Flash (Penmore #2)

by Malorie Verdant

  “Dude, thanks,” I reply as I slap his shoulder, grab the beer and work my way as fast as I can toward Andy, the team’s hotshot linebacker.

  “Hey, man, about time you finally showed up,” Andy says, fixing his long blond hair into a small bun and sipping on his beer. Ever since he saw Clay Matthews III play for the Green Bay Packers when he was thirteen, he has slowly been transforming himself into his idol’s twin.

  I found it hilarious at first, but that shit is starting to get uncanny.

  “You just missed this hot brunette. She had an awesome rack, which she kept jiggling, and I swear she was totally about to show me all of her goodies,” he continues, gesturing toward the stairs.

  I briefly shut my eyes before I turn to look at my best friend and roommate, replying with, “Please tell me you learned this from actually going up and talking to her? Please tell me you were not just standing here winking at her.”

  “Fuck, dude, don’t diss the wink. The wink works,” Andy claims as he high-fives our other team members walking over to join us. He’s my best friend, so I try not to cringe. “D, when you wink, it looks like you’ve got a disorder. I know Jase and Leyton made you that bet, but you won’t get any pussy this season if you keep trying to score with a wink,” I say as I scan the crowd for the hot brunette Andy mentioned. Usually I go for blondes, but tonight I’ve decided I’m not going to waste any time.

  After training so hard all week, I thought I definitely deserved some good head in the restroom as soon as possible and maybe, if she was willing, a quick tour of my Jeep Wrangler’s backseat. Not that I have ever met a girl here who hasn’t been willing to undress in the star quarterback’s backseat. It’s a hard burden to bear but I figure if that’s how the cookie crumbles, I might as well eat all that shit up.

  At least while I can.

  D waves me off and says, “You wait, man. My dream girl is going to love the wink.”

  Just then, one of the cheerleaders—Tiffany, or maybe it’s Kylie, not that I really care—struts past us, swaying her hips. Clearly, she wants to draw our attention to her ass. An ass covered in a short silver skirt that is so tight I already know panties won’t be a barrier this evening.

  She was also one of the cheerleaders who had been trying to catch my eye after I had an evening with one of her friends last year. Her friend must have shared all about our time in my backseat, because as I reach out and touch her lower back, her eyes turn toward me knowingly and her grin widens.

  “Babe, you got plans tonight?” I ask, sliding my hand slowly down her lower back and over her ass. The tips of my fingers lightly stroke the skin of her back thigh, where her skirt material ends.

  “Depends if you’re going to play hard to get tonight,” she replies huskily. She probably thinks that lowering her voice below what is clearly her natural pitch is sexy or something.

  I pass my untouched beer to Andy, nod to the other boys and lead her to the upstairs restroom. I’m hopeful that the faster I fill her mouth, the faster she’ll stop talking like a man. Before I have time to lock the door behind us, she is on her knees before me. Trying to work each button of my jeans with her teeth.

  And, no fucking way, she is growling like an animal.

  With the show she’s trying to put on, I’m struggling not to laugh as I carefully reach down and pop the final buttons; ensuring she doesn’t break a tooth and ruin my evening plans with a trip to the emergency room.

  As she frees me from my jeans and boxers, I can already feel myself swelling in her dainty hands. Shit. I really have been stressed if I’m getting worked up so fast over this fangirl.

  And I definitely need to figure out her name before I take her to the Wrangler. She’ll probably expect me to moan it as she works me.

  Not going to happen. I never lose control with a fan.

  Before I have a chance to appreciate the angle I have of her cosmetically enhanced breasts, she takes me into her mouth. Fast. She starts sucking at the tip of my cock, while massaging my tights balls in her hand. Thankfully, all animal noises have stopped.

  The pleasure builds quickly until I am intensely focused on every stroke of her tongue and the slurping noises she makes as she works her way up and down my throbbing shaft.

  I’m so focused on her movements and the sounds of her sucking that I miss it.

  I miss the creak of someone opening the bathroom door.

  I don’t hear the soft gasp of surprise mixed with hurt.

  It doesn’t register even for a second the click the door makes when it shuts with the lock twisted in place.

