A Bone to Pick: A New Adult College Romance (Campus Crushes Book 3)

by Rachel Shane

  “We’re going to a…museum?” I glanced at Trevor incredulously.

  “Not just any museum.” Trevor cut the engine. “A doll museum.”

  My eye twitched. “I thought you were going to show me the good parts of Throckmorton.”

  “This place is fucking awesome. It was my favorite place to take girls in high school because they lost their shit at the sight of the creepy dolls and clung to me for dear life.”

  I clamped my hand over my mouth to stifle my giggle. I could not picture Trevor’s main dating game in high school relying on a bunch of porcelain figurines. “Oh man, I have to see this.”

  He stepped out of the car, his Topsiders crunching on the gravel parking lot. “Don’t tell me you did something in high school better than this.”

  “I did the usual,” I said, joining him outside. “Parties.” But that was a lie. At least prior to my senior year. Before that, I mostly spent time at… “The mall.” I groaned and he laughed.

  “You’ll see. This is way better than a Friday night at Forever 21.”

  Inside, an old woman with a halo of blue hair sat behind a desk, her eyes pierced on the door as if it constantly opened and she needed to be ready. Two closed doors loomed behind her, shielding off the precious dolls from non-paying eyes. “Welcome.” She eyed Trevor up and down and her breath caught. “My, my. I never thought I’d see you again.”

  “What’s up, Virginia?” Trevor lifted his hand to slap her five and to my surprise, she joined in.

  “Not as much as you, I hear.” She winked at him in a way that said she knew exactly what was up with Trevor. She turned to me. “Is this Erin?”

  I guess she listened to the podcast. I held out my hand to her. “Nice to meet you.”

  Virginia nodded with satisfaction. “You have to tame this one. That’s what he needs.”

  I shifted my feet awkwardly. As far as I was concerned, Trevor had gone a long way already to taming himself.

  He slid two twenties over to her. “Keep the change.”

  My eyes flew to the sign propped up on her desk announcing fees. Adults: $8.

  I widened my eyes at him as he swung open one of the doors and led me through. “I thought you were strapped for cash?”

  He shrugged. “She needs the dough more than me. I’d rather go without food for a day if it means keeping this place in biz.”

  I stifled a twinge in my chest at his generosity.

  The doors led to a square room layered with shelves several rungs deep. On the shelves, hundreds of eyes pierced on me. I yelped and Trevor laughed, wrapping his arm around me for protection. Warmth radiated from his touch and I closed my eyes for a moment to savor it before popping them open and yelping again.

  Each doll was creepier than the next, with ghost white porcelain skin and fake hair curled to perfection, each seeming to follow me with their eyes. Some dolls were the standard Victorian style, little girls in fancy dresses, frozen forever in a look of complete disinterest. There were dolls dressed as clowns with painted on smiles that would rival The Joker for disturbing. There were dolls dressed as pirates, holding little swords that glinted in the light, the looks on their face revealing their desire to come alive and stab me over and over again. Dolls streaked with dirt with severed limbs dangling from their sockets as if they’d been plucked from apocalyptic wreckage. Dolls with stitches marring their faces like patients discarded after botched surgeries.

  The walls were white; the floor was a generic gray carpet. The only place to look was directly into the eyes of the dolls staring right back at me.

  “So? What do you think?” He voice contained the hint of a grin.

  I burrowed my face into his chest, nuzzling against his rock hard pecs. “I think I’ve seen enough. Let’s go!”

  His fingers slid down my arm, leaving a trail of tingles in his wake. “Oh, but this is just the beginning.” His fingers interlocked with mine.

  Trevor pushed open another door on the left that said Adults only, leading me into a thin hallway, dark except for spotlights illuminating glass displays wedged into the walls. I gasped when we passed the first one, which contained two female dolls draped around a male doll, both with their lips pressed against his cheek. One female wore only a lacy bra; the others were naked, exposing their anatomically correct doll parts. And the male doll seemed to have a lot to expose.

  “Oh my God. Are those dolls having a threesome?”

  Trevor threw his head back in laughter. “Now you see why this place is the best. Virginia has a wicked sense of humor.”

