by Shelia Grace
Yuck.
Sliding my card at Mercer, I walked into the first-floor lounge, planning to drop my backpack at my room before going straight to Julie’s to cry and confess the whole fucked up situation. Seeing someone sitting across the room in one of the grungy fabric-covered chairs, I froze.
“Are you trying to fuck up my life?” I demanded.
Seeing a girl coming down the stairs, I walked across the room to where Ryan was sitting so that I didn’t have to yell at him from across the room. His blond hair was still wet from a shower, and he looked perfect. Horribly and terribly perfect. I wanted to fucking kill him for looking so perfect.
“What did he say to you?” he asked, unfazed by my fury.
“Oh, nothing. Just that the pretty blonde who was at your house the other night while you were showering happened to be your fiancée until she broke up with you. What? Did she find out you were trying to fuck freshmen in the class you’re TA’ing?”
I stopped talking and pressed my lips together. I sounded pathetic and petty. Worse. I sounded jealous. Usually I was so good at shutting down and pretending I was okay when I wasn’t. The last time I had seen my father I had done just that—pretended that it hadn’t hurt that he had never bothered to show up when he said he would.
My question was: if I could do that at age twelve, then why the fuck couldn’t I do it now?
Chapter 14
Ryan
Alex’s eyes were red-rimmed and puffy, and it was my fault. Again. I was going to kill James. All through undergrad, I had watched him cause carnage, but not like this. This time, he had crossed a line that he was never coming back from. I should have seen it coming. I had told him last night to leave it the fuck alone after he had found the picture of Alex. The problem was that Leave it the fuck alone, in his head, had translated to Game on.
Then the fucker had switched phones on me in SF.
In school, we had called him Mayhem McDevitt, because he didn’t fucking care. About anything. Like the time he had rented a Bentley with his father’s credit card in sophomore year and then left it in the Tenderloin. He was like a goddamn heat-seeking missile. To him, nothing was sacred. If he had thought I gave a rat’s ass about him sleeping with my ex, then he would have called up Gretchen and tried to fuck her. Instead, he had found the picture of Alex. From my reaction, he had known that she would be a source of amusement. It was like he could tell when something—or someone—really mattered, and, in his mind, it made the whole thing more amusing when he fucked it up.
I should have cut James loose half a decade ago. The problem was that I had never thought that it was malicious on his part. I had given him a pass all these years, because I had assumed that he just didn’t have that chip in his fucking head that told him other people might actually value things. Like relationships with other human beings. Empathy was a fucking mystery to James McDevitt.
Why was I friends with him? That was what I was asking myself as I stared at Alex. I got up from the chair and started walking toward her. When she backed up a step, I stopped. Shit. I deserved that.
“I’m sorry, Alex.”
“Sorry I found out about your fiancée? Sorry I told you I had feelings for you? Sorry you keep fucking up my life? You know what? I was fine before I met you.” She shivered. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m glad you found me in the library that night, but I’m done. And, please, in the future, keep your fucking sociopath friend away from me.”
She deflated.
“Damn. I don’t want to be an unhinged bitch. … Just leave me alone.”
Her phone rang, and I watched as she turned and dug around in her backpack.
“Hey! Happy V-day, sissy. Your card’s gonna be late. No, school’s just been crazy. Did you have any secret admirers this year? Three? Wow. No, I’m fine. Tell Mom I’ll call her back later. I love you, ’kay?”
She hung up the phone and looked at me. I tried to remember the last time I had seen her when she hadn’t been crying, which made me feel like a colossal dick.
“I want you to come with me tomorrow,” I heard myself say.
She shook her head in disbelief.
“Are you off your meds or something?”
“I deserve that.”
Looking at things from her perspective, I knew that I looked like a crazy asshole. Trying to fuck her one second, pretending to be chivalrous the next. Right now I wished I could tell her that I loved her and that I was exactly what she needed. But that would have been a lie. What I felt for her wasn’t love. It was obsession. And I was the stone-cold opposite of what she needed. Actually, no. McDevitt held that title. I cracked my knuckles thinking of my smarmy fuck of a friend swapping our phones and actually making the effort to track down Alex just to piss me off.
“Please, Alex.”
“Why?”
“Because I like you. I enjoy your company …”
I sounded like a complete ass, and I was leaving out the most important part—that I was out of my mind wanting to fuck her. Still, what I had just said was true. Spending time with Alex—despite the raging, perpetual hard-on it left me with—had made me feel more alive than I had in longer than I wanted to admit.
“You want me … to go as a friend?” she asked in bewilderment, like I had just asked her to take over TA’ing for Robertson’s lecture.
I nodded. I wanted her, so it wasn’t too far from the actual truth. At least that’s how I was rationalizing it to myself. She frowned and shook her head.
“I don’t think I can do that.”
She started chewing her lip.
“Please.”
I took a step toward her, and she didn’t back up this time. She lifted her chin.
“You want to explain first why you’ve got a picture of me that you showed to your psycho friend?”
“I pulled it off the wall at your stalker’s place.”
The color drained from her face.
“Oh, fuck.”
