BAD WICKED TWISTED: A Briarcrest Academy Box Set (68 page)

Cuba rested his hands on her shoulders and gave her a reassuring pat, almost brotherly, yet not. She leaned into him for a moment, smiling at him, and well, it was the nicest I’d ever seen her face. My mouth parted as she reached up to kiss him, her petite frame curving into his protective one. Did it make me happy when he turned his cheek and her lips hit the corner of his mouth? Maybe.

Across Emma’s shoulder, our eyes met again. Feeling like an intruder on a tender moment, I glanced away.

A few seconds later, she breezed past me, her Jimmy Choo’s tapping lightly on the marble tile of the restaurant.

I waited for him to pass, but he stopped at my table. “Spider leave?” he asked, sliding into the booth.

“No,” I said in a surly tone, my entire body going stiff. I folded my napkin in tiny squares, not meeting his eyes.

“Where’s Emma?” I asked.
Your baby mama?

“We rode separately,” he said, a wary look growing in his eyes. I knew that look. It meant he didn’t want to talk about her.

“What do you want from me, Cuba?”

He rearranged the bread basket, his hands fidgeting. “Why so hostile? Earlier in the week, you mentioned us getting together and talking? Would you still want to?” He seemed to hold his breath.

“There’s no point. We’re not pals. And I don’t think Emma would appreciate it.”

He gave me a sad smile. “I’m not in love with Emma.”

What did that mean?

Oh, yeah. He didn’t fall in love.

“Why do you think I care?” I said crossly.

“You care,” he replied, sounding beaten.

“Cared, past tense. I don’t anymore.”

“You don’t make a good liar,” he growled at me, eyes low.

“What do you want?” I bit out. Wishing he would go. But not. It was completely messed up.

He spoke then. Killing me.

“When we broke up last year, I went nuts. I’ve lost count of the number of girls I was with after you. It was awful and I—”

My face reddened. “Took that many to erase me? Why do you think I want all the details now?”

His jaw clenched. “I fucked them everywhere. In my house, at their house, in hotels, in clubs, outside, wherever I happened to be. It was a binge. Sometimes more than one at a time. But lately, something’s changed, and it’s like I’m waking up—” he stopped, rubbing his hand through his hair. He swallowed. “I can’t put words to it, but I’m sick of who I’ve become. And I’m sick of being a selfish coward. So you see, you’re lucky you got away from me. I’m fucked up, and I would only have hurt you in the end. More than I had already.”

“You make me sick,” I hissed.

A look of resignation hit his face. “Yeah, I’m not surprised.”

I tossed the napkin on the table, bitterness from the past rising up. “Then stop torturing me with your stories. I already know that you didn’t care about me, okay? There’s no point in rubbing it in.”

He sucked in a sharp breath. “Dovey, no. Please wait; let me explain. I don’t want to—”

“Is Emma pregnant?” I snapped out, closing my eyes briefly at the sharp slice of pain those words caused.

Silence descended on us, the air crackling with tension. He bit his lip and looked way, twisting his class ring around and around. Finally he faced me, his face hard, his shoulders tense. “She is. And she needs me, and maybe I need this.”

“Just. Please. Go,” I begged, his words killing me inside.

He tensed up. “Dovey, listen to me. I can’t explain everything right now, but you mean something to me, and I—”

“She told you to go. So, get the bloody hell out of my seat, Hollywood,” Spider bit out. He’d come around the corner and had been standing there for a while, obviously hearing most of our convo.

Cuba focused on me, ignoring Spider. “Whatever you think of me…in the past…I made mistakes, but I’m trying to make up for it with Emma—”

“
Get out of my seat,”
Spider bellowed, his entire body drawn up.

The entire restaurant hushed, and the waitress scurried over with refills to make sure we were okay.

“Spider, it’s fine. He’s leaving,” I assured him.

Cuba exhaled heavily and rose, looming over Spider’s smaller six feet. His mouth tightened as he gazed down at him. “Grow up, Spider, and put a leash on that temper of yours. Especially if you’re going to be with Dovey. She deserves better.”

