Consolation Prize Read online

  Dammit. Gritting my teeth and unable to ignore my name, especially since I realized I was running away again, I slowed to a stop and inched around, lifting my eyebrows with question.

  When all he did was lift his hands as if silently asking, “What’s the deal?” I glanced behind him for her, but the girl he’d been talking to was nowhere in sight.

  “Where’d your friend go?” I blurted out without thinking.

  He had the gall to look confused. “What friend?”

  “The girl,” I bit out. “The one you were talking to just now.”

  “Oh.” He glanced behind him too, as if expecting her to pop out from behind a bench or something. Then he came back around and shrugged. “I didn’t even know her. She approached me after class to ask me about study groups or something. I don’t know.” He hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Was she the one you needed to talk to?”

  “What? No.” I shook my head. “Why did you follow me?”

  “It looked like you wanted to talk to me? Why the hell did you take off? You looked upset. Kind of sad, and maybe pissed, but mostly just upset.”

  Narrowing my eyes and stepping closer, I poked a finger toward his chest. “Well, you’re insane if you think I’m going to admit I was jealous of her.”

  “Whoa!” Lifting his hands, he took a step away. But then he paused and hummed deep in his throat. “Jealous, huh? I didn’t even mention the word jealous. Didn’t even think it, actually. Why would you bring up the word jealous?”

  I froze, internally cursing myself. Now he was going to think—

  Gasping when he stepped right up into my personal space and set a hand against the wall near my head, half caging me in, I looked up into his intense brown eyes and lost myself. Everything about him was just so loud. It blared through me, taking control of my heartbeat, of my breathing, of my hormones.

  “Or maybe I should ask why you’d be jealous of some girl talking to me.” His voice was low and reverberated through my ovaries, making them tingle and contract with lust. But then he added, “I’m not Brandt.”

  My mouth fell open. I was half tempted to punch him in the gut and half tempted to burst into tears. After a hard, painful swallow, I lifted my chin and sucked it up. “I suppose I deserve that.”

  “I suppose you do,” he murmured. The words were biting but the tone was not. He spoke too softly to be condemning and besides, the way his gaze traveled over my face was in no way bitter. He looked at me as if he wanted me for dinner.

  My body heated in the most inappropriate, but pleasant places.

  I wondered what he’d do if I lifted up onto my toes and kissed him.

  “So why did you want to talk to me?” he asked, returning his gaze to my face after he did a slow, thorough body check of the rest of me.

  I held my breath for half a second, commanding myself not to reach for him because he was so close and his stare was so hot, pressing against him was the only thing on my mind.

  But we were having a serious, very un-sexy conversation. My body needed to chill the fuck out.

  “Okay, fine, I did want to talk to you,” I admitted, lifting my chin.

  He nodded, encouraging me to continue. “About…?”

  I exhaled a long breath. “We’re going to share this class for the rest of the semester, right, and I’m sure we’ll cross paths again at the bar. So I just thought it would be in both of our best interests if…if…if I apologized for…you know, and cleared all this contention between us.”

  “Contention?” He cocked his head curiously to the side. “Is there contention between us?”

  With a huff of disbelief, I hissed, “Yes! You completely ignored me at the bar the day after the wedding, and then today, when you finally decided I was at least decent enough to talk to, you treated me like I was trash.”

  “How did I treat you like trash?” he demanded, finally looking a little perturbed. “By calling you an idiot, an asshole, a jerk, annoying? Oh wait, no.” He snapped his fingers. “Those are things you’ve called me. My bad.”

  I opened my mouth as words failed me. But wow, I really had been awful to him, hadn’t I? And he was very, very upset with me.

  This was not good.

  I had to fix this.

  “That’s just how I am,” I blurted. “I’m bitchy. You are not. You’re charming and flirty and…and you let insults bounce right off you. You just…” I spread my fingers before him. “You don’t act like this.”

  Okay, so that was probably the worst argument I’d ever given anyone, but it was pretty much the truth, so…I went with it.

