All Played Out (Rusk University #3) (8 page)

“Relax. I know the family who lives here. They’re out of town all this week.”

This is crazy. And ridiculous.

“Why are we here?”

“That’s up to you, sweetheart.”

I let him lead me through the fence, and around a wooden shed to the central open area of the backyard.

“I thought,” he says, “we could just hang out. Talk. Away from all the noise.” He pulls me up beside a quaint tire swing, and gestures for me to sit down on it. It takes some finagling, what with my short skirt, but I manage to lift myself up on it without making too much of a scene. He crosses behind me, takes hold of the ropes on each side, and I hold on tight, preparing for him to push me forward. But before he does, he leans down close, his lips brushing the shell of my ear. He points a finger to the far side of the yard and says, “Then I thought, if you were up for a little more adventure, we could check skinny-dipping off your list.”

Chapter 8

Mateo

N
ell’s eyes take in the swimming pool, surrounded by a mesh fence because the Del Vecchios, the people who live here, have a toddler. A little boy. Her mouth drops open, then closes, and opens again.

She’s been remarkably agreeable for the last few minutes, letting me drag her over here, and I don’t want to screw that up by pushing her too fast, so I add, “Or you can stay here on this swing and tell me all your deepest, darkest secrets.”

Okay . . . so maybe I don’t know how to not push her at least a
little
bit.

She gives what might actually be a laugh and says, “What a choice.”

“Well, I do like to be fair.”

She looks at the pool one more time, her gaze lingering just long enough to make me think she might say yes. I imagine her flicking open the buttons on her white shirt, shedding that cock-teasing costume, and I’m hard in seconds.

Damn. I just can’t keep my cool around her.

It’s got to be her similarity to Lina. Has to be. I cut myself off from thinking about Lina in that way a long time ago because every time I let myself remember her . . . it would fuck me up for weeks. Messed with my head. With my game on the field. And considering the game is why I lost her, I refused to let myself screw that up, too. That would mean I’d lost her for nothing. So, ruthlessly, I burned away the memory of her in my bed. I replaced it with new memories. Not just in my bed either. My truck, too. Anywhere that made me think of Lina. And not just places either. It sounds psycho, but I did my best to blot out memories of actions, too. There’d been this time with Lina when she wouldn’t let me kiss her the whole time we had sex. She held her mouth half an inch away from mine, but anytime I lifted up to seek out her lips, she’d pull away. Only after we both came would she kiss me, and it was the best goddamn kiss of my life.

Last year, three months into my first semester here, I re-created that night with one of the girls on the cheerleading team. It wasn’t quite the same. I’d had to hold her face to control her movements, but I held her just close enough, teased us both until we were desperate, only kissing her at the very last moment.

It wasn’t the best kiss of my life. It wasn’t even particularly good.

But it served its purpose. It had taken the edge off that memory, dulling it with this new one, until the grip of the past eased. I’d done that so well and so often last year that I rarely thought of Lina these days.

Until Nell.

Because it isn’t sex that raised the memories this time, but the cute indentation in her brow when she’s thinking. It’s the way she talks. Using words that I’ve only ever read in textbooks, rather than heard out of a person’s mouth. The arrogant tilt of her chin when she knows she’s right. Those are the things I’ve never been able to burn away about Lina, and I see them all in Nell.

And I’ve starved myself from the memory of her so much that I’m too damn hungry now to separate the past from the present. That’s the only explanation for why Nell can practically bring me to my knees with a tilt of her head or a long look.

I can’t decide whether that means that I should stay far, far away from her, or take this one last opportunity to demolish the remains of my broken heart. I can’t help but think that after a few weeks with Nell, I could break Lina’s hold on me once and for all.

“Well?” Nell asks, pulling me out of my thoughts. “Are you going to push me or not?”

I smile. “Your wish is my command.”

