Consolation Prize Read online

  He smirked. “Trust me, I don’t do anything half-assed. Especially that.”

  “Well, if you’re so sure you could keep up, then fine.”

  “Fine,” he spat right back. “I will.”

  And then we just stared at each other, realizing what we’d agreed to do.

  Holy shit.

  Colton shook his head as if to clear it. Then he squinted his eyes and hesitantly asked, “So…we’re going to have sex then? We’re really going to have sex?”

  I blew out a breath, feeling dazed. “Yeah,” I said slowly. Ohmigod, what had I just said? And why did I add, “I guess so.”

  “Okay, then.” His chest heaved and he once again shook his head as if he was trying to wrap his brain about this new development. “We, uh, well, we probably need to work out the when and where, huh?”

  I nodded, still too shocked to think properly. “Yeah. Probably.”

  This was so bizarre. We were discussing a hookup as if scheduling a boring study group. And yet when I looked up at him, I almost came. I was so turned on and ready for him now, my body was buzzing and super sensitive. But what made me really ache was seeing how hungry and ready he looked.

  “I don’t work tonight,” I blurted.

  He nodded. “Tonight’s fine with me.”

  “Unless—” I started only to stop and bite my lip for being so impatient and wanting him sooner.

  “Unless what?” he pressed, looking about as impatient and turned on as I felt for him.

  I shook my head. “Nothing. I have class in five minutes. I shouldn’t skip.”

  “Yeah.” He ran his hand through his hair, and oh shit…I was even more turned on now. I was so going to get my hands in that hair again when we got together. “I have class too. I shouldn’t skip mine either.”

  But his jaw tensed as he watched me molest his hair with my eyes. A second later, he grabbed my hand and started striding deeper into the student union. “Dammit. We’re skipping class.”

  JULIANNA’S CHAPTER | 16

  He only dragged me a few steps before reality struck home. “Wait, Colton. Wait!” I dug my feet in, stopping us.

  He jerked to a halt and turned to me, looking distinctly in pain. I knew exactly how he felt, but one of us needed to be practical here.

  “This is crazy,” I said, the God’s honest truth. Besides… “A quickie on campus is not going to cut it.”

  “Fuck,” he whispered and blew out a harried breath. “You’re right.” Chewing on his bottom lip, he glanced around us. I could practically see his mind spinning as he tried to think up a way around our dilemma.

  But all I could do was watch his teeth sink repeatedly into the fleshy fullness of his lip.

  “Stop,” I croaked, holding up a hand. “Stop chewing on your lip like that.”

  “What?”

  When he paused mid-chew, his eyebrows crinkled in confusion, I confessed, “It’s sexy as hell and not helping the situation at all.”

  His bottom lip popped free of his teeth as he gaped openmouthed at me. Then he shook his head. “Yeah, there’s no fucking way I’m going to be able to wait until tonight to get inside you.”

  He ran his hand through his hair again and blew out a breath. I pressed my legs together, trapping the ache as tightly as possible between my thighs.

  “What about an appetizer?” He snapped his fingers and grinned with accomplishment.

  I frowned, confused. “Appetizer?” I wasn’t hungry. I was horny.

  He nodded eagerly. “Yeah. Quick meaningless consumption to help quell the craving until you’re served the full course. And it’s all part of one eating experience, right, so technically we could still do something now, then the real deal later, and just group it all under one event. One and done.”

  Ooh, an appetizer.

  That was actually a genius idea.

  I nodded, agreeing. I’m sure we both knew a freaking appetizer was utter bullshit. If we had a quickie here and now and then met again this evening for more, it would most definitely be two separate sexual encounters entirely.

  But I found myself saying, “I love appetizers.”

  “Me too.” He squeezed my hand briefly before glancing around. “So…where do we go?”

  “No fucking clue.” I gulped, a bit panicky because if we didn’t find somewhere soon, I might just combust right here in the middle of everything. I was already embarrassingly wet. We needed some damn privacy. Soon.

  “Dammit,” he hissed. “Come on. We’ll just…something available has to pop up if we keep looking.”

