Chapter 29 – Hunter Hunter Stevens Miller Mess Around
Saturday
I couldn’t believe that Axel had saved the rest of his firsts for me.
He’d kissed someone else first. And I’d blown someone else first. But that was it. All the rest of our firsts would be with each other.
After all those years of suffering about him kissing someone else first, the first I’d shared with someone else was actually significantly worse. Because it was significantly more intimate.
I looked up at him as we walked hand in hand back to the dance. “We’re okay, right? You forgive me for what I did with Jacob?”
Axel’s fingers tightened around mine. “Can we just...maybe never talk about that again? I really don’t want to picture you on your knees in front of my best friend.”
“Yeah, I won’t mention it again. I’m sorry.”
Axel sighed. “You don’t have to keep apologizing. This is all my fault. If I’d just told you the truth...”
“No, it was my dad’s fault.”
Axel didn’t say anything to that.
“And maybe a bit of my fault too for not asking you out instead.”
Axel squeezed my hand. “Definitely more your dad’s fault, I think.”
I stopped walking when we reached the cafeteria doors.
“Do you think you’ll hate my dad forever?
” Because that was going to make things very awkward going forward.
Thanksgiving was coming up. I pictured the two of them glaring at each other from opposite ends of the table.
And Uncle Tyler and my dad getting in another fist fight.
“Are you mad at him?” Axel asked instead of answering my question.
“He apologized. Kind of. But I’m still furious with him. He’s manipulative and awful and...” I sighed. “But he’s my dad.”
“If I can pretend you haven’t sucked Jacob’s cock maybe I can pretend your father was never an asshole.” He reached out and tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “Does that work?”
That was probably as much as I could ask for. I slowly nodded. “Thank you, Axel.”
“But can we maybe not think about any of that right now? Tonight is about us.”
I stood on my tiptoes and placed a kiss against his lips. He was right. Tonight was all about us...
The sound of sirens made the music from the cafeteria almost disappear completely.
“Oh crap!” I said. “Sophie!”
“What about Sophie?” Axel glanced toward the front doors of Empire High where blue and red lights were lighting up the night sky.
“She has a half-kilo of cocaine in her purse!”
“Excuse me?”
“The cops are going to arrest her!” I grabbed Axel’s hand and pulled him into the cafeteria. “We need to find her before the cops do! We have to flush the drugs!”
“Why does Sophie have so much cocaine?!”
“She was trying to get Mr. Halifax...” I shook my head.
“It doesn’t matter. We need to split up and find her.
” She’d left the cafeteria with Mr. Halifax, but she might have come back by now.
And we didn’t have time to search the whole school.
I shoved Axel toward the dance floor and ran into the crowd to make my way over to where the punch was.
The dancing had gotten a lot raunchier since Axel and I had snuck off. Everyone was so much closer together and everything seemed blurred in the dim light. Sophie wasn’t anywhere near the punch bowl. I spun in a circle.
“There you are,” Jacob said. “Where did you guys run off to?”
“Jacob!” I put my hands on his arms. “We need to find Soph!”
“Or we could dance.”
“No, it’s...”
Jacob twirled me around in a circle.
Axel stepped out of the crowd, grabbed my waist, and pulled me away from Jacob. “Not a chance, man.”
Jacob laughed. “We always dance together at school dances.”
“I think you’ve had your dick close enough to my girlfriend for one lifetime,” Axel said.
Ah!
Jacob glanced at me and raised his eyebrows.
I didn’t have a chance to say anything, because Leo walked over to us.
“There you are, baby,” Leo said. “You said you’d meet me at the dance and I couldn’t find you. Ready to go fuck in a closet?”
WHAT?! My eyes grew round.
“I swear to God,” Axel said. “Everyone get away from my girlfriend.”
“Girlfriend?” Leo laughed. “No way. Scarlett is my date to the dance. Tell him, baby.”
“I took it back, Leo,” I said. “I cancelled!”
“Because your dad showed up. Such a cockblocker, am I right? We were obviously still going together. And I found the perfect spot for us to hook up just like you wanted.”
“I told you I didn’t want that!”
“Did you?”
“YES!” I turned to Axel. “This is all a misunderstanding. I thought he was my kiss thief and...”
“I know,” Axel said through gritted teeth. “Leo, you have five seconds to walk away...”
“But Scarlett and I are dating. Tell him, baby.”
“Don’t call her that,” Axel said.
“But she likes it. She asked me to call her that. Tell Axel we’re dating, baby.”
Gah!
“Scarlett is my fiancée!” Axel said.
Leo glanced at my left hand. “Now she’s your fiancée? That’s a desperate reach. I don’t see a ring on her finger, man...”
Axel grabbed Leo by the front of his varsity jacket. “I’m five seconds away from losing my fucking mind. And if you’re still standing in front of me no one will recognize you tomorrow.”
