4. JT

CHAPTER 4

JT

Half the guys I know are worried about the future. They talk about it all the time. They stress about it all the time. They make plans and when those plans go sideways, they make some more and start the whole cycle over again.

I’m not shitting on anybody’s worldview. You do you and all that.

And I’m not saying I’m immune to stress. Hell no. I just try to take it in and let it out.

I’m no planner. I have goals—literally—and I put in the work to meet them. I just don’t subscribe to the philosophy of mapping out every minute of my future, every second of every day. I know guys who live by that code, and it works for them. Santos is a spreadsheet guy. Rosco’s got a whole system of benchmarks and rewards. More power to them.

But it’s not for me.

And that’s because every good thing in my life has happened by chance.

No lie.

My best memories are the direct results of random occurrences .

And every plan I’ve ever made has failed.

A couple years ago, I worked my ass off and won a full scholarship to Woodcock University. I had goals and plans and checkmarks.

They all went up in a fiery blaze and I ended up here in Bainbridge, Maryland by sheer luck and the good fortune of being in the right place at the right time.

To the very core of my being, I believe that the bad shit’s going to happen whether you plan or not. The trick is not to get so caught up in avoiding the pitfalls of life that you miss the good stuff.

Take my current situation, for instance.

I had no plans to come out tonight. In fact, I had plans to ditch my buddies and veg out in front of my TV.

Instead, I’m sneaking in the back door of a frat house looking for an empty bathroom.

And I’m loving every minute of it.

The most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on is cradled in my arms, her head on my chest, her heart beating in time with mine.

It’s a hell of a moment, and I’m holding on to it.

I’m also slinking down a hallway with my back pressed to the wall like I’m starring in next summer’s blockbuster action flick.

I’m not.

I’m looking for a first aid kit so I can wrap Maggie’s ankle and clean out the nasty cut on her leg. I lost her for a second in the crowd, and the next thing I knew, she was rolling down an embankment and getting torn up in the process.

I come to the end of the hallway and see three doors. Statistically speaking, at least two of them are bedrooms. The third is either a closet or a bathroom. Tilting my head to the left, I listen hard, but there’s just silence. The room’s got to be empty. I’m about to lean forward and twist the handle when the door flies open. All my flexibility training comes in handy as I dart back into the shadows when a pissed off woman stalks out, tying the strings on her bikini top and bitching up a storm.

“What a waste,” she huffs, power-walking down the hall. I figure she’s headed up to the main floor to commiserate with her friends, but it turns out she’s not done with the poor sap she left behind in the bedroom. “You’re hot and all, but damn,” she says, lobbing the words over her shoulder. “That was the worst kiss of my life, and I had such high hopes for you. You need, like, sex lessons or something.”

I can’t help the shiver that runs down my spine at her words. She’s not talking to me—hell, she doesn’t even know I exist or that I’m roughly three feet away from her. But damn, that’s cold. I wait a second to see if the poor bastard will follow her out here and plead his case, but he doesn’t show. Can’t say I blame him.

I’m trying to figure out where the bathroom is, but that’s hard to do when I can make any noise or draw attention to the fact that we’re down here. Just as I’m about to ask Maggie to pick even or odd, she taps me on the chest and whispers, “Try door number two.”

I turn the knob and flick on the light. My girl’s got good instincts. The bathroom’s small, but it looks fairly clean—or at least a hell of a lot cleaner than any of the bathrooms at the hockey house.

“You can put me down now,” she says, smiling up at me.

I should set her down and then see about scrounging up some ice, but I don’t want to let her go. It’s not just that I like the feel of Maggie in my arms, but also the fact that there’s not a lot of available real estate in here. The vanity has barely any counter space, and if I set her down on the floor, she can’t stretch her leg out. I give the bathtub a glance…it’s got promise. Not only is it a decent size, but it’s also covered in a strip of tape with the word SANITIZED printed in bold letters. Yeah, we definitely don’t have ba throoms this clean where I live. I notice the same type of tape stretches across the toilet lid, so I set her down on top of that and turn over the empty trashcan for a makeshift footstool.

