Kissing Princeton Charming (The Princeton Charming Series Book 1)
Page 13
She runs her hands over my tight balls, and I groan. “I guess sex isn’t the worst way to get over our first fight.”
She smirks as she lifts her ass, sinking against my already hard cock. “You think that was our first fight?” she laughs.
I chuckle, my hands on her hips. “Oh right, you started this off by throwing champagne in my face.”
She swivels her hips, her perfect tits bouncing as she does, making me feel like the luckiest man at Princeton. “I’d do it all again,” she murmurs. “That was totally worth this.”
I kiss her once more before rolling out of bed. “I have a class this afternoon. After I shower, we can have a quick lunch, then I’ll drop you back off at campus.”
“Oh God.” She sits up and throws back the sheets, her eyes wide with panic as she searches frantically for her clothes. “No, no, no. This can’t be happening.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I have a test.” She reaches for her phone and lets out a small whimper when she looks at the time. “I missed it.”
“It’s okay, I’m sure you’ll be able to get the prof to give you a make-up.”
She shoves her legs into her jeans and haphazardly throws on her shirt. “I can’t believe I forgot. I’ve never...” She’s half under my bed looking for something.
I find her second shoe. “Is this what you’re looking for?”
Standing, she takes it from my hand and starts to dart out of the bedroom.
“I have to go. If I can catch Professor Jenkins before she leaves, maybe she’ll let me—”
“Charlie, wait. Let me get dressed and I’ll drive you.”
“No. I’ll just...” There are those damn tears again.
“I get that you’re upset, but it’s just one test.”
“It’s not just a test, Spencer. It’s my life. A life that you’ve railroaded since the moment I saw you.”
“Charlie—”
“No. I have to go.”
“Call me after?” I ask, not caring that there is a hint of desperation in my voice. “We can get dinner and drinks, do something cool—”
She cuts me off. “See, that’s the problem, Spence. It’s all cocktails and fun for you. But that isn’t the real world. And that’s why when you take out the attraction we have for one another there isn’t anything left.”
“You’re wrong, Charlie,” I say, my chest tight. “We’re so much more than sex.”
“Maybe, but right now Spencer, I can’t afford to find out if you’re right.”
22
Charlie
I spend my last twenty on a taxi back to campus, but when I get to the lecture hall, Professor Jenkins is gone. She’s also not in her office. So not knowing what else to do, I head back to my dorm.
Thankfully, Daphne isn’t there.
But another note is tucked under the door when I walk in, my name scribbled across the front.
My throat constricts when I read the words inside.
Glass slippers aren’t the only thing that break, Cinderella. Next time remember your place or your fall will be a lot worse.
Anger overrides any fear I should probably feel and I crumple the paper into a ball and toss it in the wastebasket beside my desk. But after a day like today, this stalker-thing isn’t even on my radar.
Whoever it is obviously doesn’t want me anywhere near Spencer. Which narrows it down to about...well, the entire campus.
I flop onto my bed and pull the comforter over my shoulders. It’s not the time to fall apart. I should be writing an email to the professor and finishing my essay that’s due next week - anything but thinking about Princeton Charming.
But that’s exactly where my head goes.
We’re so much more than sex. Spencer’s words echo in my head.
I actually believe he thinks he’s giving me his all - and maybe he is. Maybe he does feel more for me than just the chemistry between us. But I don’t know if it’s enough.
Honestly, I’m starting to think that I’m not strong enough to deal with the assholes in his life. The drama. The feeling like I don’t measure up. But then Spencer looks at me, touches me, and I come completely undone. It’s unnatural, the power he has over my heart and body.
I’ve never felt this confused before. My head feels like I’ve been on one of those roundabouts I used to play on at the park when I was a kid. When you’re on it, spinning, spinning, spinning, your heart races, and there’s excitement and a little bit of fear. But when you get off, the world gets all jumbled, and you feel like you’re going to be sick - that’s what happens when I’m away from Spencer. And I know I have two options, to get back on the roundabout, or to walk away and wait for the world to finally make sense again.
Walk away, Charlie, my head demands.
Get back on, my heart and body plead.
I groan, digging my palms into my eyes. I wish I was home, with one of Dad’s steaming cups of cocoa and Mom to snuggle against and tell her all my worries. I want to tell her everything, but if I call I’m going to have to finally stop putting off the inevitable and tell them that I can’t come home for Christmas.
“Hey, there you are,” Daphne says as she walks into the room. “I was getting worried about you. Tatum said you never showed for your test. And then I heard about the scene with Prescott and Spencer. Are you all right?”
