Chapter 2
DANTE
E ver since that dork ran into me with his coffee, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about him.
I’d been ready to ream his ass for not paying attention to where he was going before I heard his voice—that polite and slightly nervous tone.
It’s intriguing to me, but even more so is the way his eyes flared with irritation when he stood up to me.
And the way his neck and face went pink when I told him I wanted him on his knees…I wasn’t kidding, not even a little, but his reaction makes me even more interested in putting him there.
I need to know who he is. He knows who I am, something I shouldn’t be surprised by after all this time, but I don’t know anything about him.
Aside from the fact that his soft green eyes would— will —look fucking fantastic looking up at me from the ground.
Whether that’s with my cock in his mouth remains to be seen.
Of course, today is the day I attempt to focus on homework. If I don’t at least get a passing grade, I’ll get kicked out of school and my family will have my ass. All the shit I do for them, and they still want me to deal with this college crap so that I can “manage the business better.”
As far as I’m concerned, all I need to do that is a gym membership and a steady supply of bullets.
I lose focus entirely on my work and slam the textbook closed before shoving it aside. “Fuck this.”
There’s gotta be some kind of party going on tonight that I can crash.
I’m not part of any of the frats—pansy little shitheads—but they throw decent enough parties, and some of them even buy booze that’s not half bad.
Plus, there will be plenty of tipsy, shirtless jocks for me to choose from…
there’s something about putting one of them on their knees and listening to them whine that just bricks me up so fast.
Today it’s not the meatheads I’m interested in, though…
No, the clumsy blonde with manners is the one I can’t get off my mind.
He didn’t give me a last name, but that’s no trouble for me. A little searching through channels I shouldn’t have access to, along with looking through photos, and I know within fifteen minutes exactly who he is.
Ethan Moore.
The lanky biology major with a nearly spotless record is exactly who I’m looking for. One thing leads to another until I’m looking through his social media.
It’s all pristine, from pictures of perfectly framed sunsets to elegant handwriting on his homework, neatly placed on his desk with a mug of tea sitting nearby.
His girlfriend, who I don’t even care to study too closely, is always tucked under one of his arms or wrapping her own around his waist. Her smiles are always wide and his are always conservative but warm—no kissing, no teasing of sex between them, no early morning selfies in bed under the covers, and nothing that even remotely matches my idea of a fervid college relationship.
His social media gives the impression of a straight and scholarly gentleman with a chick of the same kind on his arm—to the least imaginative person, anyway.
I sense something different.
Especially with the way he blushed and practically tripped over his feet in reaction to me.
A guy as hot but as buttoned-up as him is one of two things—an incel or secretly gay. He doesn’t have to be gay; he could be bisexual, but…something is up.
The “Ally” with a rainbow in his bio makes me snort in amusement.
“Yeah, right,” I mumble.
I should know better than to want to fuck with a closeted dork like him—someone who can’t possibly have any idea what my life is like, what the life is like.
My time would be better spent banging my head against a brick wall than trying to get into the jeans of a guy who can’t even admit he wants me.
Still, I know he wants me, too…right?
All I can picture is his dumb girlfriend, and my blood pumps hot in my veins.
I don’t even know her name, but the thought of her touching him, of him touching her, makes my hands curl into fists.
No. He’s not hers. Not any more than he’s mine…
Ethan Moore is the face in my head as I stroke my dick tonight. His soft, skinny body is the one I imagine underneath me. In my mind I’m buried in his ass so deep that he’s crying in pleasure.
As I come all over one hand, Ethan’s picture with his full lips is on my phone in the other.
“Fuck you. I did the job like I was told,” I spit at my older brother, Marco. He’s got a look on his face that mirrors the one our father gives me when he thinks I’ve done something wrong—brows low, mouth curled down, and calm but disappointed eyes.
“You shot him in the knee with his daughter in the room,” Marco says.
“I got the money,” I remind him.
“Yes, but who knows if he’ll work with us again?” he huffs.
I growl under my breath. “So fucking what? He wasn’t going to make a deal with us again anyway, not after what happened with April.”
