I can’t help the satisfied smirk on my face, and he sees it too.
“But that’s not what I’m here for,” he spins me around so that I’m facing the wall. His hands are on my ass, exploring me, pulling my legs apart so he can reach my pussy. “I’m here to fuck you. And I’m not going to do it gently.” His words are hot in my ear, and I bite my lip to hold back a moan. His fingers are toying with me, and I know he hears the whimper that escapes. I feel the head of him at my pussy, pressing in. He pulls my hips back against his, and I love the explosion of pleasure I get as he sinks inside me. He pushes me into the wall of the shower so I’m trapped between his body and the glass, hot and cold.
Pulling out, he slams back into the hilt, and my knees buckle, the only thing keeping me up is him holding me here. Again and again and again, deep pounding thrusts that vibrate all the way through my body. His voice strains with every thrust. “I’m going to fuck you so hard that you’re still going to feel it while I’m watching you today.”
Oh god. I moan again and he keeps going.
“Yeah. I’m going to watch you. And I’m going to think of how you came all over my tongue. How I fucked you senseless with my cock.”
The way he’s thrusting into me, it’s lighting me up. He’s hitting all different places and it’s like I’m a lit fuse. It’s just a matter of time until I explode. Carter reaches down and grabs one of my legs, lifting it so he can fuck me more deeply.
Shit.
Fuck.
I’m seeing stars and I can’t breathe and I think I’m telling him yes. God I don’t think I’ll ever have enough of this. Why on earth did I wait so long for this? Carter slams into me, grunting with the effort and it might be the sexiest thing I’ve ever heard. I lean my head back on his shoulder, leaning into the feeling of being utterly, gloriously fucked. He’s so deep I feel impaled and I fucking love it. He’s hitting just the right spot and suddenly I’m almost there. I’m begging for him to keep going. Last night was so good and this might be even better.
I’m so close, and I can tell he is too. He speaks, words barely coherent in the frenzy. “I’m gonna come. I want to come inside you. Let me come inside you.”
God yes, I want that. I want all of him in me. I want to take everything from him and keep it. “Yes. Yes. Yes.” It’s all I can say.
We slam into the wall together, Carter fucking into me with savage speed, and I break open. It’s so good that I can’t even scream. How can I scream when I can’t even breathe? Lighting is flashing behind my eyes and pleasure is searing across my skin, crackling along my nerve. My pussy floods, I can feel the rush of it over his cock and down my legs. Behind me, Carter is still fucking, every thrust making my orgasm last longer. With a final burst, he pushes into me, crying out, and I feel him come. Warmth spreads through me and it triggers another orgasm. I’m shaking on him, squeezing him, wracked with shudders of pleasure. I don’t want it to stop. Please don’t let it stop.
Suddenly we both take a breath. We’re still pressed together, and I’m not sure either of us would still be standing without the support of the wall. I’m trying to slow my heart rate, trying to take a breath that’s not shallow. I think he is too. Holy fuck that was good. I can’t even move, just stand here. I feel his cum dripping down my legs and I think it’s a very good thing that we decided to do this in the shower.
Slowly, I turn. He’s still pressing me into the wall, but I need to see his face. Need to kiss him. He still looks far away, eyes glazed with the aftermath of it all. I kiss him, tangling my tongue with his. I wouldn’t be opposed to playing hooky from practice and spending the whole time in this bathroom with him if it means I’ll get more of that.
He groans, coming back to himself and deepening our kiss.
The front door opens, and we both go entirely still.
“April?”
Shit. It’s Kara.
14
“Shit,” I whisper. “Shit shit shit. I’m in the shower!” I raise my voice louder for that last part. I look back at Carter. “What are we going to do?”
“You could just tell her now,” he whispers, smiling.
I know he’s kidding, but I can’t joke about this. “I don’t think I’m going to break it to Kara that I broke our pact while I’m naked in the shower with our cheerleading coach whose semen is still running down my legs.”