And then he turned and walked out the door.

Spider cursed and sat down. He slapped his cell on the table. “If I’d known he was going to harass you…”

“Let it go,” I said.

He grumbled under his breath, but I ignored him. Maybe I was a little ticked at him because he’d been gone so long. But, he wasn’t my protector either.

Thankfully our food came and both of us got quiet.

“So. Emmo is preggo,” he sang in between bites of his pizza.

I set down my knife and fork on my plate. My food was tasteless anyway. “Yes.”

He shrugged and took a sip of the beer he’d ordered with his fake ID. “She’ll get fat, you know. We can make fun of her. But, she’ll probably get rid of it.”

“Don’t be so flippant,” I snapped, angry with his attitude. “What if that was you and not Cuba?”

He smirked. “Emma is not my type. Too much fake going on.” His eyes scanned over me. “I want someone real, someone like you, Dovey.”

Not this again.

I looked away and took a sip of water to cover up my nervousness, but I don’t think I fooled him.

A few minutes later, we finished and walked out of the restaurant. “Why don’t you come home with me tonight, and we’ll watch a movie.” He pointed out at the white-covered parking lot. “And it might be a good idea if you spent the night. The roads will be crap.”

I nodded. Heather-Lynn was with Sarah tonight, and sleeping at Spider’s sounded perfect. Right?

AFTER SLIPPING AND sliding the entire way back to his dorm in his SUV, he smuggled me into his one bedroom apartment—he paid extra for a private suite—and we watched
Pulp Fiction
. We lay on his suede couch while his beer bottles accumulated, and I dozed on and off, the screams and the blood from the movie not registering. We’d only watched it a dozen times together.

I woke to the credits rolling across his big screen. Stretching out, I eyed my bag, resting next to his discarded pizza boxes from one night this week. Or maybe it was last week? Ha. His room was a mess, and I wondered if I should pop over one day and offer to clean it up for him. It was the least I could do since he was loaning me money.

Spider sat his drink down on the side table next to the couch and tugged me into his arms. “You staying?” he asked, his nose nuzzling my cheek.

I stiffened at the touch, yet the moment I’d climbed in his car, I’d known we were teetering on the edge of something dangerous.

But why not experiment? And maybe I wanted this. To prove to him that Cuba meant nothing to me.

“Let me check in with Sarah,” I said, calling home. I half-way wanted her to tell me to come home, but Heather-Lynn answered and said they were fine and for me to stay put in this weather.

I hung up the phone and my eyes locked with his warm ones. I gazed into them, searching for answers about our iffy relationship. Were we friends who turned into lovers?

He must have read the question in my eyes because he took my hand and kissed my palm. And it wasn’t a friendly, let’s be BFFs kiss. No, it was
I want to throw you down and have my way with you kiss.
He kissed it with an open mouth, the pressure of his soft lips and the heat from his tongue making me fall toward him.

He threaded our fingers together and gazed down at me, his eyes hot. “I’m going to kiss you, Dovey. You good?”

Was I? No idea. But I nodded.

He tilted my face up to his and kissed me, his mouth fitting over mine easily and, of course, expertly. This
was
Spider, and he’d been with countless girls, filling a void I didn’t understand.

His hands encircled my nape as his tongue coaxed my mouth to open, the pressure hesitant and easy as if he were afraid I’d pull away. I sighed, liking the sweetness, getting lost a little in playing with his stud, rolling it around, experimenting. Kissing him didn’t make my heart fly like Cuba’s first kiss had, but there was something to be said for kissing someone who you knew cared for you.

He pulled me on top of him as he stretched out on the couch, and we fit. His hardness against my stomach created an ache in me, reminding me of the emptiness I felt. I sank into him deeper, and he groaned, his hands working my shirt up, until his fingers reached the front snap of my bra. In seconds, he had the clasp undone, my grey tunic and pink lace bra off and over my head. I sensed more than saw him toss my things over the couch.

He had some lightening moves.

