36. CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE

P resent

Ruby

I’m rinsing the conditioner out of my hair and singing my favorite tune in the shower grateful I have a brother who lives on campus. I remember getting my offer to Westfall U and thinking what a great opportunity it would be to run on their track team when Abuela reminded me it was always good to have family close by. Riverside U has just as good as a reputation, but I had wanted to leave Michigan. This morning was a good reminder as to why I made the right choice. When the sprinkler system went off in Campbell Hall because of a burst pipe this morning and my dorm room flooded all hell broke loose. By the time me and my bestie Charlie got our things out of the building I was a sweaty mess and my anxiety had shot through the roof. Thankfully my older brother Hayden gave me his house key. He saved my ass once again. Just thinking of all the students trying to save their belongings from getting ruined by all the water and how we had to lift our suitcases down the stairs since the elevators weren’t working exhausts me. At least I had a few minutes to take a shower before class this morning.

I leave the shower and wrap a towel around me. I’m still humming as I leave the bathroom upstairs and head to my brother’s room. He isn’t home. None of the guys are. Hayden lives in the hockey house and all the guys are either in morning skate or on their way to class. I trudge barefoot down the hall. I didn’t have it in me to lift my suitcases up the stairs so I opened one of them up downstairs and took some clean clothes for today. Unfortunately, I forgot all my hair supplies back in the dorm and we were told we won’t be able to enter the building for a while. I’m almost at my brother’s bedroom door when Macklin Dombrovsky comes up the stairs. I freeze my heart skipping a beat. I’ve crushed on Macklin since we were teenagers. He’d grown up living across the hall from us. But I haven’t seen him much since coming to Riverside. He’s busy with the team like my brother but he is also being weird since I arrived. I don’t know what I expected from him but we were super close growing up. It was Hayden, Macklin and me against the world. I was disappointed when Macklin barely gave me the time of day my freshman year and when his cold silence continued into my sophomore year I was heartbroken but I didn’t want to stir any trouble. He was still Hayden’s best friend. He was still like family since he always came back home with Hayden for the holidays he just has a problem that he doesn’t look me in the eyes. Sometimes I want to ask him if I did something wrong but then I drop it because he’s too important to Hayden and so am I and I hate conflict.

“Ruby?” Macklin asks wide eyed.

“Hi, sorry, my dorm flooded and I had nowhere to go,” I mumble holding the top of my towel so it doesn’t drop.

“Shit, that’s crazy,” he replies his eyes sweeping over my body. “I should go. I’m late for class.” He inches past me in the narrow hallway. His chest brushing mine. I take in the scent of his body wash he must have just showered at the sports complex. Our chests brush my hand moves and my towel slips and before I can catch it my towel is a pool on the floor.

“Holy shit,” I curse bending to get it.

“Sorry it was my fault,” he says bending too to help me. Our eyes meet and I see heat in his eyes when he checks me out but that doesn’t make sense because now he looks panicked. Our foreheads smash together as we stand.

I howl in pain. Macklin curses.

“Please let me just pick it up,” I plead. I can’t believe I am wet and buck naked in front of my teenage crush.

He takes a step back and turns around, so he isn’t ogling me. “I didn’t see anything,” he says awkwardly but he fully saw every naked inch of me.

“Like I believe you,” I mutter.

“Shit, I am so sorry Rubes,” he says. Is he apologizing for barely speaking to me for two years, for knocking my towel off me of for colliding with my head?

“It’s fine Mack. I’ll just slip into the room and cry from shame,” I reply feeling mortified. I will be traumatized from this moment forever. Okay maybe that’s a little dramatic but this is completely horrible. The first guy to see me buck naked is my brother’s best friend and it wasn’t intentional. This is why I am still a virgin in my junior year of college.

“You have nothing to be ashamed of,” he answers facing the other way.

“Yeah, well I disagree with that,” I mumble, and I head into my brother’s room and close the door behind me. I can never look Macklin in the eyes again and it’s a bloody shame because the guy has the most stunning shade of gray eyes I’ve ever seen.

I melt against the door squeezing my eyes shut and trying to get my baring’s. So, what if he was the first guy to see you naked? It wasn’t on purpose. He didn’t seem to be flustered. I think he cared more about respecting me than anything else. He probably also doesn’t want Hayden to beat his ass. Hayden loves him like a brother, but my brother is seriously overprotective of me.

