She heaves in a breath and shivers. Her body relaxes against mine slightly as she wraps her arms around my waist.
“I’ll be here,” she says into my chest. “I don’t know … I don’t know if there was any chance I wouldn’t be.”
I tilt her face up and press our lips together. I could regret this. I will regret this. Because she makes me feel. She makes me feel human again, like a person instead of like an empty, soulless shell. She makes me feel real, even if it’s only for a short time while I’m with her.
I nip her top lip. “Good,” I say against her mouth. “Because I was seriously debating the bed pinning.”
She smiles. “Maybe next time.”
Chapter Nine - Megan
My bed smells like him, and I’m being a total teenage girl by snuggling under the covers instead of getting up. It’s a spicy scent that’s so out of place in California, but so right for him.
I feel a little like Juliet right now, secretly in love and holding onto it desperately. Of course that’s probably much more suitable for a thirteen year old to do than me, but I’ll take it because it’s all I have.
The idea of telling Braden crosses my mind. Why not? That’s the decent thing to do – the right thing to do. I should just tell him and get it over with. He’ll probably ignore me for a few days and okay, punch Aston, but surely that would be easier than pretending?
No, it wouldn’t. Telling him would mean admitting that both of us lied about last weekend – kind of. A lie of omission. Telling him would just cause unnecessary pain for all of us. It would tear Braden up and it would tear Aston and me apart before we’d even been together.
But are we even together? I have no idea. No point in telling Braden until I’m completely, absolutely sure, right? There’s no point in getting him annoyed over something that might not even be.
Yes. That makes me feel better. A little.
Relationships are shit. They’re so much easier to comprehend when they’re not real. They make much more sense when I’m lying in bed with my covers over my head, a torch in hand and sneaking another chapter.
I snapped off the torch and lay down as Mom opened the door. “Well? Has Jo realized it yet?”
I took a few deep breaths.
“Megan Harper, you’re the worst pretend sleeper this side of the Pacific, so give it up.” She turned on my light, and I sat up.
“Why doesn’t she get it, Mom?” I held the book up.
“Jo was a tomboy. She wanted to be fighting with her father, not sitting pretty and looking for a nice man to marry.”
“I know that!” I sighed. “Laurie is so in love with her and she’s blind to it. And anyway, it’s not like she went looking for him. She found him by accident.”
Mom laughed quietly and a smile crept onto her face. Her blue eyes regarded me with tenderness and an understanding of my frustration.
“Oh, Meg,” she said softly. “The best kind of love is the kind that happens by accident.”
I smile at the memory and breathe in deeply, taking one last smell of Aston, and climb out of bed with my selfish decision made. I beat back the guilt bubbling up and step into the shower. The hot water runs over my body, alleviating the tightness from my shoulders. But not the tension. That’s still there – but that tension is inside, somewhere the relaxing pounding of the water can’t reach.
I climb from the shower and dress quickly, shoving my wet hair up on top of my head with a few clips. The dorm is still quiet, and I expect the only person up in the Frat house will be Lila – if only because she spends more time there than in our dorm room.
My arms hug my jacket tighter around my body as I cross from the main campus to the house. The temperatures are quickly dropping and it’s obvious. It’s a far cry from Southern California, that’s for sure.
I grasp the door handle tightly and pull open the door at the same time it’s pushed from the inside. I squeak a little, jumping. Two hands land on my arms, hands I know. I look up straight into gray eyes.
“Careful,” Aston mutters with a smile, rubbing his thumbs across my arms.
“What are you doing up?” I ask. I’ve never seen him out of bed before eleven unless he has class.
“Going for a run. I can do that, can’t I?” He raises an eyebrow, still smiling, and drops his arms. His palms brush my arms and his fingers trail along in their wake. Goose pimples rise as if it was skin on skin, and my breath catches slightly. His fingertips brush mine as his hands fall away from me completely.
“Of course,” I manage and decide to ask my next question silently. “Is anyone else up?” I mouth. He nods. “I’m just surprised you’re up this early. I mean, aren’t you usually recovering from whatever you dragged upstairs with you last night?”
A muscle under his eye twitches, and it actually hurts me to say it.
“Oh, last night was different to every other night,” he says in his cocky voice. The eyes fixated on mine are softer than the edge in his tone. “In fact, I don’t think I’ll be forgetting it any time soon.”
“I’ll leave you to your remembering then.” I step to the side, fighting the urge to reach for him the way I did last night.
He moves in closer, his lips brushing my ear. “Good choice.”
I watch him over my shoulder as he runs off. His shirt is clinging to his body, his legs strong as they beat against the pavement.
Running - that explains that lickable washboard of abs he has going on.
“If he pulled that shit around Braden, his ass would meet the sidewalk.”
I turn around abruptly, coming face to face with Maddie. She’s leaning against the banister casually, her eyes on me.
“In fact,” she continues. “I’m surprised you didn’t put him on his ass.”
“What’s the point?” I shrug and enter the house. “It wouldn’t bruise his overly large ego any, neither would it slice some of it off.”
“Never stopped you before.”
“I’m learning to pick my battles.”
“And putting an egotistical, arrogant ass**le on his ass isn’t one of your battles?”
“Nope. Not anymore.” I slide onto a stool in the kitchen and look around. “Wow. This place was trashed last night.”
“You have no idea.” Maddie starts up the coffee machine. “So let me guess – Braden was the last egotistical battle you fought?”