Chapter 7 Roscoe
These fucking idiots.
“So, let me get this straight. You’re fake dating her too?” Carson’s eyes are full of excitement and barely contained glee.
“Yeah,” Owen says, wiping the sweat off his brow as we enter the locker room. Practice was brutal today, and Coach wasn’t thrilled with our distracted QB’s performance on the field. “The prick loser showed up at her apartment unannounced, and she cozied up to me like she didn’t hate my guts.”
“This is great news!” Carson begins stripping out of his sweat-drenched gear, leaving him in his boxers. He starts pacing the floor, hands on his hips. “That means we just need to get that loser over there his own fake dating moment, then maybe we can make this a real thing.”
Shooting him a murderous look, which earns me the middle finger in return, I decide to ignore them as they engage in a serious discussion about how to win over our sworn enemy.
It’s like they’ve completely forgotten how she detested us in high school.
Forgotten how she would go out of her way to lash out at us with insults, or how she would parade her long line of short-term boyfriends in front of us.
I say short term because I’m pretty sure none of them lasted longer than twenty-four hours max.
Hell, for all I know, she paid them to pretend to date her, which actually makes this current situation all the more ironic.
I’m staring at my phone screen, scrolling through the latest posts, when a new one pops up.
Looks like we’re all fucked regardless because the town gossip has latched onto the fake dating story and blown it wide open.
A small childish part of me wants to stomp my foot in protest or throw my phone across the room, but I have way more self-control than that.
Instead, I drop onto the bench, quietly set my phone down, and cross my arms so I can glare at the two numbnuts acting like they actually have a chance with Annika Fucking Reed.
“So we play up the fake boyfriends thing, using everything in our power to show her how great being our real girlfriend could be. Sounds foolproof to me.”
“Fool-ish is more like it,” I grumble.
Carson waves me off. “Don’t mind him. We’ve got this, bro, and when Nik jumps into our arms, we’ll see who has the last laugh.”
“It’s like you guys have forgotten one very important piece of this complicated puzzle.”
Owen’s serious stare finds mine. “What do you mean?”
“Did y’all forget about Dre?”
“That’s just a bunch of gibberish…” Carson grins, playfully rapping the lyrics to the Dr. Dre song.
Owen rolls his eyes. “No. We didn’t forget about him. That’s the second part of the plan that we haven’t discussed yet—how to get past her protective guard dog. Any ideas?”
Tapping my phone with my pointer finger, I say, “Best think of something quick. Word is already starting to spread.”
Their combined groans fill the room.
It’s my turn to roll my eyes. “I’d say you have until end of day at best. He’s at practice right now, but once he reads that, I’d bet my entire savings account that he’ll be cornering one of us in the alley, telling us to stay the hell away from his precious baby sister.”
The two share a loaded look, but there’s a sense of something unnameable building inside me.
Anticipation?
Dread?
Fear?
All of the above?
I have no idea. I just know that I need to move. Standing, I head for the shower.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” Owen demands.
“Away from you two idiots,” I mutter, walking into the tiled shower room and dropping my clothes into a pile. Grabbing a towel more angrily than I probably should, I throw it on one of the hooks outside the stalls. “What the fuck were they thinking?”
I mean, I know what they were thinking. Annika Reed was a pretty little thing in high school, and I can only assume she’s stunningly gorgeous now based on the reaction of the two knuckleheads out there.
It’s not like we haven’t had our share of girls over the years, but there’s never been one that’s lured us closer and sunk her claws in deep like Nik.
That girl was always built differently. With brains to back up the beauty and a personality that makes you want to just snatch her up and never let her go even while she curses you out like a sailor, she’s a hard one to forget.
And we never did, not even after her brother fucked it all up with a giant misunderstanding.
He’d always been a little cocky and a bit overbearing when it came to Nik, but that night, he was a bull who’d seen red.
There was no talking sense into him because he wouldn't listen.
By the time all was said and done, he was being carted off by an ambulance with a broken arm while we were reamed out by our football coach and benched for the rest of the season, reprimanded by our parents, and looked at like we were monsters by the girl we were all in love with.