“I’ve been wanting this…you…for so long,” he said, cupping breasts and kissing across my jaw line, whispering sexy words, and I whispered words back, feeling into the moment, surprised by the slow burn but going with it.

And he was surprisingly gentle. Most of the time when I’d watched him interact with girls, I got the impression he wasn’t a tender lover, that he took what he wanted hard and fast. I’d always suspected he fucked, not made love. But, maybe I was wrong.

We escalated faster than I wanted. But, he felt good against me, especially when he whipped his shirt off, the searing touch of his chest against mine making me pant. I kissed him harder, my tongue searching for his, needing him.

See
, I tried to convey with my lips,
I do not still love Cuba
.

And I didn’t. Cuba was long gone. Yesterday’s news.

Yet, in the middle of our kiss, I pictured Cuba and Emma at some place like Babies R Us. I tried to push the image away, but it kept resurrecting itself over and over. Them oohing and ahhing over cute baby clothes, taking a Lamaze class together, pushing a stroller. My stomach roiled.

“Open your eyes,” Spider said, his hands framing the sides of my face, his thumbs against my cheeks almost painful. I shook my head and buried it in his shoulder and bit his neck, finding his erratic pulse and sucking on it. He smelled good, clean and woodsy and yet not quite right.

I whispered to him again and again and…

“Dovey,” a voice snapped. “Look at me.”

I didn’t want to. I didn’t. I decided I wouldn’t. I rotated my hips against his, making him hiss and let out a string of curses.
Was this a good idea
flitted through my mind, but oh, I didn’t care about that, because he was hard and I was soft, and I wanted to feel good about something. I wanted to forget about Sarah’s illness and Cuba’s baby. I wanted to forget about all the shit floating around in my head.

I put my hands on his crotch and stroked hard, letting him know I meant business. He stiffened, groaned and said my name, and it sounded beautiful and sweet, like a benediction. And because I loved the sound of my name on his lips, I said his name. Over and over and over…

Then his voice changed, getting shrill. He shoved me off him, pushing until my bare back bounced off the couch, and I slid onto the carpet. My eyes blared open, my desire cooling at the anger in his eyes.

“What? Isn’t that what you wanted?” I scrounged around on the floor, found my shirt and pulled it on. The bra was MIA. Great. My favorite one. I didn’t doubt for a second he’d add it to his collection later.

He snapped off the couch and paced around, a tinge of unbalance in his jerky movements. “You have no idea what just happened, do you?” he said, snatching up his beer and guzzling it.

I shrugged. “We were making out and—”

“You called me
Cuba
, Dovey! You kissed me and called me his bloody name. Complete cluster-fuck.”

“Not possible.” But had I? For the life of me, I couldn’t remember what I’d said. “You misunderstood.”

“I’m not deaf,” he said. “Nor am I stupid.”

I rubbed my hand over my swollen mouth. I
had
been thinking of Cuba, comparing their kisses.

“Don’t you think you’re overreacting? It was a slip-up—”

“You were thinking about him the whole time,” he interrupted, pulling at his spiked hair, seeming to be talking to himself more than to me.

Now that wasn’t true.

“You’re overacting,” I said, feeling defensive. And sad.
I wanted to forget Cuba.

“I’m not,” he said. “Your eyes follow him everywhere he goes. He shit on you, and you still want him.” He raised his hands up over his head and yelled, “I hate the way you rip me up inside.”

My ire rose, taking over my mouth. “I thought you were my friend. Was your friendship all pretend? Was I the only girl who didn’t give you what you wanted, Spider? Is that why you hung around for four years?” I seethed. “Fine, you wanna fuck? Let’s do it. Let’s taint ourselves with meaningless sex between friends. So what if I’m just one in a long line of girls. Because next month, you’ll be hot for someone else. And our friendship will be ruined.”

His color rose and veins popped out along his temple. He closed the distance between us and pulled me back into his arms, but this time his face was all wrong, hard and angry.

“Stop,” I said, twisting around trying to get some space between us. “Let me go.”