Hot Mother Pucker (Hollis U #3)

Blake

“Dude. Why do you keep looking at Briar?”

I tear my gaze away from my best friend and glance down at the beer in my hand. “I’m not.”

I’m lying. Of course I’m staring at her.

And of course my teammate, Nick St. George, picked up on it. He’s been giving me shit about how I’ve been keeping tabs on her the whole night.

I can’t help it though. She’s standing in the corner with some guy I don’t recognize, and I can tell she’s uncomfortable.

She’s nodding along with whatever he’s saying, but her smile is forced. Her arms are crossed. She never crosses her arms unless she’s disinterested or uneasy. And every time he leans in to close the space between them, she takes a step back.

The urge to march over there and tell him to back the fuck off hits me hard, but I hold it in. She hasn’t looked over at me yet. If she needs help, she’ll let me know. She always does.

“You’re acting like her bodyguard,” Nick says.

I sip my beer. “I’m just trying to look out for her.”

He shakes his head as he scans the crowded house party. My housemates Nick, Travis, and Leo, and I are throwing a back-to-school party at our place on the edge of the Hollis U campus. It’s the start of our senior year, and we’re throwing a rager to kick off our last year of college.

“You’ve been death-glaring that guy the entire time he’s been talking to her. You’re coming off like a crazy jealous boyfriend,” Nick says.

“I’m not her boyfriend.”

He flashes a shit-eating smirk. “But you wanna be.”

I roll my eyes, annoyed. “No, I don’t.”

“You’re a shitty liar, man.” He laughs.

I don’t say anything. Because he’s right.

I have a massive crush on Briar. I have ever since we met in high school and became friends.

We were paired together as lab partners in biology class freshman year, and bonded over the fact that we both sucked at science and loved the show Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

I was instantly attracted to her. Any guy would be. She was funny and sweet and smart. And beautiful.

Her long, honey blonde hair falls to the middle of her back in soft waves, and her eyes are the most mesmerizing color I’ve ever seen: green with a burst of gold in the middle. And her mouth is so damn cute. Lush and pouty too.

Nick elbows me. “You’re staring again. Creeper.”

I tear my gaze away from her, look over at the TV, and pretend to be interested in the football game playing on the screen.

He’s right. It’s creepy as fuck that I’m gawking at her, thinking about how pretty she is, when she’s made it crystal clear that she doesn’t see me as anything other than a friend.

I think back to all those times I tried and failed to work up the nerve to ask her out in high school. How I was finally going to tell her I liked her and then ask her to go to the winter formal dance with me freshman year…but then some guy in her French class asked her out before I could.

I kept my feelings quiet the whole time they dated. When they broke up months later, I took her out for tacos to cheer her up. And then, as we sat in the restaurant together, she looked at me and said, “You’re like a brother to me, Blake. Thank you for being the best friend I could ever ask for.”

Despite how disappointed I felt, I just smiled and said, “I’ll always be your friend, Briar.”

And that was that. I buried my crush. Yeah, it sucked that she wasn’t interested in anything more, but that was okay. I’m more than happy just to be her best friend.

And being Briar’s best friend means looking out for her at parties where weirdo guys try to hit on her.

“She’s new at Hollis. She doesn’t know anyone,” I say to Nick. “I don’t want to be a jerk and make her fend for herself in a room full of strangers.”

I direct my gaze back at Briar. When she finally looks at me, I arch my right eyebrow at her. It’s the signal we came up with years ago—my silent way of checking in with her.

She nods twice. That protective feeling swoops through me, and I walk over to her.

When I slide my arm around her, she beams. Her eyes sparkle as she gazes up at me.

“Hey, you,” she says.

“Hey, baby doll.”

She purses her lips like she’s trying not to laugh.

I lift my shoulder in a small shrug. This is a thing we do sometimes.

Whenever a guy is hitting on her, and she’s not interested, I look over at her to check on her.

If she nods twice, I pretend to be her boyfriend and make the guy go away.

And I always use a different pet name for her every time.

The guy hitting on her looks between the two of us. His shoulders sink in disappointment.

“I didn’t know you had a boyfriend,” he mutters.