“He had quite a collection of pictures. I didn’t think you wanted me to leave yours there.”
“Thanks,” she muttered.
“Will you go with me tomorrow?”
“What’s your fiancée going to think?”
I ran my hand through my hair. Damn, I should have told her about Gretchen. Why hadn’t I told her?
“Alex, Gretchen and I haven’t been together for a long time.”
“That’s not what your friend made it sound like.”
I shook my head.
“You can’t listen to anything James says. He was just …”
“Being an asshole?” she laughed humorlessly.
“That is what he’s best at.”
“And you’re friends with him, why?” She shook her head. “Never mind. None of my business.”
I wished I could explain why I was friends with James, but I couldn’t even explain it to myself. The good thing was that, judging from his past behavior, Alex was the last thing on his mind. She had provided enough entertainment, and by now he was probably calling Gretchen—from my phone—to see if he could bang my ex.
James wasn’t built for endurance sports. He liked a fast thrill. And he deserved the ass-kicking I was going to dole out. Fucking asshole.
“Please, Alex.”
She quirked an eyebrow.
“Professor Bennett, just curious, but do you realize how many girls in this dorm—fuck, in this university—would jump into bed with you in a heartbeat?”
I ground my teeth together, but didn’t say anything.
“Well, I just thought you should be aware of that,” she said blandly. “Because we are not sleeping together. Got it? Now, do you still think it’s a good idea to take me as your date tomorrow?”
Fuck honesty.
“Yes.”
She shrugged.
“All right. But my roommate found the dress, so you’ll have to take it back with you. Can I change at your house tomorrow?”
I nodded, and she turned and started wal
king toward the stairs.
“Alex, I’m sorry about James.”
She looked back at me.
“Yeah, so am I. Some people spend their entire lives being dicks. Sucks for them.”
I followed Alex to her room and watched as she opened the door. Then I stayed outside and waited. She came out a few seconds later with the garment bag and the shoebox. Handing them to me, she looked down.
“What time should I get to your house tomorrow?” she asked.
I shook my head, knowing she wouldn’t show.
“I’ll pick you up at six.”
She hesitated before nodding.
“Okay.”
I could see the regret in her eyes, and I hated myself for it. Maybe I was a bigger dick than James. Not that he would feel guilty for fucking with another person’s wellbeing, but at least he didn’t have the attention span or the tenacity to cause deep wounds. When Alex closed the door, I turned and walked down the stairs, thinking about the miscreants living on the second floor of her dorm. My instinct had been to protect Alex from their testosterone-fueled bullshit, but was I any better than these assholes? As I walked out to the car, McDevitt’s phone rang. The incoming call was from my cell number, of course.
“I’m surprised you’re still in town,” I said flatly.
“Tetchy, aren’t we?” James drawled.
“If you want your phone back, I’ll be at the house in two minutes.”
Putting the phone back in my pocket, I got in the car and pushed the speed limit all the way to the house. When I pulled up, McDevitt was sitting on the front step with another six-pack of beer, like bad déjà vu from last night.
“I never should have let you in my house, you degenerate.”
Retrieving the dress and shoebox from the backseat, I walked past him to the front door and unlocked it. When I got to the couch, I set the stuff down and heard James walk in behind me.
“Pickin’ ’em kinda young these days, aren’t ya? By the way, your little freshman told me you weren’t fucking her. Were you waiting for a Yelp review?” He laughed. “You know, I could try her out and report back if that would help you make up your mind.”
My hand clenched, and I swung around, catching McDevitt on the corner of the mouth, sending him reeling backward. The can of beer went flying, and I couldn’t get myself to give one shit that I would be cleaning alcohol off my floor for a second time. It had been worth it to see the nanosecond of shock on his smug fucking face the second before my fist connected. He sat up and touched his jaw before laughing hysterically.
“Fuck, Bennett. What happened to bro’s before ho’s?”
“You’re an asshole.”
“Yeah? You never got butt-hurt about it before,” he said getting up.
“Well, I’m taking exception to it now.”
“Taking exception? Did I just fucking wake up in a Brontë novel?”
“Give me the phone and get the fuck out of my house.”
He took the phone out of his pocket and threw it to me. I threw his, aiming for his fucking head.
“Shit. Clearly old age has made you incapable of taking a fucking joke.”
“Actually, it’s made me appreciate a true asshole when I see one.”
I turned to go let my dog in.
“Well, now that I know you’re babysitting the freshman, you mind if I take Gretchen tomorrow?”
I looked back at him, and he shrugged.
“Kathleen invited me.”
My … fucking … mother. Jesus. Of course she would invite McDevitt to the event tomorrow. As far as she knew, James was a perfect gentleman, which was my fault. I should have let her open the dildo package.
“If you and Gretchen want to fuck each other over, feel free. But if you get near Alex again, I’ll break your fucking head.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow night, then,” he said cheerfully as I walked to the back.
I had to admit that one of McDevitt’s few redeeming qualities was the fact that you could punch the guy in the face and he wouldn’t take it all that personally, which was a good thing considering how often people wanted to punch him in the face.
