It wasn’t until after the pizza showed up, and another hour into studying that I needed a break. I headed to my place for the bathroom and when I was coming back, one of the girls was waiting for me in the kitchen.
“Hey.”
She was the one I invited to the Alpha Mu house.
“Hey.” I paused, waiting to see where this was going.
“I couldn’t go to the party because–well, it doesn’t matter, but my friends went. They gave your name at the door and said you never vouched for them.”
I was trying to remember. “Right. Yeah.” I relayed what the door guy had told me.
“So why didn’t you vouch for them?”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “You serious? You wanted me to babysit them when I didn’t know them?”
“You could’ve just vouched for them, and not have to babysit them. They’re not children.”
Okay. Yeah. Because that’s how it worked.
“Uh huh.” I made to move around her.
Further discussion was pointless. She didn’t want to put herself into my shoes. I relayed everything to her, and hoped she’d be like, “Oh yeah, you were going to leave and my two friends that you don’t know just showed up. Makes total sense that you wouldn’t claim them considering their new rules.” She didn’t do that, and there was no “aha” moment with her. She had a bone to pick with me. And I literally told Skylar hours earlier that I’d try better with confrontations. Though, this girl didn’t seem like the type to pick, pick, pick, target, bully, and so on. She seemed just mad that she hadn’t gotten into the Alpha Mu party, or in this case, that her friends hadn’t gotten in.
I frowned. “Why do you want to go to one of their parties so much?”
“What?”
I repeated my question.
She moved back a step, still frowning.
“Is it some weird fixation with a fraternity? Because if so, there’s better frats to party with, safer frats. Some are amazing and great. This one–”
“This one has connections the others don’t. They have senators as alumni. Fortune 500 CEOs. Professional athletes.”
I could list three other fraternities on campus with better reputations, and which had the same resume, but she seemed dug in on the Alpha Mu fraternity.
“Is there a particular guy you want to bone or something?”
She blinked at me. “What?”
“Your other reason doesn’t make sense. So, is there a particular guy you want?”
She continued to stare at me, a look of panic flaring for a brief moment. “No.”
Liar. She was so lying.
“Who is it?”
“It’s no–”
“Just tell me and maybe I can introduce you–”
She rushed out, “Leander Carrington.”
Now I was taken aback. “The door guy?”
“What?”
“The door guy. He’s Flynn Carrington’s brother? That guy?”
Her mouth pressed closed, and she lifted a shoulder before saying tightly, “I don’t know if he was the door guy, but he’s a freshman. And Flynn is his older brother.”
“Why do you want to be set up with him?”
Her mouth went flat once again.
“I’m not reaching out until you tell me.”
She sighed. “You know at orientation, they put us in clubs?”
No. I never went. “Sure. Yeah.”
“Well, he was in the club that I was in charge of and…” Her cheeks got red. She lowered her head.
She was being shy. The guy she wanted to meet was the guy her friends had met. But it was fine. He seemed like a nice enough guy. “I can introduce you.”
Her head whipped up. “You serious?” Her chest rose, and held… It was still holding.
I frowned, willing her chest to move. “What’s your name?”
“Susan.”
“What time do you do breakfast on Tuesdays?”
“Breakfast?”
“You want to meet him or not?”
“I can meet you at nine.”
“Done. Campus coffee shop. Get there early and grab a table.”
“Are you serious?”
It was an easy enough thing to do. “Sure. Yeah.”
“Oh!” She began waving her hands in the air. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. My advice, move on to a different guy at a better frat.”
Her hands stopped moving, but she held them stationary in the air. “Why do you hang out with them?”
“I’m currently asking myself the same question.”
I started to go around her but paused when my phone buzzed in my pocket.
She moved around me, hurrying back to the room.
My phone had either been on silent earlier, or I hadn’t had cell service for the last hour. Either way, I was just now seeing an unknown number had called me thirty times.
That wasn’t right.
The phone had been by me the whole time. Thirty times was possible, but all without me getting one notification?
I knew I was going to regret it. It was a hunch, but I hit call back.
It rang, and rang, and rang. I let it go, expecting a voice message recording to start but it never did. Then, after the sixteenth ring, it was picked up.
Loud music and voices were heard first before a girl asked, sounding harassed, “Yeah?”
“Who is this?”
“Who is this?”
“You called me.”
“No, bitch. You called me. I was strolling by, and the phone wouldn’t shut up, so what do you want?”
It was Vegas. I hadn’t put the area code together till just now.
Vegas.
I knew what Vegas meant.
That bark was back in my throat, and I swallowed over it, needing to speak. “This is on a payphone?”
