Lucky postures between us and I’m hoping she’s about to rip my roomie a new one for even thinking of making me climb an entire story to catch some z’s. “I’m Lucky,” she introduces herself. “And this is my roommate, Ava. I’m sorry I didn’t get your name.” Wow, Lucky actually sounds kind and accommodating herself. Little does she know this girl and her crooked spine just hijacked my sanity.
She pokes her head from beneath the bunk and sneers at the three of us. “That’s because I didn’t give it. I’m Sabine, but you’ll call me Garfield.”
The three of us exchange a brief yet highly curious glance.
“Garfield?” Ava asks for us.
“Yeah, you know, like the cat. All my friends back home used to call me that because I used to dye my hair orange.”
Lucky’s chest pumps. “You sure they were your friends?”
“Very funny.” She bites the air with her words as she scans those squinted eyes over Lucky. “I think I like you.”
“Great.” I look to Ava while suddenly basking in two rejections in a single night.
I give my two best friends a quick hug goodbye as I dig for my sweats, which I find rumpled in the corner of the bottom drawer. I may as well have to stoop to hell to reach them. I bashfully get dressed in the privacy of the corner and eye the top bunk as if my mattress were sitting on the Empire State Building. My heart begins to pound as if it’s attempting to shatter itself, and my body breaks out into a cold sweat as fight-or-flight kicks in.
“You know”—I swallow hard as I grab my Kindle off the desk—“I think I’ll go read a book in the commons room.” And accidentally on purpose fall asleep doing so.
I grab a blanket and head down to find a cozy spot by the fire, but my mind is buzzing too much to focus on any one book. Instead, that steamy kiss plays on a loop, and each time I think about Knox Toberman’s strong tongue penetrating my mouth, my entire body sparks to life in the sweetest form of electrocution.
I fall asleep and dream of that kiss all night long.
Knox Toberman is the sweetest form of revenge that I could have ever thought of.
Knox
That kiss.
It was bad enough I was losing sleep over the fact Janelle chose to pull my balls up through my throat, but after landing a wet one on Harper, my mind keeps drifting to her sweet lips, those cushioned lips that gave me the invite to the warm nexus of her mouth.
A day goes by and I dodge phone calls and text messages alike in lieu of losing myself in a day of lazying around in bed. I need it. I need to try to wrap my head around this new world I’ve been thrown into. But come Wednesday, I’m right back at Forest Orville’s realty center looking over the Capwell file. Forest gave me an empty cubicle to hang out in and review all the paperwork I needed. Plus, he gave me the access codes to the available houses in the area. It’s twenty minutes past the hour and Harper isn’t here yet. I’m half-tempted to ask Rush for her number to see if she’s okay. Hell, I know she’s not. What Janelle did was horrible, but the way Justin treated Harper was downright cruel. How dare that asshole look her in the eye and tell her she meant nothing to him. Yes, she’s cutting and a little rough around the edges, but they were together just as long as Jen and I were. There’s no way you’re with someone for that amount of time and not feel anything.
A dull laugh pumps through me. And by the end of that kiss Harper and I shared, he was definitely feeling something. You don’t give someone a Coke bath, followed up with dumping your dinner on them, just because the mood strikes. Nope, that kind of rage is fueled by emotion, deep-seated passion that at the end of the day you wish you still had access to.
The bell attached to the front door gives a little rattle and a balmy breeze floats in. I hear Happy give a cheery hello and another female voice grumble out something just this side of an insult. Then in a moment she’s standing beside me.
“Morning, sunshine.” I give a short-lived smile.
“Whatever.” She falls into the seat beside me and pulls the file over before gutting its contents and strewing the papers across the desk. “You talk to her?”
“Laney Capwell? The woman we’re helping buy a home or—”
“The she-devil that’s turned my life upside down.” She sneers at the insult a moment.
“I’ll agree with you on the she-devil part, but I’m not sure she exactly ruined your life. Your ex-boyfriend played a little hand in it.”
