7. Colton
SEVEN
COLTON
Jasmine’s room smells like expensive perfume and rose-scented candles. Everything soft. Curated. Perfect.
Just like her.
She smiles at me from her place on the bed, curled up in her pastel sheets, a fantasy any guy should want. I tell myself that all the time. She’s perfect. Sweet, caring, into charity and shit. Everything I should choose.
“You okay?” she asks, fingers trailing lightly along my arm. “You’ve been quiet all day.”
“I’m fine,” I say automatically, leaning down to kiss her. Her lips are warm, practiced, and eager.
She shifts, tugging me closer, her hands already slipping under my shirt. Removing it with practiced ease, before her fingers go to my shorts.
I let her. Because this is what I’m supposed to want. What I’ve always wanted. Right?
She slides to the edge of the bed, moving me to sit and then dropping to her knees between my legs without waiting, eyes looking up at me with that sweet, glossy-lipped look I’ve seen a hundred times.
Her hands are steady as she works me over with focused care.
Her lips soft as she kisses along my limp dick.
Sucking the head into the warmth of her mouth.
And I try.
I try to be in the moment.
To want her.
But it’s not working.
Not until I close my eyes. Not until I stop seeing Jasmine. And start seeing him.
Micah.
Knees spread. Mouth slick. That smirk curling at the corners of his lips. That bitter tongue of his—bratty, unforgiving, hungry.
My breath hitches, hips jerking forward as Jasmine takes me deeper. I fist her hair hard enough to make her moan, eyes still shut, brain miles away from this bed.
I can feel it now. The heat, the rush. My body responding with a vengeance. But not to her. To the fantasy I’m not allowed to want.
I push deeper into her mouth, eyes shut, teeth clenched, chasing the edge as though it’ll erase the truth I can’t admit out loud.
I’m so far gone, I almost say his name.
Almost.
My grip tightens in her hair, body moving on instinct now—hips thrusting slow at first, then harder, deeper. She makes a noise in her throat that I’m pretty sure is approval, and I go with it, using the sound, the sensation, the fantasy.
Micah .
Mouth full. Eyes dark. Need for my cum plain on his face. His taunting words completely muffled by my dick.
I fuck Jasmine’s mouth like I’ve imagined fucking his— hands in his thick curls, his throat working around me, that filthy smirk wiped clean as I push him to his knees and take exactly what I crave.
My jaw clenches, muscles tightening as I chase the edge, and when I come—hard and hot in her mouth—it feels like a punishment. A secret confession I’ll never speak out loud.
Jasmine swallows and pulls off with a smile, wiping the corner of her mouth with her thumb like it’s nothing.
She crawls up beside me, eyes soft and a little dazed. “Damn,” she murmurs, curling up against my side, voice syrupy and satisfied. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but I am not complaining.”
I force a breath through my nose. Nod.
She presses a kiss to my shoulder, still glowing. “I love when you’re a little rough like that,” she adds, tracing circles on my stomach with her finger. “You always hold back. That was…”
She grins.
“Hot.”
I swallow, throat dry. I’m a shit person. My arm comes around her automatically. She nestles into my side, still pretending we’re some perfect couple, like this meant something more than misdirected need and emotional whiplash.
After a minute, she shifts.
“I want my turn,” she whispers, her hand sliding lower again, fingers teasing my half-mast cock.
My body tenses. Micah’s gone now. The fantasy burned out with the high. And all I’m left with…is her. And me. And the lie we’re both still telling.
I capture her fingers with a lazy smile, trying to sell it like it’s about her, not me. “I’m not quite ready, I don’t want to disappoint you,” I murmur, kissing the back of her hand. “And isn’t Samantha due back soon?”
She pouts, lips pushing out just enough to remind me how much effort she puts into looking perfect. “She’s gone for the next few hours,” she says, eyes gleaming. “Told me to have fun.”
Her hand moves again, purposeful now, wrapping around me with the same kind of care she always gives. Gentle. Sweet.
Wrong.
I try.
God, I try.
I tilt my head back against the pillow, lips parted as I force myself to focus. On her. On this. On being the guy I’m supposed to be.
Nothing.
The silence stretches, thick and awkward.
So I close my eyes.
And there he is.
Micah.
Pressing against me in the showers. Panting under me in a dark room. On his knees, mouth open, voice low and full of sin as he begs me for my come. Heat floods my stomach.
I grow hard in her hand. Aching for something I can't have.
She climbs onto my lap like she’s the reason. I don’t correct her. She wants this. This will make her happy, I tell myself.
Fantasizing isn’t cheating. Right?
She guides me in with a satisfied sigh, rocking slow at first, hands braced on my chest. She whispers something—sweet, maybe even loving—but I don’t hear it .
My eyes stay shut.
Micah fills every frame in my mind. His body. His mouth. His voice.
I grip her hips, thrusting up into her harder now, chasing the high I shouldn’t want.
Not here. Not with her. She moans, and it takes me out of the fantasy for a moment.