The tire is laid flat so that you can sit with your ass in the opening, but Nell is sitting primly on the other end in a way that’s sure to throw the whole thing off balance when it’s moving. I reach forward, hooking my hands under her arms and tugging her backward. She falls back, squealing, her body cradled by the tire. After a few seconds, she realizes that she’s not going to slip through, and she tilts her head back, looking at me from below.

My mouth goes dry at the sight of her.

Quickly, before I can do something stupid like lean down and devour that plump mouth of hers, I pull back on the ropes and send her swinging. When she comes back my way, I push on the tire, sending her higher, faster. I do this a few times before I allow myself to say, “So tell me about this list.”

Her tone blunt, she says, “No.”

I notice then that she’s still got ahold of the spiral, pressing it tight against her chest.

“Fine. I don’t need you to tell me what it is. It’s a list obviously, and judging by the contents, it’s a bucket list of things you want to do. What I don’t get is why. Most people’s bucket lists are about seeing the world and following their dreams and seeking adventures. Yours is about cursing and kissing strangers, which leads to the obvious conclusion that you’ve never done those kinds of things. Keep swinging if I’m right.”

I punctuate that last sentence with another push, and I think I see a faint smile across her lips as she flies away from me.

“I knew it.” Her eyes meet mine when she returns, and I grin down at her. “So I’m going to guess you’ve been pretty sheltered. Maybe your parents were strict. Religious probably. If you were a freshman, I’d say you were sowing your wild oats now that you’re out of your parents’ house, but I’m pretty sure Dylan said once that you two are the same age. So that can’t be it. You’ve been out from under your parents for a while. You are a puzzle, sweetheart.”

“It’s not that complicated,” she says, and I tamp down my wide smile at having won this little battle.

“Enlighten me.”

“I’ve just been really focused on school, and I’ve not had that much of a social life since I got here. I thought it was time for that to change.”

I ease back on my pushes so that her swinging slows to a lazy glide. “So you’ve been busy with school. Studying biomechanical engineering.”

She sits up on her elbows as she swings, looking back at me with raised eyebrows. “You remembered.”

“It might not seem like it, but I do listen. When I’m interested.”

“And you’re interested in engineering?”

“It’s a related interest.”

She frowns. “Meaning?”

“Meaning it’s connected to something else I’m interested in, so I’m interested by association.”

“You mean me?”

God, she’s direct. Just like . . .

I cut off that thought and focus on Nell.

“Yes, I mean you. I’m interested in you.”

“I gathered that.”

“So, let me ask again? Do I count as a stranger?”

She sits up in the swing, upsetting the balance, and I have to grab on to the ropes and pull back to bring the thing to a stop. Before she can wiggle out of the tire, I circle around her. I stand and grip the ropes, just as she gets herself to the edge, ready to jump off.

“Torres . . .” she says, stretching my name out uncertainly. It’s not how I’d like her to say my name, but it’s not quite an admonishment either. It’s just . . . hesitant.

“This list is obviously something that matters to you, or you wouldn’t carry it with you. You wouldn’t have brought it to a party, of all places.” Something occurs to me then. “That’s why Dylan is suddenly bringing you around. She’s helping you with this list. That’s why she warned you away from me. She’s probably the one who made you make the list in the first place. I like the girl, but Christ, does she like to tell other people what to do, how to behave—”

Nell pushes to her feet, her chest grazing mine before she jolts back. “Dylan doesn’t know about the list. And I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t tell her.”

I frown. Now,
that
is not what I expected.

“Why doesn’t she know?”

Nell worries her bottom lip between her teeth, and God, her lips are already full enough without being swollen from her nibbling. If I didn’t know better, I’d think she was doing this on purpose, trying to distract me from prodding further.

“Because this is something private, and you’re right. Dylan can be very opinionated. She means well, but these things . . . well, it’s more of an experiment for me, and experiments aren’t for an audience. They’re for discovery.”

“I promise I won’t tell Dylan.” Her shoulders slump in relief just before I add, “If you’ll let me help.”

“
What?
But I just told you this was private. You’d be just as much of an audience as her. These are things I need to do alone.”