“Nice work, Doc,” she says, beaming at me and at this very moment, I know I’ll do anything—any fucking thing—to earn another of her smiles.

I squat down in front of the sink and check the contents of the cabinet underneath. “Jackpot!” I say, holding up the red plastic first aid kit like it’s the Vezina trophy. “You want to sort through this while I scrounge up an ice pack?”

She nods. “Just don’t?—”

“I’ve got you,” I assure her, opening the door and turning the lock. “The password is icepack. Got it?”

“Icepack? That’s genius,” she quips.

“I promise I’ve got more creativity than that,” I assure her. “I’m just saving it for later.”

Her cheeks turn pink as I slip out the door.

I’m not sure what’s up with her need for stealth mode or why she cares so much about privacy. Yeah, we’re probably the only two sober people in this house, but that shouldn’t really matter. It just means no one else will remember us or care that we’re here. But laying low seems to be important to her, so I’ll play along.

I hit the top of the steps and stride into the kitchen, making a beeline for the fridge like I live in this house. And no one calls me on it. I know a couple of the guys in here from the baseball team, and there are a few other familiar faces, including the guy who dragged me here tonight.

Ollie’s leaning back in a kitchen chair with his feet propped up on the table. “Briiiiick!” He drags out the nickname I hate, but I don’t flinch or correct him. I just grab a Solo cup from the stack on the counter and hand it over to him. “Ice me.”

Dunking my cup in the cooler next to him, Ollie looks right at home manning the makeshift bar. He slides the cup my way, and I give him a salute.

“You don’t want any alcohol in that?” he asks, clearly stymied.

“Nah. They’re serving up margaritas in the living room. Ollie nods as though my explanation makes total sense.

I head out the way I came, swiping a dish towel as I pass the stove. They have actual dish towels here? And sanitized bathrooms. Is it too late to pledge this paradise?

I’m three steps down when I hear my name being called. I turn to see the first baseman—Chad? Brad?—pointing in my direction. “Party’s that way,” he says, pointing in the direction of the living room.

I hold up my cup. “Toad wants a margarita,” I tell him, pulling the catcher’s name out of my brain at the last second.

“Fuck. He’s a sloppy drunk when he drinks tequila.”

“I’ll go easy on him,” I promise as I make my way back downstairs. After knocking twice on door #2, I whisper the word icepack and the door pops open.

Maggie’s right where I left her, on top of the closed toilet lid with her foot propped up on a trash can. The relief that surges through me is unwelcome, not to mention ridiculous. She’s got a twisted ankle. Where the hell did I think she’d run off to?

“Points to Kappa for a fully stocked first aid kit. It may not have been opened in the last decade, but none of this stuff goes bad, right?”

Maggie looks hopeful, and I mentally cross my fingers as I pluck a pack of alcohol wipes from the box. “We’re good,” I announce, and it’s the truth. According to the package, these wipes are good until August thirty-first of this year. And today’s August twenty-first.

We’re golden.

I root through the box and find the rest of what I need. Snapping on a pair of gloves, I take a look at her scraped up knee in the light. I don’t pay any attention to the curve of her calf or the smooth, soft skin of her thigh. Nope. I’m just cleaning out her wound like any normal person who totally does not have a new-found leg fetish would do. Tearing the alcohol wipes open, I look into Maggie’s eyes. “Can’t lie. This is probably gonna hurt.”

“Is that really necessary? It’s probably clean, right?”

I laugh lightly. “You basically rolled around in the dirt. I’m no medical professional, but this step is definitely required.”

She bites her lip and closes her eyes.

“You’re tough. You’ve got this.”

Maggie just laughs. “No one has ever mistaken me for tough in my whole life. I’m a certified wimp. I freak out when I get a paper cut. I don’t even handle the hiccups with any amount of dignity or bravery.”

“Hiccups are the worst. Besides, you’ve been walking around on pointy-toed heels all night. That counts as badass. You can absolutely handle a little rubbing alcohol. On three, ready? One, two?—”

“Motherfucking son of a bitch in heat,” she mutters, squeezing her eyes shut as she stops the flow of blood from my arm to my hand with her death grip.

