Exposed: An Anthology

by Brooke Cumberland

  “Hey boys, I saved table number twelve for you.” I pointed to the pool table closest to the bar. “Quinn didn’t come with you?”

  Cole tapped the bar with his fist, which I was coming to realize was a sign of frustration toward Quinn that he was trying to tamper down. “She’s tutoring.”

  “Where’s Jaxon?” I asked while pouring Cole’s favorite whiskey into his glass. I didn’t want to upset him anymore with talk of what Quinn was most likely up to tonight, with Bryce.

  “Right here, Beautiful.” He grinned from behind me. “I was just outside talking on the phone with mom. By the way, Jace, she said you couldn’t use studying as an excuse not to call her, jackass.”

  I smiled at the fact that he enjoyed calling his mom and he wasn’t ashamed of it. I had heard him on the phone with her a couple times already. I still had my back turned toward him. When I finished with Cole’s drink, I turned around to ask him what he wanted and his eyes bugged out at the sight of my shirt. It was just a tight black t-shirt that said, ‘Nice Rack’ across my chest, which is the pool hall’s name. But Ed had thought it would be a fantastic idea for me to wear a deep V-neck t-shirt. My boobs were on display nightly at the bar. I learned quickly to get a tight-fitting bra, one that wouldn’t expose anything when I bent down a hundred times a night. I tried to get the rest of the employees of the bar to have to wear V-necks as well, but since they’re all male, they weren’t having it.

  “I agree with the shirt,” he said while beaming.

  Jace came up beside him with a devilish grin and said, “Me too, Emmy.”

  Jaxon slapped him upside the head and pushed him toward the pool table. It was fun to watch these three playing pool together; they really were the three amigos. Cole looked so happy to have his two best friends finally back with him, and I was pretty happy they decided to join our little group as well. Cole was decent at playing, but that was because he came in here a lot to play with Quinn when she wanted to hang out with me while I worked. Jace and Jaxon knew how to work a table though, and they were extremely competitive with each other. There were lots of cuss words and playful punches thrown.

  *.*.*.*.*

  Jaxon: We have that test today in Media Law. Come over to crash study with me? Pleeease.

  Me: I’ll be over in 5. But it’s nice to hear you beg. ;-)

  Jaxon: Bring breakfast. I’m hungry ;-)

  Me: What do I look like… a maid?

  Jaxon: Do you have one of those little outfits? If so, I’ll come over there right now.

  *.*.*.*.*

  The next couple of weeks of school and work went by pretty fast. I picked up a lot of shifts since tomorrow was the first game of the season and I knew I’d be taking off all Fridays and some Saturdays until the season was over. Ed complained that he would fire me, but I was the only female bartender, and I pulled in a lot of customers, so I knew he wouldn’t. I usually just picked up extra weekday shifts to appease him and the other bartenders that had to cover for me.

  A couple of times I met up with everyone at some of the Frat parties after work. Jace usually didn’t go to those; Cole said he was pretty bogged down with pre-med. Every once in a while, I would see him on campus and he always had a new entourage of girls on each side of him. I couldn’t blame them though, the Riley boys were hot.

  I heard rumors every now and then about some girl saying she hooked up with Jaxon, but I never asked him if they were true. Micah had said that he was a lot like the male version of me. I did notice Rachel Morgan always sitting next to him in the cafeteria, but I knew they weren’t dating or anything. Not yet at least. Some girls took it upon themselves every once in a while to come and sit in his lap. He usually let them for a couple of seconds and I always laughed into my hand, as he would try politely to move them off.

  We continued flirting with each other but nothing more ever happened between us. Mr. Patterson assigned us a huge midterm project that we had to have partners on, so Jaxon and I would meet in one or the other’s apartment to work on it. As we were walking out to his truck after lunch one day, I asked him if he was nervous about the game tomorrow, since he hadn’t played on a team in a couple years.