The memory of her face when we walked into school the next day is burned into my retinas.
Her eyes were puffy and red, with dark circles telling us that she hadn’t slept any more than we had the night before.
But it was the pure, unadulterated hatred that had replaced her normally bright smile that drove a stake through my heart.
From that moment on, we were enemy number one, and she never missed an opportunity to remind us.
By the time I’ve scrubbed off the dirt and sweat, gotten dressed in fresh clothes, and grabbed my bag, my mood hasn’t improved at all. I need to get the hell out of here before I say shit that pisses off my two best friends—even if I do seriously want to strangle them right now.
My bike is parked in the lot, and I make it there in record time with absolutely no destination in mind.
The engine roars to life, and I navigate out of the CVU East campus.
For long minutes, I just drive, seeing nothing and no one, so lost in my jumbled confused mess that I don’t notice where I’m going or that I’m slowing down and parking up on the sidewalk along Main Street.
A car horn brings me back to the present, and I find myself staring at the front window of Turn the Page.
Hesitating for all of point-three seconds, I push the door open.
Part of me needs to see the woman the guys can’t get enough of.
Surely, she can’t be that much hotter now.
Not enough to have my brothers stumbling over themselves to be with her.
The other part—that’s mostly in denial—desperately wants to catch a glimpse of the only girl he’s ever really had eyes for.
A group of people are standing at the counter, and a few are over on the left-hand side of the store, scanning the shelves.
There’s no sign of Nik, but the light scent of cherry blossoms lingers in the air.
The memory it unlocks is so visceral that my body reacts despite my every attempt at keeping myself under control.
I might not have ever had her the way Owen did, but I’ve imagined it more times than I can count. Even now, the thought of her long dark hair wrapped around my fist and her pretty milky skin pinkened from my hand has my dick pressing against the soft fabric of my basketball shorts.
“Sorry about the wait. I had to find—”
I don’t hear the rest of what she says since I make a beeline for the small sitting area off to the right.
There’s a table with a stack of books that partially conceals my new hiding place, and I drop into the seat in order to watch her.
I’m sure there’s some flaw or quirk that will shut off the voice in my head that insists my brothers are onto something, that we’re closer than we’ve ever been to getting everything we ever wanted so I need to wake the fuck up.
It damn near killed me the last time she froze us out, and I’m not sure my poor, shriveled-up heart could take another blow.
So I sit and watch as she steps behind the counter, her hair up in a high ponytail, wearing a simple white crop-top tee and jean shorts that make her tanned legs look illegal.
She turns to step behind the counter, gracing me with a view of her ass that has me shifting in my seat because dayum.
Apparently, her tits aren’t the only thing that have filled out. Her curves make my hands want to take a road trip.
Pushing her black-rimmed glasses up her nose, she smiles at the young man and hands him the bag. Something slices through my gut, damn near stealing my breath.
No.
No fucking way could a single smile rock my entire world like that.
There’s gotta be something—some annoying habit or godawful tic that knocks her off this pedestal in my mind.
The other two people pay for their purchases, and the group exits the store. There’s soft music playing in the background, but it isn’t until she starts singing that I recognize the song. There’s nothing I can do but quietly curse because her being so fucking adorable isn’t helping my cause.
“Well, hello there, Sir Hemingway. Come to pillage some of my snacks?”
Her soft giggle echoes through the room, and I adjust my straining dick.
Jesus.
“Cindy had it right, my friend. Girls really do just wanna have fun.” There’s a crinkling of a wrapper, then footsteps head in my direction.
There’s no time to panic or run without being seen, so I sit forward, bracing my elbows on my knees. The scowl I plaster on my face has scared off more than a few interested cheerleaders, so I’m hopeful that it will save me from what is surely about to become a disaster.
“Holy fuckballs!” she screams, clutching a startled Hemingway to her chest.
The little asshole clings to her, hissing at me, before he hops down and runs off—probably to frighten unsuspecting citizens, which is his specialty.
“Jesus. You scared the hell out of me! I had no idea anyone else was in here.”
“Obviously. If there was anyone else left, you would’ve sent them running with that voice of yours.”