I can’t help the chuckle that escapes my lips. All five foot three of this little blonde bombshell is bringing me to my goddamn knees as she winces from the sting of the rubbing alcohol.

If she thinks this hurts, she may well pass out when I wrap her ankle.

Maggie peels her eyes open just in time to see me tearing the top off of another packet.

“Almost done, I promise.”

“How do I know I can trust you?” Her words are playful but something in her tone tells me my answer matters.

I could joke and ask her what other choice she has. I could pretend to call out to any number of drunken party guests to see if there are any pre-med majors in the house.

I could toss out some cheesy line about how I don’t go around lying to beautiful women.

But none of that’s my style. I’m not the funny guy. Or the suave one. I’m the dependable one. The one who protects what’s mine.

I’m a keeper. It’s what I do.

Maggie’s sure as hell not mine , I tell myself, tamping down the wave of possessiveness that washes over me.

But she’s in my care for the time being, and that’s all I’m focused on right now.

Well, that and the fact that her perfect tits are about to spill out of her tiny little dress…

I give my head a mental shake and reach for another alcohol wipe. “I went to summer camp when I was nine. It was a sleepaway camp, the kind where you stay all summer long.” I don’t need to look into her sky-blue eyes to see that she’s wondering what the hell I’m talking about. “I don’t even remember the name of the camp now, but I was in Sparrow Cabin with a bunch of other guys my age. The second day we were there, someone stole all the gummy worms from the snack stand.”

I blow a little cool air on her skin before dabbing some ointment on her cut and sealing it with a bandage.

Maggie’s paying no attention to the first-rate medical care I’m doling out. She’s too busy clutching her non-existent pearls and feigning shock. “Not the gummy worms!”

“Mmhmm,” I say, nodding gravely as I reach for the ACE bandage. “And brace yourself because it gets worse. One time, when we were on a hike, somebody TP’d our cabin.”

“The audacity.”

“Right?” I smile up at her. “Pretty sure I didn’t know that word when I was nine, but yes. The fucking nerve. And you want to know what’s worse? ”

Her eyes light up. She likes playing along. “Is there any crime more heinous?”

I shrug, looping the bandage around her ankle. “You tell me. All I know is that later that summer, somebody drew a dick on our counselor’s forehead while he was sleeping.”

Maggie bites her full bottom lip, and fuck, I want those pouty lips wrapped around my dick. “My god. Who would do such a thing?!”

After securing the wrap with two flimsy aluminum clips, I lean back and look up at her. “I’m not telling.”

“Woah, woah, woah. You’re going to leave me in suspense? I don’t think so, Mr. Gym Shorts Hottie Man. I hate suspense. Can’t stand it. I read the last chapter of a book before I read the first one.”

Now it’s my turn to be in shock. I shake my head and let out a low rumble of laughter. “I should have known. Hot as fuck, funny as hell, and clearly a sociopath.”

“Uh, no…” she says, drawing out the word. “I just like to know the end. If it’s awful or sad or unsatisfying, why bother reading the rest of the book?”

“Because the whole point of reading a book is to see how it ends?” I say, even though she’s already shaking her head at me.

“Nope. The whole point of reading is to enjoy it or to learn something. Starting at the end doesn’t prevent me from learning anything, and there’s no way I can enjoy a book if I’m worried about the conclusion. So…who’s the culprit?”

“Can’t tell you,” I insist. “I’m not gonna do my boys dirty like that.”

“Your boys?” She asks, laughing. “You see these guys on the regular, huh?”

“Not exactly,” I hedge. I haven’t seen any of them since that summer ended, and I’m pretty sure I couldn’t pick any of the guys out of a lineup. ”But a promise is a promise. And I keep my promises.” To prove my point, I lift her ankle gently so she can see it’s securely wrapped.

“You…how did you? You distracted me!”

I nod. “It worked, didn’t it?”

“Yes, but… now I’m onto your tricks. There’s a nasty scrape on my shoulder. What are you going to do the next time I?—”

Maggie’s words die off as my lips cover hers.