Sitting up, I lean against my headboard, I wrap my arms around my chest. “No. Not even a little.”
She sits down on the edge of my bed. “Want to talk about it?”
“I’m just so confused.”
“What you need is a girl’s night out. My treat.”
“That’s the last thing I need right now.”
“You can’t let a boy bring you down like this. Best medicine for a broken heart is to get pissed drunk with your best friend.” She grins at me. “And get right back on the saddle. I’ve got the perfect guy for you—”
“Spencer and I aren’t really broken up.”
“You’re kidding, right?” She looks absolutely mortified. “But he cheated on you. Where’s your pride?”
“He didn’t—”
My phone starts to ring, and I dig through my backpack until I find it. I frown when I see my dad’s cell number, but talking to him is less daunting than facing the angry stare down from Daphne.
“Hey, Dad.”
“Hey, peanut.” His voice is strained, and he sounds like he hasn’t slept in awhile.
“Is everything all right?”
Silence.
“Dad?” Nerves scatter across my flesh causing goosebumps to rise on my arms. “What’s wrong?”
“I didn’t want you to worry, sweetheart, but your mom isn’t doing well. She’s back in the hospital. She has pneumonia—”
“Oh no.”
“Baby girl, I think you need to come home.”
Grief. Fear. They strangle me, because I know the only way he’d ever ask me to come home is if...I can’t think about it.
“Okay. I’ll...” I don’t have enough for a plane ticket, and even a one-way bus ticket will be hard to pay for. But I have to find a way. “I’ll be home as soon as I can. I love you, Daddy.”
“Love you too, Charlie bear,” he chokes on the words before he ends the call.
“I have to go home...” I push myself off my bed and grab my suitcase from under my bed, then start shoving my clothes into it.
“What happened?” Daphne is beside me.
“My mom—” I bite my bottom lip hard, trying to stop the tears that burn my eyes. I can’t lose her.
“Is it her MS again?”
I manage to nod, not even looking at what I’m doing. Everything I own can fit in that one bag, and in a way I’m grateful. Because I don’t know when or if I’ll be back.
“Oh, sweetheart.” She hugs me and I let her, even though I want to keep moving. I’ll walk home if I have to. “I’m sorry.”
“I...just need...” I cover my face with my hands. “I don’t know
how I’m going to pay for a damn ticket. I lost my job, and I just used my last twenty to pay for a taxi...” God, I wish I could go back to the night I tossed champagne in Spencer’s face and change things.
“How much do you need?”
“I’m not taking your money, Daph. I don’t know when I’ll be able to pay you back.”
She shrugs and moves to her bed, pulling out a fistful of bills from her wallet. “I still haven’t bought your Christmas gift yet. So consider this your present.” She places the bills in my hand.
“It’s too much.” And yet it’s just enough to get me on a red-eye to Detroit.
“I may not be Spencer Beckett rich, but I can afford to help you out.”
I know I shouldn’t take it. There are always strings attached with Daphne. But honestly, I don’t know what else to do.
“Thank you. I promise I’ll pay you back.”
“I know you will,” she says, her smile a little too big.
But my suspicion radar is off the charts after today.
All I know for certain is I have to get home.
I start to text Spencer but stop myself. I can’t deal with him right now, and I know if I call him, he’ll be here in a heartbeat, throwing his money around and trying to fix things. And as much as I want his arms around me, his strength, his words that everything will be alright, I know that it won’t be.
In my world, people get sick, jobs are lost, and moms die.
I’m not Cinderella.
And Spencer isn’t my prince.
Kissing Princeton Charming was fun while it lasted.
But it’s finally time I wake up and remember that this isn’t a damn fairy tale.
23
Spencer
“Charlie, call me back,” I say to her voice message for the third time since she left my place yesterday afternoon. “I’m getting worried.”
I waited outside her Poli-Sci class, but she never came out. She’s usually with Tatum afterward, but he’s got a redhead hanging off his arms as he walks out of the building.
He frowns when he sees me. “What do you want?”
“I’m trying to find Charlie. Have you talked to her?”
“Wouldn't tell you if I had. You hurt her. Lucky I don’t give you a beat down.”
The redhead gasps, looking between us. But even as she feigns shock, I see her gaze run down my body appreciatively.
I hold back the eye roll that I want to unleash on both of them.
“Charlie and I are good.”
“If that was the case you wouldn’t be here asking me where she is.”
He has a point. But even though I knew she was upset when she left my place, I thought we had made strides to make things work.