“Yeah. Listen, your gripe isn’t with me. I gotta go.”
“No, wait.”
“What?”
“Did you see anyone on the phone before you walked past?”
She was quiet. My heart started to thump. Hard.
“There was a woman on it.”
“What’d she look like?” Why was I asking? That was the better question. It was my mom. That was certain, and again, why was I asking?
I expected the same irritated response, but instead, the woman’s voice grew louder, and also closer to the phone. “I don’t think you want me to answer that. You missed the call. Maybe better to leave it alone?”
God. It was my mother.
I whispered, bending over, “What’d she look like?”
“Not good, honey. She was banged up. Someone worked her over.”
That made me reel because there was no way. But… there was. Was it her?
“Are you serious?”
“Listen, I don’t know what’s going on here but my advice? Let it go. She’s gone. Be like looking for a needle in a haystack.”
My mom called and as long as she was standing upright, I let it go. Always. It was my rule with her, but to hear what a stranger was saying? If that’d been her? She got jumped or roughed up by someone?
What should I do? Go there? Look for her?
Call my dad and tell him so he would worry about her too?
I didn’t know.
Do nothing and feel this information burn a hole in my gut. That was door number three, and door number three is what I would do, but it would hurt. It’d hurt so much.
She was my mom, end of the day.
“Thank you.”
“Listen, if she shows up again and I talk to her, I’ll give you a call. What’s your number?”
I gave it to her, along with a name, and she ended the call with a soft, “You sound young. Seems late for you to be up worrying about this lady. My advice, head to bed. I’m sure the lady is fine. She seemed like a survivor when I saw her.”
I thanked her again, and when the call was done, I saw that Cruz had texted.
Cruz: Heading over. Still studying?
I was going to text him back when Skylar spoke up, “You okay?”
I was a little dazed, staring at her for a second. My head was still reeling. “What?”
Her eyes fell to the phone in my hand. “You look like you saw a ghost. You okay?”
A fist rammed into my chest. “How much did you hear?”
She shrugged a little. “I mean, the whole thing, but just your side. Not enough to know what’s going on, but enough to know something’s going on.” She eyed me. “I mostly heard you and the other girl before. What you offered to do, that was nice of you. Unnecessary, but nice.”
Flynn’s brother. Leander. The girl. Breakfast.
It was coming back to me. “Uh, okay.”
“That guy you’re introducing to her, is he a nice guy?”
“He was nice enough, but I had a three-minute conversation with him. Getting him to go to breakfast will be nothing. I’m figuring she can figure it out for herself from there.”
“You’re going to tell him about her?”
“No.”
She frowned. “How are you going to do the introduction then?”
“I’m going to tell him I’ll buy him breakfast. He’ll show up. We’ll sit at her table. I’ll leave early.”
She blinked, staring at me. Slowly, her eyes closed, and she began shaking her head. “Just when I thought I had you figured out.” She began laughing. “That’s kinda genius in the most simple way.”
The house’s doorbell rang just as I said, “Not genius, just easy.”
Wade was heading out of the dining room and paused seeing Skylar and me in the kitchen. He shot us a small frown before answering the door. “Oh, hey man. How’s it going? You here for Gaynor?”
“Uh…”
Wade stepped back and Cruz stepped in, seeing me right away.
Need flooded me, instantly, and seeing it, but also seeing how I wasn’t moving or saying anything, Cruz gestured to me. His backpack was slung over one of his shoulders. “Daniels said you guys had a studying thing going on. We’re in anthro together. Mind if I crash?”
Wade’s head reared back, and he seemed startled, going from me to Cruz before nodding eagerly. “Yeah, man. The new star of our hockey team? You can crash anytime you want.” He laughed slightly as Cruz stepped farther into the house. Some of the other guys came out, hearing Cruz’s name and approached. Hands were shook. Shoulders pounded. The guys were doing their “athlete heralding” thing.
And Skylar drew in another deep breath, moving to stand next to me. She said under her breath, “Now I really don’t have you figured out.”
I wanted to fuck it all, take Cruz’s hand and lead him upstairs.
I used sex to hide from life, but there were times when I didn’t want it to control me, and this was a moment where I felt it would. It was a fine line that I walked at times, and I didn’t want to step over it, letting sex start to replace the very thing my mom liked to take away from me, my life. I was a college student. I had to study, so therefore, I would study. Because of that, even though I was feeling a burning sensation searing in my stomach, I forced myself to return to the table.
To my seat.
I picked up a slice of pizza and ate it.
I never tasted it.