  “No, I don’t think so, I’ve been doing well during practice. I worked my butt off the two years after high school so I could stay fit. I woke up every morning at 5 AM to practice before classes and then I would hit the gyms in the afternoons and evenings. I used to drag Jace with me every morning. He would bitch my head off for making him get up and throw me the ball so early in the morning,” he said while walking over to my side of the truck.

  He opened my door and dipped down to grab my waist. This was always my favorite part. I told him once that I was completely capable of getting into a truck on my own, but he just ignored me and did it anyway. He lifted me up into the seat, looking right into my eyes. I swear, every time we did this his face got closer to mine and I almost leaned in to kiss him today. By the time I realized I should, he was already backing out to close my door. He came around to the driver’s side and slid in. His dark jeans made a slight scratching noise across the leather seat.

  I realized I hadn’t replied to him yet. “You have a pretty awesome brother to get up every day at five in the morning for two years to throw a ball.”

  “I didn’t say he liked doing it,” he returned.

  “If he didn’t like doing it, he wouldn’t have been there, Jaxon. He loves you. Besides you said he stayed behind to go to community college with you when he obviously had a university fully ready to pay four years for him in pre-med.”

  “Hmm… yeah I guess you’re right.” He said this like he’d never considered his own brother loved him before. “After a while I guess he became used to waking up so early because there were a couple of times that I just didn’t feel like getting up. I mean we did it every single morning even on the weekends. Jace would be there, slapping me upside the head to get me to wake up.” He laughed at the memory and I let him think about it the rest of the drive home.

  As we were walking up to our apartment doors, I looked back at him and said, “Hey, you should really think about doing something nice, thanking Jace for helping you.”

  “I was just thinking about that. I have no idea what, but I’ll think of something. I’ll catch ya later, Beautiful,” he said while smacking my ass on his way to their door.

  He got inside before I even got my keys out. I knelt down with my bag in front of me so I could dig around for my keys. I’m pretty sure this violates Self-Defense 101, be prepared and always have your keys ready. Oh well, I guess if anyone were to try to attack me, I could shout loud enough for the guys to hear or the seventy year-old lady down the hall. Surely she would help out. I kept digging around but I wasn’t feeling the familiar cold metal. I turned my backpack upside down and dumped all of the contents out. No keys. I checked every tiny pocket this backpack had, but still no luck. Damn, I must have forgotten to grab them this morning when I left with Quinn.

  Lately, since I’ve been working so much, I’ve been taking a nap before I go in. I didn’t have to work tonight but I was really looking forward to a nap before the party that we were going to hit tonight. I guess I could go take a nap in Cole’s bed. When he lived in the Frat house, Quinn and I used to sleep in his bed all of the time, when we drank too much at their parties. He would sleep on the floor, instead of the couch downstairs, because he didn’t want any of the drunken guys to come in and mess with us while we were asleep.

  I walked down to their apartment and knocked on the door. It took a while but Jaxon finally answered, wearing only a navy blue towel wrapped around his waist. Well hot damn. He quirked an eyebrow at me as he raised his right arm, resting his hand on the top of the doorframe. It wasn’t a long reach with his height, but the way it stretched him out made my legs tingle.

  Guys shouldn’t be allowed to look like this, especially ones that live next door to me; it really wasn’t fair to all the other more average-looking guys. I looked up from
his muscular calves, over the ridges of his abs to his broad chest. I had to pause for a couple of heated beats when I roamed over the v-shaped indentions at his hipbones disappearing under the towel.

  “I see you’ve upgraded your home attire. I approve,” I said softly. My voice sounded raspy. “I don’t have my keys. I was just going to come down here and nap on Cole’s bed till Quinn gets home to let me in.”

  He nodded his head but he didn’t say anything and he didn’t move from his position, so I stepped up closer to him. Something in his eyes was different. They were smoldering and oozed sex. I’m not sure what had changed between now and when I saw him two minutes ago, but I wasn’t going to question it.

