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The servers brought out roast beef and vegetables, while the fraternity welcomed the new players and congratulated them on their wins. It was a simple banquet, with good food and nothing too crazy.
That was until it ended and everyone walked over to the fraternity house. The throbbing base of the speakers rattled the windows and I felt the hum deep in my stomach. Maverick guided me through the crowd, stopping where Jordan sat in the kitchen. “Booker!” he shouted.
Maverick chuckled, leaning down to whisper. “He’s already wasted.”
I didn’t imagine Jordan would be anything else by this point in the night. Maverick grabbed me a girlie drink from the cooler but refused to drink himself, pulling me onto his lap as he sat on a bar stool.
Maverick started to get handsy around forty minutes into the party, his palms sliding up and down my thighs, biting at my neck and whispering things he wished he could have done to me the night before.
Thank God, for the alcohol in that little wine cooler, and my low tolerance, because I didn’t even care that people watched us. “You want to go upstairs?” he whispered.
I nodded, sliding off his legs and following him toward the staircase. We made it to the first step when someone tapped on a karaoke microphone in the corner, and turned the music down.
“Turn the music back on!” someone shouted.
Everyone booed. The top of King’s baseball hat bobbed up a head above everyone. He swayed, obviously plastered. “To the LSU Tigers, my brothers—the ones that aren’t bitches, that is.”
Maverick stopped on the stairs, shoulders tensed, his fingers tightened around my own.Oh no. I shook my head when Maverick glanced down at me. If he weren’t pissed, I would have melted at how hot he looked. The buttons to his shirt were undone, his smooth chest noticeable, and coiled forearms showing from where he rolled up his sleeves. “Don’t,” I whispered.
“Yeah, I’m talking about you, Maverick Booker. Big dog on campus, huh? All the girls wanted to screw you in Zachary, doesn’t look that way here, huh?”
Someone tried to pull him down but he stumbled from the chair he stood on and jumped onto the living room table. “Now, all you’ve got are my sloppy seconds, huh? How does it feel to be second best?”
That was it. Maverick snatched away from my pleading hands and stomped through the crowd. I tried to push my way through, but it took me longer than I imagined. When I finally broke through the crowd, Maverick laid lick after lick against King’s face who smiled as if he enjoyed it.
I jerked at his shoulder but he didn’t seem to notice. Jordan made it over a few seconds later, sober enough to help me pull Maverick back, but not enough to keep them apart. King spit at him, and I noticed how red-rimmed his eyes were, more than a few beers would do to him.
Two linebackers held Maverick back while King staggered to get his footing.
“You think Josie gives one shit about you?” he asked King. “You think calling the cops on us will keep us from one another? You’re pathetic.”
King chuckled and wiped the blood running down his chin. “I don’t give a shit about her, and I didn’t call any cops. Get over yourself.”
Maverick snatched from the two boys holding him back and grabbed my hand, dragging me from the party and into the humid night.
We stayed mostly quiet on the way home. I noticed Maverick’s knuckles were bleeding all down his forearm and the steering wheel, but I didn’t dare speak. He looked pissed. His leg jiggled as we closed in on our apartment.
He slammed his truck into park. I followed behind him, reading the note Frankie left for us over his shoulder.Went to the movies on campus, I’ll be back at eleven-ish.
The silence of the apartment felt unnerving because it was a rarity, but I let it soak into my skin. After that, we needed silence. Maverick started picking up his room, shoving clothes into his hamper and ignoring the obvious.
I walked over, grabbed his shoulder, and forced him to look at me. “Let me take care of your hands,” I said. “Come on.” He didn’t argue when I sat him down on my bed and pulled out the first-aid kit my mother forced me to pack. His eyes looked defeated, and I hated King for that because we’d worked so hard to get his guard down.
I picked up his right hand and started putting on the ointment and wrapping it up. “There we go,” I whispered, catching him staring at me.
“Do you believe him?” he asked, sinking his palms back against my bed.
“As bad as it sounds, yeah, I don’t think he did it,” I said.
Maverick nodded. “Me too, but, he deserved those licks regardless if he did it or not. He just told everyone that I took his sloppy seconds.” He bit his bottom lip hard into his mouth. “I could have kept hitting him. I felt out of control.”
I cupped his jaw in my fingertips. “How about that shower you wanted?”
Maverick’s mossy eyes met mine. “You sure?”
Sliding my dress from my shoulders, I stepped out of it, watching the way he ate me alive with his gaze. The sexy panties and bra were finally getting their use. He chuckled, picking me up by my thighs and encircling them around his waist as he walked us to the bathroom and locked the door behind us.
Maverick sat me on the counter, starting the shower and taking off his shirt. He watched me like prey, kissing down my jawline to the scar on my shoulder, and then to the one on my side. I felt undone seeing this kindness from him, and it had my head spinning. Helping me from the granite countertop, he stripped the straps of my bra off my shoulder and unclasped the back.
