I step closer because I want to fucking touch her, but this will have to do. "Dead serious."
She exhales, shaking her head and rolling her eyes. She crosses her arms over her chest, pushing her cleavage up toward me, and my mouth fucking waters. I just know she has the most perfect nipples ever made, and I want to taste every inch of them. "Please, not today, Callum. It’s already been a doozy, and I don’t need you breathing down my neck just because you’re bored or want to score points with my brother."
I narrow my eyes because she sounds off. Like she’s stressed or tired, and that makes me angry. "Who’s been bothering you?" My voice is low, and I already know I’m not going to like the answer.
She huffs, crossing her arms. "Unless you want to argue with my father, I suggest you don’t ask questions." A shiver rolls through her, and I don’t think it’s from the cold. Her breath hitches, the rise and fall of her chest stuttering. She clenches her jaw, shaking her head slightly, like she’s trying to convey that she’s not going to tell me what’s going on.
My jaw clenches. That’s fine, I can stay on task. "Did he steal your coat?" I’m being a flippant asshole right now, and we both know it.
“You’re insane,” she whispers, but there’s something else in her tone now that pulls at my chest. She’s genuinely upset, and now that I know, I won’t let it go until I find out why. I won’t force her to tell me, but I will find out on my own, and I’ll take care of it. I’ll take care of her like I always do.
My smirk is slow, deliberate because I need to keep up my act. “And you’re freezing.”
I don’t wait for her to argue. Instead, I quickly pull my hoodie over her head, my fingers brushing along her bare arms as I help her slide into it. She stiffens, her breath hitching when my knuckles graze the soft swell of her ample breast.
She inhales sharply, her lashes fluttering, cheeks going pink, and a shallow breath slips free. She thinks I don’t notice, but Ido. And it takes everything in me not to groan and crash my lips to hers. She’s fucking perfect.
The fabric of my hoodie swallows her up. My name and number is plastered on her back for everyone to see. If her brother sees her, he’ll think I’m the dutiful best friend, looking out for his precious, but sassy, younger sister.
Her cheeks are flushed with both annoyance and something else, but she doesn’t look at me as she pulls the sleeves down, hiding her hands. She looks up at me, eyes daring me to say something. I step closer, brushing my fingers against her arm. “Now, don’t forget. I don’t want to see you without a coat again. A parka, preferably. One that comes down to your knees.” She gives me a sarcastic smile and flips me off. Whatever had her rattled early she’s pushed down and replaced those feelings with her annoyance for me.
“I’m wearing a string bikini tomorrow, so be prepared to give me your sweatpants,” she chirps out, and I grin because that’s my fucking girl. She walks away, and my chest tightens when I actually get to see my ownership on her back. The white letters on navy fabric that spell out Grey seventy-seven are like a brand. It’s mine. She’s mine. As she walks by, a group of guys are eyeing her up. I see the way they look at her, the way they try to hide their glances despite the fact that my hoodie comes down to the bottom of her thighs. I memorize their faces, because I’ll be coming for them. They don’t know who the fuck they’re dealing with or that every single one of them is about to have a very bad night.
CALLUM
Ihave been in love with Lilac Fairbanks for as long as I can remember. It’s not because she’s my best friend’s little sister and the only daughter of the family who saved me from a hard life as an outcast in Castlebrook Falls. I can’t say that I don’t still feel like an outcast, but I do my absolute best to play it off like I don’t have a care in the world. That isn’t true. I have one thing I care about deeply, but I’m good at burying my feelings deep. Lilac is off-limits in ways I can’t even describe. If I told her how I feel, it would ruin us both and the people closest to us. I’ve grown apart from Adam Fairbanks. We don’t see eye-to-eye on a lot of things, but mostly I’ve seen how he doesn’t look out for Lilac in the way I think she deserves. She should be protected, but it’s not my place. So when it comes to her, I resort to looking like a creep, watching her any chance I get.
My girl doesn’t see me at first, but she will. It’s like she has a sixth sense when it comes to me. I can always tell the exact moment she feels me watching her. Her whole body stiffens, and her eyes search the room until they land on me.