I let my dog in and went to the safe to get my external drives. Then, sitting down at the kitchen table, I exhaled. I waited to feel the least bit of guilt that I had convinced Alex Reed to come with me tomorrow. Instead, a dark part of my soul was celebrating her surrender. Because what had started as a simple physical reaction to her was something else now. It was an obsession I didn’t have much control over.
When Jess called a few hours later to see if I wanted to come over to dinner, I smelled an intervention, so I made up a lame excuse. I wasn’t up for Brenda’s good intentions. Now, if I had been smart in the first place, I would have let her fix me up with one of her friends. Most of Brenda’s friends likely worked for the university and were of the appropriate age. In short, they were appropriate. Alex wasn’t. But looking back at my history of not doing what I wanted, I decided that right now was the perfect time to do something inappropriate.
For the next twenty-four hours, I was virtuous. I worked, I took a run, and then I took Finn to the park. Then I got up and did it again on Saturday, well aware that I would see Alex again in a matter of hours. Before picking her up, I showered and got a dozen roses. Stupid? Yes. But it had been grating on me that Alex’s first Valentine’s Day as an adult had been spent getting harassed by a pair of adolescent twenty-eight-year-olds. Given that McDevitt had the emotional intellect of a twelve-year-old, at least he had an excuse. My excuse was—what?
I drove to Mercer, preparing myself for the possibility that Alex had taken off somewhere for the night to avoid me. Parking and getting out, I looked over and saw her at the front door, already walking toward me. Her long hair was up, and she was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt. But her face was different. Beautiful, but different. Her eyes were smoky and her pale skin was even more flawless. She stopped and looked up at me.
“What?” she asked defensively. “Did Julie make me look like I’m doing a burlesque show later on?”
I laughed and shook my head before lifting the white roses like a peace offering.
Her eyes widened with shock as she took the flowers.
“Thank you.”
She looked down as I opened the car door for her, and as soon as she sat down, I closed the door and exhaled. What the fuck was I doing? But the answer was obvious: I was doing exactly what I wanted to. I walked around to the driver’s side and got in. Alex was staring at her lap. Finally, she looked up and gave me a quavering smile. Driving out of the parking lot, I felt like a fucking kidnapper making off with an innocent young girl, and the really fucked up part was that it was true.
At the house, I got out and went to open the gate at the side yard. Finn ran out, and Alex looked more thrilled to see my dog than anything else. I walked up the stairs and opened the front door, glaring at my dog when he as he sat down in front of her. Asshole dog.
“I missed you, too, you freaking crotch sniffer,” she muttered, leaning down to pet him.
When she followed me into the house, I took the flowers to put them in the vase of water. By the time I came back, Alex and my dog were still worshipping one another.
“Everything’s in the guest bedroom. I’m going to get changed. If you need anything, I’m just down the hall.”
Wishful-fucking-thinking on my part, but hey. She stood up and walked toward the guest bedroom, my dog obediently following behind her. I had worn jeans and a T-shirt to pick her up, mostly because it had felt way too douchey to show up at her dorm in a suit like one of those frat dildos.
Walking down the hall, I remembered this time to close the bedroom door behind me. Then I stopped and closed my eyes, trying not to think about Alex down the hall stripping out of her clothes. What struck me, though, was that the thought of her going with me tonight made the inevitable disapproval I was facing seem more bearable.
For one, my mother would have a hard ti
me trying to convince me to patch things up with Gretchen with Alex standing right there. And my father might keep his thoughts about my graduate school education to himself. Besides, like I had told Alex, I enjoyed her company—even if a disproportionate amount of my brain had devoted its energy to imagining her naked.
I straightened my tie and walked out of the bedroom. The guest bedroom door was still closed, so I went into the living room and thought about the first night I had brought Alex back here … the surprised whimper as my fingers had stroked over her panties. I swallowed. Fuck. I could not think straight with her around. But like she had said yesterday: no sex. My cock, however, was not cooperating with her decree. I sat down on the couch, futilely trying to turn my thoughts to the theorem I had been working on earlier in the day. It was useless.
The door to the guest bedroom swung open, and Finn trotted out, his tongue lolling out of his mouth. Asshole. Seeing Alex walk out a second later, I nearly bit off my own tongue. I made a mental note to thank my sister for the dress, which barely covered half of Alex’s creamy thighs. She began walking very carefully, like she was navigating a tightrope.
“I’m not good with heels,” she said, flushing with embarrassment. “And I don’t think I tied the back of the dress very well. Can you re-tie it so it won’t come loose?”
I stood up, and she walked slowly until she reached me. Turning, she pointed to the loose knot she had tied. But that’s not what I was paying attention to. The dress was almost entirely backless. Reaching up to secure the top, I could feel the heat of her bare skin and wanted nothing more than to slip the dress from her shoulders and carry her into the bedroom.
“You smell good,” she murmured.
I closed my eyes. So did she. Sweet, like strawberries. And she was trying to kill me. There was no other answer. My hands shaking, I tied a bow and double knotted it before lowering my arms. She turned around and smiled, holding out a black sweater.