  I nodded, not because I thought that was a good idea, but because any idea to find a place to get him naked seemed brilliant right about now.

  So he commenced to tug me down the corridor of the student union. When we passed a closed door with an electronic sign next to it stating its next use wouldn’t be until Friday, I tightened my grip on his hand to get his attention.

  Colton glanced back and then followed my gaze to the door when I gave a silent tip of my head toward it. His gaze lit with interest before he reached out to jiggle the handle.

  And holy fuck, it actually opened.

  He glanced at me, his eyebrows raised in question. I gulped and nodded, and he led me inside. Two slim tall windows hugged either side of the entrance, but a person wouldn’t be able to see the entire room from the outside if they were trying to peek in.

  After Colton eased the door shut, he whispered, “There’s a lock,” and flipped it.

  He squeezed his grip supportively around my hand and led me to the one corner where absolutely no one could see in. All it contained was a sturdy wall and a red carpeted floor. I slapped my hand over my mouth, trying not to laugh because my nerves were going wild. Giggling was a super bad habit of mine when I was this wound up with excitement and apprehension.

  “Colton,” I whispered, touching my hand tentatively to his back, the warmth of his flesh immediately soaking through the cloth to greet my fingers. I wasn’t really trying to get his attention, I just felt the need to say his name.

  But he turned to me, his grin radiating so much happiness his entire face freaking glowed. A part of me was actually too intimidated to touch all that beauty while the rest of me wanted to overindulge.

  He reached for my cheek, and I panicked.

  “Wait, uh…!” I gulped and shook my head. Ohmigod, this was really happening.

  “What’s wrong?” He dropped his hand, and his brow crinkled with worry.

  “Nothing.” I sucked in more air and smoothed my bangs out of my eyes. “I just…we need to set some conditions first.”

  Yeah, that sounded good.

  “Conditions?” He narrowed his eyes. “What kind of conditions?”

  “Like...” I bit my lip and winced. “I’m not sure how to word this.” Mostly because I wasn’t even sure what to say. I was stalling because I was suddenly scared.

  “It’s okay. Just say it. What am I not allowed to do?” His shoulders slumped as if he thought I was reneging on the deal already.

  Unable to disappoint him, especially when I knew I didn’t want out—at all—I was only freaking a bit, I clutched his arm. “No, nothing like that. Just…actually it’s the opposite,” I added when I realized there was a condition I would like added to our deal. “I want...I want...”

  His eyebrows lifted. “You want...?”

  “No, I guess it’s something I don’t want. I don’t want either of us,” meaning him, “to turn down any new ideas offhand, like...I don’t know. I’m just asking you to be open-minded to suggestions that might not be your norm, and maybe testing them out first before vetoing something offhand.”

  “Oh, I’m definitely open to suggestions.” He wiggled his eyebrows mischievously. “But now I gotta know what kind of kinky ideas you have stirring around in that amazing brain of yours.”

  I frowned at the salacious grin he had going on. “I didn’t say I had kinky ideas, necessarily.”

  He immediately stopp
ed grinning.

  I huffed out a frustrated breath. “I just don’t want to build this up in my head only for you to be a three-pump, missionary-position-only kind of guy.”

  He tipped his head thoughtfully. “You don’t like missionary?”

  I flushed. “No. I mean, I don’t have anything against it. I just—”

  Grinning, he set two fingers against my lips. “Baby doll, do I really seem like I’m only into vanilla sex to you?”

  “No,” I admitted, feeling foolish for even bringing the issue up. My shoulders relaxed.

  His smile spread so wide and beautifully I felt blinded and consumed by it. “Trust me,” he assured me. “As long as my dick ends up inside you, you can Kama Sutra me any way you like.”

  I nodded and blew out a breath. “Good.”

  He stepped in closer, making me catch my breath. Why did his nearness always make my heart beat faster and my breathing go crazy?

  “My turn. Condition number one—”

  “Wait. What?” I flashed my gaze to his face. “You have conditions?”

  He shrugged. “Why not? You did.”