There are many things I enjoy about silently admiring the girl in front of me, but the moment when she starts looking for me isthe best part. Seeing her flit around on the same ice that the guys and I practice on in that soft purple dress that hugs her body like it was made for her has me questioning if I’ll always be able to keep her at a distance. The hem flutters around her thighs as she spins, that chestnut hair flying behind her in a wave, catching the lights overhead. She lands the turn on a single blade like it’s nothing, graceful and exact, like she’s never once been off balance a day in her life.
Meanwhile, I haven’t taken a full breath in five minutes.
She does that to me. Every time.
Lilac Fairbanks might be the only person alive who could kill me with a pirouette and never even know it. I’m not going to make it out of this alive, and somehow I’m embracing it. I’m going to snap. Judging by the way my hands are flexing into fists to keep from rushing out there and scooping her up in my arms, it’s going to be soon.
I glance over at the exit off the ice and notice a rather large looking navy blue hoodie hanging there. Number seventy-seven. My chest feels crowded because it’s fucking swelling with pride. She wears my hoodie when she thinks I won’t be around to notice. Yet, when I tell her to wear it so douchebags on campus don’t stare at her boobs, she fights me on it. She’s confusing, and a brat sometimes, but she feels a lot like mine in this moment. She must have hung it there just before she stepped out to skate, which means that she must have been wearing it even after she changed into her practice dress.
I'm still in jeans and a t-shirt, my skates and pads nowhere to be seen. Coach Kav is going to have my ass in a sling if he walks in and catches me literally drooling over Lilac, but it’s all fucking worth it for just a few more moments with her. I should’ve gone into the locker room ten minutes ago, and really, she should be in the girls locker room with the other figure skaters, but Lilacisn’t one to follow the crowd. As much as her parents tried to control her, she’s always been her own person.
She’s slowing now, coasting along the edge as her cheeks flush from exertion, eyes soft with focus. She still hasn’t seen me, but I don’t miss the way she glances around after landing a trick. She’s still looking for me, wondering why she can feel me, but I haven’t popped up to playfully give her a hard time.
I also know something’s bothering her, and it’s not just the normal stress of family, school, and friends. I see everything. I never miss even the smallest things when it comes to Lilac. I notice how she holds her shoulders like she’s bracing for something, how her lips twitch like she's trying to hold back whatever’s really on her mind.
Then she turns her head slightly, and I purposely step out from behind the partition. Lilac’s gaze snags on mine and it feels like my whole body is alive with something that I’ll never feel with anyone else.
There it is. That flicker that has always been between the two of us. First it was a crush, but now? At least on my side, it’s festered into straight up obsession. There’s a familiar spark of recognition in her eyes and I like the fact that aside from her brother, she doesn’t know anyone on this campus the way she knows me. She looks a little annoyed, a little curious, a little too excited for someone who’s supposed to think I’m just her brother’s best friend.
Lilac suddenly starts barreling toward me and slams into a hockey stop right in front of me, ice spraying around her and her delicate fingers tipped in light purple nail polish wrapping around the boards like she didn’t just do something most of the guys on our team haven’t mastered. They didn’t have me teaching them how to skate when we were eight and ten years old, though. Her shaky legs the first time she stepped onto the ice was where she got the nickname bambi. I’m the only onewho calls her that, and I plan on keeping it that way. There’s a baseball player back home who still limps because I beat the fuck out of him with his own bat. Maybe everyone is right about me. Maybe I do have rage issues, but it seemed like a legitimate reaction to a heinous crime at the time. I’m doubling down, because I’d do it again.
Lilac caught onto skating quickly, and despite the fact that Adam hated when she’d tag along to skate on the rink her parents built for him, anything I taught her she picked up and surprised me with what a natural she was. I’m glad she didn’t want to play hockey and opted for figure skating because I’d have to kill everyone on both teams for knocking into her.
“Seriously, cowboy?” Lilac’s voice is sweet, but she’s looking for some banter and I’m totally here for it. I come from a long line of bull riders, but most people at this pretentious college don’t know that. She knows everything about me. Almost.
I raise a brow, smirking. “Seriously, what?”
“Well, are you just practicing for a career as a figure skating judge or are you just watching me again like some creeper?” She gives me a pretty smile meant to get under my skin. The only thing it does is make my dick strain against my jeans, and I’ll I can do is pray that I can get it tucked under my waistband before Coach Kav finds me. He’ll have the whole team doing battle drills till we all die if he finds me in his arena with a hard on.
