"Don't touch me."
"When Colton told me you were a virgin, I thought there was no way someone who walks around the way you do — like you're just asking for it — was actually a virgin."
Like I'm just asking for it?
Okay, now my blood is boiling.
What did my brother Daniel teach me? I rack my brain for the ass-kicking techniques my brothers were always forcing me to learn when I was a kid. None of those are going to come in handy with a massive football player.
"Colton wouldn't tell you anything," I hiss.
"Obviously," the creep says. "He blurted it out. Trying to make sure I knew you weren't a slut. Which, well, is clearly not true."
He… blurted it out trying to defend me?
"He didn't brag about nailing me," I say, the realization finally hitting me.
A smile creeps across his face. "You're available now," he points out. "And right here for the taking."
"Fuck you."
He reaches down to my thigh and yanks the side of my skirt up, his other hand pushing my bag aside and squeezing my breast.
"Get away from me, you pig," I say loudly, struggling against him. His face is close to mine, and then I remember.
"Bottom part of the palm of your hand up to the nose," Daniel said. "If someone's bigger than you, you pull that hand back and fucking push their nose into their skull."
"That's gross."
"Whatever, brat," he said. "You'll thank me some day."
I do it. I whip my hand back and I shove my palm upward just as hard as I can, colliding with his nose. I hear a crunch, and he stumbles back a step, his hand over his face.
I make a mental note to call Daniel and thank him profusely.
"You little bitch," he shouts, lunging toward me but I'm already out of the way.
"Dillon Parker," comes a booming voice through the hallway. "Back the fuck up right now and sit your ass down!"
It's Coach Walker. He looks at the guy with his hand over his nose, then at me. I'm slightly disheveled and clutching my bag against my chest. I don't know how much the coach saw, but he sizes up the situation immediately.
Coach Walker takes out his cell phone and puts it up to his ear. "I'm calling to report an assault," I hear him say. "At the athletic department. By one of my players."
"It was a fucking joke, and she broke my fucking nose," Dillon yells.
"Nice shot," Coach Walker says to me. "You're all right?"
I nod. "Totally fine."
A couple of big guys who emerge behind the coach move in front of Dillon, blocking him from going anywhere.
"Were you here for me?" the coach asks.
"I came here to turn in my resignation," I say, my voice faltering.
"Related to this?" the coach asks. "Because this isn't tolerated. Not at all."
"No, related to…" I stop. Related to my believing this guy over what Colton said? I swallow hard. "Related to nothing. I'm…moving on."
Shit. Moving on.
I have to teach in fifteen minutes.
"I need to go," I start.
"You need to stay here until the cops take your statement," Coach Walker insists.
"The cops?" I squeak. I thought he called campus security, the rent-a-cops with the beer guts who are a campus joke. I could just tell them I'd give a statement later.
"I saw one of my players assault you, and assault is a crime," he says, matter-of-fact.
"I have to teach," I explain lamely. Of course, I'd also like that guy to pay for groping me.
"Can you call someone?" Coach Walker asks.
I clear my throat. "Yes, actually."
When I call Sable and ask her to teach the intro sociology class for me, she squeals. "What the hell for?" she asks. "You know I don't teach."
That much is true. Sable has an allowance now that her parents have resigned themselves to the fact that she's in grad school. "I need you to do this for me," I beg softly into the phone. "You can download the syllabus from online. It's the second class. It's literally basic, basic stuff. It's intro sociology, Sable. Just bullshit your way through."
"What will Dr. Richards say?" she squeals.
"He's not even here this week. He went to that conference. Please, please cover for me."
"What's happening? Are you okay? You weren't in an accident or something, were you?"
I walk around the corner, out of sight of the coach and the players. I hear Dillon groaning from the end of the hallway. "I wasn't in an accident," I tell her. "I'm at the athletic center."
"With Colton?" Her voice goes up an octave.
"No, not with Colton."
"Miss Rae?" A uniformed man gestures at me from a few yards away. "We'll need to get a statement."