  “But I...okay…I guess.” Inside, I tensed, worried what kind of regulation he was going to put on me.

  “You can’t bite your lip when you come this time.”

  I blinked. “Excuse me?”

  “At the wedding, when you came…” I flushed because I’d never discussed sex so openly with a guy before. But then… most of the stuff I’d discussed with Colton was confidential. I rarely—if ever—shared that kind of shit with anyone, so I guess it made sense to open up more with him about this too. “…You fought it the entire way through.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Yes, you did. You locked your muscles, hid your face, and I know you bit this lip.” He reached out and softly slid his finger over my bottom lip as if to ease it from the bite I’d given it nearly two weeks before. Without telling myself to, I swiped out my tongue to taste the salty flavor of his finger.

  He smiled at me and ran the back of that very same digit up my cheek. “Just promise to try to let yourself feel the whole thing, okay?”

  “Okay, fine.” I rolled my eyes, still convinced I hadn’t held anything back. I mean, it’d been a pretty powerful orgasm. I remember being almost scared of it because it’d started off stronger than I was used to. And then…shit, I had tried to shut it down because it’d been overwhelming.

  But I couldn’t tell Colton he was right, so I sighed and tried to make myself sound impatient. “Assuming you can make me come again, I promise I won’t try to hold it all in this time.”

  With a chuckle, he kissed the end of my nose. “Oh, I’ll make you come. I plan to make you come a lot.” His chin dipped as if he were easing in for a kiss on the lips. But the moment I lifted my mouth to meet his, he murmured, “Condition number two.”

  “Two?” I squawked! “You can’t have two. I didn’t have two.”

  “Well, I have two. And I don’t want Brandt to know about this.” He suddenly wasn’t teasing or grinning anymore. I fact, he looked ready to walk out the door if I didn’t comply.

  I gulped. “That’s fine.” I didn’t particularly want Brandt to know about it either. I mean, awkward much? But still…why was Colton so against it?

  He didn’t explain. He just added, “Actually, I don’t even want his name brought up between the two of us. Ever.”

  Unease slithered through me. I wanted to apologize to him once again for what I’d said that night. I must’ve hurt him a hell of a lot more than I’d initially realized.

  Suddenly, this whole one-time-deal-just-to-get-it-out-of-our-systems agreement sounded like a really bad idea.

  “Just curious, but...why...” I licked my dry lips. “Why don’t you want him to know?”

  “Because he wouldn’t like it,” he said. “He knows you still have a thing for him, and he’d think the worst. I don’t want him thinking—”

  “Wait!” I held up my hands, completely not expecting that last part. “What do you mean, he knows I have a thing for him?”

  Colton closed his eyes. After a moment of deep breathing, he opened them again and said, “Who do you think sent me over to distract you at his wedding? He didn’t want his wife to worry about anything if she caught on to how persistently you were watching him.”

  “Oh my God,” I whispered. I covered my mouth before slapping my arms over my chest to hug myself. “You were sent to me?”

  He seemed to realize telling me that little detail was something he never should’ve done when his face froze as if he’d just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. “I…”

  “So, what…?” I demanded, feeling just…really, really shitty. “He tossed me a pity bone? Like I don’t want you, but here’s my little brother. Enjoy? You really were my consolation prize? Are you fucking kidding me right now?”

  “No, it wasn’t like that at all.” He grasped my shoulders gently and looked into my eyes beseechingly. “Jesus, baby doll. That is not what happened. He actually told me not to touch you. No, actually, that wasn’t how he put it. What did he say?” He winced, trying to recall the exact wording before he refocused on me to relay, “He said I didn’t stand a chance with you.”

  “Oh.” I shoved his hands off me so I could back up enough to glare at all of him. “So you decided to prove him wrong, huh?”

  “No.” He didn’t sound so insistent this time. He was almost defeated as he explained, “I didn’t think I stood a chance either. But you looked so miserable, I wanted to help you. I thought I could annoy you away with my flirting like I usually did, and it would chase you off so you’d stop torturing yourself. But then…then I learned what your fucking earrings meant, and…Jesus, Juli. You were there. You know what happened just happened. I didn’t plan that.”