She offers a polite smile. “Yeah. Sorry.” She tucks her hair behind her ear. “I would have mentioned it, but you were really passionate about that documentary you were telling me about. I didn’t want to interrupt.”

He frowns. “I’ll, uh, leave you two alone.”

He walks off, and I look down at Briar.

Her mouth tilts up in an amused smile. “Baby doll?”

I grin. “What’s wrong with baby doll?”

The bridge of her cute, ski-slope nose wrinkles. “It sounds so old-fashioned.”

“It was the best I could come up with. I’ve already used the most common pet names. Honey, baby, darling, sweetie, cutie.”

She chuckles. “Okay, yeah, you definitely get points for originality.”

I notice her cup is empty. “Want another beer?”

She nods. We walk into the kitchen, and I grab a can from the fridge.

“So what documentary was he telling you about?” I ask as I fill her cup.

She leans against the counter and groans. “I don’t remember the name. It was about cryptocurrency.”

I burst out laughing. “Seriously?”

She nods and thanks me when I hand over her drink. She takes a sip. “I don’t even remember half of what he said. It was so boring. I’m pretty sure my eyes glazed over at one point.”

“It didn’t look like he even asked you anything.”

Her smile turns teasing. “You were watching me for a while, weren’t you?”

Heat climbs up my face. She’s gonna think I’m so creepy for doing that.

I shake my head, but she just giggles and pats my arm. “I’m glad you were keeping an eye on me. You’re such a good friend, Blake. Seriously.”

That embarrassed feeling fades. “It’s no big deal.”

She squeezes my arm. “It is though. You’re amazing. You could be partying with your teammates, but instead, you’re making sure I’m okay. On top of that, you’ve been letting me stay in your bedroom this past week.”

Briar’s new apartment fell through at the last minute, so I offered to let her stay here for free while she looks for a place to live.

I tilt my head at her. “You’d do the same for me if I were in a bind.”

“You’re right. I absolutely would. And once I find a new apartment and move in, you’re welcome to crash on my couch any time. Or hey, I’ll let you sleep in my bed while I take the couch. It’s only fair since that's exactly what you’re doing for me.”

She looks into the crowded living room. “Actually, what are you going to do tonight? You can’t sleep on the couch when there’s a party going on.”

I reach up and stretch my arm over my head. “I’ve got an air mattress that I can inflate. I’ll sleep in the closet.”

She shoves my arm. “Blake, don’t be ridiculous. I’m not going to make you sleep in your own closet.”

I raise my eyebrow at her. “You’re not making me do anything. I’m offering.”

She bites back a sweet smile that makes my chest do funny things. I clear my throat.

“You can put the air mattress on the floor of your bedroom, okay?” she says.

I study her expression. “You sure you’d be comfortable with that?”

She nods. For a moment, I think about asking her again, just to make sure, but I don’t want to fuss over her. She hates that.

But I need to make sure she’s not just saying this to be polite. Especially after how things ended with her ex.

I don’t know the details. She won’t tell me, and I don’t want to push her.

All I know is that she dropped out of her program at Chicago University in the middle of last semester after breaking up with her ex, Logan.

He was a hockey player, and they had been going out for a few months.

I never met him, but when Briar and I would text and talk on the phone, she said he was a good guy and that she liked him a lot.

But then, one night a few months ago, she called me in tears, saying they had broken up.

I asked her what happened, but all she said was that she didn’t want to be around him anymore, and that she quit school because she wanted a fresh start.

I tried to get her to tell me more, but she didn’t want to talk about it.

She just wanted to move on and forget about Logan.

So she transferred to Hollis and hasn’t brought him up since.

I haven’t either. But my gut tells me he did something terrible to her. I’ve never heard her that upset before.

I notice she’s different around men now. She’s quieter and keeps her distance whenever she’s around a guy she doesn’t know.

That protective feeling inside of me morphs into something sharper, angrier. No one’s ever going to make her feel that way while I’m around.

But I don’t want to make her uncomfortable after what she went through with her ex. I don’t want to push her boundaries by making her sleep in the same room as me.

When she looks up at me, her gaze is warm. There’s no trace of fear or stress in her expression.

“You’re my best friend, Blake. Of course it’s fine for us to sleep in the same room together.”