“Wow.” Her eyes enlarge a moment, a gorgeous shade of green just like my mother’s, and I can’t help but give a little smile even though I know I’ve got it coming. “You just defend and defend and defend, don’t you? Honestly, the girl dry-humped another guy in front of your face, and you really can’t find it in you to say one nasty thing about her.”
“I can.” I frown into the admission while racking my brain, and shockingly, I can’t think of anything disparaging I’d like to say. “But I choose not to.” Almost the truth. “That’s not the point. The point is, you need to focus on the fact that toad you were kissing was no Prince Charming. He’s a scammer. Every time I saw the guy, he was leering at someone else’s girl. He didn’t seem to care.”
“Oh? Did you follow him around campus? As I recall, you were nowhere near Whitney Briggs last year.”
“No, but I’ve been hanging out with Lawson and Rex enough to become a fixture at the Black Bear. Look, Lucky mentioned something last spring about him having wandering eyes. And when Ava said she didn’t trust him, it put my radar up. Every time he was nearby, it seemed he was trying to get the attention of some other chick and it wasn’t you.”
Her mouth opens, those pretty pink lips struggle as she grasps for words. The urge to cover her mouth with mine comes in strong and I give a few quick blinks trying to deflect it.
“You think what he said was true?” Her voice grows faint as she looks past me and straight through the wall into the mindfuck of a rabbit hole we’ve both fallen into.
“No. The guy was ravenous with jealousy last night. If anything, the opposite is true. Seeing the two of us together lit a fuse in him that is a long way from extinguishing itself.”
She nods, giving a hard sniff. “I figured it was all an act.” She blinks back tears. “I mean, we weren’t perfect, but we had moments. We said words to one another.” Her gaze begins to drift once again.
“Anytime you’re up for setting the dude on fire, I’ll lend you my lips.” I give a cheesy wink without meaning to and an awkward silence springs up between us. Crap.
“I think you’re on to something.” She gives a little shrug. “It really seemed to piss off that skankaholic that stabbed you in the heart. I couldn’t get her mice-like screams out of my head. I mean, is a voice that helium-inspired even natural?” She shakes her head in disbelief and I give a quick laugh. Janelle comes from a long line of high-pitched squeakers, her father strangely enough being the highest of them all. It’s unnerving to see a two hundred fifty pound grown man with the face of an ox come at you with the voice of a cartoon mouse.
“It was the first thing I noticed about her.” I wince into the admission. “We were at a party and I thought she was drunk. I thought no way could that voice be real. She’s putting me on. But she wasn’t—until she was.” I point a quick finger to Harper.
“Ha-ha. I see what you did there.” A smile drifts from her face before it ever fully arrives. “So, you mean what you said—about the lips?”
“Hell yes.” I bounce my knee to hers a moment. “In fact, if you want to take it a step further, we can set them up. We can cling to one another like koala bears whenever they’re around.” The thought sends my dick throbbing and I try to shut it down. It’s been about a month since it has seen any real action, and now that I know what I do, it makes me sick that it had any action at all.
“How about we do one better?” She leans in with those cutthroat eyes, skin like light brown sugar, and those lips, those hot lips that I can’t seem to look away from. “How about we declare
one another our most favorite rebound and show up those two social media whores when it comes to hogging all the attention?”
“You and I?” My dick ticks again like a bomb.
“Yes.” Her eyes grow wild. Harper’s entire body lights up with the proposal. “We’ll go all out, no holds barred. You and I lighting up Hollow Brook like the hottest new couple.” Her voice hums the words smooth as velvet. Harper leans in close until her warm breath tickles my lips, tempting me to take one more bite. “And then at the end of the summer, we’ll have a classic blowout in front of God and all of our near and dear peers—including the guests of honor of this little charade.”
“A blowout.” My perverted mind heard blowjob, but I’m pretty sure that’s one thing that she’s not about to generate in front of God and our nearest and dearest peers—but perhaps she might entertain the thought loosely if the guests of honor were nearby.
A crooked grin comes to my lips. “Judging by the mortally wounded reactions we garnered from the two of them at the bar, I think this just might be what we need to finish them off.”
Harper’s indignation pours off her like fumes. “I hope they deep fry in the hell we’re about to dish up for them.”