  “Oh don’t I?” he asked softly. “Because you know me so well then?”

  Unable to answer him because he was right, I didn’t really know him, I just stared, helpless, not even sure what to say.

  He shook his head and glanced away before returning his gaze to me, his eyes swirling with turbulence. “Maybe I just don’t feel like being my usual self right now,” he said quietly. “Okay?”

  My heart ached. Feeling like shit, I reached up and cupped his cheek gently in my palm. “I really broke you, didn’t I?”

  His eyelashes flickered, dragging the lids over his eyes as if he had no control over it. When he leaned slightly into my hand, his scent floated over me. I wanted to press my lips to his. Then I wanted to hug him and feel his heat wrap around me, maybe let it soak into my bones and fix all this misery I was putting him through.

  Watching his face, I said, “I’ll admit there’s something very...chemical between us.”

  His eyes sprang open. He stared at me for a moment before pulling his face from my hand. Scowling, he said, “It’s called a chemical imbalance. And those cause mental illnesses, like schizophrenia, so...” He wrinkled his nose as if smelling something foul. “I’ll pass.”

  Ouch.

  Spinning away, he started down the hall away from me.

  My stomach gripped with unease. “Colton...”

  He only waved a hand over his shoulder. “I’ll work on the contention thing,” he growled. And that was that.

  I didn’t feel better about facing my guilt head-on at all. And Colton still seemed to hate me.

  Fuck.

  JULIANNA’S CHAPTER | 9

  By the time my day ended, I was frazzled and drained. I didn’t see Colton anymore, though I kept expecting to bump into him again throughout the rest of my classes.

  When I slumped into my apartment, I collapsed on the couch and let my book bag thump to the floor beside me. After a second of gazing dazedly across the room, I decided I could move again after all and dug into my backpack to pull out my Kindle.

  Nothing tore me away from distressing thoughts like a good book.

  But every time the hero and heroine shared a heated glance, I kept thinking back to Colton, and the way he’d looked up at me when I put the condom on him or when I’d cupped his cheek after class today, or the first moment we’d met when he’d told me I looked like Rihanna.

  This wasn’t working.

  I swapped that book for a grisly murder mystery Chad had insisted I read.

  It was bloody and gory and would probably give me nightmares if not for the fact I had about twenty different dream catchers hanging from various places around my room. But the story successfully nabbed my attention. I barely even noticed my two roommates returning to the apartment after they finished their classes.

  I think Tyla might’ve even asked me how my day went. I hoped I told her it was fine, but I’m not certain.

  I was hiding, couldn’t they tell?

  With no idea how much time had passed, though I was certain I was about to find out who the killer was, a figure stomped up to the couch and stopped right in front of me.

  I glanced up at Tyla as she set her hands on her hips.

  “That’s it!” she told me in no uncertain terms. “I can’t handle watching you mope around the apartment a fucking second longer. We’re going out. Tonight.”

  I blinked and brushed m
y bangs out of my face. Since I hadn’t been moping at all, but sitting here calmly reading a book, I guessed, “Theo’s hanging out with his basketball friends again, huh?”

  She scowled, probably because I’d just hit the nail on the head. “That is totally beside the point. This is about you, JuJu. You need to stop pining over some unavailable, married man, who is probably cuddling with his wife this very—”

  “I am not moping over him,” I muttered, grinding my teeth to keep from announcing I was moping over his brother.

  God, I was a mess, such a mess, in fact, that I was too humiliated to confess to my roommates that I no longer even thought about Brandt; I was too busy stressing over Gamble Number Two now.

  “Well, whatever you’re doing is depressing as hell. And it’s going to stop. Right now. Sasha!” She clapped her hands before cupping them to her mouth and bellowing, “Girls’ night out. Go find me something to wear.”

  “Girl, what’re you yelling about?” Sasha asked, strolling into the living room. “Chad and I have plans to…” Her words trailed off when she entered the living room and took stock of me moping on the couch and Tyla hovering over me in mama bear mode. A second later, she nodded. “Yeah, okay. I can cancel with Chad. Are you in the mood for sexy or comfy?”