He stifles a laugh as I grab the soap and quickly wash my body. My hair will have to wait till later. “Please,” I say before turning the water off. “Please just hide until we leave for practice. This isn’t the right time.”
“I know. It will be all right.” He kisses me before letting me turn off the water, and I quickly wrap a tool around myself and shut the door behind me.
Kara is in the kitchen, pouring herself some water. She looks over at me, seeing I’m still soaking wet from the shower. “You’re cutting it close,” she says. “We have to leave in like five minutes.”
“You’re not dressed yet either.” I give her a pointed look.
“Yes, but I,” she gestures to herself grandly, “am dry.”
“Fair point.” I head into our room, trying to dry myself as best I can.
Kara follows me. “So, how was it?”
“Was what?”
“Your date!” She rolls her eyes. “It can’t have been that good if you forgot about it already.”
Oh, I have very much not forgotten about it. I wring the water out of my hair and pin it back into a bun. It’s just going to have to live like this for practice until I can wash it properly and dry it. “It was fine,” I say. “Nice.” I hope that I’m conveying nonchalance with my tone.
“Are you sure it’s a good idea to go out with someone who works for the school?” She pulls her uniform out of the closet. “I mean, I know what I said yesterday, but I was thinking, and I guess since he’s not a professor there aren’t the same rules. He might expect something from you and it might get awkward.”
I laugh to break the tension because she has no fucking clue. “I’m sure it will be fine, Kara. Carter is a good guy.”
“Still. It’s weird.”
“That he asked me out?”
She nods. “Yeah. Don’t you think so?”
“Not really. If he had been the assistant coach I wouldn’t have found it weird.”
“But he’s not the assistant coach.” Kara finishes pulling on her uniform, and I do too.
I don’t know what else to say to her, so I decide to skip it all together. “Come on, if we don’t leave now, we’ll be late.”
She grabs her bag, and I give a final glance at the bathroom door as we leave.
* * *
As soon as we enter the gym, Marian confronts me. “I need to talk to you. Alone.” She glares at Kara until she leaves my side and goes to the locker room. “Did you have fun last night?” Marian spits at me, her tone loaded with venom.
“Excuse me?”
“Don’t play dumb, freshman. I’m a waitress at Celia’s.”
I nod. “It’s not against the law to have dinner with someone.”
“Then why were you also together at your dorm in the middle of the night? I saw you two.”
My jaw drops open. “So you’re a waitress and a stalker? That’s classy. I know you think I’m out to get you, but I’m not, and this is none of your business.”
She looks my up and down, eyes full of poison. “Make sure you’re put together when you come to practice. With dry hair. I don’t want anyone seeing you and thinking that CGS cheerleaders don’t take care of themselves.”
I walk away and leave her standing there. I can’t imagine she has anything else to say that matters.
I hit the mats to stretch and realize that Carter isn’t here yet. He should have left right after us, so where is he? I suddenly worry that something happened, maybe he slipped in the bathroom after we left. Was he already in practice clothes or did he have to go all the way home first? Why didn’t I notice? I smother the laugh building u
p inside me. Because I wasn’t exactly paying attention to his clothes.
As I stretch, I feel the toll that last night and this afternoon have left on my body. I’m much more sore than usual, and the way my vagina feels is strange. It’s not used to that much friction. I wonder if I should call Carter and see where he is? But I don’t have his number. It’s hard to imagine that we’ve had sex but I don’t have his phone number yet. We need to fix that immediately.
Carter walks in and I breathe out a sigh of relief. He’s not too late. It can be explained away and nothing happened to him. He’s wearing his normal coaching clothes, sweats, and a CGS t-shirt. The t-shirt clings to him a little more than normal, and his wet hair is flopping down into his face in a way that is so damn cute—
Wait. Wet hair.
Oh shit.
I see it the moment it happens.