I reach over and take her tiny hand in mine, and instinctively my thumb rubs over her palm. “They will.”
Something tells me I will too.
Harper and I exhaust ourselves going over the MLS listings in the Hollow Brook-Jepson area. Next week, we’re to propose an entire list of homes that Ryder and Laney Capwell might be interested in based on the specs they’ve given us. But that kiss we shared is still stuck in my head as I head home, and sure enough, I forget to hit the drive-through, only to find an empty fridge waiting for me—so I do the only thing a single guy can do—meet his friends at the bar.
Rex is the first friendly face I see as I step into the Black Bear, and his girlfriend, my new stepsister, is right there with him. Rex and I have been rebuilding our relationship steadily over the last year. Back when Mom and Dad split, it felt like he took Dad’s side, and Trixie and I took our mother’s. But since Mom’s wedding, it seems like we’re crawling closer to where we used to be. Rex and Scarlett, the aforementioned new stepsister, are dating. Suffice it to say, it still feels a bit weird.
“Returning to the scene of the crime?” Scarlett laughs as if she told the funniest joke. Her dark red hair shimmers in the light, and from this angle it looks a lot like Harper’s.
“This would be it.” I grimace over at the spot where I was accosted with molten hot beans and cheese. “You didn’t happen to witness the event, did you?”
Rex gives a disgruntled grunt. “Let’s just say we’ve got friends in high places. Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Hell yeah.” I give the back of my head a quick stroke. “A shower took care of it.” I meant the lava-hot enchilada sauce, but on another note, I also made sure it took care of that hard-on Harper sponsored. It was a one-off. I’m a guy. Kissing a girl like that can only lead to one outcome in my primal mind. I’m not giving myself a hard time about it.
Rex shakes his head at me, dismayed as if he heard the ex-rated version I just spouted off. “I meant with the breakup. Trixie says it was brutal. You found Janelle kissing some dude at a mixer.”
“I’m sorry,” Scarlett mouths. “I swear, if it’s any consolation, she’s not worth your time. I know for a fact when things smooth over, you’ll have girls beating down your door.”
“Speaking of girls.” Rex cocks his head in that big brother way that used to make me cringe as a kid. When our mother went away to prison, that eleven-month stretch that felt like ten long hellish years, Rex stepped in to help parent Trixie and me. “Who the hell were you playing tonsil hockey with? My buddy, Cole, the bartender, said you were going at it hot and heavy before you were baptized with the nightly special.”
I give the bar a quick scan, and when I don’t see a sign of her, it feels like a green light. “Harper Shelton, she’s just a friend.” The pit of my stomach ropes off in a knot as if I just slung a lie my big brother’s way. “It turns out, it was her boyfriend that Jen was going at it with.” I slap the back of my neck like I’m killing a fly. “Apparently, they had been at it for months.”
“I’m sorry, dude.” Rex gives my arm a light sock. “I’m glad you’re at Briggs, though. And I’ll be damn glad to see your face on the field. You know I’m your biggest fan.”
“I’m right there with him,” Scarlett offers while holding onto his arm. “I can’t wait to see you on the field in September.” She wrinkles her nose a moment. “It’s going to be a long, hot summer, though. Do yourself a favor and stay away from that poor Harper girl. The last thing you want to get involved with is a quick summer fling. You’re vulnerable. You’ve both just been through something that has thrown your worlds off their axis. I can see how it would be easy to fall into something with her. But I think it’s for the best you cool your jets for a while.”
“She’s right.” Rex gives my shoulder a quick squeeze. “Take the summer to focus on football, on yourself.” He nods into the establishment. “Come on. We’ll buy you dinner. We’re meeting up with Trix.”
I glance past him to find my sister waving spastically.
Rex nods to someone at the bar. “Why don’t you head over to Trix while Scarlett and I say a quick hello to Cade and Piper?”
The three of us break way, and no sooner do I get to Trixie’s table than she latches onto me as if it’s my last night on the planet.
“My poor big bro,” Trix groans into my armpit.
“Easy, girl. I got kicked out of here not long ago for holding a girl like that.”