Cruz came in, and the girls’ voices went up a notch. Wade who? Who was Wade again?
It was all about Cruz after that.
I studied, and in a way, I wanted to ignore him. Cruz, being Cruz, didn’t let that happen. He moved to sit next to me, and as he sat, he pushed his leg up right next to mine.
I closed my eyes, feeling that sensation settling me, just a tiny bit.
But over the next hour, I kept looking at my phone.
That unknown number never called.
Two hours of studying, and Cruz’s leg was pressing so hard against mine, that I was struggling to stay in my seat. It was obvious what he wanted, though he never talked to me. He never looked at me. There were no secretive looks. The others didn’t seem to notice anything, and he had moved his bag on the table so it was blocking everyone’s view where our legs were.
But I heard the girls flirting with him, or trying.
They weren’t getting the ‘go ahead’ signal from him, so the girl who liked Wade had started flirting with him again. The other two guys might’ve been more enamored with Cruz than the girls. They competed with them for his attention, asking him about their next hockey game.
“So, Cruz. Can I ask you a question?” Wade spoke up, and everyone quieted.
Cruz shifted, leaning back in his seat. “Yeah, man. What’s up?” One of his hands dropped to his lap. He looked the epitome of cool and calm.
“You’re like a shoe-in for the NHL, right?”
One of the girls started giggling.
Cruz lifted up a shoulder. “I mean, you never know, but I hope there’s a good chance I’ll go there. Why do you ask?”
“Did you ever think of going straight there? Skipping college?”
And that’s when his hand moved to my leg.
Heat engulfed me, and tingles shot from that touch.
I moved my leg. His hand moved to the inside of it, and I almost jumped.
The need was back and pulsating inside of me.
He was saying, running his finger up the inside of my leg, “Most guys go to college before the NHL. It’s pretty rare to go straight out of high school, and to get to play. It’s always been hockey for me. That’s been my focus all my life.”
His finger was at my core, and waves of desire were spreading through me, like an inferno. Slowly, methodically, he pushed down, and began to rub. Fuck, how was he doing this? His voice was normal. It looked like he was resting his hand on his leg. And he was holding a whole conversation where Wade and the other guys were hanging onto every word he was saying. The girls perked back up, remembering who was sitting at the same table as them.
“Oh, yeah. I get that.” Wade was nodding back.
Cruz gave another shrug, as his finger circled around me. “College was a good play for me. With injuries, you just never know.”
“But didn’t they try to draft you? Or asked you to enter it?”
He didn’t respond right away, rubbing me. “I was approached, yeah.”
A second finger joined, and he began moving more intensely, pressing, grinding. Before a moan slipped out of me, my hand grabbed his wrist.
He was still looking at Wade, but I caught a slight twitch at the corner of his mouth. Then he yawned, the mother fucker yawned. The pounding was between my legs, right where he was touching, and I could remove his hand. So easily. I could do that. No more tormenting.
But I wasn’t.
I pressed his hand harder into me.
He made a strangled sound, and covered it with another yawn. “Sorry. Traveling, and studying. I’m always wiped by Sunday. How about you, man? Do you have plans for swimming after college?”
Wade launched into his spiel about how he found swimming, how it was going on the team, and what he wanted to do after college. I didn’t hear a word of it because Cruz went back to rubbing my clit. I sat there, pretending to study with one hand holding my highlighter, and the other was holding onto Cruz’s wrist.
God. He was so good at that.
Another sweep, another caress. Then he pressed in again, holding, and ohmyfuckinggod, I was coming at the table. My hand clamped down on his wrist, even as my legs quaked, and when the last of the waves subsided, he turned his hand around, linking with mine briefly before pulling his hand free. Wade was talking to another of the guys. The girls were enraptured, so I shot Cruz a look from the side of my eye. He was looking right at me, and grinned, slowly, but his eyes were dark and piercing.
I opened my mouth, an excuse to leave on the tip of my tongue when the back kitchen door opened.
Plop!
A cupboard was opened and closed. Another cupboard.
The sound of the fridge door being opened.
Things, containers were being placed on the counter.
A bag was crinkled.
More crinkling.
A plate.
The sound of a knife or fork moving over a plate.
The click of something I couldn’t decipher.
The fridge was opened again. I was on the end so I could hear everything more easily than the others.
Whoosh! The smell of toast.
I heard more sounds and then the slightest squeak of sneakers against the kitchen tile.
Miles came to the doorway, a plate of toast in hand and was raising a mug to his mouth. He froze, taking everyone in, the mug at his mouth. His eyes went wide. “Ooh–” He choked a little on his coffee before adjusting and waving with the plate, a tiny motion. “Hi, everyone. No clue a whole study thing was happening here.”