I walk toward Charlie’s dorm, calling her again, and cursing when it goes straight to voicemail.
“I don’t know why you’re ignoring me...” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Okay, I get why you are. But don’t ignore me, Charlie. We can work through this. I...”
I need her. It’s pathetic, but it’s the truth. And yet as I walk down the hall of her dorm toward her room, there’s a pressure on the back of my skull. Maybe it’s a premonition, a knowing. Whatever it is, I hesitate before knocking.
When the door opens, I have a second of hope, before I see it’s Daphne and not Charlie on the other side.
“What do you want?”
I’m getting a little sick of people asking me that. Treating me like I’m the fucking devil himself.
“I need to speak to Charlie.”
“She’s not here.” The blonde crosses her arms and glares daggers at me.
“Do you know when she’ll be back?”
“No.”
More silence, more daggers.
“Look, I know you’re trying to protect her, but I’m worried. She wasn’t in class today, and Charlie doesn’t skip—”
“She’s gone, Spencer.”
“Gone?” My heart sinks. “Gone where?”
She hesitates before sighing and answering, “Home.”
“Why?”
“Does it matter? You need to leave her alone. She’s gone. If she wanted to talk to you, she would have called. That she didn’t, proves she doesn’t want anything to do with you.”
“Please, Daphne, call her and tell her I need to talk.”
Daphne purses her lips. “No way, I’m not letting you stress her out at a time like this.”
I’m so pissed I could punch a wall. Turning, I head for the stairwell. There is no getting through to Daphne.
As I walk toward the landing, I am so consumed with Charlie that I bump into someone. “Shit, I’m sorry,” I say as I knock a bucket of cleaning supplies from the woman’s hand and onto the floor.
“Oh it’s fine,” she says, reaching for the bucket the same time I do. We knock heads.
“Fuck, sorry.” I hand it to her, feeling like I’m on the verge of fucking tears.
“Hey, are you Spencer Beckett?” she asks.
I nod, running a hand over my neck. “Yeah, sorry again.” I start to walk away, but she calls me back.
“You were dating Charlotte, right?”
Were.
No. Are. At least if I have a say in it.
“Yeah.” I turn to her. “You’re friends?”
“Yeah, I’m Jill,” she says, sticking out her hand.
I register the name and remember Charlie telling me it was Jill she traded work shifts with sometimes.
“Have you heard from her today?” I ask.
I almost tell her that she won’t call me back, but I bite my tongue, hoping she’ll unknowingly give me information. Unethical maybe, but what would anyone expect from Spencer Fucking Beckett? I work people, isn’t that how I got this bullshit nickname in the first place?
Jill gives my arm a sympathetic squeeze. “It’s awful, isn't it? To have her mom back in the hospital at Christmas? And today she texted saying she wasn’t coming back next semester. It makes me hate the one percent.” She grimaces after that last line, then gives me an awkward smile. “No offense.”
I raise my hands. “None taken.”
Jill exhales. “But a girl like Charlie shouldn’t have to drop out to help pay her mom’s medical expenses.”
“No,” I say. “She shouldn’t.” My mind is swirling with ideas. I’ve got to get Charlie back here. She shouldn’t carry all this on her own.
But she would say that is exactly what privileged Ivy League royalty would say.
Jill gives me a half-smile. “Well, try and have a good Christmas. Once the campus clears out tomorrow, I’ll be on cleaning duty.” She lifts her buckets and gives me a small wave goodbye.
Jill is going to be cleaning the dorms all winter break. Charlie is going to be keeping vigil at the hospital. And me? My family celebrates Christmas with a decadent brunch with their closest fifty friends and then rings in the New Year in a Manhattan penthouse.
Except maybe not this year.
This year I am finding Charlie Hayes.
Kissing her wasn’t enough. I need to date her, to prove to her I am more than Princeton Charming.
I am her happily-ever-after.
She just doesn’t know it yet.
Princeton Charming Series
Kissing Princeton Charming
Dating Princeton Charming
Losing Princeton Charming
Forever Princeton Charming
C.M. Seabrook
Amazon bestselling author C.M. Seabrook writes hot, steamy romances with possessive bad boys, and the passionate, fiery women who love them. Swoonworthy romances from the heart!
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Frankie Love
Frankie Love writes sexy stories about bad boys and mountain men. As a thirty-something mom who is ridiculously in love with her own bearded hottie, she believes in love-at-first-sight and happily-ever-afters. She also believes in the power of a quickie.
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