  “Ooh, let’s go comfy. I already got my man; who do I need to impress?” Tyla hurried after her as Sasha disappeared back down the hall. Their voices floated back as they debated over what the other should wear, and then Tyla yelled, “Be ready within the hour, JuJu! Or your ass is going as is.”

  I groaned and set down my Kindle. She wasn’t kidding around when she used that tone of voice. I’d probably best get my ass ready then, though the last thing I wanted to do was mingle with a bunch of immature, drunk college kids. I’d listened to a pair of girls talk before my last class today and damn, I felt so freaking old, too old to attend one of their parties, and I already knew that’s exactly where Tyla and Sasha would want to go.

  I guess I could’ve just refused, but yeah… Maybe I really should stop moping and get out of the apartment. If nothing else, it’d help me stop thinking about him for a couple hours.

  Still…

  “It’s a Wednesday night,” I called. “We all have classes in the morning.”

  “Like we’ve never gone to class hungover with two hours of sleep before,” Tyla’s answer echoed down the hall.

  “But today was the first day of class,” I whined.

  “Especially after a first day frat party under our belt,” Sasha added.

  “But it’s our senior year?” Shouldn’t we be more mature than this by now?

  Except they both yelled, “Exactly!”

  Ugh. I wasn’t going to get out of this unless I pissed them off beyond all prissiness. And I didn’t want to do that.

  So I trudged to my room and raided my closet. On the other side of the wall, Sasha and Tyla burst out laughing, the muffled sound cheerful and upbeat. I eyed the wall, longingly, wondering what they were talking about.

  I had met Sasha first. We’d worked together at a restaurant across town our sophomore year. When we’d both found ourselves needing a place to live, we’d decided to rent this place together. Later, when I’d met Tyla in a class we shared, I’d invited her to live with us too because she’d broken up with her cheating, asshole boyfriend at that time and needed a room. And less than a month after she’d moved in with us, she and Sasha had bonded like soul mates.

  I knew it was petty of me to feel left out and wish they wanted to share clothes and secrets and makeup advice with me the way they did each other, but most of the time, I couldn’t help it; I envied their close relationship pitifully.

  Dressing by myself, I debated between a couple of romper jumpsuits before deciding on a pair of dark hip-hugging jeans with a black turtleneck top that cropped short at the waist and had a heart-shaped hole at the throat large enough to show off some decent cleavage. And then, since it was winter, I pulled on some furred boots with spiky heels. I checked out my hair, swishing the long bangs in the front to the side before checking out the short crop in the back; I’d fixed it this morning. Just a little fluff and spritz here, and I moved onto my face. After a couple minutes of touching up my makeup, I went to check on my girls.

  Pausing in the doorway to Sasha’s room, I found them both half-ready.

  Tyla noticed me first. With a scowl, she demanded, “How the fuck do you always look so flawless after five minutes of prepping?”

  With a confused frown, I checked my Fitbit. “It’s been fifteen minutes.”

  “Whatever.” She swished out a hand and turned back to the mirror where Sasha was fluffing at her hair. “You’re a bitch.”

  “Such a bitch you guys don’t want me going with you tonight?” I asked hopefully.

  “Ha. Don’t even try to get out of it. You’re going.”

  With a sigh, I sat on the end of Sasha’s bed and examined my nails for imperfections. I touched up my polish every night after tying up my hair for bedtime. Lots of people thought my nails had to be fake press-ons or extensions because they were so long, but nope, they were the real deal. One hundred percent Julianna Radcliffe claws.

  For some reason, that made me think about Colton’s hair and how that had been real. I swear, it’d been as soft as rabbit hair, but thick and lush and beautiful. It was kind of depressing to know I’d never get to touch it again. If I could manage to get a seat behind him some day in class, I’d probably stare at his hair the whole damn hour.

  I seriously loved his hair.

  “Oh my God, honey, you need to stop thinking about that man already.”