  The displays got weirder as we went. Stripper dolls swinging around a pole. Dolls engaging in bondage, one bound and gagged while another stood over him with a whip. Dolls demonstrating various sexual positions that would require extreme acrobatics. Blow job dolls. Cunnilingus dolls. Sixty-nine. Doggy style. Reverse cowgirl.

  My eyes bulged with each one we passed. “And here I thought this would be a place you would take kids.”

  “Oh, it is. That’s what the other door is for. That hallway contains, uh, family friendly scenes.”

  I nudged him with my arm. “No wonder you brought all your dates here. Get them thinking about, well…” I flourished my hand to a diorama that depicted two female dolls scissoring. “That.”

  He chuckled. “Maybe not that one in particular if I’m involved.”

  I nodded. “Right. So this one then?” I tapped the glass of the next one, which featured what looked like an eight doll orgy, complete with strap ons and dental dams.

  Trevor’s face turned bright red. “And now you see why my game in high school was not nearly as strong as my game once I became Clever Trevor.”

  “That’s because you didn’t show up at school wearing nothing but cellophane. That would have turned the tables in your favor.”

  “Ugh the cellophane.” He banged his head against one of the glass panes. “Chalk that mistake up to being six drinks deep and not giving a fuck. But when that image is retweeted millions of times and still haunts you to this day, you start to give a fuck.”

  I placed a hand on my chest in mock shock. “Are my ears deceiving me? Does Trevor Cardinelli actually…” I paused for dramatic effect. “Care?”

  He sauntered toward me, the display behind him lit up to give him a halo glow. His face turned serious. Determined. Hungry. He didn’t stop when he stepped right in front of me, but took another step forward until I backed into the wall. He pressed both palms on either side of my head, caging me in. His body sealed against mine, every part of me coming alive at his touch.

  “I care,” he whispered, and this time his words carried weight. “About lots of things.” His delicate fingers danced over the skin of my jaw, trailing hot fire from my ear to my chin. “I care about your lips a lot.” He bent down and brushed his lips against mine whisper soft, back and forth. It took all my effort to swallow my gasp as desire pulsed deep in my core. “I care about what you say.” His lips followed the same path as his fingers, kissing along my jaw. I’d won the battle against the gasp but I lost all control against the moans slipping past my mouth. “I especially care when you say things like that.” His mouth left a warm imprint behind my ear.

  I arched my back into him. “Like what?” I whispered, totally forgetting whatever I’d just said but thankful it led to this. His body against mine, his balmy breath on my skin making my veins ache.

  He pulled back to study me. “Like you don’t believe me. Like you think everything I say is bullshit. Like this is still all an act.”

  My pulse thumped and I opened my mouth to deny it, but then clamped it shut. He was right. I still didn’t believe him.

  All of a sudden he tugged me into step, fast. We whipped past the other displays, dolls and sex toys blurring in my vision. My breath amped as I huffed to keep up pace with him. “Why are we running?”

  “Because I’m going to make you believe me.”

  We burst out the back entrance of the museum into the stinging cold, wh
ich hit me like a slap in the face. Temperatures had been warm enough to abandon my pea coat earlier but it was nighttime and they were back to bitter levels. Our feet pounded the pavement of the parking lot and I found myself smiling wide at the prospect of another adventure. Another secret about Trevor to unearth.

  He was practically bouncing in his seat as he pulled out of the lot and merged onto the highway. His eyes kept a laser focus on the road. I didn’t want to disturb his good mood, especially after finding him slumped in his bed earlier, but there was something bugging me about his confession. Something I had to know.

  I reached over and pinched a bit of fabric on his generic sweater. He’d worn drab ones every day I’d seen him. His usual wild hair was combed down each time I saw him or styled haphazardly, not artfully arranged in Mohawks like he always wore on stage. “If the real you is”—I had to stop myself from saying over the top—”Eccentric…then why this? Why the transition into Every Man?”

  “Because I don’t feel like myself anymore.”