“Hi, Miles.” One of the girls, not the one that liked Wade, waved.
Miles saw Cruz and lit up. “Styles. Man! What’s up.” He walked around, and I ducked to avoid having coffee or toast spilled on me.
“What’s up?” Cruz reached back, giving some space between us from the motion, and his hand met Miles’s in a half handshake, half slap.
Miles scanned the table and sat across from Cruz. “Guessing I’m joining the party.” He put his things down and went to grab his bag.
I sighed.
Thirty minutes later, my phone started lighting up.
I saw an earlier text from Gavin and clicked on it.
Studying with Gaynor at the library. What are you doing?
Me: Just saw your text. I’m in for the night. See you in class on Tuesday.
He responded, but I scrolled through the rest.
Tasmin: Can we talk?
Five minutes later,
Tasmin: You were a bitch to me on the phone, and I’d like to know what I did to piss you off.
Five more minutes later,
Tasmin: I’m not trying to be a bother here, but wth?
Ten minutes after that,
Tasmin: Text me back or I’m telling my brother.
That did it.
I hit call and stood from the table, heading up to my place as she picked up.
“Finally,” she griped.
“I was a bitch to you because we’re not friends. I do not want to set a precedent where you think we’re going to be friends. And for you threatening to call your brother on me, fine, but get ready because knowing how he is, he’d chew me out. Threaten me. Then he’d turn right around and tear into you to leave me the fuck alone.”
She was quiet for a second. “I wasn’t talking about that brother.”
Oh. That’s right. She had a twin, who was in a crew, and they were known for handling themselves.
“I don’t know your twin. Remember? Want a go at me, you should’ve stuck with the one I used to fuck.” I ended the call, annoyed. If Tasmin wasn’t connected to people from back home, I might’ve been friends with her. But she was and that’s just how it worked out.
“Who did you used to fuck?”
I cursed under my breath.
I’d left the door open, and Cruz was standing there, my bag in one hand and his in the other.
He came into the room, shutting the door, and put both bags on the couch. He remained standing.
“I grabbed your stuff, told them I’d drop it off on my way home. I’m pretty sure one of those girls is waiting to proposition me when I leave here.” He didn’t come toward me, instead he put his hands in his sweatshirt, stretching it and getting comfortable.
Or he looked it.
I couldn’t read him right now.
I was also remembering that I was still wearing his hoodie.
This was the shit I didn’t want to deal with in our arrangement. But I was dealing with it because I didn’t want to end what we had going, and I didn’t want to think any more on that because I should end it, right now, as soon as possible.
I said, “You know Tasmin Shaw?”
He frowned a little, his head cocking to the side. “I think so.”
“Ryerson is her boyfriend.”
“Oh, yeah. He’s a cool guy.”
“I used to have the same arrangement with her half-brother that I do with you.” My tongue was sticking to the back of my throat. I did not want to talk about Blaise with Cruz. “Except he and I were friends.”
His eyes flickered before a long slow nod. “I see. It didn’t end well?”
I hated this, hated it. But here I was, going personal.
I went to my chair by the couch and scooted back in the corner, bringing my legs up and hugging my knees to my chest. I looked away because I did not want to see Cruz when I said some of this.
“Things are a lot with my home life, and that’s all I’m going to ever say about that, but I use sex to cope with it. Blaise fell for someone, called quits on our arrangement, and well; it was during a really hard time at home. I was losing the thing I used to cope with what was going on, and I didn’t handle it very well. Not because of him, but because I didn’t have another lifeline set in place. If I had, I wouldn’t have cared. He didn’t know any of that and I’m still embarrassed, even a year later, how I reacted. I can be…a bitch to push people away.”
“Blaise DeVroe.”
He wasn’t speaking like that was a question. He knew who Blaise was. “Yeah. Seems I have a type.”
“Your ex is another major athlete.” Cruz let out a short laugh. “You acted like you didn’t know who I was when we hooked up the first time.”
My head whipped to his. “I didn’t. I found out in December.”
His eyes were narrowed, and there was a coldness that I’d never seen directed at me. Ice went down my spine. “I don’t like being targeted or used.”
“Fuck you. I did neither.”
His jaw clenched. “I don’t believe you.”
Okay. This was going the route it needed to. “Then leave, Cruz. Our arrangement was for a reason. I didn’t lie, ever. I had no clue who you were until your name started popping up in everyone’s conversations about the hockey team. The door’s that way. No skin off my nose.”