So I flip her over, my fingers going to her neck.
She likes it a little rough, right? I squeeze enough to cut off the sounds as I pound into her.
She gasps, her pleasure in that sound even. I need something else. Fuck.
“I need your ass,” I grunt.
She moans, and I take it as consent. I work my hand between us, prepping her to take me. Holding on to the image of Micah in my head. I pull out and flip her over, tugging her ass back and up. Then I slide in slowly, adding some lube she has in her bedside table, as her muscles clench around me.
Then I shut my eyes and fuck her the way I want to fuck Micah. Replacing the sounds she makes with the ones I want to hear from him. I’m so fucked up. This is so fucked up. But it’s the only way I can finish.
When I come, it’s with a groan that could’ve been a name. But I bite it back before it escapes. Jasmine collapses against the bed, panting, murmuring something into her pillow.
I keep my eyes closed.
Because if I open them, it will remind me of what a bastard I really am. The guilt of not being what she deserves might kill me.
By the time the sun sets, the whole house smells like cinnamon candles and glitter hairspray. Jasmine’s got me carrying boxes of decorations from the storage closet to the living room while she and her sisters hang silver streamers and string twinkle lights along the banister.
“Higher,” she calls, standing on a chair to tape a cluster of masks to the wall. “No, like…two inches more to the left.”
I adjust the ladder and try not to sigh. “Like this?”
“Perfect!” she beams down at me, and it should make me feel warm. Instead, all I can think about is the way her smile looks nothing like Micah’s.
I swallow that thought down and focus on untangling the fairy lights. The bass from someone’s pre-party playlist rattles the floorboards, and a couple of her friends weave past me in sequined dresses, laughing as they take shots in the kitchen.
Jasmine hops down and dusts glitter off her hands. “I love when you’re here,” she says, slipping her arm around my waist like we’re in some perfect college romance montage. “It feels like… I don’t know. Like we’re really doing this again and we’ve got our spark back.”
Her words hit me right in the ribs. Our spark.
I force a nod, leaning down to brush a kiss against her temple. “Yeah. Feels good.”
It doesn’t. Not really. Because every time her perfume hits me, my brain flickers somewhere else. To a football field two years ago. To a smirk I can’t forget. To the way I had to bite my lip earlier just to keep from saying another man’s name.
The party starts, and the house fills with music, laughter, and the smell of spiked punch.
Jasmine’s flushed and gorgeous, mask glittering under the string lights as she pulls me into the throng of people.
She loops her arms around my neck, body pressed to mine and, for a second, I try—God, I really try—to be here. To be hers.
But my chest feels tight. My hands on her hips feel like someone else’s. And when she tilts her face up to kiss me, my stomach knots because I know exactly whose mouth I wish I was tasting.
“Come on,” she giggles against my lips. “Dance with me.”
We dance and party for what feels like hours.
She’s drunk now, tipsy and handsy, and her friends whistle when she tugs me up the stairs. I follow, heart sinking. I help her into her room, take off her heels, and tuck her beneath the soft pink blanket she bought over summer break.
“Stay,” she murmurs, eyes heavy, fingers catching my wrist. “You never stay anymore.”
The words cut deep, guilt slicing me open.
I kiss her forehead, my voice rough. “Sleep, Jas. I’ll check on you in the morning.”
Her lashes flutter, and she pouts up at me, lips glossy in the soft glow of her bedside lamp. “Or…” Her voice is a slurred whisper. “You could get in. With me.”
My stomach knots. “Jas?—”
She scoots toward the wall, patting the empty space beside her. “C’mon, Colton. You’re so warm. And I miss you. You used to…” she trails off into a sleepy giggle, reaching for my shirt to tug me closer. “You used to always stay. Always touch me.”
The guilt hits like a punch to the chest. She’s right. I used to. And now, even when I do, my brain is a thousand miles away.
“Not tonight,” I murmur, crouching by the bed to ease her hand off my shirt. “You’re drunk, Jas. You’ll thank me in the morning.”
She makes a frustrated sound and flops onto her back, hair fanning across the pillow. “I want you now.”
God, she’s beautiful. Sweet. Trusting. And I am the worst kind of liar.
I stand quickly, before my resolve breaks, before I do something even crueler than I already have. “Sleep. Please.”
Her lower lip wobbles in a half-pout, half-sleepy smile. “You’re no fun anymore.”
The words shouldn’t hurt. They do anyway.
I force a soft chuckle and step toward the door. “I’ll check on you later.”
By the time I close it behind me, my chest feels as if it’s caving in. My hands are shaking. My legs move automatically down the hall, past the noise of the party, until I’m out the front door and into the cold night.
The air bites at my skin, but it’s still not enough to quiet the echo of her voice.
You never stay anymore.
I want you now.
I grip my phone, even before I’ve unlocked it. Because I already know what I’m going to do. I’m going to check the app. I’m going to look for Smoke. I’m going to do the exact thing that makes me the kind of guy she doesn’t deserve.