"Shit," I mutter. "I have to talk to the cops."
"The cops?" Sable asks. "What the hell is going on?"
"That creep from Colton's team groped me," I whisper. "I have to go. Please cover for me."
"What?" Sable's loud screech is audible even when I hold the phone far away from my ear.
"I'm completely fine," I assure her. "I'll tell you the whole story when I get back."
* * *
It takes me an hour to get finished with the cops and then for Coach Walker to talk to me, assuring me that the athletic department takes sexual assault seriously and that Dillon will be kicked off the football team and, if he has any say in the matter, off campus. I don't know if he's worried I'm going to sue the athletic department or what, but he was serious as a heart attack.
The cops encourage me to file a restraining order.
I just want to go home.
I'm walking out of the hallway, into the middle of the commons, when I see him taking long strides through the building, moving with a purpose.
Colton stops short, just for a second, when he sees me. Then he walks over to me, his expression pained, and picks me up. He doesn't say a word to me or anyone else, just storms out of the athletic center with me scooped up in his arms like he's daring someone to ask what the hell he's doing.
"Put me down, Colton," I order once we're outside.
"I'm not fucking putting you down," he says. "I'm taking you to my truck."
"My car is parked in the parking garage! Put me down. Why the hell are you here, anyway?"
I should be happy to see him. Especially now that I know he was telling the truth, that he didn't say all of those things about me. I am happy to see him. Except that I'm annoyed by the fact that he just waltzed into the athletic center and caveman-carried me out of there.
"I'm here because I'm taking you home."
"I have a car," I protest, squirming in his arms. "And I don't need you to ride in on your white horse and rescue me."
Colton doesn't put me down until we're right beside his truck. And he doesn't just set me down. He drops his hand from behind my legs and pulls me against him so that I slide right down his body before my feet touch the ground. The familiar spark of electricity, the attraction that was there before, runs straight through me.
"Too fucking bad," he says.
"Excuse me?"
"You heard what I said. Too fucking bad if you don't need me to rescue you."
I bristle, the throbbing of my palm from where I hit Dillon reminding me that I broke a guy's nose an hour ago. "I can rescue my own damn self just fine," I say firmly. "Who called you? Sable?"
"Yeah, and she didn't know what the hell happened, but she said someone groped you, so I'm taking you out of here and then I'm going to kill whoever touched you."
I exhale heavily. "Look, I'm fine. He tried to grope me. Or I guess he got a handful of boob. Over my shirt," I clarify. Colton's eyes go big and his nostrils flare. "Don't get all crazy. It wasn't a huge deal."
"Some asshole grabbed your boob but it's not a big deal?" Colton asks. His face is turning red.
"That guy," I say, sighing. "The one you got into a fight with before. Dillon Parker."
"Dillon put his fucking hands on you?"
Now Colton's face is a pretty impressive shade of burgundy. I'm not sure I've ever seen a human's face turn that color.
"It sounds worse than it actually was," I try to tell him. "And… I sort of broke his nose. I think. It made a pretty loud crunching sound and I'm pretty sure that's the sound of a nose breaking. So he got a two-second handful of boob and a broken nose, which is a terrible trade-off, if you think about it. That's pretty much it. It's not as dramatic a story as you'd imagine."
A smile tugs at the corners of Colton's lips. "You really broke his nose?"
"There was a decent amount of blood," I admit, shrugging.
"Did you punch him?"
"Palm, right up to the nose. Guess my brothers' endless attempts to teach me self-defense came in handy."
"Good girl."
"Coach Walker saw what happened and called the police, and Dillon was arrested. I have to go in and give a formal statement. He's going to get kicked off the team. Anyway, that's the extent of the story. It's actually not all that exciting. Now I'm going to get in my car and drive to my house and go to sleep."
"No." Colton opens the passenger side door.
"What do you mean, no?" I ask, crossing my arms over my chest. "What, are you kidnapping me?"
45
Colton
"If you're not going to go willingly," I say.
