Chapter 8 #2
"Too late," Kane says, already walking toward the door. "Party's starting."
Twenty minutes later I'm sweating inside ten pounds of foam and fake leaves.
The Tree head bobs dangerously every time I walk.
Everywhere I go people cheer.
Because drunk college students love mascots.
Someone hands me a drink.
I pretend to sip.
Another guy throws beads around my neck.
Someone shouts, "TREE! TREE! TREE!"
This is my life now.
I'm halfway through regretting every decision that led me here when I see her.
Stella.
Across the backyard near the fire pit.
Hair pulled up tonight, soft tendrils escaping around her face and curling against the back of her neck like an invitation. Oversized sweater slipping off one shoulder — that shoulder, bare and golden in the firelight. A can of fizzy water in her hand while everyone else is pounding beer.
Still Stella.
Still the only person in the crowd not trying to be part of the crowd.
My chest tightens in a way that has nothing to do with ten pounds of foam.
She hasn't seen me.
Perfect.
I shuffle closer in full mascot glory.
She glances up.
Then laughs.
Actually laughs — head tipping back, throat exposed, the kind of laugh that punches me somewhere low and warm.
"Well," she says, raising her can slightly, "you're committed to the bit."
The voice inside the Tree is muffled enough that she can't recognize it.
I nod dramatically.
Someone in the crowd shouts, "Give her a dance, Tree!"
Bad idea.
I do it anyway.
I throw my fake leafy arms up and start dancing like an absolute idiot.
The crowd explodes.
Someone blasts music from a speaker.
"STELLA GETTING A LAP DANCE FROM THE TREE!" someone yells.
Her face turns bright red — all the way down to that bare shoulder.
"Oh my God," she groans, covering her face with one hand.
But she's laughing.
Really laughing.
I exaggerate the moves just to make her giggle harder. Just to watch her shoulders shake. Just to see her eyes crinkle at the corners like that.
Worth every ounce of humiliation.
I press a finger to where my lips are inside the costume.
Shhh.
Then I beckon.
Come with me.
She hesitates — just long enough for me to feel it in my ribs.
Then curiosity wins.
"Fine," she mutters. "But if you murder me in the woods this will be very embarrassing for everyone involved."
The crowd hoots.
"STELLA'S LEAVING WITH THE TREE!"
"Didn't go for a man so she went for a furry!"
"NEW FETISH UNLOCKED!"
She flips them off over her shoulder without even looking back.
I guide her toward the darker edge of the property where the trees thicken and the party noise fades into distant bass.
The night air is cooler here. Softer.
Fireflies flicker between branches like someone scattered sparks across the dark.
She leans against a real tree, still giggling, cheeks still flushed from the fire and the laughing — and God, she's beautiful like this. Unguarded. Warm. That sweater still hanging off her shoulder like it's been trying to fall all night.
"Okay, Tree," she says, breathless. "You win. That was funny."
I pull the mascot head off.
Her eyes go wide.
Then she bursts out laughing all over again — this time softer, more surprised, more real.
"It's you."
Leaves fall from my shoulders as I push the costume down. My hair is a disaster. I'm sweating. I look absolutely unhinged.
She's still laughing.
"You're ridiculous," she says.
"You liked it."
Her smile lingers. Shifts into something quieter.
That's the thing.
She did.
Because for a moment she saw something she didn't expect from me. Not the serious player. Not the guy in the headlines. Just someone willing to look completely, thoroughly stupid to make her laugh.
"You take yourself so seriously," she says softly, studying my face in the shadow and flickering light. "I didn't know you could be… this."
"Embarrassing?"
"Playful."
The word settles between us like something delicate.
The firelight from the party bleeds through the branches behind her, catching the loose strands of hair at her temples, the curve of her bare shoulder, the soft rise and fall of her chest.
Her eyes look darker out here.
Warmer.
Dangerous.
"I missed that laugh," I admit.
Her smile fades just a little — not gone, just changed. Tilted into something more honest.
"So did I."
The space between us vanishes like it was never there.
My hand finds her jaw before I've consciously decided to move — thumb grazing her cheekbone, slow and deliberate, asking without a single word. Her skin is warm and impossibly soft and I feel her exhale tremble just slightly under my touch.
She doesn't pull back.
She leans into it — eyes dropping half-shut, lips parting on a soft inhale that steals every coherent thought I have left.
Then I kiss her.
And holy hell.
It's not just a kiss. It's never been just a kiss with her — but this, out here in the dark with fireflies and distant bass and her back against the bark and my hand cradling her face like she's something I'm terrified of dropping — this is something else entirely.
Her mouth is warm velvet and sweet sparkling water and something underneath both of those things that tastes dangerously, recklessly like forever.
The second her lips move against mine — slow at first, testing, remembering — I feel it everywhere at once.
A rush of heat floods my chest, my stomach, lower.
My toes curl inside the stupid mascot feet.
Her tongue brushes mine, tentative and then suddenly bold, and a low groan tears from my throat before I can swallow it back.
She makes a soft sound against my mouth in response.
That sound nearly destroys me.
I deepen the kiss — tilting her head just enough to take more, to fit my mouth more perfectly against hers — and she melts into me like she's been waiting for exactly this angle.
Her fingers curl into the front of my shirt, fisting the fabric tight, pulling me closer even as her spine arches gently back against the tree.
Every slow slide of her lips against mine sends heat skittering down my spine, pooling low and urgent.
Every tiny whimper she can't quite hold back makes my pulse stutter.
She tastes like summer nights and second chances and every single thing I've been starving for since the moment I met her.
