The Love Series Complete Box Set (168 page)

“Me?” I swallowed the rest of my beer. “I wished for my dad to leave and never come back.” She looked at me, her eyes wide, but not out of shock so much as sympathy.

“That sucks.” Our chairs were close enough together that she reached out for my arm and gently placed her hand there. Her eyes softened and she began tracing her fingers up and down my forearm.

Shit. She was definitely misreading me. I pulled my arm away from her and she wrapped hers back around her legs. “So Scott told me you play ball.” I was happy she wasn’t hurt, and talking about baseball was easy enough.

“My whole life actually.” That thought saddened me. It was the one thing that brought me happiness when I was a kid, stress as a teenager and pure contentment because it brought me to Dylan. I thought coming to the party would help distract me, but instead, it did the opposite. Sitting here talking ball with Alex, who was pretty—no man, gay or straight, could deny that—and who was obviously interested in me—if even just for conversation—just made me miss him even more.

I would much rather be sitting in front of a campfire, talking about the playoffs and whether Boston would actually make it into the series, with Dylan curled up by my side than Alex.

But as the night went on, Alex began to grow on me. She was fun to hang around, knew her baseball, and made me laugh more than a few times.

We both looked over to the car at the exact second Scott stumbled. He righted himself and then stumbled again as he tried to get the key into the door.

“He probably shouldn’t drive, huh?” she asked.

“Uh, no. Definitely not. I would drive, but if my dad sees me in someone else’s car, it wouldn’t be pretty.”

“I got it.” She walked past me and I followed behind, laughing at how easily she bossed around her younger but much bigger brother.

“I’m fiiine, Alex. I can totally drive,” Scott slurred.

She snatched the keys from the ground and dangled them in front of his face. “Yeah? And how are you gonna manage that without these?” she quipped and opened the back door for him. “Get in, Scotty. You’re drunk.” The second his ass hit the seat, he flopped over and passed out.

We pulled away from the party and I told her where I lived. A few minutes into the drive, my phone buzzed in my pocket. I pulled it out and a warm feeling bloomed in my chest as Dylan’s name popped up on the screen. “Hey,” I was consciously trying to keep my voice even, to hide my excitement. Dylan had been so busy with classes and his fall baseball league that we hadn’t talked much since he left.

“Hi, babe.” The term of endearment caught me off-guard, but I loved it.

We were still about ten minutes from home, so I knew I wouldn’t be able to talk. “Let me call you back in a few minutes, okay?”

“Sure. But hurry up. I miss you.” His confession forced a goofy grin to pull at my lips. As soon as we said goodbye, Alex turned down the music, but kept her eyes on the road.

“Girlfriend?” There was a hint of accusation in her question.

I scrubbed my hand through my hair, trying to figure out what the best approach was. “Something like that, but it’s nothing serious.” Calling what I had with Dylan “casual” made bile rise in my throat. It was anything but that. I just didn’t need to get into it with Alex.

“That’s me.” I pointed to my house and she parked in the road. Scott was still knocked out in the back, curled up like a baby. I was actually surprised he hadn’t fallen off the seat when the car shifted into park.

“So if it’s nothing serious, can we get together next weekend?” she asked nervously. Even if I was straight, what did she see in me?

“No, I don’t think–”

She cut me off before I could finish. “Come on, Shane. It’ll be fun.” She gave me a pouty face look and I rolled my eyes.

I shocked even myself when I said, “Okay, sure.”

She bounced in her seat, but simply said, “Cool.”

After we exchanged numbers, I quickly added, “As friends.” It was a clarification, not a question.

She leaned across the center console. “Sure,” her voice was pitched low and she trailed a fingernail down the length of my arm. I just rolled my eyes, trying desperately to hide my unease.

I didn’t want to go out with her. It was pretty much the last thing I wanted to do, but I didn’t want to turn her down, make her feel rejected, at least not to her face. I had a week to come up with an excuse and call her to break it off. Maybe it would be easier to do over the phone rather than in person.

I thought of all of this as I softly crept into my house and up the stairs to my room, careful to avoid all the spots that creaked loudly when you stepped on them.

Thankfully, I arrived home before Reid, which left me alone in our bedroom.

I flopped back on my bed, slid my phone out of my pocket, and dialed Dylan. He picked up on the first ring.

“Hey,” his voice bathed over me, sending shivers everywhere.

I sighed into the line, “God, I miss you.”

“I miss you, too. So much.” We’d been apart for a little over a month, but the aching pain of him not being here was not easy to deal with.

“How’s the team?” I asked, genuinely interested in how the fall training league was going. I listened intently as he told me all about his teammates, all the while trying to bite back my jealousy that they got his time when I couldn’t. “Sounds like things are amazing,” I added the “for you” quietly, not without a hint of anger. But the anger was all directed at myself.

“What’s been going on with you?” Even though I couldn’t see it, I could hear his smile. The sounds of sheets and blankets rustled through the line. I filled him in on school—not that there was anything exciting going on with that.

We both tiptoed around the topic of my family. I could tell he wanted to ask, but we hadn’t spoken in so long, neither of us wanted to waste the time talking about things that were never going to change.

“Oh, get this. You remember Scott Henderson, from camp last summer?”

“Yeah.” The tone of that single word was icy and curt. “Why?”

“He’s in my sociology class. I actually went to a party with him tonight.” It wasn’t as if I had done anything wrong, but the tension that hung in the silence between us told me differently. It actually took Dylan so long to say anything that I had to pull my phone away from my ear to see if the call had been dropped. “You still there?”

“Yeah.” His clipped tone put me on edge.

“What’s the problem?” I became defensive.

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit, Dylan. I can hear it in your voice. What’s the problem?” Starting a fight with him was the last thing I wanted, but I technically hadn’t started it.