She turns up her chin, her jaw set in the way it gets when she's pissed off. Or being stubborn. "I don't know where you got the idea that you could tell me what to do, Colton King."
God, she's infuriating.
"Stop talking and get in the truck," I demand.
"Why?"
"Because we have unfinished business, Cassie, that's fucking why," I say, trying to ignore the way that knot in my stomach, the one that disappeared the second I put her in my arms, suddenly returns now that I'm standing here waiting for her to either get in the truck or to tell me to fuck off.
I genuinely don't know what she's going to do.
"No kidding we have unfinished business," she huffs. But then she does it. She turns and slides into the front seat, her arms crossing her chest. She doesn't look at me when I get behind the wheel but when I glance over at her, she's tapping her foot on the floor of the car. It's a tiny movement, but it's there.
She's nervous.
I feel guilty for ordering her around, telling her no, demanding what I want from her, especially since she was just groped by someone who didn't take no for an answer.
I get on the highway, and drive straight out of town because I don't know what the hell else to do. She doesn't speak the entire ride, doesn't even ask where we're going, and I keep my eyes straight ahead. I want her so damn badly that I can't look at her.
As soon as I put the truck in park at the top of the lookout, I'm out of the vehicle and walking to Cassie's side. She slides out of the truck before I reach her, slamming the passenger door hard. When she turns to face me, she has her hands on her hips.
Her hips. My eyes go straight to them and I nearly groan.
"You sent me dildos as apologies," she says, her voice infused with anger.
"Because you didn't fucking listen to me that night when I came to your place."
"Because that creep – Dillon – told me… ugh, whatever, I don't want to say it again."
"You really actually thought I'd brag to a locker room full of guys about how I fucked you?" I ask, my voice getting louder. "I don't even want another guy near you. You think I want them imagining you naked?"
"The virgin thing…" she murmurs, her voice drifting off.
I'm standing a respectable six inches away from her, but I can smell her. She's wearing that perfume, the one that smells like coconuts and summer, and my cock goes absolutely rigid at the scent.
"I wasn't thinking," I explain to her, my voice softer. "That night when he was talking about wanting to nail you, I blurted it out before I hit him."
"Why?" she asks, her eyes flashing. She looks up at me, her lower lip caught between her teeth, and all I can think about doing is pulling it between mine.
"Because I was pissed the hell off," I say, irritated with even having to think about that again. "I didn't like him talking about my girl like that."
"Your girl?" She doesn't ask it; she states it like she's challenging me. "The one you hated because of the thesis?"
"You hated me because of Dillon," I growl back. "And yeah, my girl."
"Maybe I don't want to be your girl."
"You're so damn irritating."
Her eyes narrow. "So are you," she blurts back, her hands on her hips again. "You're infuriating. And you're stubborn, arrogant, and hot-headed."
"You're high-strung and uptight and way too fucking serious," I say. Somehow I'm so close to her now.
"Yeah, then why did you bring me out here?"
"Because training started and I should be thinking about football," I explain, exasperated, "but I can't fucking sleep, alright? I'm lying in the back of this stupid truck and all I smell is you on my damn pillows and it's making me crazy. Which means I can't fucking train because I'm so damn tired."
"So you brought me here to lecture me on how I'm screwing up your training?"
"Goddamn it, Cassie, stop talking." I growl the words because I'm done arguing with her, and I'm done not touching her, and I'm sure as hell done not having her in my bed.
"Don't tell me to stop –" she starts, but I plant my lips on hers before she can finish. She melts against me like she's made to fit right here in my arms, and when my tongue finds hers there's no question that this is where I'm supposed to be.
This girl feels like home. She feels like a place of calm, the eye in the middle of the storm. She's mine and I don't want to let her go.
She slides her hands underneath my shirt, her palms moving across my chest, and she lets out a sound, a cross between a whimper and a moan, as she slips her hands to my back and pulls me against her.
When I come up for air, she sucks in a deep breath. Her hand flies to her mouth, her fingers touching her swollen lips. "Colton," she says, her voice breathy.