I take a few slow breaths. I have to get my shit together and get to class. I hate missing class and I have an elective this morning. It’s a kinesiology class and there is this hot guy I’ve been checking out. I make sure the door is locked before I drop the towel and get dressed. I put on a pair of jean shorts and a pink cropped t-shirt. I use my brother’s hair brush and then put my hair up in a high pony tail since it’s hot outside and my hair is long and sometimes makes me hot. I slip on my socks and sneakers and check myself in my brother’s body length mirror. I need to speak to Hayden because Charlie and I need a place to stay tonight. I’d rather not have to pay for an Airbnb. I shoot Hayden a quick text telling him what happened. Within seconds my brother is responding that I should take Shane Stalkhouse’s room and Charlie is welcome to stay with me. Hayden knows that Charlie which is short for Charlotte and me have been bestie’s since my first week on campus and we are always together.

I head back downstairs not realizing Macklin is still home.

“Oh, hi,” I say awkwardly.

His right hand rubs the back of his neck. “Are you okay?”

Macklin was always the sweetest most caring guy. Having him practically ignore me never sat right with me. Abuela thinks he just has a lot on his mind when he goes back to the apartment and that’s why he’s quiet but I’m not so sure that is the case. He was never the type of guy to share too much. We knew his foster mom was a bitch that was using him but Macklin didn’t talk about her too much.

“Besides the bump forming on my head, yes,” I say giving him a small smile.

“Shit, can I get you ice?” he offers moving toward the kitchen.

“I’m fine Mack. I was joking. If anything my ego is bruised that you saw me naked,” I tell him.

“Why bruised?” he asks.

“Oh, come on Mr. Womanizer. You’ve seen tons of naked woman and. . .” what the hell am I doing? Shut up Ruby.

“What were you going to say?” he smirks.

“Nothing,” I clear my throat. “I have to get to class.”

I duck passed him and grab my backpack.

“I can lock up,” he says after me.

“Okay,” I say without looking back and I head onto the street and walk to campus.

Staying in the hockey house tonight is going to be super embarrassing. I just have to put Macklin out of my mind and act like it never happened. I make it to my kin class a few minutes before lecture starts. Two bad things happened this morning and I am just waiting for number three to strike. When the hot guy I’ve been checking out walks into class and takes a seat two seats away from me I can only think in what way I will embarrass myself now.

“Have you heard good things about the prof? I kind of felt like she was monotone,” he asks.

“No, I’m not a kin major. I just took the course for interest,” I say nervously. The guy is hot and I do not have the best social skills around guys like him. He looks like an Abercrombie model with blonde hair and blue eyes and muscles that are so defined he looks like he was cut from stone.

“Cool. I’m Knox by the way,” he says with a perfect smile.

“Ruby, nice to meet you,” I reply.

“That’s a pretty name,” he smiles.

I blush. “Thanks.”

The prof starts lecture and we stop talking. The lecture is fifty minutes long and I feel his presence beside me the whole time. I wonder if he’ll ask me out but I know it’s wishful thinking.

When the class is over I am slipping my laptop in my bag when Knox moves in closer to me. “Would you like to grab a coffee or a bite to eat sometime?” he asks.

I take it as a win that he wants to go to coffee which means he is interested in talking. I find most guys don’t care what you have to say. They just want to get in my pants and I can’t bring myself to go with some horny guy I care nothing about.

“Sure,” I say unsure of what should happen next.

“Can I get your number?” he asks.

“Yup,” I reply and I tell him my number.

“Are you free tonight?” he continues.

“I don’t think so. I have to get settled into my brother’s house. My dorm flooded,” I explain.

“Oh, crap were you in Campbell?” he asks.

“Yeah,” I frown. “It was a rude awakening.”

“I heard. I have a friend that lives there he has nowhere to go tonight,” he says.

“I have my brother thankfully,” I say.

“Nice. So maybe tomorrow?” he asks. For someone so good looking he seems sincere.

“That sounds good,” I agree.

“Cool, I’ll be in touch then, Ruby.” He grins and walks off. He’s giving a young Brad Pitt vibe with that smile.

I nod and smile back and I head out of class with him following behind but he heads in another direction.

For the rest of the day I try to focus on Knox and not on the horrible interaction I had with Macklin this morning but it doesn’t work because I can’t get the way Macklin looked at my naked body out of my mind.