His jaw was still clenching, and he looked away, a harshness coming off him. “I didn’t want a girlfriend.”
“We’re not. I don’t want a boyfriend.”
“We’re something because I’m pissed thinking you targeted me, and I’m not leaving. I should’ve walked the second you said your ex’s name.”
“He wasn’t my ex.”
He shot back, “He was your ex of something.”
I couldn’t fight against that.
“Goddammit!” He rose from the couch.
I watched him, locking down, waiting for him to walk out that door. It’s what he should do. He knew it and I knew it, but I wasn’t being a bitch. I wasn’t sealing the end of us in place, and that was terrifying me.
My phone started ringing again, but I ignored it.
I was waiting for Cruz to either leave or do what he came here for. He needed to make the decision, and I’d handle the consequences.
He wasn’t moving, but he was glaring at me. He was seething, looking like he hated me.
That calmed me for some crazy reason. It did. If he hated me, we could still do this. Hate fucking was sometimes the best kind. Hate fucking. Loathe fucking. Just a good personal barrier in there, between him and me that kept us from getting close because we were already too close. It was too personal. Too dangerous.
Too foolish.
But if he hated me, yeah. I could see it. We could still do this then. He just had to keep hating me.
My phone stopped ringing, and a second later, it started up again.
Cruz cursed, going for the phone. He answered, “What?”
A woman’s voice was on the other end.
He blinked, frowning, but handed the phone to me. “Some lady in Vegas?”
I launched off the chair, snatching the phone from him and I went to the bedroom. “Mom?”
“I’m not her.”
It wasn’t the lady from before. Different voice.
“Who is this?”
She coughed into the phone, her voice coming out hoarse. “I got a call from your mom. I was in the same facility as her. She asked me to give you a message.”
Every word she said was searing me. “What’s the message?” I didn’t want to hear it. It would be bad, so bad.
“She said she knows where you are and if you don’t want her to show up and fuck your life up, she wants fifty grand.” The lady’s tone grew firm but cold. Businesslike. “You’ve got to the end of the week to get it to her, and she said if you want instructions on how to get it to her, unblock one of her numbers. She’ll be waiting for your call.”
She ended the call after that.
“Who was that?”
Cruz was still here.
Fifty grand? She was blackmailing me?
Blackmailing her daughter?
What was the fifty grand for? Was she in trouble? Again?
My walls were rattling. They were threatening to explode, and I tried bringing up the house imagery again. Everyone had their own room. I could walk freely through the hallways, but it wasn’t working. I couldn’t focus on envisioning a house.
I was so fucked.
My mom was blackmailing me, and if I gave in, she’d keep doing it. “This is payback for ignoring her.”
Right? Or was she really in trouble?
My chest was starting to hurt.
“Ignoring who? Who was on the phone?” Cruz was at my side, and he lifted my hand. “Jesus, Mara.”
He pulled back my fingers. I saw the blood trickling down.
I’d sunk my nails into my skin and hadn’t felt a thing.
Huh.
I looked at my other hand, wondering if I’d done the same with that one, but no. It still had the phone.
That’s when I lost it, throwing my phone.
A deep and primal scream ripped from me, and I couldn’t stop.
“Mara!”
I couldn’t.
I couldn’t.
I couldn’t.
My mother.
I couldn’t–
Cruz picked me up and ran.
I was still screaming.
I wanted to puncture my own ears.
Pain. Something. I needed to feel something other than what she was doing to me.
Cruz was fumbling, reaching into my pockets. I didn’t know what he was doing. I didn’t care. He was searching his own pockets. He tossed something in the corner, and then I was being shoved underwater.
I choked off, the water cascading inside my mouth, but no. That was even better.
I could drown.
Could I drown?
Would that make it stop?
“Fuck!”
I turned, starting to fight off whoever was there.
“What–Mara!” Cruz was yelling in my face.
Cruz.
It was Cruz.
I looked down, in a daze, seeing he was soaked, his chest heaving and his eyes blazing.
“Baby, stop screaming.” He moved in, huddling over me since I was starting to shake from the cold.
I felt that. Why was I cold?
He pushed back some of my hair, cupping and framing my face. His forehead rested on mine. “If you don’t shut up, your neighbors are going to call the cops. I have no idea why your roommates aren’t up here yet.”
Shut up?
Screaming. I’d been screaming.
My throat was hurting.
I whispered, “You hate me.”
His eyes flashed. “I don’t know about that, but yeah, I’m still pissed.”
“I need you to hate me.”
He frowned, not saying anything. But the need was too deep, too now.
I reached for him.
