Chapter Seven #3
“An attempt at saving you from a nasty hangover.”
Leah was quiet for a long beat—so long that it was starting to make me kind of nervous. “You don’t have to take them, I just thought I’d offer.”
“No, this was just…” Her expression softened, her eyes fixed on her palm. “This was really nice. Thank you.”
I smiled, amused. “It’s just some basic drug store meds. I’d consider that kind of the bare minimum.”
“I get a lot of whatever would be less than the bare minimum,” Leah admitted. She looked so plain-faced, so sad as she said it that I couldn’t tell if it was a drunken confession she’d forget she said, or if it was just an honest acknowledgment.
Either way, it made my chest ache for her. Not from pity, but from knowing that she deserved better than that. It didn’t require knowing her that well or for that long to see that.
Leah threw the pills back and then swallowed them down with water.
The strap of her dress fell down her shoulder, and I reached out to move it back up, my fingers grazing over her skin.
My mouth went dry, my hands still and steady—no matter how nervous I was, my hands never shook; if anything, I’d gotten used to performing well under pressure—but my heart rate skyrocketed.
Leah gazed up at me through her lashes. Her hazel eyes were warm, soft. I didn’t know how long I was staring at her, but it felt simultaneously embarrassingly long and far too short.
“I’m going to shower,” I said, because if I didn’t leave the room, I’d probably explode from how badly I wanted her. “Do you want a shirt or anything? Sweatshirt? Might be more comfortable than your dress.”
“You just want to see me in your shirt,” Leah teased.
My lips lifted in a smile. “Maybe I have an ulterior motive.”
“I’d love a shirt, thank you,” she said softly.
I turned to my closet and pulled out a shirt from my overflowing and eternally expanding collection of Lakeside Green Coyotes merch. We got new shirts constantly, the school taking full advantage of any special event.
I pulled out whatever shirt was on top and handed it off to her. When she reached for the straps of her dress to drop it to the floor, I quickly turned around to give her privacy.
Leah giggled. “It’s nothing you haven’t seen before. You can look.”
“I didn’t want to make an assumption.”
“When it comes to you, the answer will always be a yes.”
Despite Leah’s permission, I still didn’t turn around. I kept my eyes locked on the wall in front of me, focusing on counting down from one-hundred instead of thinking about the perfect curves of Leah’s body, the softness of her skin.
Or the fact that we were here, together and alone in my apartment.
It occurred to me then that I hadn’t invited anyone else over in the time since Leah and I had hooked up.
This was admittedly one of my longer drought periods for calling someone over, and I hadn’t even noticed.
My phone buzzed with options periodically, but I’d gotten in the habit of just brushing them off.
I cleared my throat. “I have makeup wipes, too, actually,” I said, still not looking at Leah, and turned left to head into the bathroom.
“Oh, for all of the makeup that you wear?” Leah teased, her voice muffled by the wall.
My skin went hot. “It’s…”
“It’s okay, I get it,” she said. “I also know exactly what this is. Your reputation goes pretty deep.”
Her tone is teasing, but the slightest bit of shame still cuts through me.
I’d never been worried before about my perception or the talk of the town.
I knew what my reputation was—I’d heard earfuls of it from the girls themselves.
And their friends. And my teammates. But realizing that Leah probably knew a lot of that made me feel exposed and nervous, desperate to explain myself to her.
I found a travel makeup wipe loose and still in its packaging in one of my bathroom drawers. I picked it up, but I took my time, hovering in the bathroom until Leah was ready.
A few seconds later, as if reading my mind, Leah said, “I’m modest now, I promise.”
I walked back into the room and inhaled when my eyes landed on her. God, she was gorgeous. We were close in height, but my build was broader and more muscular than hers, so the shirt fell differently on her than on me. It brushed just over the top of her thighs, a devastatingly sexy look.
A beat too late, I handed her the makeup wipe. I did it from an arm’s length away, like I was worried I’d scoop her up in my arms if I took even one step closer to her.
Leah walked over to the microwave to look at her reflection while she wiped her makeup off.
“You can use my bathroom,” I offered. “You know, the room with an actual mirror in it.”
“This works, too.”
I smiled a little bit. “Striking me as kind of an expert at removing your makeup on the go. Maybe I’m not the only one with a reputation here.”