  I rested my hand on his shoulder, my chest aching for him. For not feeling comfortable in his skin anymore. “After you take me wherever you’re taking me next,” I said. “I have a place I want to take you. Someplace that might help you find yourself again.”

  THE PLACE HE THOUGHT might change my mind completely turned out to be a pizza joint hidden in the back of a shopping center that seemed to have died a slow death except this one place. Every other store boasted blacked out windows and For Rent signs swinging on their doors. Only a few cars huddled in the parking lot, congregating together in the wide expanse of space. I half expected dust bunnies to float down the lane and a cowboy with spurs to giddy up on a horse in this ghost town.

  “A pizza place?” I eyed the abandoned buildings and the sign on the front Pizza Guys. Beneath that was another sign in another font, shinier as if it was newer. (And Gal). “Or an adventure breaking and entering in one of those scary, empty places?”

  “Pizza. But not just any pizza.”

  “Let me guess.” I made a show of pressing my finger to my lip in mock consideration. “The best pizza in Throckmorton? Not gonna lie, pizza does go a long way toward changing my mind.”

  He winked at me and pointed a finger gun in my direction. “It’s like we can read each other’s minds. Except, not just the best pizza in Throckmorton. The interesting part is why it’s the best.”

  With that he cut the engine and exited the car, loping toward the entrance and forcing me to follow in his wake like a child running after her mother.

  Inside, wooden booths lined the walls, red curtains shielding them from the harsh street lamps filtering in from outside. Painted glass chandeliers in the shape of umbrellas hung over each table, shedding dim light over the scratched wooden surfaces. The scent of garlic and spicy tomato sauce accosted my nose, making my stomach instantly grumble. Chefs decked in white coats with flour smears smudging the front tossed pizza dough high in the air. They couldn’t have been more than sixteen-years-old while a guy who appeared to be sixty manned the cash register. A waitress shuffled from the back room, carrying a tray heavy with steaming pasta dishes and a slice of pizza to a family squeezed into a booth toward the front. “Be right with you,” she nodded at us, then stopped short for a moment, blinking. The tray in her arms wobbled. “Trevor?”

  He lifted his hand in a wave. “Hey, Bella.”

  She winked at him and continued her shuffle to the family. The guys behind the pizza counter all popped up, one after the other, their gaze zooming in our direction. “Holy fucking shit,” one said before placing his hand on the flour-covered counter and straight up leaping over it, his shoes clearing the pizza resting on the table in mid-prep.

  The old man at the register shook his head. “Victor, how many times have I got to tell you not to do that?”

  “Clearly more!” another guy said, wiping his hands on a towel and unhooking his apron before he leaving the counter through a swinging exit door.

  The two young guys tackle-hugged Trevor at the same time, Victor digging his knuckles into Trevor’s hair while the bigger, older one lightly punched him in the gut. They all had the same flowy hair, slightly darker and more gelled on the other guys.

  I stood there, shifting from foot to foot, unsure what to do with myself. The woman, Bella, migrated over to us, smoothing her apron over her plump hips. Her dark hair was tied back in a messy bun, ringlet curls escaping. She looked older than us, maybe in her late twenties. A shiny gold band circled the ring finger on her left hand. The two guys definitely looked like they were in high school and a pile of textbooks propped open next to the pizza station confirmed as much.

  All of a sudden a little boy came bounding out of the double doors in the kitchen, a look of pure glee in his face. He beelined straight for the herd.

  “Uh oh,” Victor said, and promptly hopped out of the way. The other guy scrambled fast, but Trevor crouched down and opened his arms wide.

  The little boy slammed into Trevor’s legs, wrapping himself around his entire body. “Uncle Trevor!”

  My heart stopped. Uncle?

  Trevor laughed and ruffled the boy’s head. “Told ya I wasn’t going anywhere this time.”

  The little boy looked up and spotted me. He whispered too loudly, “Is that your girlfriend? I heard girls have cooties.” He made a disgusted face that squished his freckles. His hair was styled in a similar Mohawk to the one Trevor always wore in public.

  Every head in the place, including the family eating at the booth, twisted their heads toward mine. My cheeks burst with color.

