Slammed #4 (The Slammed Romance Series - Book #4)

SLAMMED
#4

(The
Bad Boy Frat Series)

By
Claire Adams

This
book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are
products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not
to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual
events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Copyright
© 2015 Claire Adams

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CHAPTER
ONE

For what felt like a long time, I stared at the
newspaper that Jess had given me, looking at the picture as my stomach churned.
I’d had no idea that the morning was going to bring anything like this. My mind
swirled around, alternating between fear and
worry for Zack’s
position—
the possibility that he might be suspended from the team—and
growing anger at the sight of a woman grinding up on him. The alcohol didn’t
bother me in the slightest; I knew that Zack had started drinking before he
even came to college, and the whole point of the frat he belonged to was to
party as much as humanly possible.

“I don’t understand,” I said finally, looking from
the paper to Jess. “I mean, I really just don’t understand.”

Jess sat down heavily, shrugging. “The school has to
look like they’ll only tolerate a certain level of partying, and someone I
guess turned Zack in.”

“But…” I shook my head, staring at the picture once
more. Had I seen the girl before? Was she one of the girls that seemed to
always be around Zack? Had he slept with her? When was the picture from—it had
to have been recent to have been included in the article. “Who the hell is that
and what is Zack doing letting her be all over him like that?”

Jess shrugged again. “I’d seen Zack around a few
times before, and I mean, he’s sort of always been like that—wild, partying,
hitting up whatever girl would pay him the least bit of attention. I mean,
until you showed up, at least.”

I bit my bottom lip and put the newspaper down. I
felt hot and cold all at once, my heart pounding in my chest, my head already
starting to ache. Zack had been like this before I came back into the picture.
He had fooled around with girls, let them grind up on him—well, in fairness, I
thought, he and I had danced just like that the first time he had seen me in
years; why should I be surprised? I shouldn’t. But it still hurt; especially
since I had no idea if the picture was from long before I had come back into
his life or if it was from earlier in the night during the party I’d gone to
find him
at
. I couldn’t think straight—my head was
spinning.

“Do you think I made a huge mistake getting back
into his life?” I asked Jess. “I mean, that’s not the kind of person I am—do
you think…do you think that’s the kind of girl he wants?”

Jess shook her head. “He knows what kind of girl you
are and he clearly wants you. What are you so upset about,
Evie
?”

I swallowed against the tightness I could feel
growing steadily worse in my throat. “I’m upset at the sight of the guy I like
being dry-humped by some girl!” I said, standing up and pacing across the
living room floor. “I mean, yeah, sure, whatever,
double-fisting
beers is
an old hat trick, I’ve seen him doing that before. It’s not
news. But what if he’s doing this…what if he’s still going after any girl
who’ll pay attention to him?”

I thought of seeing him in the dining hall line with
his arm around a girl, just a couple of days after we’d had sex for the first
time in years. I thought of him telling me it was just sex.

But he’d acted differently since, hadn’t he? He’d
asked me out on a proper date, he’d declared he was hung up on me in front of
everyone. I’d been humiliated by the way he acted, but he was just showing off,
just trying to get my attention. If he was really serious about having a relationship
with me I could forgive him for what he’d done. But if he was dancing and
flirting with other girls while keeping me on the line as a steady lay—if all I
was to him was a reliable piece of ass—then I couldn’t stand that.

“Is that what you think is happening?” Jess asked
me.

I shrugged, throwing my arms out wildly. “I have no
fucking clue!” I ran my hands through my hair, trying to decide what I thought.
“I just…he’s right there, some slut grabbing on him, and they probably slept
together, and I don’t know whether it was from months ago or last year or last
week!”

“Last week, if it was then, you were freezing him
out.”

“What if it was the night of the party? What if he
was grinding on that girl and hooked up with her and then got rid of her before
I got there to talk to him.”

“Busy guy, then,” Jess said, smiling faintly.

“This isn’t funny, Jess!” Jess’ smile fell and she
nodded. “On top of all that he might be getting suspended from the football
team, and I don’t know how to feel about that…” I threw myself down on the
couch. “What do I do, Jess? This is just…I can’t even handle everything going
on in my brain right now.”

“First, take a chill pill. If Zack gets suspended
from the team then I sure as hell hope they have a backup plan because I can’t
think of any way they’ll manage in the championship without him.” Jess paused a
moment to think before continuing. “As for the rest of it, I mean, are you
really not okay with him drinking and partying? You’re worried about the kind
of girl that he wants you to be—but are you okay with the kind of guy he is?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “If he’s the kind of
guy—still—who would let girls get all up on him and rub up against him even if
he’s with someone…with me…then no. But I don’t know.”