Marian walks over to Carter and they speak. I don’t know about what. But she reaches up and touches his hair. He laughs and pushes her hand away. And while he’s coming over to the rest of the group to talk to us about what to work on today, Marian turns and looks directly at me. She smirks. She knows. She saw too much and connected the dots. I don’t care if she knows—I couldn’t give a shit. It’s who she might tell that could be the problem.
The squad gathers around Carter. “Hey everyone, sorry I’m late. There was something I really needed to do,” he says, and I feel him very consciously avoiding looking at me. And I know why, because if he had said that and looked at me we both would have laughed. “It couldn’t wait. But I’m here now, so let’s get started.”
It’s a confusing practice. Between Marian throwing me smirks and glares, and Carter watching me like he’s reliving every moment in the shower, I’m not sure what to do or feel. It’s not my finest practice, that’s for damn sure. In the locker room, Marian makes sure everyone knows.
“You need to step it up, Collins.” Her voice rings across the locker room. “Our first competition is in a month, and we can’t have any weak links. We’ll never be ready if you keep slacking off like you did today.”
I am so sick of her shit. “It’s our second practice, Marian. We’ll be fine.”
“I’m the captain,” she says, going red with rage. “That means when I say something, you better damn well listen.”
“Sure,” I nod, “whatever you say.”
“I told you,” Marian says loudly to one of her upperclassmen friends. “Ungrateful bitch of a freshman.”
I grab my bag, slamming my locker door shut. “What is your problem, Marian? I spilled a drink on you, let it go.”
“You think this is about the drink? It’s not about that. It’s about you think you’re better than you are, taking things you don’t deserve.”
Shaking my head, it’s a struggle not to just slap her and get it over with. Everyone is watching us now to see what’s going to happen. “I literally have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Marian snorts like she doesn’t believe me. “So you’re not trying to become the first freshman captain this school has ever had?”
“No,” I say. “I’m not. You can keep the captain position. I don’t want it.”
Her face goes cold and cruel, and even though I know it’s coming, it still feels like a punch to the stomach. “So why are you fucking the coach?”
All the air gets sucked out of the room, and I swear no one breathes. Even Marian looks like she’s not sure she should have said that.
Kara breaks the silence. “Geeze, Marian. Stop being such an asshole. There’s no way that would ever happen. Right, April?”
Marian gives me a small smile, like she knows she won. Because if I deny it, I’ll be lying to Kara’s face. To everyone’s face.
“April?”
She looks over at me, and I look at her, but actually meeting her eyes is…hard.
The change that comes over her face is like night and day. Her hand flies to her mouth and her eyes fill with tears. “Kara, it’s not what you think,” I say. She grabs her bag, sprinting past the rest of the team before I can catch her. “Kara!”
Everyone else is staring at me. Some in disgust, others in admiration. Everyone is judging me though. “It’s not what you think,” I say quietly. “We met at a party before school started. We…like each other.” I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter.”
Marian actually looks surprised as I push past her. “So you really don’t want my spot?”
It’s the last straw. I turn and unleash my anger on her. “Go fuck yourself, Marian.”
There’s more than one quiet laugh as I leave the locker room. At least there are some people still on my side.
15
My phone is in my hand the minute I leave the gym, calling Kara. It goes to straight to voicemail. I call again, same thing. It doesn’t even sound like she’s screening the calls, the phone is just off. I practically sprint back to our dorm, making it across campus in half the time. I burst into the room, startling another of my suite mates. “Kara?”
“She’s not here,” Ellen says. “Haven’t seen her at all.”
“Shit.” I change out of my uniform as fast as I can, grab my bag and head out again. Where could she possibly be? This is exactly what I was afraid of, that she’d get the wrong idea, that I wouldn’t get to explain, that now she thinks that I’ve betrayed her. Or maybe she thinks something even worse. I don’t know. She’s not in the dining hall, and she’s not in the little lounge in the science building where she likes to study. I haven’t seen her anywhere across campus. I check the gym again, just in case she circled back to avoid me. No luck. Her phone is still going straight to voicemail, though I leave one more message. “Kara. Please call me. I can explain everything. Just give me the chance.”
