I ran a hand through my hair as he leaned back on the wall, settling in like he’d taken my silence to meanyes. I was still too stunned at what had just come from my mouth to tell him I was pretty close to having my mind made up already, and didn't need his advice to know how I felt about her. Everything else meant jack shit to me.
Putting a name to the feeling that had bloomed in my chest, and saying it aloud to my closest friend, made everything so much more clear. That was all that mattered. Her. Because I didn’t just think I loved her, Ididlove her.
“I say you take her to prom, or hell, even tonight’s party, and then you bring her home and sleep with her. If she’s as good in bed as the rest of the school says—” My gut and fist twisted, but Jared pressed on, oblivious as to what that imagery was doing to me. “Then, yeah. Maybe get her that ring and still. Fucking. Enlist.” When my vision cleared of the angry haze his words had created, he was standing in front of me, and his hand was on my shoulder. “Nothing and no one is ever worth ruining your plans—shit,ourplans—to that degree. Especially if the sex isn’t good.”
I nodded as if I agreed to any part of what he was saying. But none of what the rest of the guys said about her made any sense. She’d stayed at my house all weekend, and not once did she flash any skin, or suggest that we do anything more than make out on my bed—which was all my doing in the first place. We mostly played board games or watched movies—innocent enough.
Something didn’t add up, and as much as I had believed what they all said about her—what the entire school thought about her—was true, I didn’t know who she was deep down at the time.Now, what I knew about her was completely different. Lyra lied more than anyone else I knew, but she was also cunning, fucking brilliant, and utterly beautiful in ways I couldn’t comprehend.
Those mocking, lying words about watching eye-candy in the field ricocheted in my head as I waited for her to finish her last class, long after Jared had left to go home.
Lyra successfully put on a front, and let people believe the worst about her—but, why?
16
Carver
The Shower
“That’s it, sweetheart. Get it all out.”
Lyra continued dry-heaving, gasping for breaths between the liquor’s violence, then fell back into myarms as I sat behind her, holding her hair up each time she lunged forward.
“I’m gross.”
“You’re not.” I stroked a few tendrils back from her forehead.
“I’m dumb.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “We all do stupid shit here and there.”
“I’m also mean.” She tipped her chin toward the ceiling to see me better.
“Well.” I tucked my chin to my chest to meet her gaze. Those brown eyes of hers had stolen every piece of me before and were quickly proving to have lost none of their spell-binding charm. “I haven’t been nice, either,” I admitted.
The hint of a smile graced her lips right before she jerked forward and repeated the process of emptying every ounce of liquor she’d taken in and more. I glanced around the bathroom, scorning myself for having nothing feminine.
I’d change that tomorrow.
“Be right back.”
“Don’t leave—” She hurled into the toilet, and I fought against my instincts to stay by her side when she needed me. Even after everything, I just…couldn’t do it. Not while the alcohol was coursing through my system, softening my insides to putty that she’d be able to take more advantage of had she not drunk more than me.
I returned with a roll of twine I’d normally use on my plants and ripped a good foot or so off. Lyra was leaning on the toilet, her head sideways and eyes fighting to stay open. Taking the twine, I gathered her hair and wrapped it around, then tied it off.
“I’mreallygross,” she muttered and hiccuped, then grimaced when she opened her eyes to find me cleaning up around the toilet. “I’m so sorry.”
“Stop apologizin’.” I lifted her and closed the lid, then flushed the toilet with my elbow.
“Where’re you takin’ me?”
“The shower,” I replied as I set her on the counter.
I slowly worked her shirt up, grazing past her stomach, then pulling her arms through one-by-one before stretching the collar to fit over her head. She swayed even as I held her there, removing her clothes, but she didn’t protest. Just stared at me like she was too hazed-out to fight or felt comfortable with me doing this. Touching her like I was.
“Gonna have to buy you more of these sets,” I said, more to myself than her, but she grinned and looked down at the lace as I peeled it from her perky breasts.
“You aren’t”—she hiccuped—“takin’ advantage of me now, Mr. Roland, are you?” Her finger traced sloppy hearts on my forearm, almost like she didn't know she was doing it.