“How do you know that, Dante? You act like you know everything, but you don’t. You’ve got a lot to learn before you could even begin to take my place,” Marco berates me as he steps closer to me, pointing in my face.
I swat his hand away. “Get your fucking hand out of my face.” I grab his wrist when he puts it in front of me again.
I squeeze hard. Marco might be older, but he’s smaller than me.
“I think it’s pretty fucking obvious that Kramer wasn’t going to make a deal with us again.
You fucked his wife, Marco. Not once, not twice, but for the entire summer.
He caught you idiots and didn’t want to pay up.
So, yeah, I think that partnership is as dead as a well-done steak, you shithead. ”
Marco stares at me after attempting to yank his hand out of my grip. I hold it tighter.
“I got the money he owed us while you sat here on your sad ass, wondering if April is gonna stay married to him or come running back to you,” I tell him.
“So what if I traumatized a nine-year-old girl? Did anyone say sorry to me when they killed our ma right in front of me when I was five fucking years old? No. She’ll get the fuck over it. ”
I let go of his wrist and step back from him.
Marco rubs his wrist, then adjusts his shirt. “Fine. Your cut of the money will be in your account by tomorrow. Don’t forget the meeting on Friday.”
I sigh. “Yeah, I’ll be there.” I turn around and grab my leather jacket off the hooks by the front door of the Romano mansion.
“Where are you going?” Marco asks.
“I got shit to do,” I tell him. “Anyone needs me, I’ll be at the campus library.”
“Library? Since when do you read?” Marco teases me, bouncing back from our argument as quickly as he always does.
“Since your dick ,” I snap at him as I open the door. I don’t have to look back at him to know he’s smiling.
I know Ethan will be at the library tonight, just like I know which classes he’ll be in throughout the week. That information really shouldn’t be as easy to find as it is.
The library is the easiest place to bump into him. We’re entirely different majors and years, so we have no classes in common what-so-fucking-ever.
As I make my way into the library on the Valmont campus, I realize this might be the first time I’ve been in here aside from when I come to pick up my books at the beginning of every year.
Since I’m not just making a beeline for the reception desk, everything looks unfamiliar.
There’s only a handful of people in here tonight. It’s after dinnertime, but not late enough that it’s completely silent. Whispering from every corner distracts me momentarily as I wonder what people are talking about…and feel a few pairs of eyes on me.
My focus immediately shifts when I spot him.
Ethan.
He’s sitting at a small two-person table near the back of the library, away from the computers and nestled between two tall bookcases.
His bright blonde hair is easy to spot, even in the dim overhead lighting.
I adjust my book bag over my shoulder and head over there. My black designer combat boots feel heavier than normal, and their thuds on the carpeted floor are louder than any other noise in here.
Just as I reach the table, Ethan’s pretty green eyes flick up to me, disinterested at first, but then they widen.
“What…?” he says slowly. “Dante?”
I take a step to the side, as if I wasn’t just walking in the exact direction of his table.
“Well hey there, pretty boy.” I smirk at him.
The skin around his nose instantly reddens.
“Uh, hi,” he replies and sits up straighter, no longer hunching over his laptop and notebook. “Do you need the table?”
I raise a brow.
“You know, because it’s closer to a plug,” he tells me. Ethan motions to the side, and I follow his fingers, seeing a two-slot plug, one taken up by his laptop charging cord.
“Right, yeah. You mind?” I ask, but I’m already sitting down in the hard wooden chair across from him.
“No…there’s room,” he says, and moves his things closer to him. I swear I can see his pulse racing in his neck.
“Fuck yeah. Ethan, was it?” I ask, locking my eyes to his, never looking away for even a moment.
He licks his lips before he speaks. “Yup. Ethan Moore.”
Yeah, I know.
I smirk, both at him and to myself.
For another moment he just looks at me, then looks away and down at his work, as if he’s trying to figure out if he should keep talking to me or focus.
I move my bag in front of me, unzip it, and take out a notebook.
The tension in the air is already thick, and I can’t help but look at the way his fingers gently turn the mechanical pencil between them…
…and wonder what his hands would feel like on my dick.