23. Jordan
JORDAN
Liam disappeared after practice and hasn’t come back to the dorms yet. He was late again and just a total mess. I don’t get it. These streaks of hot and cold are throwing the team for a loop. We get in a nice groove with him, and then BAM, he’s late or having a bad day, and we all have to readjust.
I came back to the dorm thinking he’d be here beating himself up about it, but it’s been hours, and he’s not here and not answering my texts. Jenkins came over with his teammate Warren and Warren’s girlfriend, Regina. We’re playing video games when there’s a knock at the door.
“Are you expecting someone?” Jenkins asks.
“No.”
“Go away,” he yells in the direction of the door.
“Nice,” I say, and then call louder than he did. “Door’s open.”
No one enters. I wait for another knock. Nothing. I put down the controller. I wouldn’t normally bother checking. In fact, it’s only the thought that it’s Liam on the other side, too drunk to work the door handle, that gets me to my feet and across the room.
A lot of athletes are still here over break, but the hallway lights are dim, and it’s quieter on the floor than during the semester. I notice all of this because the girl in front of me is a shock.
Daisy’s face is red from the cold. She’s bundled up in a coat and hat that puts all the focus on her face and those big blue eyes that seem even brighter in this dark hallway.
“You’re not Liam.” That’s what I say. It’s all I seem capable of getting out of my mouth as I stare at her.
“Surprise!” Her smile is small and forced—hesitant. “Hi.”
I’m still a little thrown that she’s really here, and I don’t move or say anything for too long. Regina’s laughter breaks the silence. That moves me to action because instantly I can see the wheels turning in Daisy’s head and her jumping to the wrong conclusion.
She takes a step back. “I’m sorry for showing up like this. You’re obviously busy. I was trying to be spontaneous. I’ll text you like a normal person.”
She ducks her head and actually takes off down the hallway.
A laugh breaks free from my chest, and I take off after her, grabbing her around the waist.
“You’re fast.”
“Humiliation is a great motivator,” she mumbles, and tries to keep moving forward. “Let me go. I’ll text you later.”
“But then I can’t see your face when I tell you that I missed you.”
She stops struggling and turns her head to look me in the eye. “You did?”
“Yeah. I did.” It’s true, too. I don’t think I even realized how much until I saw her. Everything just feels better when she’s around. Liam disappearing after practice has me worried, but here she shows up, and it soothes something inside of me.
I take her hand and tug her back toward my room.
“Are you sure?” she asks before I push open the door. I’m not sure what she thinks she’s walking into, but I’m not the kind of asshole she obviously thinks I am.
“Positive.”
Inside, she glances around and visibly relaxes at the scene in front of her. Warren’s girl is halfway on his lap as they stare at the screen.
Jenkins looks up first. “Hey, Daisy, right?”
She nods and waves. “Hi.”
“That’s Warren and Regina.” I point as I introduce them.
“Hi,” Regina says. Warren tips his head.
“Do you want something to drink?” I go to the mini fridge.
“Water is fine.”
I grab her one and take a seat on the chair, beckoning her to sit on my lap. She’s all bundled up and the cold from outside is radiating off her.
I’m still a little stunned, so I just wrap my arms around her.
“Why’d you think I was Liam? He’s not here?”
I shake my head. “No. He disappeared after practice.”
“Uh-oh. That doesn’t sound good.” I can barely hear her over Jenkins’ smack talk to Warren.
I lean closer. “Practice was pretty awful.”
Her response gets lost in another wave of noise, but her mouth turns down in a sympathetic frown. I stand with her, and we go into my room. After kicking the door closed behind us, I flop down on the bed and hold my arms out. She sits on the edge of the mattress, looking all unsure and adorable.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” I say, dropping my hands around her.
“I wouldn’t be if I’d thought it through. I should have realized you’d be hanging with friends.”
“You’re a friend.” I hook a finger through a belt loop on her jeans. The denim gaps around her hip bone. I don’t pull, but she leans into me anyway.
“Is that what I am?”
She smiles as I bring my mouth to hers. Has it only been a little more than a week? Damn. I missed her lips.
“Hello, friend,” I tease and sweep my tongue against hers.
Most of the time, when girls start trying to have the what do we mean to each other conversation, it freaks me out.
I’m not anti-girlfriend, exactly. I did it once, and it didn’t work out, but that isn’t why I haven’t seriously dated since.
The truth is, I like hanging with my friends and doing what I want without worrying about another person.
With Daisy, though, I don’t get the feeling that she’s trying to trap me into a label, so much as she’s taunting me.