  PARKER

  Next time I go to a party, I’ll have to remember to bring my own keys for our dorm. Halfway home and I have to turn back to the frat house. Why? Because Keeley insisted that we would come back together. Therefore, we only needed one set of keys, which she put in her leopard print-covered jeans.

  I love that girl.

  All through school, it had always just been Millie and me. But over the past week, Keeley had slowly worked her way into my heart. The first day I moved in, I was in awe of her shining blonde hair that hangs like a waterfall down her back, plus her unique style that seems to always involve something with sequins.

  My awe quickly transformed into idolization after she spent her entire afternoon helping me unpack while dancing around singing to the latest Calvin Harris release. She is wild and fun. Everything I wish I could be.

  She also happens to be tone deaf and doesn’t care in the least that she subjects her friends to her ear-splitting cries. So she makes me laugh all the time. Unfortunately for me, she isn’t running around trying to get people to set up a karaoke booth like she had been when she first arrived at the party.

  Instead, she’s in the throes of passion with the bassist.

  As I walked the last mile back to the rows of houses all fraternities at Penmore are located on, I came to accept the fact that I was going to be subjected to couple after couple mid-grope or more. I was hoping that the first room I opened would be bright enough that I could spot her jeans lying on the floor and quickly make a getaway without either party noticing my appearance, but I knew that would be too good to be true.

  As I step through the wide archway of the frat house, I take a quick glance around. Nothing seems to have changed in the fifteen minutes since my departure. Terrible music is still blaring and the floor is still littered with dirty red cups.

  I notice the muscled blond hasn’t moved from his spot in the lounge room. The only difference is that now, most of what looks like the football team is surrounding him as he tries to catch the attention of a shy blonde girl in the corner. Her reaction to him winking at her makes me break out into a full-blown smile. I’m sure her facial expression mirrors my own from earlier this evening.

  I quickly move up the stairs toward the main bedrooms and restrooms.

  Just as I had predicted, after opening the first door I am immediately apologizing to a couple who gasp and cover their naked bodies with pillows when the light shines through.

  As I approach the second door, I’ve already decided to take it slower, less attention-grabbing.

  I have never thought of myself as a ninja when hiding my presence from Grayson over the years in school halls and during small-town events. Actually, I often worried I had turned into a full-blown crazy person who would inspire a Criminal Minds episode. But as I carefully turn the handle of the next door, I try really hard to summon any latent stealth abilities I may have been ignoring.

  I was going to be just like that funny ninja meme of a guy drinking someone else’s drink because the drink owner was distracted, kissing some girl.

  Yep, that could totally be me. Super stealthy.

  The sounds of a girl giving it her all aren’t hard to miss as I carefully poke my head into what must be a restroom. The shining white tiles combined with the horrible florescent lighting make me squint for a second, before taking the people in fully.

  I feel like I should be grateful
that it wasn’t Keeley.

  I don’t know if you can still be close friends with someone, or at least friends without blushing, if you know what they look like as they work a cock. The ridiculous porn star noises they make in an effort to be sexy aren’t just embarrassing for the person making them.

  There should probably even be a name for it. Friendships ruined from seeing a friend slurping at a cock. Cocking up a friendship? Friend-sucking?

  I’m pretty sure I would have been able to come up with the perfect name for ‘friend-sucking’, had I not noticed the hair or the football jersey.

  As soon as I saw the loose dark strands, I looked down. Seeing the number 27 had me sucking in a breath and trying not to cry all at once. After a second, I start to get a little annoyed.

  Is he ever going to ensure no one can observe his activities?

  I let my annoyance and anger wash over the hurt as I flip the lock of the bathroom door and shut it behind me.

  Fuck this.

  I’m going back to the dorm. I’ll sit out on the front steps until Keeley gets back or another girl with keys can let me in. Thankfully, it’s not a cold night and I’ll be busy.

  Busy thinking about what a fool I am.

  Over the past year, I’ve been looking forward to seeing him. I kept picturing the tilt of his lips when he tries not to laugh. The flash of anger that burns in his eyes when he jumps up to defend someone.