My free hand finds her waist — just above the hem of her sweater, fingertips brushing the warm strip of skin there — and she shivers. Not from cold. I feel the shiver travel through her whole body like I plucked a string.
I slide my palm flat against the small of her back and pull, and she comes willingly, completely, chest pressing to mine with a soft exhale that I swallow whole.
Her hands uncurl from my shirt and travel upward — fingers skimming my jaw, my neck, threading into my hair with a tentative grip that tightens the longer we kiss.
Like she's anchoring herself. Like she doesn't trust her own legs.
Good. Mine aren't doing much better.
Her mouth is soft and plush and so impossibly responsive — every time I slow down she chases it, every time I press deeper she sighs into me — and it is driving me completely, exquisitely insane.
I'm coming undone at every seam and being reassembled into something entirely new, something that only makes sense when her lips are moving against mine like this.
My cock strains against my shorts. Thank fuck she can’t feel how hard she makes me, the tree costume makes sure of that.
She’s strong as hell but with me she becomes a frightened little bird, waiting t flee at the first sign of unrestrained passion.
I love the chase— but I don’t want her to fly away on me again.
When we finally break apart we're both breathing hard.
Her lips are swollen and glistening. Cheeks flushed deep rose. Eyes heavy-lidded and dark, glassy with the same heat still burning through my bloodstream. Her fingers are still tangled loosely in my hair.
Neither of us moves.
The fireflies drift between the branches.
The bass pulses faint and far away.
"Tree disguise," she murmurs, voice low and husky and completely undone, "might be the weirdest way you've ever kissed me."
I grin — forehead still resting against hers, thumb stroking slow across her bottom lip because I physically cannot stop touching her, because her mouth is swollen from kissing me and I want to catalogue every detail of this moment until it's permanent.
"Worth it."
She laughs softly.
And for the first time since I crashed back into her universe—she doesn't look like she regrets me being here.
I let her go first.
She walks back toward the party lights, brushing her fingers over her mouth like she can still feel the kiss there.
Hell, I can still feel it.
Her lips looked a little swollen when she turned back once, smiling to herself before disappearing into the glow of the fire pit and music.
I lean back against the tree trunk and drag a hand over my face.
“Yeah,” I mutter to myself. “I’m gonna need a minute.”
The mascot suit rustles when I shift, the stupid foam branches brushing my shoulders. I glance down at the ridiculous costume and shake my head.
Of all the ways to get a girl back.
Apparently the Stanford Tree works.
I shove the mascot head back under my arm and step out of the trees once my pulse finally settles.
The party noise swells again the closer I get — bass thumping, people shouting, the fire crackling.
And then I see Kane.
He’s standing near the edge of the crowd, leaning against the fence with that calm expression he wears when he’s thinking too much.
His eyes slide past me.
Then past the stupid tree suit.
Then land on Stella across the yard.
She’s laughing at something Delia says, but the look in her eyes is… different.
Softer.
Like she just stepped out of a secret.
Kane notices it too.
He looks back at me slowly.
Then at the mascot head under my arm.
His mouth tilts.
“You seduced her,” he says flatly.
I blink.
“Wearing the tree.”
I shrug one shoulder.
He studies me another second, then exhales through his nose.
“I didn’t think Stella would be that easy.”
My head snaps up.
“Easy?” I repeat.
He raises his hands slightly.
“You know what I mean.”
“No,” I say sharply. “I don’t.”
My grip tightens around the mascot head.
“Because if she were easy,” I add, voice lowering, “you would’ve gotten somewhere by now.”
The words land harder than I intend.
Kane’s eyebrows rise.
I shove the ridiculous foam tree head into his chest.
“Here,” I mutter. “Guess this was the missing ingredient.”
He catches it automatically.
“Whoa,” he says. “Easy, man.”
The music fades behind the rush in my ears.
“I thought we agreed,” he says carefully, “best man wins.”
“Yeah,” I say.
My jaw tightens.
“Doesn’t mean I have to love the idea of you trying to touch my girl.”
Kane goes very still.
“Your girl?” he repeats.
A beat passes.
Then he huffs out a short laugh.
“Our girl, you mean.”
A couple guys nearby glance over.
The tension isn’t subtle anymore.
Someone nudges someone else.
The word spreads quick when athletes start posturing.
I notice the shift immediately.
The attention.
The phones.
Not again.
I run a hand through my hair and take a step back.
“Nope,” I mutter.
Kane watches me carefully.
“I’m out.”
I scan the yard until I find Stella again.
She’s standing near the fire with her teammates.
I raise my voice slightly.
“Stell.”
She looks up.
“You want a ride home?”
The party quiets a little around us.
Everyone waiting.
Stella glances around at the crowd, then back at me.
Her cheeks flush faintly.
“No,” she says softly. “I’m good here.”
Then she adds with a teasing half-smile,
“I’ve got a ride, Ace.”
Ace.
The nickname the team started using for me during practice.
Kane smirks beside me.
My fists clench.
Unclench.
Because every instinct in my body is screaming to go full caveman right now.
To grab her hand, pull her out of the party, make it clear who she belongs with.
But that’s exactly the kind of move that blew everything up last time.
So instead I step back.
Hands up in surrender.
“Your call.”
The crowd slowly relaxes when it becomes obvious no one’s about to throw a punch.
I glance once more at Stella.
Then turn and head for the street.
The night air is cooler out here.
Behind me I can feel both of their eyes on my back.
And for the first time all night, the music fades into something quieter.
Because wanting her is easy.
Respecting her choice?
That’s the hard part.
And if I’m going to win her for real—
I’m going to have to prove I can do both.