“You need to figure out what kind of guy he is, and
you need to figure out if you’re okay with the kind of guy he is. I mean it. I
can see you’re serious about him, but if he isn’t serious about you, you’re
never going to be okay with that.” I nodded. “So figure it out,
Evie
, and do what makes sense from there.” Jess stood up,
stretching. “Try and get some breakfast in your system before class.”

I went into my room, still shaking with anger and
upset. I should change out of my pajamas and get to the dining hall, get ready
for the rest of my day. I should just put the picture I had seen and the
article I had read completely out of my mind until I could talk to Zack about
it. But my heart was pounding in my chest and I couldn’t take my mind off of
the picture. I couldn’t stop thinking about the lurid details that the article
had featured, the highlights of the frat’s history.
“In 2004, the fraternity was the subject of a long investigation by the
administration when an early-admission student, aged 15, told her parents that
she had had sex with one of the members of the frat…In 2010, the frat was once
more temporarily suspended pending the verdict in allegations of underage
drinking and public lewdness, with several students alleging that public sex
occurred during at least one party…”
Zack hadn’t been a member of the frat
for the worst of the infractions, but the frat’s reputation lent itself well to
encouraging someone like Zack to do whatever he wanted.

I pulled at my hair, groaning as I buried my face
against my mattress. The thought of seeing Zack with another girl—both the way
I had in real life, just a few short days after we had first reunited and then
in the picture—made me angrier and angrier. I couldn’t put it out of my mind;
it was impossible. I stood up and took a deep breath. I would have to actually
confront him about it. There was just no two ways about it. I had to do it
before I could psych myself out, before I had a chance to make myself miserable
during my morning classes dwelling on it.

I strode out of my room, stepping into a pair of
slip-on shoes and grabbing up the newspaper that Jess had brought in from the
coffee table where I’d let it fall. I made sure to grab my keys and card so I
wouldn’t be locked out of the dorms, but I didn’t make time or take time for
anything else. As I walked down the hall to the stairwell, I considered where I
could actually find Zack. It was early enough in the morning that my first
thought was that he would be at the frat house, still asleep. But then I
corrected myself; Zack had told me about his training routine in our interview
together. He and the team would be in the school gym, in the weight room,
working out.

I walked across campus, ignoring the chill in the
air that cut through my pajamas and barely looking around me. It was early
enough in the day that there weren’t very many people up and about; there was
no one to see how upset I was at the whole situation. I caught sight of a few
people rushing to early-morning classes in their pajamas, or heading for the
dining hall, but anyone who was out of the dorms and the frats that early in
the morning was focused entirely on
themselves
. As I
walked I got more and more upset; how could Zack have led me on, if this was
the kind of playing around he did? He and I—I thought—had had something
special. The words from one of his frat brothers, the first night we had seen
each other since we’d broken up in high school, filled my head. Zack was one of
those guys, the kind I had started to avoid. All I was to him was a piece of
ass—and that’s all I was to his frat brothers; another one of Zack’s conquests.

It was easy to get into the gym; the card that let
me into the dorm building was just as effective on the locked doors in the rec
center. As soon as I got into the nearly-vacant building, I could hear the hard
workouts going on in the weight room. The entire team would be there. For just
a moment I checked, remembering just how much I hated making a public spectacle
of myself—and how much I had hated Zack for making me a public spectacle the
two times he had done it. But I knew I couldn’t wait. If I waited and let
myself cool off, I’d accept any explanation from Zack and never get to the
bottom of the situation. I plunged into the weight room and looked around.

It wasn’t just the football team on the machines and
using the free weights; the basketball team was also in the room, going through
their own paces—some of them on treadmills, some of them on bikes, most of them
lifting weights heavy enough to daunt me. I moved through the room as quickly
as possible, ignoring the eddying pause of conversation all around me as I
looked around for Zack. He was lying on a bench, a heavy weight hooked on a bar
over him, getting ready to do presses.

“Zack!”
I called out, intending only to get his attention before he started; but my
voice was shriller, sharper than I wanted it to be. Zack started, pulling his
hands back from the barbell as if it was hot. Looking around, he spotted me and
grinned.

“Hey,
Evie
,” he said,
slipping out from underneath the bar and standing up quickly. “I can’t really
talk now—but I can hit you up right after class.”

I shook my head, my heart pounding in my chest. I
could feel everyone looking at us, but I couldn’t make myself stop long enough
to calm down and think about the best way to do what I needed to do.

“What the hell is this?” I asked, waving the
newspaper in front of his face. Zack grabbed at it, looking at the picture and
article. He went red, and then white.