“As I recall, there’s at least one thing on that list that
can’t
be done alone.”

Her cheeks flush, and I’m suddenly bursting with curiosity to know what else is on the list. What else might require two people.

And there goes my body’s traitorous reaction again. Even if she doesn’t want to go skinny-dipping, I might need my own dunk in the pool just to cool down before I go back to the party.

She holds the spiral tighter to her chest and says, “It’s not just that I want to do this alone. I want to be through my list before the semester ends in a month and a half. It’s easier and faster to do this on my own.”

A month and a half. Sounds like a good amount of time to accomplish what I’m looking to do, too.

“For you, sweetheart, I would make time.”

“Some of the items on the list are . . . they’re of a personal nature, okay? And I don’t know you.”

“You don’t know me? Does that mean you’d go so far as to call me a
stranger?
”

She lets out an exasperated sigh, but I can tell by the frantic clutching of her fingers around the spiral that she’s not just frustrated. She’s downright terrified.

“Listen.” I take hold of her shoulders, stilling her nervous movements and forcing her to look at me. “You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to. And I promise I won’t look at your list again. I swear, okay? And I won’t tell Dylan or anyone else about it. But I want you to swear that whenever it’s something you don’t have to do alone or something you shouldn’t do alone . . . you’ll call me. I sing a mean karaoke, and I pull all-nighters all the time, and I—”

“Okay.”

I pause, letting my arms trail down from her shoulders to her elbows.

“Okay?”

I lean a little closer, pitching my mouth closer to hers. “Does that mean I can be your strange—”

She covers my lips with her hand, cutting off my words, and with that familiar proud tilt of her chin she says, “The list says to
kiss
a stranger. Not
be kissed
by one.”

And with that she pulls out of my arms and starts toward the pool, her hips swaying to the heavy pounding of my heart.

Chapter 9

Nell’s To-Do List

I
keep my head held high and my back straight the whole way over to the pool.

But inside?

I am an equation with too many missing variables. My heart is doing things that biologically it should not be able to do. Or at least it feels that way. And my nerves begin to bleed through as I try with shaky hands to undo the childproof lock on the fence around the pool.

The pool where I am trespassing.

Where I am breaking the law.

And where I will presumably be wearing far less clothing in a matter of minutes if I do actually go through this.

Just breathe, Antonella. The more you breathe, the less panicked you’ll feel.

It’s all biology. Hormones and neurons and impulses. This is a biological response to an intimidating situation. I have nothing to fear here. My brain just thinks I do.

While I’m still struggling with the lock, Torres’s hands settle over the top of mine, halting my movements. He’s directly behind me, one arm on either side, effectively surrounding me with his skin and heat and scent.

“Relax,” he says in my ear, but if anything that just shatters the smidgen of control I’d managed to wrangle back from my panic. My shoulders tense, rising up closer to my ears, and I squeeze my eyes shut.

“I can’t,” I admit, my voice quiet. “You . . . intimidate me.”

“Why?”

“Because . . .”

“Because you like me. Even though I’m flashy and shameless. Even though I’m too concerned with how other people see me, and I’m like a puppet who doesn’t realize his strings are being pulled?”

I flinch at the reminder of what I said at that Frisbee game. He’d been so close and so appealing, and I’d lashed out with my most ruthless honesty so that he’d give me some space to breathe, to think.

I twist, looking over my shoulder at him, and my back comes into contact with his chest.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

He doesn’t look angry. His face is relaxed and easy, but he’s so good at putting on a show that could just be what he wants me to see.

“Don’t be. I’m just reminding you why you have no need to be embarrassed in front of me. You said we were complete opposites. That you don’t care what people think. So don’t start now. But if you’re too nervous, just say the word, and I’ll take us back to the party. Or I’ll go back to the party and leave you here to check this item off your list alone.”

I swallow. I don’t want to be alone. But I’m not sure I’m brave enough to do this with him either.