  If I looked straight ahead, all that was in my line of vision was a hard muscled stomach. I reached out and put my palm against his abs. My hand had a mind of its own as it slowly climbed up his chest. He was looking down at me with a heated stare. When I rose up on my tiptoes, I could trace my hand up past his collarbone, over that sexy shoulder tattoo, to the back of his neck. His lips were slightly parted and I heard the slight hitch in his breath. The tips of my fingers met the ends of his hair on the back of his neck.

  He still had one hand up on the top of the doorframe. He lightly brushed the tips of his fingers along my arm on the way down. I reached up my opposite hand to join the other behind his neck. Then I grasped his hair in my hands.

  His voice was barely a whisper, “Emerson…”

  Once I heard my favorite voice laced in sexual desire, my control was gone. Still up on my toes, I quickly pulled his head down to me, and crushed my lips into his. His hands were staying at his side though. I pushed my body up against his and I could feel how he was reacting to me, so I couldn’t understand why he wasn’t moving beyond kissing me. I wanted to beg him to touch me. I slid one hand back down and grabbed a hold of him through the cotton towel hoping to get my message across. He groaned into my mouth through my lips.

  “Emerson, if you keep this up, I swear I won’t be able to stop,” he said almost painfully.

  “Don’t you dare ask me to stop,” I quickly said as I came back off my toes and kissed a line down his chest.

  Before I could even finish saying, “stop,” he grabbed me by the waist and lifted me effortlessly up to his mouth again. My legs instinctively wrapped around him and I dug my fingers through his hair roughly. Finally. This was finally happening.

  He walked us down the hall toward his bedroom, which was directly across from Jace’s. Thankfully, neither of the other guys was home yet. I feel like I’ve been in his room to study a thousand times already but it felt different today. Today there wouldn’t be any textbooks involved. He always kept it perfectly tidy. I also noticed when I would sit on his bed to study that his sheets always had a clean scent to them. He climbed onto his bed, still holding me from behind with one arm. When we reached the middle of the mattress, he laid me down on top of the comforter. His hands came down on either side of my head, our lips never parted. I felt like he was devouring me, like he couldn’t get enough. I pray that was the case, because I know I couldn’t; I’ve been waiting for this for too long.

  I kept my legs wrapped around his waist and he dipped down to rub up against me. The longest moan ever escaped from my mouth before I could catch it. He made me feel as if I’d never done this before; it was almost embarrassing. I reached down to pull open his towel and I tossed it off the bed. Holy shit, he’s gorgeous. I couldn’t help but to run my tongue down his neck and suck on his pulse point.

  Without moving his neck away from my mouth, he whispered in my ear, “You have me at a disadvantage here, it’s not fair.”

  Throughout my perusing of his body, I forgot that I was still fully clothed. He didn’t let that last long though. He took the hem of my shirt and pulled it over my head tossing it behind him. In one swoop, he grabbed my shorts and panties and slipped them down my legs. I sat up and reached behind my back to unhook my bra. He was right there sliding the straps down my shoulders, leaving a trail with his lips in their wake.

  “Fuck, your body is amazing,” he growled.

  He ducked his head down to kiss the swell of my breasts and I fell back onto the bed. He went down with me, and I ran my hands down his back to get him closer. He reached down with one hand to see if I was ready and I heard his muffled groan on my skin, the vibrations rocked all the way down my body. I had never been more ready in my life. My breaths were coming in small gasps now in anticipation of him.

  Suddenly, he sat up on his knees, leaving me cold. I followed his movements with my eyes as he reached into his nightstand to grab a foil packet. When he came back to kneel between my thighs, I took the packet from him. Without letting my eyes leave his, I tore the package open and I watched his eyes close as I slid the condom on him, slowly. When I finally felt every inch of him inside me, I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer either. His name passed through my lips.

  “Emerson, you’re so beautiful, I need to see your eyes.” He continued rocking into me as I peeled my eyes open and looked up at him. The view from down here couldn’t get any better. “I’ve wanted to be this close to you since the moment I first saw you.”

