Chapter 14 #7
Stella took a sip of her drink, then glanced over at me. “For what it’s worth, I don’t think he meant to hurt you.”
I looked at her. “That is almost never worth what people think it is.”
Her mouth curved faintly. “Fair.”
The waves rushed in, hissing around the sand near our boots before sliding back into the dark.
I stared at the water because looking at her made too many things complicated.
“I stopped wishing longterm Covid on you. That’s progress, right?”
Her laugh was low and surprised. “That might be the most honest thing anyone has said to me all semester.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
“I won’t.”
We stood there another minute, not friends, not enemies, not anything clean enough to name. Just two girls at the edge of a beach party while the men behind us recovered from the devastating realization that women could walk away from them mid-drama.
Then Stella looked past my shoulder.
Her expression shifted.
Not alarmed.
Amused.
“Your boyfriend is coming.”
I did not turn around.
My pulse did, which was irritating.
“He’s not my boyfriend.”
“Right,” she said dryly. “And I’m not emotionally exhausted.”
I glared at the ocean.
The footsteps came closer. Heavy through the sand. Unhurried, but not casual. I knew they were Drew’s before he said a word because apparently my body had started recognizing him like weather too.
“Ladies,” he said behind us.
Stella turned first.
I stayed facing the water, because I was mad and also because I needed one more second before looking at him. Drew after a fight was dangerous. Drew after a win was worse. Drew after nearly fighting Tristan Vale because of me while I wore his jersey?
That was not a man I should look at without supervision.
Stella tipped her can toward him. “Try not to punch anyone in the next twenty minutes, Travers. It was embarrassing.”
Drew was quiet for half a second.
Then, “Noted.”
“It wasn’t even elegant violence.”
“Didn’t realize we were scoring style points.”
“We always are.” Stella stepped back, eyes flicking once between us. “I’m going to rescue Tristan from whatever tragic internal monologue he’s currently drowning in.”
“Good luck,” Drew said.
“I don’t need luck.” Stella glanced at me, and the corner of her mouth lifted. “I need stronger alcohol.”
Against my will, a laugh slipped out.
She looked pleased with herself, which made me like her less again.
Good. Balance restored.
Then she walked away, cutting across the sand toward the bonfire with the kind of composure that made people move without realizing they had moved. Drew and I watched her go for three steps.
Then silence landed.
Heavy.
Ocean in front of us. Fire behind us. The whole beach pretending not to watch.
Drew moved to stand beside me. Close enough that his shoulder almost brushed mine. Close enough that I could smell peppermint on his breath under the beer and bonfire smoke.
Of course he tasted like peppermint after trying to commit felony assault.
Ridiculous man.
“You okay?” he asked.
I laughed once, sharp and humorless. “That’s what you’re opening with?”
“Was going to start with an apology, but you looked like you might throw the can at my head.”
“I still might.”
He nodded. “Fair.”
I finally turned to him.
Mistake.
He stood there in black sweats and a white shirt that clung to him in all the wrong places, hair damp from the locker room and wind-tossed now, jaw tight, mouth serious, shoulders still carrying the fight he had not gotten to finish.
The stadium lights were long gone, but the bonfire lit one side of his face in gold, the other in shadow.
He looked less like campus prime candy and more like trouble with a pulse.
“You cannot do that again,” I said.
His gaze held mine. “I know.”
“No, I need you to actually hear me, Drew. You cannot turn me into the thing men fight over. Not Tristan. Not you. Not anyone.”
His jaw flexed.
“I know.”
“You shoved him.”
“He came at me.”
“Because you shoved him.”
“Because he opened his mouth.”
“Because you opened yours first.”
Drew’s brows pulled together. “Are we doing a legal timeline or a moral one?”
“We are doing the one where you stop acting like I’m property.”
That hit.
Good.
It was supposed to.
His face changed—not anger, exactly. Something sharper and more wounded, gone almost as fast as it appeared.
“You think that’s what that was?”
“I think that’s what it looked like.”
His laugh was short and ugly. “Then everyone on that beach needs glasses.”
“Drew.”
“No.” He stepped closer, then stopped himself, like he remembered my leg, my space, my temper. “I get that I was an ass. I do. But don’t stand there and tell me I was trying to own you.”
I folded my arms, mostly so I would not touch him.
“What were you trying to do?”
His eyes flashed. “I was trying not to let him stand there looking at you like he still gets a vote.”
My throat went tight.
Drew saw it.
Of course he did.
He saw everything when I least wanted to be seen.
