Chapter 6

CHAPTER 6

CHASE

O ne second I’m standing in the middle of the hotel room, waiting for the bathroom to be free, the next a shoulder is crammed into my stomach and I find myself flying through the air. And hitting the floor with enough force to knock the wind out of me.

“What the fuck,” I groan.

The bedside light comes on.

“Shit. Sorry. You scared the crap out of me!” Cameron rushes across the room. Her hair is a wild mess, her eyes are wide, and she looks ridiculous in the massive hoodie that looks like it was made for a giant.

“Why the fuck did you do that?” I’m still lying on the floor, mostly because I’m trying to recover. I’m also processing what just happened. Weird little Cameron has suddenly turned into weird, fuckhot Cameron. There’s literally nothing to her and she just flipped me over her shoulder. I’m six-four and two hundred pounds. There’s nothing quite as sexy as a tiny woman who can kick ass.

“It was a reflex. I didn’t expect you to be looming!”

“Looming? ”

“You were standing there, being huge and imposing, and it freaked me out and I just reacted.”

I roll up to a sitting position. “Did you think some random dude appeared out of nowhere?”

“I’m sorry. You scared me. Are you okay? Did I hurt you?” Her arms pinwheel, the too-long sleeves of the hoodie flopping around.

I hold up a hand. “I’m okay.”

She takes it as a sign that I want her assistance, shoves a sleeve up, and wraps her small hand around mine. The contact isn’t unwelcome, but the jolt it sends through me is foreign. It happened the first time, too. Maybe she’s a staticky person. I let her help pull me to my feet.

She tips her chin up. “I’m really sorry.”

“Where’d you learn how to do that?” I straighten my shirt and run a hand through my hair, trying to be cool about the fact that she just laid me out and I’m kind of a lot turned on by it.

“My sister and I had to learn how to fight young because my dad wanted us to be able to defend ourselves. I had a black belt in karate by the time I was fifteen.”

“That’s fucking hot,” I blurt.

Cameron blinks up at me, cheeks turning pink. “Uh, thanks?” She takes a step back. “You needed the bathroom?”

“Right. Yeah.”

I leave her standing there and close the bathroom door, locking it behind me. As I relieve myself, I notice that her panties are no longer hanging on the shower rod. But her shirt is folded on the counter. Is she wearing those panties again? Why am I suddenly turned on by the fact that she wears underwear proclaiming her pussy is her precious? I also wonder how many guys, if any, have had access to her precious. What if she has a boyfriend? The hot feeling creeping up the back of my neck is weird, and I don’t know what to do with it. I shouldn’t be thinking about her panties like some kind of fucking creep. She probably wouldn’t have agreed to stay in this room with me if she had a boyfriend. Or she would have mentioned him. Girls with partners do that so straight dudes know not to shoot their shot for no reason.

I shake it off, literally, wash my hands, and return to the bedroom. The bedside lamp is still on. Cameron waits until I’m lying down again before she asks, “Should I turn out the light now?”

“If you want.” I turn on my side and push the pillow between our heads down so I can see her profile. I don’t know how I missed how pretty she is. Her bottom lip is fuller than her top lip, pouty and suckable. I try not to think about what it would feel like to have those luscious lips wrapped around my precious. And fail. “So you have an older sister, huh?”

“Yeah. She’s really fun. And super pretty. She makes friends everywhere she goes and everyone loves her. High school was kind of weird because she was basically famous for being hot.” Her voice starts to pitch up the longer she talks.

“Did that make it hard?” If her sister looks anything like her, I believe the hotness factor. But I don’t care about her sister. I just want to know the girl in front of me.

“She’s outgoing and I’m more of an introvert. She’s cool though. I kind of lived in her shadow, but also it meant that people were nicer to me because of her, and mostly left me alone. I definitely wouldn’t repeat high school, but it could have been worse. Anyway…” She takes a deep breath. “Do you have any siblings?”

I tuck my arm under my cheek, getting more comfortable. “One older sister and a younger brother.”

“Oooh. The middle child.” She rolls toward me and folds her pillow in half, then punches it down like she’s annoyed with it. “Do you feel misunderstood most of the time?”

“Nah, my sister’s only a year older and my brother’s a year younger so there wasn’t a lot of room to be misunderstood.” I shift, trying to get comfortable, but my ribs are sore. “What’s your major? What classes do you have this semester? ”

“Seriously?” Her eyebrows rise.

“Yeah, seriously. I thought I saw you in bio last week.”

Her nose wrinkles. It’s pretty freaking cute. “Yeah, you did.”

So I’m right, she’s the same girl. “You live in res, right?” Unless she was just visiting a friend when I saw her in the elevator.

Her cheeks flush. “Uh, yeah.”

I rub my bicep. “Right. Cool. What floor?”

“You’re like three doors down from me.” She rolls onto her back.

“You’re kidding, right?” That means we’ve been passing each other in the halls for two months.

“Nope.”

“We must sit on opposite sides of the lecture theater in bio.” That’s the only explanation for not knowing her before now.

She scoffs. “You literally sat on me during the first week. Like you didn’t even see me sitting there, and your ass was in my lap.”

“Oh shit. That was you?” I remember that. We’d gone to our teammate Mac’s off-campus house for lunch and a swim but ended up drinking too many beers. I’d been half in the bag and not in the best form for that class. I’d fallen asleep and my teammates left me there. I woke up when the next class arrived, and some disapproving guy told me I should probably check with my classmates for notes since he was doubtful I’d retained much with the way I was hard-core drooling. He wasn’t wrong.

“Yup. That was me.” She rolls over and flicks off the light. “I’m tired, so I’m gonna go back to sleep.”

“I’m sorry I sat on you.”

“It’s fine.”

“It’s not really, though.” I was probably an asshole to her. I’m pretty sure the guys had laughed when it happened. I’m pretty sure I laughed.

“I knocked the wind out of you, so we’re even. Night. ”

My throat suddenly feels tight. I want to keep pushing, but clearly she’s done with me. “Night.”

She pulls her covers over her head. I lie here feeling like a bag of shit.

I try to relax, but my mind keeps churning. How fucking oblivious am I that I completely overlooked her until last week? How many times have I walked right by her? How many opportunities have I missed to walk with her to class? Every beat of my heart sounds like a bass drum right now.

Her flipping me over her shoulder and laying me out on the floor keeps playing over and over in my head. She gets hotter and hotter with every replay.

I hit that weird zone between half awake and half asleep, and reach the point where the replay starts to morph. Instead of having the wind knocked out of me, Cameron straddles my hips, wraps her small, delicate but lethal hands around my wrists, and pins me to the floor. She rolls that full, pouty bottom lip of hers between her teeth and leans in until her mouth is barely out of reach. My shirt disappears and her braid sweeps across my chest, tickling my skin. And then she slides her precious over my erection and I groan, loudly.

My eyes pop open. My fist is wrapped around my erection, and I was probably about to sleep jerk it. It’s a weird, embarrassing habit I have. Cameron rustles around beside me. Did I groan aloud? I really fucking hope not.

I let go of my dick and will my erection to fuck off. I think of unappealing things. Like zombies and roadkill and losing hockey games. But none of it works. Especially when Cameron makes this little sound that’s half moan, half sigh.

I lie there for fifteen minutes, but my hard-on isn’t giving up. If I don’t take care of my problem, there’s a good chance I’ll wake up with raging morning wood. It’s better if I handle it now. I tuck the sensitive head into my waistband and quietly slide out of bed. It shouldn’t take long with how freaking worked up I am.