  I gripped his back tighter to pull him even closer. “I was basically naked, of course you did,” I tried to laugh but a moan escaped instead.

  “I’m not going to lie; you were fucking hot sneaking out of that house. This has nothing to do with your gorgeous body though. It was the way you squared your shoulders when you knew you’d been caught and decided not to be embarrassed. Oh, and the way you were limping on your foot… so damn adorable. ” He grinned down at me.

  I’d never met a guy who could carry on a conversation so well during sex. No one had ever said anything like that to me before either. I didn’t want to like it, but I usually got bumbling idiots that were way too excited about the size of my boobs or they were done by now. Jaxon’s words were refreshing to hear but deeply terrifying at the same time.

  “Shut up,” I said as I pushed up against him to meet his strokes and smashed my lips against his. He pushed my legs up closer to my head as I shouted his name again.

  His movements came quicker and shorter and he buried his face in my neck. I loved the sound of his groan as he pushed into me one more time. Then I felt the full weight of his body on top of me. When he rolled off, he pulled me with him so I was laying my head on his shoulder and our legs were tangled.

  “I’m going to have to get up; I have practice in like fifteen minutes. But I want you to nap in my bed, anytime you want. Seriously. Just don’t go get in Cole’s bed, please or Jace’s, for that matter. That’s my rule.” He winked at me.

  “You do understand we’re not dating, right?” I sounded like such a bitch saying that right now, but his possessive tone was scaring me. I didn’t need another Micah.

  “Oh, I understand. Crystal clear.”

  He scooted out from under me and came down to brush his lips across mine. I closed my eyes to inhale his scent. I loved that his scent was mixed with mine in this bed. He finally pressed his lips down on mine and pushed his tongue inside. The kiss became more eager and I wanted him all over again. I couldn’t stop my fingers from sliding into his hair and holding his mouth to mine.

  I heard him groan and say, “You’re revving me back up again. I wish I could, but Coach will bench me tomorrow if I’m late, and I have a bet to win.” He leaned down to kiss me again and then got up to grab clothes out of his dresser. “Are you and Quinn going to go to that house party with us tonight?”

  “Yeah, Cole said we could all ride together after you guys get out of practice,” I replied while smiling at him.

  I watched him pull on some running shorts as I moved underneath his comforter. He smiled over at me getting comfortable in his bed. He pulled a University football t-shirt over his rippling muscles, when he said, “Nice, I’ll catch ya later then, Beautiful.” He pulled the door closed behind him and I was already halfway asleep before he got o
ut of the apartment.

  After spending the next couple of hours lounging in Jaxon’s bed, I finally got up when I knew Quinn would be home. As I was walking out of Jaxon’s bedroom in one of his long t-shirts, Jace came out of his bedroom across the hall at the same time.

  I froze and pointed behind me at the bedroom, “Jaxon… was here. Earlier. But he had… to leave,” I sounded like a child getting caught with my hand in the cookie jar. Why was I nervous about Jace seeing me leave his brother’s room, it’s not like I’d run into his mom?

  He burst out laughing at my appearance. “You’re so cute, Em. Don’t worry I’ve been waiting for this to happen. Maybe now he’ll shut up about you.”

  “Alright, well thanks… I’ll see you tonight?” When he nodded his head, I said, “Tell him I’ll give him his shirt back later.”

  When we walked into the house party that night we heard chanting coming from the kitchen in the back. The house was already packed bodies-to-bodies and they were all heavily intoxicated. The music was so loud that I could feel the beat in my chest to the rhythm of the music. Jaxon and Jace made a barrier to help us squeeze through the crowd while Cole stayed in the back to make sure no one pushed us from behind. I never hold hands with anybody it’s just an unspoken rule of mine. But when Jaxon grabbed mine as we walked into the house and wouldn’t let me go, it didn’t take long for me to stop fighting him. For some reason, it felt nice to have his big strong hand wrapped around mine. These guys were way too protective of us though. Quinn and I had gone to plenty of parties on our own and survived.