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“Um, sure. Whatever,” I reply distractedly, taking another look around the living room. I already checked the kitchen once, but maybe Aidan has showed up since.
“Um, sure. Whatever.” Cole laughs. “I take back everything I said about you being off your game, Brennan.”
Jake flips Cole off before guiding me down the hallway toward the kitchen.
“Have you seen Phillips?” a tall guy with shaggy blond hair stops to ask.
I pause too, very interested in the answer. I couldn’t come up with any casual way to ask Jake the same thing.
Jake smirks. “Of course not, Sampson.”
Sampson groans. “Damnit. I was hoping he’d be done upstairs by now. I really need to talk to him.”
A cold drip of uncertainty trickles through me like a leaky faucet. Aidan isbusyupstairs, and I can easily extrapolate exactly what that means.
And ithurts, so much worse than I was expecting it to.
Way more than walking in on Walker did.
This time, I have no right to be mad. Iammad, but I have no right to be.
We’re not in a relationship. Aidan never said he wasn’t seeing other girls. Never asked me if I was seeing other guys.
Except, I thought there was something more between us than simply sex.
My fingers find the bracelet hidden beneath my sleeve. I haven’t taken it off since Aidan slipped it on my wrist. It felt like some physical indication that I meant something to him. A signal that hewasn’thooking up with girls upstairs at parties.
I saw the signs with Walker. How he was often busy. How he’d take hours to reply to my texts. How we stopped having sex.
Myboyfriendcheating on me wasn’t a surprise.
But the campus playboy who constantly has girls hitting on him hooking up with someone else is as shocking as a slap.
He said he didn’t want anyone else, and I feel foolish for believing him. I guess that changed after we fucked a few more times. He’s already bored.
All of a sudden, the warm, smoky air is suffocating.
“I gotta go,” I blurt, then spin around and head in the direction of the front door.
I didn’t tell Aidan I was coming to this party, and now I’mextra glad. He won’t question why I wasn’t here tonight, and he’ll hopefully be too busy preparing for the championship to talk anytime soon.
Meaning I’m in fantastic shape to not see him until our final tutoring session on Tuesday, after which I’ll never have to see him again.
Someone calls my name, but I don’t turn around to see who it is or find out what they want. I’m too focused on getting the hell out of here as quickly as possible.
I reach the front door, yank it open, and freeze.
Conor and Harlow are walking up the stairs that lead from the walkway to the porch. Hunter is right behind them, followed by…Aidan.
The relief is staggering.
Another reminder I’m in way deeper with Aidan than I was supposed to wade.
I’ve made the predictable mistake of developing way too many feelings for the guy I’m sleeping with. Some of them felt inevitable. Unlike Aidan, I’m not used to separating emotion from sex. But I thought any feelings of mine were tempered by reality—that I could sleep with him and still know that our fling could end at any time.
I’m braced for him to lose interest, especially after what just happened. But there’s no clear limit to my feelings, no line I know I’m not about to cross.
He’s here, right in front of me. Not upstairs, talking to someone else. Laughing with someone else. Touching someone else. Fucking someone else. Doing all the things I want him only to do with me.