  I believed him. I don’t think I would’ve believed anyone else who’d fed me an excuse in that moment, but I believed Colton. Because I had been there. There’d been nothing planned or diabolical behind our encounter in that room.

  But still, everything felt…wrong again.

  “Maybe we shouldn’t do this,” I whispered, shaking my head and almost about to cry because that wasn’t what I really wanted to say. “This is getting complicated.”

  He shook his head. “It’s not complicated at all, baby doll. Do you want me or not?”

  Everything inside me screamed yes, but I gulped. “But what about…he who shall not be named?”

  “That’s why I made that condition because this right here is between you and me, not him. He doesn’t belong here, and I don’t want him involved. And if he knew about it, he’d make himself involved.”

  I nodded. “Okay, but just for the record, I don’t still have a thing for him.”

  “Whatever.” He stepped in closer to me and ran a single fingertip up the side of my throat. It felt...wow, really good, but I think he was trying to distract me because he didn’t believe me and he didn’t want to hear what he thought was a lie.

  I grabbed his wrist, making him look into my eyes.

  “I’m serious, Colton. I was over him that night. I just didn’t realize it yet. You were right. One taste of you and I forgot all about big brother.”

  He cupped my cheek and whispered, “Okay.” This time, I think the words actually sank in. He believed.

  Releasing a breath of relief, I smiled. Then he smiled. And we leaned toward each other to kiss. At first, it was just lips pressing against lips. I had to close my eyes against the utter sweetness of it. But soon enough his mouth opened and tongue came out, so my tongue came out.

  Before I knew it, we were stepping closer, then right up against each other. I gripped his shirt with two fistfuls as he slid the straps of my book bag off my shoulders. So I did the same for him. Once both packs dropped to the floor at our feet, he smoothed his palms along my back until he gripped my ass and picked me up. I hooked his waist with my legs, and he spun to press my spine against the wall.


  When the hard ridge of his erection slammed against my clit, I sucked in a breath and clutched him, gripping and releasing, almost like a cat kneading a lap before sitting on it. I think I even purred when his lips found the base of my throat.

  “Yes.”

  He angled my hips using his grip on my ass and hit another sensitive spot. “Dammit, Colton. You’re going to make me come before we even get to the good stuff. Please tell me you have something.”

  When he froze against me, his face still buried against my neck, I almost wept. “Oh my God, you’ve got to be kidding me.”

  He finally looked up and met my gaze, his eyes wide. “I forgot to refill my wallet after the wedding.”

  The wedding…where he’d heaved his unused condom across the room.

  Shit.

  I guess that meant he hadn’t been getting frisky with any other woman since then, which was good to know, but fuuuuck…a condom sounded like air right about now, I needed one to keep breathing.

  “We, uh…we can just go back to my place then. My roommates have tons of condoms in our bathroom for their boyfriends. You can follow my car, and—”

  “Sounds good,” he said, cutting me off as he set my feet back on the floor. “Except we’re not leaving this room until one of us comes. And I choose you.”

  He slipped his fingers into the waistband of my yoga pants and whipped them along with my panties down my legs, making me screech in surprise, then slap my hands over my mouth, hoping no one had heard me through the walls. An instant later, Colton was kneeling in front of me and cupping the outsides of my thighs with warm fingers.

  “Holy shit,” I gulped as my frantic gaze veered toward the doorway, hoping no one with a key tried to enter.

  When his tongue touched me, I sank deep into the corner of the wall. My hands slapped out for any kind of support but grasped at nothing.

  “Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmi…god.” My head fell back, and my eyes rolled up. The muscles in my legs loosened, and Colton took that opportunity to open them wider so he could discover more of me.

  My lashes fluttered and I finally looked down. There was a swirl of dark hair around the crown of his head, like a cowlick. I became obsessed with watching it as his tongue kept swirling and working at me without ceasing. Unable to help myself, I continued to splay out one arm against the wall but dropped the other so I could grip a handful of that soft, silky hair.