She blushed and suddenly stopped what she was doing. She locked eyes with me through the reflection in the microwave. “Have you heard anything?”
“No, no,” I said and retreated quickly. “Sorry, it was just…sorry. Based on how you’d talked to me at the last party about the person you’d been seeing or whatever.”
With how she’d teased me, I didn’t think fooling around with other people was a sensitive spot.
While I admittedly hated the thought of Leah fooling around with anyone else and just the thought filled my chest with seething, burning jealousy, I also knew I didn’t own her.
It was an unfair standard to expect that after I’d torn my way through most of the lesbian population at school, I’d expect Leah to suddenly drop everything and only want me just because I suddenly only had eyes for her.
“Oh god.” Leah groaned, rolling her eyes.
She turned back to me, her face now bare.
It was my first time ever—in all of the years Leah had been around, all of the times we’d passed each other at parties—seeing her so stripped down.
This somehow felt even more vulnerable than seeing her naked.
I couldn’t stop staring at her, taking in every detail of her face.
At risk of sounding corny, I couldn’t believe how beautiful she was without makeup.
It took me a second to even remember what we’d been talking about before. “Still being terrorized by your former lover?”
Leah paused. “No, actually.”
I didn’t ask her to elaborate—even if I was trying to play it cool with Leah, I wasn’t so cool that I could hear details of her having a crush on someone else—and instead held out my hand for the used makeup wipe so I could throw it away.
Leah sat down on my bed again, this time with way less intention. Instead of posing for me and offering seductive, through-her-lashes looks at me, she was moving with seemingly no thought at all about me being there. I liked that she seemed so much more at ease.
I walked over to her, gently brushing a loose strand of hair behind her ear. She closed her eyes, leaning into my touch.
“Thanks for being so nice,” she said. “You didn’t have to come and get me. I think I’m going to be really embarrassed by pretty much all of this in, like, two to three hours.”
My lips turned up in a smile. “You don’t have to be embarrassed. I want you here. I don’t mind.”
Leah dropped her gaze, her lips twisted up like she was fighting off a smile.
I wanted to kiss her so badly—every cell in my body was telling me to do—but I couldn’t.
If I kissed her now, I’d never leave the room.
And as much as Leah didn’t seem to mind my post-workout sweat, I wasn’t so sure she’d appreciate it in such close proximity.
“I’m going to shower,” I said, forcing the words out of my mouth even though I really didn’t want to have to go.
Everything with her felt so easy, so fun.
This was only our second time being left alone here, and I could tell I was getting addicted to the thrill.
I understood now why people completely fell off the face of the earth when they had a crush.
“Stay here with me. I like your sweat.”
I laughed. “You can smell it whenever you want. I’ve just been itching to shower since I left the court.”
Leah mock pouted at me, but then eased herself into bed, laying her head down on the pillow like her body had suddenly decided it was exhausted as easily as flipping a switch.
“Come back to me when you’re done.”
I smiled. “Yes, ma’am.”
After taking a long, stop daydreaming about Leah shower, I toweled off and pulled on my fresh pair of clothes. In my bed, Leah was peacefully asleep, now curled up under my sheets.
She looked so sweet that it was tempting to take a picture. I’d never really liked sharing my space with other people, especially when it came to sleepovers with flings, but a sleepover suddenly sounded like the most appealing thing in the world if I got to wake up to her in the morning.
“Stop staring and come lay with me,” Leah mumbled. She half opened her eyes and patted the empty spot next to her in the bed. “I could feel you looking at me.”
She made space for me as I slid into bed next to her. She wasted no time resting her head on my chest.
“Hard to be sneaky when you’re over six feet tall.”
“People over six feet tall will always find some excuse to bring it up,” she teased sleepily.
“As if you’ve ever been with someone before who's been tall enough that you can wear heels,” I teased back.
I trailed my fingers through the ends of her hair, letting my touch just barely brush over her back.
The weight of her head on my chest was comforting.
Rather than feeling suffocated and checking the clock, I wondered if I could come up with some kind of excuse to keep her here for a few more hours at least.
“I’m only a few inches shorter than you. For that to happen, you’d need to be closer to 6’3.””
I blinked. “How tall are your heels usually?”
“The ones I was wearing today were nothing. You forget I have pageant training; I’ve never been scared of a few inches.”