Relief washes over me. “Okay.”

Nick pops his head into the kitchen. “Hey. You guys wanna play beer pong?”

We follow him into the living room. In the middle of the game, my phone buzzes with an alert. I pull it out and see a slew of new comments on my latest post on Instagram.

I hide my smile. I don’t want anyone to notice my reaction and ask why I look so happy. I don’t want anyone to know about my Instagram account. It’s my biggest secret.

I skim the comments.

I like hot shirtless men, and I cannot lie.

A hot guy with a six-pack AND a happy trail? YES PLEASE

OMG those forearms! YUM!

So, um, new kink unlocked. Sexy shirtless guy who doesn’t show his face? HOLY HOTNESS.

I check my follower count and see that I’m almost to one hundred thousand followers.

My biggest secret? I have a sexy social media account where I post shirtless photos and videos of myself.

I never show my face. I crop it out of the photos, or I pose so my body is only visible from the neck down.

Sometimes I wear a helmet because apparently, that’s a big turn-on for a lot of people.

I guess it’s a popular trope in a lot of romance books, which is cool.

I’ll admit, it’s kind of weird that I do this. But it’s also a lot of fun. I’m comfortable with my body, and I work hard to keep in good shape. Why not flaunt it a little? And make some money too.

This all happened by accident. I posted a shirtless photo of myself on the beach freshman year on my personal account and got hundreds of likes.

And then some men’s underwear brand slid into my DMs asking if I’d be interested in modeling their boxer briefs on social media.

The amount of money they offered made my eyes pop.

I said yes immediately, made a new account—@thatshirtlessguy—and posted a bunch of photos of me wearing their boxer briefs.

I always made sure to leave out my face so I could be anonymous.

In just a few days, I had thousands of likes and followers.

I kept getting DMs from brands asking me to model their stuff. Watches, underwear, protein powder. I said yes to it all because hell yeah, I want to make easy money. And I want to do something good with it.

I put my phone away to line up a shot in beer pong. I sink it in and laugh as Nick mutters a curse word before guzzling down the beer from the cup. Then I check my bank account balance on my phone.

Almost a hundred thousand dollars.

Excitement flickers inside of me when I think about my plan for this money. I’m going to surprise my parents and pay off their mortgage. It’ll be my way of thanking them for all the sacrifices they made so I could play hockey.

Hockey is an insanely expensive sport—a rich kid’s sport. I’m not rich, though. Not even close.

My family is working class. Both my parents worked long hours at multiple jobs for years to pay for my gear, league fees, training camps, and extra lessons.

Both of them drive old cars that should have been replaced years ago.

They haven’t been on a vacation in years.

They even took out a second mortgage on their house.

They used all their money to make sure that I had a shot at my dream—to play hockey professionally.

And now, it’s finally happening. Last semester, I got drafted by the Nashville Wolves. After I graduate, I’ll start playing for them. My biggest dream will finally come true because of my parents.

And I want to give them something in return for all they gave to me.

Briar nudges me, and I slide my phone back in my pocket. “You’re up. You sink this shot, and we win the game,” she says.

Nick looks at me and flashes that cocky smile. “No way you’re making this, Morrissey.”

I toss the ball. It lands straight into the cup. He laughs and groans. “Fuck!” he yells before downing the beer in the cup.

Briar jumps up and down and claps, then high-fives me. “Nicely done!”

“Couldn’t have done it without you.”

She laughs. “You made most of our shots. We won because of you.”

I shake my head. “I play the best when you’re my partner. Always.”

She bites back a smile. For a split second, I wonder what she’d think if she knew I had a secret sexy account.

Would she even care? Briar’s such a kind and open person.

I know she wouldn’t judge me for it. She’d probably think it’s funny that her best guy friend posts sexy photos of himself and gets money for it.

She might even be weirded out. I’m like a brother to her after all.

She finishes her drink and sets the empty red Solo cup on the table. When her stomach growls loudly, she blushes.

I chuckle. “You hungry?”

“I should probably eat something after all that beer.”

I set down my cup and grab her hand, leading her out of the crowded house.

“Where are we going?” she asks when we’re walking down the porch stairs.

“To get you some tacos.”