My anger at Marian and my determination to find Kara suddenly vanish, and I’m left with just overwhelming sadness. No one’s here in the gym, so I just sit down against the wall and let the tears come. Maybe Carter was right. Maybe I should have just told her while we were naked in the shower. It would have been better than finding out from fucking Marian.
The tears flow, and I cry until I can’t even breathe normally. I’m starting to hiccup. Kara and I don’t ever fight. Not really. Small arguments that are resolved after a couple of hours. Nothing like this. This feels bigger, and I don’t know if we’ll come back from it. I don’t know if I’ve wrecked it for good.
I feel someone sit down next to me and I lean over onto Carter’s shoulder. My tears soak through his shirt, but he doesn’t seem to mind. Instead, he takes my hand, thumb rubbing circles on my palm. He doesn’t ask but I tell him what happened anyway. It all comes spilling out quickly. It doesn’t take long—he already knows most of it.
When I’ve finished hiccupping through the last of it, Carter reaches around me, cradling me in his arms. “It’s going to be okay.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No,” he says lightly, “but I’ve been told I’ve got very good intuition.”
I want to believe him, but I can’t. Not yet. Not when Kara is somewhere with a broken heart thinking her best friend is a traitor and a liar.
“Come on,” he says, getting up and pulling me with him. “I know what’s going to make you feel better.”
“If it’s sex, now’s not the time.”
He laughs, and it fills up the gym. “It’s not sex. That comes later.”
“Okay.”
Together we walk out of the gym and Carter holds my hand. He really doesn’t care what people think about the two of us. His confidence gives me confidence, and I slowly relax into it, like it could be normal. I’m not really paying attention to where we’re going until we’re already there. “The library?” I ask.
“You said when you were young that the library was your favorite place. Your best memories. I know it’s not the same library, but I thought maybe just being in one would make you happy.”
It’s unbearably sweet, him remembering that. It’s exactly wha
t I needed, not even being at the library but just someone else looking after me. Being there for me. I feel tears rising again and I don’t want to cry anymore, so I just hug him instead. “Thank you.”
“I also think I saw Kara go this direction when she left the gym,” he says softly into my hair. He pulls back. “I’ll wait here, read a newspaper. You let me know when you’re ready to leave.”
I shake my head. Just when I thought he couldn’t get any better, he does. I tug on his shirt so he leans down to kiss me. “Don’t go anywhere.”
“I won’t.” His voice is so sure, I have the sudden feeling he’s not just talking about today, and I keep glancing back at him as I head into the stacks of the library.
Kara and I always hung out in the children’s section of our library. We don’t have a children’s section since it’s a college library, but I think I know where she’d go. There’s a place on the second floor with reading nooks that look out over the campus. She’s always loved cozy spaces.
I know I’m right when I’m walking along the row and hear the telltale sounds of post-cry sniffing. Considering it’s what I was just doing, I’m familiar with the sound. Each alcove has a couch and cushions, and sure enough, Kara is tucked into the corner of one, knees up to her chest. She’s still in her cheer uniform and her face is blotchy from crying. She doesn’t look at me as I slip into the alcove, settling down on the other side of the couch.
“Haven’t seen you in a library in a long time,” I say.
“Yeah.”
We sit in silence for a few minutes. I know that Kara will speak when she’s ready. She needed to be alone but she’s not afraid of confrontation.
“I don’t understand,” she says, her voice sounding teary. “Why would you do that?”
“I’m sorry.” I bring my own knees up, mimicking her posture. “I never meant to hurt you. I was going to tell you, but I’d barely seen you. I wanted to tell you when you were comfortable and would have time to process. Not rushing off to class or practice or something else.”
Best of Penny Wylder: Virgin Romance Page 15