“He had his chance,” he said, voice lower now. “He had your attention. Your hope. That careful little smile you use when you’re pretending something doesn’t hurt. He had all that, and he still kept one eye on Stella.”
I looked away first.
Bad move.
Coward move.
Human move.
“He cared about me,” I said, but it came out weaker than I meant it to.
“I know.”
That was worse.
Drew stepped closer again, this time slowly. “I’m not saying he didn’t. I’m saying caring about you didn’t stop him from hurting you.”
The waves rushed in.
Foam curled near my boots.
Something inside me twisted, mean and tender at the same time.
“You don’t get to use his mistakes as your opening,” I whispered.
His mouth hardened. “That what you think I’m doing?”
“I don’t know what you’re doing.”
“That makes two of us.”
The honesty landed too hard.
For a second, neither of us moved.
Behind us, someone whistled. Not at us. Probably at the keg or a stupid dare or one of the players doing something athletic and unnecessary. But the sound reminded me that we were not hidden. Not really.
People were watching.
People were always watching.
Drew’s gaze flicked over my shoulder toward the bonfire.
Then back to me.
The corner of his mouth lifted, but his eyes stayed hot.
“We should kiss and make up,” he said.
I stared at him.
“What?”
“Everyone’s watching.”
“You are unbelievable.”
“Committed to the role.”
“I’m mad at you.”
“I know.”
“You do not get to kiss your way out of this.”
“Wasn’t planning to kiss my way out.” His voice dipped. “Just through.”
A laugh burst out of me because if I didn’t laugh, I was going to combust.
Then I hit his chest.
Not hard.
Not gently either.
My fist landed against solid muscle, and he barely moved. Of course he didn’t. He was built like a wall with dimples. I hit him again because I was embarrassed, furious, confused, and dangerously close to wanting exactly what he had offered.
“You are such an ass,” I said.
His hand closed around my wrist.
Everything stopped.
Drew looked down at my hand against his chest, then back at my face. “I know,” he said again.
This time, his voice was rougher.
I should have pulled away.
I didn’t.
He tugged once.
Just once.
And I went.
He caught me against him, careful of my leg but not careful of anything else. One hand slid to the back of my neck. The other cupped my jaw, fingers spread wide, thumb beneath my cheekbone like he needed to hold my face still so I couldn’t hide from him.
“Drew—”
His mouth covered mine.
The word disappeared.
So did the beach.
For one suspended second, I froze. Pure pride. Pure punishment. Pure reminder that I was angry and he did not get to melt me just because his hands were big and his mouth was unfair and half the athletic department was probably pretending not to watch.
Then his tongue swept against mine.
Hot.
Slow.
Certain.
And my body folded like it had been waiting all night for permission.
A sound slipped out of me before I could stop it.
Soft. Embarrassing. Honest.
Drew heard it.
His grip tightened.
He tasted like peppermint and sin, like beer and victory and bad decisions made in the dark.
The second his mouth opened over mine, that other night came crashing back.
The one I still refused to think about too clearly.
Me with tears in my eyes over Vale. Drew making me feel wanted when I had been humiliated.
Drew’s hands, Drew’s mouth, Drew looking at me like there was nothing almost about the way he wanted me.
This kiss was worse.
Because I was not crying now.
I was not using him to survive someone else.
I was kissing him because I wanted to.
Because I was mad at him.
Because he was mine in public and impossible in private and I had no idea where the performance ended anymore.
His hands moved from my face, down my sides, over the oversized jersey with his name across my back. His palms found my hips.
Then lower.
He cupped my ass and pulled me into him.
Hard.
I gasped against his mouth.
He was already there.
Thick and unmistakable against my stomach, and the knowledge shot heat straight through me so fast my knees nearly forgot their job. Drew made a rough sound low in his throat, like he felt me feel it, like the little hitch in my breath had done something vicious to his self-control.
His mouth left mine only to drag across my jaw.
“Still mad?” he murmured against my skin.
“Yes.”
“Good.”
His teeth grazed the side of my throat.
My fingers fisted in his shirt.
Down the beach, somebody whistled.
Then someone else shouted, “Damn, Travers!”
Laughter scattered around the fire.
The sound snapped reality back into place.
We were outside.
On a beach.
At a party.
In front of people.
I shoved lightly at Drew’s chest, breathless and hot all over. “Drew.”
He lifted his head.
His eyes were dark. Wild. Focused completely on me.
For a second, he did not look like he remembered there was a crowd either.
Then his mouth curved.
Slow.
Dangerous.