“He’s an asshole, that’s all.”

I huffed flippantly. “Well, it’s not like I have groupies following me around like you or anything.” Now it was my turn to let the tension-laden silence settle between us.

“I just don’t like him, that’s all.” It sounded like he wanted to say so much more, like there was something brewing beneath his words, but he shut up as I cut him off.

“Here’s a newsflash for you. You’re. Not. Here.” I emphasized each word, throwing them at him in the hopes that they would hurt him as much as his absence wounded me.

I heard him take a deep breath—could imagine him running his hand through his floppy, light brown hair. My fingers twitched with phantom pains. “Don’t you think I know that, babe?” There it was again—the soft, tenderness reserved only for me. “You’re right. I’m not there and it’s killing me. I’m sorry I snapped at you over Scott. I just . . . there’s something about him I don’t trust.”

I was kind of shocked at his quick recovery, but in all the years I’d known Dylan, he was always the diplomat, always the peacemaker. It was probably those characteristics that drew him and me together in the first place.

I had needed someone to listen, and Dylan was and always would be perfect—in every way imaginable.

That last thought forced a smile to split my face. A devilish smirk quickly followed. “Exactly how sorry are you?”

He heard the amused tone to my words because a sexy chuckle followed my question. “Sorry enough to do whatever it is you’re hinting at,” he quipped. He knew me so well and I loved it.

“Are you alone?” He had to be, but just asking it made things feel more illicit somehow.

“Yeah.” I heard him move on the bed before the click and snap of what I assumed was a door being locked registered in my brain. “You?”

I pulled a face at him, even though he couldn’t see it. “What do you think?”

“I think you miss me touching you so much, it’s taking every ounce of self-restraint you have right now, not to shove your hand in your shorts and touch yourself.” His bluntness made my mouth go dry and my cock get instantly hard.

I pushed my shorts down as I lifted my hips off the bed, freeing my already painfully erect dick. “Isn’t that what you want, too?” My words were breathless as I wrapped my hand around myself.

“More than anything.” A low groan rumbled in my ear and I could tell that his hand was just as busy as mine. “What are you thinking about right now? What is it that you want, Shane?”

“You,” I groaned as I stroked myself relentlessly. “Your mouth. I miss the heat of your mouth.” Just the thought of his lips wrapping around my cock forced a bead of moisture to fall from my tip.

“And I miss the way you taste. Just imagine my tongue licking you all over before taking every single inch of you deep into my throat.” For a moment, the only noise shared between us was the breathless panting of our joined pleasure. I was about to explode and he was close, too. I heard it in his commands.

“Make yourself come, Shane. Do it like I would.” His words were laced with desire, with lust.

My hips began to move quickly, without any rhythm as I fucked my hand. I spit in the palm of my hand before tightening my grasp. It was nowhere near the heavenly feeling of Dylan giving me a blow job, but it would have to be good enough for now.

Imagining him doing the same had me racing toward a blinding light. “Dylan . . .” I growled his name as my balls pulled tight, as tingles went racing from the base of my spine.

“Oh, fuck! I’m coming.” His sigh of relief pushed me over the edge. My heart pounded in my chest as I struggled to pull in enough oxygen. He sounded about the same.

Not knowing when Reid would be home, I cleaned up quickly. “I need to see you.” The gruff huskiness of his earlier words was still there and I loved that I affected him. Drove him as crazy as he drove me.

“Maybe I can get there next week. I can tell my dad it’s a meeting with the coach or something.” He’d more than likely demand to go with me, but if I dropped it on him at the last minute, he’d have no choice. I hated the pull he had over my life and I was dying to break free.

“We don’t have games next weekend, so that would be perfect.”

A second later, Reid drunkenly stumbled through the door, essentially ending our conversation. “I’ll call you during the week and we’ll figure it out.”

“Okay, babe. Talk to you soon.”

“Goodnight.” Reid must have caught a glimpse of the satisfied look on my face, or heard a touch of the longing in my voice, because as he sank onto the edge of his bed, he stared over at me. A loaded question dangled on the tip of his tongue.

“Whadya get laid or somethin’?” he asked, his words slurring together. I didn’t even want to think about how he’d gotten home. It was up to him to learn some life lessons on his own. I wouldn’t always be here to do that for him.

“Shut the fuck up, asshole!” I grabbed one of the pillows from behind my head and launched it at him, hitting him square in the face.

“You totally did!” He laughed before asking, “Who is she?”

I faltered for a moment, my brain still stuck on Dylan. If there was anyone I could tell, it was probably Reid, but not now. I still wasn’t ready.

So instead of the truth, Reid got lies, the last thing he deserved. I told him about how I met Alex and how we were going out this week. He seemed to buy it; more importantly, he seemed happy for me.

And with thoughts of possibly seeing Dylan in just a few days, I pushed the lies to the back of my brain. I’d deal with them later, because, for the moment, I was happy too.

Chapter Nine

October 12, 2007

“You’re running around this place like a chicken with its head cut off.” John, my roommate, poked his head out from behind his textbook, calling out to me from across the room. “You’d think the President was coming here.”

His words made me stop in my tracks. Realizing that I was in fact going a bit overboard, I shrugged. “I just haven’t seen him in a while. Guess I’m nervous and excited, too.”

He jumped down from his bed and closed his book before tossing it on the mattress. “There’s a fine line between
excited
and
obsessive.
It’s a dorm room. He’s a guy. You haven’t seen him in two months. He’s not going to care what the room looks like. He just wants to see you.” John held my shoulders, shaking me on each reassurance.

“You’re right.” I sighed and John stepped away, grabbing his hoodie and bag from the hook in his closet. “And thanks for staying at Elise’s this weekend.”