  And like my seven-year-old self, I started to believe that maybe I could try to introduce myself. It’s almost too embarrassing to admit that I even began to practice in the mirror again. And how does my seeing Grayson go? I figure it’s safe to say worse than the first time. I have to face the harsh reality of seeing him with some random girl.

  Sure, I’m not stupid. I know he wasn’t pining after me during his first year at college. Especially seeing as he didn’t even know who I was, what with my never-ending game of hide-without-the-seek. And I’m sure all the college football players probably have their pick of sorority girls and use that to their advantage. But even as I storm out the door of the fraternity, I can’t help but wish things were different.

  As I stomp down the path leading back to my dorm, I replay how he looked as she wrapped her mouth around him.

  Thick.

  Gorgeous.

  Mouth-watering.

  Which, while I’m hosting this pity-party inside my mind, also leads to me to think about my pitiful sexual experience.

  I have only ever had one boyfriend, and there was nothing exciting about what Temporary Troy was sporting beneath his boxers.

  Millie decided to name him Temporary Troy once he dumped me three months after we decided to date, which just so happened to be the night after my first time.

  We met at the state science fair and I thought he was just like me; he was quiet, insecure and not very attractive.

  I just didn’t know he was a sleaze-bag.

  He was packing limited material, didn’t care for foreplay and he still made it sound like our breakup and any sexual failures were entirely my fault.

  And currently, my entire sexual knowledge is made up of those firsthand encounters with that fuckhead or secondhand observations of Grayson Waters through a glass window.

  But seeing Grayson for the first time in a year, I’m reminded that I only get to observe the stars and my daydreams will never be realities. I need to get out of fantasyland and get used to the Temporary Troys of the world.

  I wasn’t ever going to be the sexy girl Grayson kept around.

  I wasn’t ever going to be confident enough to get on my knees in a crowded house.

  I definitely wasn’t ever going to be wrapping my mouth around anything that magnificent while growling like an animal. Not that I really wanted to pretend to be a lion. Or was it a bear?

  Either way, I needed to be realistic.

  I was going to be stuck with ordinary.

  Which I think meant it was about time that I stopped observing Grayson Waters and started to embrace my life.

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  THIS IS AS CLOSE TO an Oscar acceptance speech as I will ever get and there is no music forcing me to stop typing, so here it is, the long list of people who continue to help my dreams come true.

  First and foremost: My family. If they weren’t supportive and encouraging, there is no way I would be confident enough to leave my never-ending day job and think it would be a great idea to spend my entire evening writing.

  Chantal Fernando, your work ethic, your enthusiasm for romance writing, your encouragement, our sprinting sessions and your words of wisdom are things I’m constantly grateful for.

  Stephanie Knowles, you’re so busy, states away, and yet you make time to help me. I will never regret taking my clothes off in front of a complete stranger at a romance convention ever again.

  Lauren Bille, countless drafts, countless condoms and countless Facebook messages. Thank you so much for being with me from the beginning of this story.

  Teneale Zamarini, thank you for not stabbing me every time I told you to “Don’t keep reading that version, I’ve got a new one.”

  Claire Hielscher, I’ve always tried to make my family proud of me, not once thinking about how it would feel if my friends were proud of me. Thank you so much for giving me that experience and for supporting me through every step of my writing journey.

  Maxime Saltmarsh, I can only hope to be as helpful to you as you have been to me. I absolutely adore you.

  Amy, Lorna, Christine and Leeann, thank you for giving up some of your holiday time to help me and my characters.

  Rose Tawil your belief in me has humbled and awed me on so many occasions.

  Regina Wamba, thank you for my wonderful cover and Yuli! Thank you for putting up with all of my emails.

  The team at Hot Tree Editing! It was exciting the first time you helped me, but going into this process knowing how reliable, helpful and enthusiastic you all are to all your authors was a pure blessing.

  The amazing girls at Give Me Books Promotions! Thank you for everything you have done to promote Flash!

  And Jake, I might have written this book a year earlier if it weren’t for you, but my understanding of a man with a plan who would bend over backward for others would not have been nearly as accurate.

  Xoxox