“Hey, Noel, baby.” Warm feminine fingers crept up my arm, making me jerk away and spin toward the redhead grinning at me.
Tianna’s friend. Marci, if I remembered correctly. “Hey,” I called over the noise, tipping my head to greet her in a vague kind of way.
She reached up on tiptoes and leaned in to talk into my ear. “Ready to cash in on the rain check?”
The threesome. Shit, I’d totally forgotten about that. As I glanced around, I spotted Tianna closing in on us. She waved, and my stomach swirled with unease.
Feeling cornered but wanting to let the girl down gently, I smiled at I shook my head. “Bad night.”
Biting her lip, she wrapped her arms around my bicep. “Tomorrow then? Please.”
Great. She wasn’t going to give up, was she? I winced. “Look, I appreciate the offer but...”
Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Who is she?” she asked, no longer smiling, and actually looking as if she was ready to cut a bitch.
Alarm raced up my spine, but I kept playing it cool. Clueless. I wrinkled my eyebrows. “Who’s who?”
“The new girl you’re fucking? I haven’t seen you with anyone around campus.”
“Marci,” I gritted out, growing annoyed with this conversation. “I didn’t want to be an asshole and say this, but I’m just not interested in you.”
She snorted. “Not interested?” Backing up, she splayed out her hands to encompass her body. “In this?”
Meh. I actually preferred Aspen’s look more. But I couldn’t say that. I could, however, put a dent in Marci’s inflated ego.
“Look, Tianna told me how obsessed you are about me. And I’m not looking for anything like that. I don’t do relationships, or clinging women, or sobbing midnight phone calls, begging me to give you another chance. And you have exactly that kind of drama written all over you.”
When her mouth fell open, I realized I’d probably gone a little overboard. I sent her another apologetic wince and friendly pat on the shoulder. Then I turned and got out of there as quickly as possible without looking as if I was bolting. She didn’t follow, but I had a feeling I hadn’t heard the last from her. I’d never been into cutting down a woman like that before, so whatever she did to me in response, I’d probably deserve.
I faced a whole new set of problems when I entered the next room, though. Less crowded, it had a couple couches sitting around a coffee table and facing a television. And my roommate was in the center of the action, drinking from a funnel and looking completely lit.
“Ow!” he shouted when he saw me. Jumping onto the coffee table, he pretended to strum a guitar like a rocker. “I got it bad. Got it bad. Got it bad. I’m hot for teacher.” Then he fisted his hands and pumped his hips, dry humping the air as he continued to sing the golden oldie Van Halen song.
I shook my head and sighed. “I’m gonna kill him. I am seriously going to kill him.”
“Hey, Gamble.” He cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled. “Sing it with me. Got it bad, got it bad, got it bad—”
“You’re fucking drunk,” I shouted back.
“No, really? How’d you guess? Hey, does she like to play naughty schoolgirl? That way, you could be her professor every once in a while.”
Quinn appeared next to me, holding a red plastic cup as he peered up at Ten. “What’s he talking about?”
“I have no idea.” I couldn’t stop glaring at my roommate, thinking up the quickest way to silence him.
Death.
Yes, it’d have to be death.
“What kind of stuff does she make you do for extra credit? Write fuck me silly fifty times in a row? Do you call her Dr. Kavanagh when you’re inside her? Hey, do you even know her first name?”
“Enough!”
“Think she’d lift my grade too if I offered to lick her—”
With a roar, I launched myself at Ten’s legs. When we both toppled over backward off the table, someone screamed and about a dozen players surged forward to break us apart. But I still got in a couple decent punches before I was pulled off him.
Quinn was the only one with enough muscle to drag me away. Breathing hard, I pushed him off me as soon as he got me alone in a brightly lit bathroom. But Jesus, I couldn’t believe my best friend on earth had just ousted me like that.
“I’m gonna kill him,” I muttered even as I grew sick to my stomach. Aspen would never forgive me for this. Oh, God. Had I just ruined her entire life? “I can’t believe he...he...”
“Jeez, Noel.” Hamilton tugged at my arm to get me to face him. “He’s drunk. He always talks stupid when he’s drunk.”
My chest heaved from how strongly I was breathing. “But he said—”
Quinn laughed and shook his head, looking completely unconcerned about how shit was about to hit the fan. “You’re not honestly worried we believed a word he said, are you? We all know how much you hate Kavanagh.”
When I shot him an irritated scowl, everything inside me was still too open and raw. The truth must’ve reflected on my face because his eyes widened.