  Feeling guilty, I jerked my gaze up to find both my roommates watching me as they each held up some form of makeup to apply the finishing touches to their faces.

  “He’s married.”

  I opened my mouth to tell them I wasn’t thinking about Brandt. But it was useless. I wasn’t ready to confess the truth, so I took a deep breath and commanded, “Then distract me. What happened to you guys today? Did Jeff ever find out you put that note on him while he was sleeping during class?”

  Tyla laughed and turned back to the mirror. “Oh, hell yeah, he knew. He tried to follow me after class and get all up in my grill about it, but Theo was waiting for me and chased him off.” With a dreamy sigh, she tossed down her lipstick and patted a wayward piece of hair into place. “Damn, I love my man. He’s so much better than Jeff ever was…and I ain’t just talking about in the looks department neither, if you know what I mean.”

  When she winked and bumped her hip against Sasha’s, Sasha hummed in her throat. “Mmm, you do have a good one. He’s almost as good as my Chad.”

  “Oh, honey, I don’t think so. Did you see the necklace Theo gave me for my birthday? My boy is ballin’.”

  “Well, do you see the messages Chad leaves me every morning on my phone telling me how beautiful I am and how much he loves me? Theo don’t do that, does he?”

  Tyla opened her mouth to retaliate, but I cleared my throat. “I think you both have amazing boyfriends.” Though truth be told, I liked Chad tons better than Theo.

  They glanced at me simultaneously, and I could tell exactly what they were thinking from their expressions. Remembering their single, loner roommate didn’t have a man, they winced in sympathy. But a second later, their gazes filled with determination.

  “You know, I can always get Theo to set you up with someone on the basketball team. There’s this tall, gorgeous transfer student from Jamaica who looks like he could make a girl’s toes curl all night long.”

  “Or Chad’s friend Reggie always asks about you,” Sasha added helpfully.

  I sighed and offered them a sad smile. “Thank you, guys. Really. But…” I shook my head. “With work and the class load I have this semester I really don’t have time for a boyfriend.”

  “You said that last semester,” Sasha reminded me.

  “And the semester before that,” Tyla felt the need to input.


  “In fact, the only guy you’ve seemed even remotely interested in since Shaun is this Brandt Gamble stranger you work with.”

  “That neither of us has ever even met.”

  “Or seen a picture of.”

  “Well, he’s married now,” I broke in before they could bombard me any further. “So, that’s a dead end and should stay dead…please.” When they merely set their hands on their hips as they gave me the look, I sighed. “I really just want to focus on me right now, okay? I’ll think about dating again after I graduate and find a job. I swear.”

  “We’re not saying you have to find Mr. Perfect or anything, sweetie. We just think it’d do you a world of good to relax every now and then and have a little fun.”

  I arched an eyebrow. “I have a vibrator.” But even as I said that, guilt tickled my conscience because I didn’t mention the fun I’d had a week earlier. “Any fun a man could provide I can take care of myself.”

  Except, no way could a vibrator accomplish what Colton had. I’d been so starved for him I’d been willing to be with him in the middle of a reception hall where anyone could’ve walked in on us. The way he’d kissed and touched me, yeah… no pulsating stick of plastic could ever replicate that.

  “Mmm, honey.” Tyla shook her head and waggled a finger. “You obviously haven’t been with the right guys if you think that way.”

  “A vibrator can’t kiss you as if you’re the air they breathe,” Sasha added dreamily.

  True that. Colton’s mouth had been pretty damn magical. And so had his hands.

  “A vibrator can’t pick you up and push you against a wall before—”

  “Okay, okay, okay!” I yelped, lifting my hands because I couldn’t stop thinking about how Colton had picked me up and thrust me onto that table. But then I had to add, “But truthfully, a vibrator won’t lie or cheat or ruin my faith in men completely.”

  “Damn,” Tyla murmured, shaking her head. “If Shaun were here right now, I would kick that little shit straight in the nuts. He really destroyed you.”