  Trevor extricated himself from the boy and came over to me, wrapping an arm around my shoulder. “This is Erin.” He made no clarification as to whether I was his girlfriend or not, but I guessed most of them already knew who I was. Bella wore a disapproving look while the two high school guys waggled their eyebrows and knocked knuckles. “And this,” Trevor said, ruffling the boy’s Mohawk and causing the kid to growl, “Is Baylor, my nephew.” He turned to Bella. “My sister.” The two boys raised their hands in anticipation of being introduced. “My brothers, Victor and Taylor.”

  “I’m sensing a theme,” I said, noticing all the boy names ended in the or sound.

  “Except me.” Bella rolled her eyes. “Always getting the shaft.”

  “Hey now,” Trevor said, flourishing his hand toward the doorway. “It says ‘and gal’ now. You’re totally included.”

  “As an afterthought.” She blew her bangs out of her face and then straightened when the group eating raised their hand to get her attention.

  Someone cleared their throat by the register and Trevor raked a hand through his hair, the tips of his ears turning pink. “And that’s my dad.”

  “It’s nice to meet you all.” I held out my hand, prepared to shake Victor and Taylor’s but instead they pulled me into a giant bear hug, reeking of cheese. I yelped and they only hugged harder until Trevor wedged between us and quite literally ripped them off me. Souvenirs of flour clung to my shirt when we broke apart.

  “Hey, hey, hey.” Trevor not-so-lightly punched Taylor in the shoulder. “She’s off limits, bros.”

  Taylor held up his flour-stained hands. “I’m not trying to date her. Just say hi.” Still though, he backed away, as did Victor.

  This was surreal. I was meeting Trevor’s family. The guy who had a Billboard number one song that was basically a fuck you to his father, like a subtweet.

  You made me real.

  You made me feel.

  You’re never there for me anymore.

  It’s just distance

  Not resistance

  I’m the one who slammed the door.

  As the lyrics played over in my mind, I realized it wasn’t a hate song but an apology. The song wasn’t about how Trevor’s dad didn’t fulfill his role as father like most people interpreted but how Trevor was a shitty son for leaving him behind. It was a piece of Trevor he ripped out of his heart and gave to the ent
ire world, and all they did was throw the gift back in his face.

  A pulse in the back of my neck ticked, fogging my brain. I made my way to Trevor’s dad, feeling like I knew so much about him just from Trevor’s lyrics. My heels clicking on the linoleum floor echoed the thump of my heart. He, too, gave me a hug in lieu of a hand shake. I buried my head in his shoulder, wanting to squeeze so much into the hug: my condolences for his wife’s death years ago but also for the way his son was dead to him by way of fame for the last few years.

  Trevor cleared his throat and I spun around to see him jiggling an apron…and hairnet.

  “I didn’t bring you here for fun. I’m putting you to work.” He tossed the uniform to me, then grabbed his own apron and hairnet and slid behind the counter. I trudged after him, my fingers shaking.

  After we washed our hands, I stood a few feet away, surveying the raw ingredients stored in metal containers lined on the counter against glass. Trevor yanked my hips until I slid right next to him, our thighs pressed together. In front of the containers was a wooden surface covered with flour and corn meal. Victor slipped beside us, pulling and shaping his pizza before sliding it into the oven behind us. A blast of sharp heat made me warm all over, or maybe that was just Trevor next to me.

  Trevor pressed me up against the counter, his torso against my back. His hands slid beneath mine, so he was practically wrapped around my body. “I’m going to teach you how to make the best pizza ever.”

  “Not that you’re biased or anything.”

  “Hey, it’s a proven fact,” Victor yelled, then jabbed his finger against a newspaper article that was cut out and framed on the wall with a headline that read, “The best pizza that ever!”

  I chuckled.

  “See?” Trevor slid the container that held a few balls of dough. “We don’t speak in hyperbole here.” He set the dough in front of me. “All right, so what you want to do is knead the dough into a circle about sixteen inches long. Watch.” Trevor lifted the dough over his hands in front of me, stretching, pulling, and yanking the ball into a flattened shape with a lumpy exterior. “You try.”