“I think we all need to calm down,” Jacob said. “Maybe we should all go get some punch?” Jacob put his hand on my lower back.
“I told you to get your dick away from my girlfriend!”
Jacob lifted his hands in the air to show he was innocent.
“So now she’s your girlfriend again?” Leo asked. “And I thought I was the one always making jokes.”
It looked like Axel’s head was about to explode.
I put my hand on his shoulder. “Axel, I’m so sorry I went to third base with Jacob. And I’m sorry I thought Leo was my kiss thief. I’m so freaking sorry about everything.”
“You gave Jacob head?” Leo asked. “Can I get in on that, or...”
Axel shoved Leo backward.
Leo laughed. “This is actually a little messy for me. Luis might be into this. But I’m out. Sorry, baby. It’s been fun.”
I just stared at him.
He winked at me and walked away.
Jacob cleared his throat. “So Scarlett told you about...”
“Yes,” Axel said.
“I didn’t know you liked her,” Jacob said. “I swear. I never would have let her suck...”
“Can we please not finish that sentence?” I asked.
Jacob nodded. “I’m really sorry, man. But Scarlett and I are still going to be friends. Just like we always have been.”
I was grateful that he was fighting for our friendship. Because I didn’t like the idea of my life without him in it.
“I know that,” Axel said. “I just...” his voice trailed off. “I have this freaking image in my head of the two of you and it’s driving me crazy.”
I winced.
Jacob saw the expression on my face and turned back to Axel. “Don’t make her feel bad about this. You’re being a hypocrite. Scarlett isn’t freaking about all the girls you’ve been with...”
“Because I haven’t been with anyone!”
Jacob lowered his eyebrows. “What are you talking about? You’ve had a million girlfriends.”
“But I didn’t hook up with any of them.”
Jacob laughed, but then he stopped. “Wait, are you serious?”
“I was waiting for Scarlett.”
“Oh.” Jacob looked very uncomfortable. “Well, I, um...” He cleared his throat. “I’m very sorry about that.”
The sound of RJ laughing made us turn around.
“Dude,” RJ said. “You’ve seriously never gotten head? You’re so old.”
“I have,” Axel said.
“But you just said...”
“We just did that in the library,” Axel said. He shook his head and turned to me. “I’m sorry, I...”
“It’s fine,” I said. But I knew my face was bright red.
“Congrats,” RJ said. “Now I’m dying to know. How was she? Did Jacob teach her well?”
“You may be close to my height now,” Axel said. “But I could still kill you.”
“I think that’s a yes,” RJ said to Jacob.
Jacob laughed.
“Can we please stop talking about this now?” I asked.
“It’s all I can think about now,” RJ said. “I’m a little sad that I’m the only one standing here that you haven’t blown.”
“She’s your cousin,” Axel said.
RJ shrugged. “She’s kind of your cousin too.”
“We’re not related. At all.”
“Yeah, but I’ve seen Aunt Penny on the security feed so many times that it’s hard not to picture Scarlett that way...”
“Stop watching my parents, perv,” I said.
RJ laughed. “Why? I am not in fact related to your hot mom. And she still does all those things she mentioned in her books...”
“You’ve read them too?!”
“Obviously.”
I sighed.
RJ turned to Jacob. “So on a scale of one to ten, how good at head is she?”
“Oh, definitely a ten,” Jacob said.
I glared at him. “Jacob!”
“What?” Jacob shrugged. “It’s a compliment, Scar.”
“I would have asked you the scale question, Axel,” RJ said. “But you don’t have anything to compare it to, so...”
Axel sighed. “You guys are the worst.” But he smiled down at me.
It seemed like he’d calmed down about this. Somehow. Maybe he was just pleased that I was so good at it? And honestly, I was kind of glad he’d missed out on my first few times at trying. Because those were a disaster. This truly was for the best, even if it was hard for him to see that.
“So are you guys going to lose your V-cards to each other tonight?” RJ asked.
“That is really none of your business,” Axel said.
“But if you do...which room are you thinking?”
“Hers, because there’s no cameras.”
“Son of a bitch,” RJ said under his breath.
I laughed. But then I realized it was a really really good thing that there weren’t any cameras in my room. Because if I was as bad at sex as I was at head at first, I didn’t want any footage of that. It would be mortifying.
The music cut off and the lights turned on.
I turned to see two cops walking through the cafeteria.
Shit! Soph! “Where is your sister?” I asked RJ.
RJ shrugged. “How should I know? Wait. Actually I do. She’s right there.” He pointed over toward the windows.
Mr. Halifax had just walked back into the cafeteria. With Sophie. His hand was on Sophie’s elbow and he was pulling her toward the cops.
Crap! I ran over to them.
Axel caught me around the waist before I could run up to them. “Are you trying to get arrested too?”
“I have to help Soph.”
“You can’t help her if you’re both behind bars.”