She’s supposed to end up with someone smarter, nicer, just generally better.
Someone like Liam. Fuck, they’d probably already be an item if I hadn’t interfered.
The thought places an uncomfortable weight on my chest.
She places a hand softly on my side. Unassuming and tentative, she’s slow to touch me, like the week apart has made her more unsure. I tug her down on me and encourage her with deep, hungry kisses that only show her a fraction of how much I missed her—missed this.
My phone vibrates in my pocket, and I groan because I know I have to check it in case it’s Liam. I dig it out without breaking the kiss.
“Is it him?” Daisy asks, pulling back.
“No. Still nothing.” As a last-ditch effort, I texted some guys from class that I thought might be around, but no one’s seen him.
Daisy leans over my outstretched legs and props herself up on an elbow. “I’m sure he’s around somewhere. Where would he go? Bar? McCallum’s apartment?”
Damn, she looks good laid across my bed.
I settle a hand on her hip and up the curve of her stomach. “He’s not at either of those places. Or The White House. I’ve texted everyone that’s in town. No one’s seen him.”
“You’re really worried about him?” It isn’t a question so much as her pointing out a fact she just discerned. Her brows pinch together.
“It isn’t like him to go off the grid.”
“Yeah. That doesn’t sound like him.” She gets that contemplative look like she does when she’s studying. She stands and moves to the door. When she opens it, she looks back at me. “Are you coming or what?”
“Where are we going?” And how do I get her back on my bed?
“To find Liam.”
Campus is a graveyard. I pull the hood up on my sweatshirt, and Daisy zips up her coat and shoves her hands in her pockets.
“Any other ideas where he might have gone?” she asks.
“Not really.”
“Where are his favorite places?”
“I don’t know. The arena.”
“Did you check there?”
I hang my head, and Daisy laughs. “We’ll go there first.”
Damn. It never even occurred to me that he might have stayed at the rink, but it makes sense. It’s a good ten-minute walk to the arena, and we move slowly.
“Did you have a nice time at home?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she answers immediately and then adds, “I was kind of bored.”
I can almost picture Daisy sitting all alone in a room with her sketchbook.
“My parents aren’t evil or anything.” Soft laughter falls from her lips. “I realize I might have made them out to be awful, and they aren’t.”
I hold her hand, swinging it lightly between us. “I don’t think that.”
“I don’t want to be like them,” she says. “Someday, when I have a house, I want it to be loud and chaotic. That’s my favorite part of living with Vi, Dahlia, and Jane. It’s never completely silent.”
My mouth hitches up with a smile. “You like loud, huh?”
She nods.
We’ve reached the arena. I tip my head back into the still night and shout as loud as I can, “Daiiiissy!”
She’s laughing when I pull her against me. Her nose is cold against my face as I kiss her.
“You’re cold.” I slide my hands under her coat and shirt. She inhales sharply as my freezing fingers walk up her sides.
“So are you. We should go inside.”
I pin her against the building, kissing her until we’re breathless, and the only next step is getting naked. I’m so hard it’s painful.
“I want you.”
“I want you too.” The words fall from her trembling lips. “We should hurry and find Liam.”
Not a lot I wouldn’t agree to right now if it clears the path for sex at the end of the night. I swipe my access card and hold open the door for her. The arena is silent. I check the locker room first, shaking my head at Daisy when I come out.
“He’s not on the ice either,” she says. “Is there somewhere else here?”
“No.”
We walk down the tunnel to take another look anyway. I glance around at the empty seats. Daisy leans into me. The pressure of her small body against mine is a comfort.
“We’ll find him.” She links her arm through mine.
We check the weight room and then head back out into the cold. I hold on to Daisy’s hand, swinging our arms lightly, as we make our way back to the heart of campus.
“What made you decide to come back to Valley so early? Besides boredom, of course.”
“Hmm. I’m not sure.” She smiles like we’re in on the same secret, then her eyes widen. “Oh my gosh. Do you not remember asking me to come back?”
“Uhhh…”
She groans and mutters something about being embarrassed as she tries to hurry off again. This time I have her by the hand, so she doesn’t get far.
“What did I say, and when did I say it?”
She faces me, avoiding eye contact. “The night before Christmas Eve.”
“I talked to you on the twenty-third?” I was wasted that entire day simultaneously trying to remember Mark and forget the horrors of the day. I definitely don’t remember talking to Daisy.
“Yes. You were at someone’s house. You didn’t know whose.”
“And I asked you to come back early?”
“Yeah, in hindsight, it’s obvious you were drunk and not thinking clearly.”