“You’re sick.” Trix pulls me into the seat next to hers. “What the hell was that display of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation everyone is talking about? Rumor has it, you made out with the girl whose boyfriend snagged Jen. What’s the deal?”
“The deal is—” I glance to Rex and Scarlett who have taken a temporary seat at the bar with their friends. I gave them the sanitized version, something a little lower than the truth, but with Trix I can feel that entire conversation I had with Harper this afternoon ready to vomit up, and so I do just that. I tell her all about the so-called arrangement we’ve bound ourselves to for the summer, about the big dramatic breakup for all to see just before the semester gets going.
“Oh, shit.” Her chin slides down her arm as she nearly crashes her head onto the table. Trix has always had a flair for the dramatic. “So, you think you’re going to accost this girl whenever your psycho exes are around in hopes to turn them into a dynamite factory? You’re not thinking straight. The Knox I know is levelheaded, calm, and not at all interested in something as petty as revenge.” She leans in and inspects me with those eyes that are a mirror to mine. “Wait a minute. You said this girl was a good kisser—a detail I found disgusting a moment ago now offers a clue into why you’re so quick to stick your tongue down this girl’s throat.”
“You’re the disgusting one.” I pull up my menu and she slaps it down with her hand. “What do you want me to say, Trix? That I’m losing my mind for some girl I’ve essentially just met? Because I’m not.” My stomach boils in its own acids. “We happen to be in the same boat, no thanks to our exes, and she’s nice. It pisses me off that she’s hurting just as much as I am.”
Her face contorts into something short of disbelief. “So, you’re just friends?”
“I swear to you she’s been friend-zoned. Nothing serious is going to happen between the two of us. I won’t let it.” My dick ticks to life as if protesting the idea. It’s just responding to the id. Rex taught me all about the id back when he was taking a psychology class. The id does whatever it can to get what it wants, but not in this case. My apologies to my dick because it’s not getting anywhere near Harper Shelton.
Trixie leans in with that all-knowing, smug-as-hell smile growing on her face.
“What?” I give an annoyed glance to the band who just walked on stag
e to the cheering delight of just about every coed in here.
“I’m just memorizing the moment my brother had the nerve to lie to my face.”
“Crap.” A dull laugh pumps from me. “Didn’t happen.”
“Aww!” Trixie marvels at me a moment. “Then I just witnessed the time my brother had the nerve to lie to himself.” She takes the menu and knocks me over the head with it. “You like this girl. You’ll see I’m right. I always am.”
Rex and Scarlett take their seats at the table and the waitress comes over to take our orders, but I’ve suddenly lost my appetite.
I can count on one hand how many times Trixie’s womanly intuition has been wrong and still have five fingers left over.
I suppose there’s always a first time.
Harper walks into the bar and my center of gravity pulls in her direction. It takes everything I’ve got to remain seated in my chair. She spots me and our eyes lock, sending a heated spark from her to me, and the crowd between us disappears for a moment. She gives a little wave and heads to the corner where Ava and Lucky wait for her.
Trixie leans in and knocks her leg hard into mine as if she were looking to break a bone.
“Still think I’m wrong?”
I don’t answer. I do the only thing I can do—change the subject. We talk all night about everything under the sun except for anything remotely to do with my life.
But all the while I see Harper, feel the weight of that kiss we shared. And on occasion, I steal a few glances to the corner of the bar.
Trixie’s not right.
She can’t be.
Breaking into Fort Knox
Harper
After two nights of dodging my bunk, otherwise known as the skyscraper from hell, I try my damnedest to take a shower, only to find each and every bathroom locked and stocked with a line full of girls outside. What the hell? Is this really going to be my life for the next few years? And what about my morning run? I haven’t partaken since I moved in, only because I live in fear of walking around all day smelling like an onion. I’m starting to think maybe life wasn’t so bad back at Cutler Tower with my crappy roommate who thought her feet were as tasty as a bag of chips. I mean, really? At least then I had the freedom to fill my bladder without the fear of never being able to empty it. We had bathrooms in our own dorms for Pete’s sake!