoughts drifted away. My hand slid underneath his arm to his back, and as the kiss deepened even more, I moved one of my legs over his. He groaned, pulling me closer until the hard ridge of his cock pressed against my aching sex. A moan escaped and my hips moved of their own accord, helping me to assuage the release my body sought.
“Gabby,” he whispered, my name coming out as a painful sigh before his lips touched the base of my neck, sending a maddening wave of tingles across my nipples once more.
I arched into him. “Ryker.”
His head lifted, and his dreamy eyes locked with mine.
My hand trailed over his collarbone and up to the sharp definition of his jawline.
“I know you’re leaving, and I’m not expecting anything more than this.” I raised a shoulder, trying for indifference even though I didn’t necessarily believe what I was telling him. I wanted more than tonight, but if tonight was all we had, there was no use in pretending I didn’t want him. “I guess I just want to have you before you leave.”
“Have me?” He placed a light kiss on my mouth. “I wanted to talk to you, get to know you again in a sense, that’s why I came up here with you. We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to, Gabby, or anything that you’re not ready for. But” —he cleared his throat, a smile stretching across his lips—“what exactly do you mean by have me?”
“It means that—” I stared at a random spot between us before adding, “I’m ready for anything if it involves you.”
When I chanced a look at him, his smile had changed into this sexy smirk. “Like a threesome?”
My heart sank. “Never mind.”
Trying to flirt was a fail. I didn’t even know what I was thinking. I would never be enough for him. He was Ryker Fucking Stanley. A heartthrob and a bad choice to have as anything more than a friend, and if he was also the guy who took my virginity, could he handle that? Could I?
My gaze shifted to his vibrant red hair and storm-cloud eyes. A few barely-visible freckles ran along his nose and at the edge of his full bottom lip. I’d literally never seen anything as beautiful as Ryker, and it was hard not to stare at how unique and captivating he was, so I knew he had no problems getting girls, but a threesome? Was that what he wanted?
I didn’t want to watch or imagine him paying the same attention to someone else that he was giving to me right now, and it made my chest ache.
His hand dropped to the small of my back, and he leaned forward, kissing my cheek. “That was supposed to be a joke, Bunny.” He sighed while I swooned at the nickname that used to be Snow Bunny when we were younger but had become just Bunny over time. He’d given me that name. “What’s that look?”
I couldn’t talk so I kissed him, trying to forget his stupid joke.
My lips parted over his, and my tongue found his as we became lost in each other for a while until I was pushing down my leggings. They’d become too tight for some reason, and I wanted to be free of them so I could feel more of him.
I lifted my legs in the air where my leggings and socks were trapped together at my ankles. I chuckled. “Help me?”
“Gabby.” He groaned but sat up, his eyes lingering on my thighs as he removed them. “You’re killing me.”
“That’s impossible. I’m still almost fully dressed,” I said.
“Almost.”
I swallowed as his hands smoothed up my legs and thighs before his lips met mine once more. “You’re making this so hard for me.”
“Your penis?”
“First of all, don’t ever call it a penis. It’s a dick, preferably a cock, a big, thick cock.”
I wanted to laugh, but nerves took over. I’d seen
the bulge in his pants before, but I guess I’d never thought this far ahead. He was huge, and I didn’t know what to expect, or how ‘fun’ this might or might not be, so I liked that he was lightening the mood.
“Second of all, what I meant was that having you like this on the bed is like looking at a delectable dessert and being told I can’t eat it.”
“Who says you can’t eat it?”
Chapter 20
Ryker
I groaned.
Fuck. Me.
She wasn’t doing herself or me any favors taunting me like this.
Gabriella was pure, and the monster in me wanted to tarnish that because my dick should be the first she ever felt, the only one she ever felt inside her.
As her phone buzzed on the bed, I caught a glimpse of the name on the screen. Douchebag Jax. The thought of him almost having Gabby half-naked in a bed like this made me crazy.
Feeling the urge to stake my claim and distract her from Douchebag’s threats, I captured her lips with mine, kissing her until she was enlivened beneath me, breathing and squirming with the need for more.
My hand slipped under her top and worked its way under the stiff edge of her bra until my palm covered the perfect, soft mound beneath. My thumb smoothed over her nipple, causing her to let out a small moan that went straight to my head, both of them.
My mouth traveled down her neck, tasting and savoring her sweet smell.
“Maybe we should take this off too,” I murmured, tugging on her blouse.
“Your clothes first.”
“Done.”
Getting off the bed, I pulled my shirt over my head and unfastened my belt buckle. When my jeans dropped to my feet, I stepped out of them.
She chuckled. “That was fast.” Her eyes stayed on my face instead of checking out the rest of my physique.
“I don’t like to waste time.” Lying down next to her, I rubbed my hand over her smooth thigh. Damn they were sexy. “And we don’t have any to waste.” I looked in her eye. “But I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable, and if at any time you want me to stop, or put my clothes back on, tell me.”
She nodded, and as her phone vibrated again, I cursed under my breath.
