Chapter 17

 

 

“Aiden,” I say with a nod. I take a sip of my second drink of the night while some pop song plays overhead, which is an unusual music choice for Mexican restaurant.

Miranda downs half of her second drink in one huge gulp. “Aiden… that’s a sexy name.”

She reaches over and puts a hand on my leg. She has long natural nails with chipped red polish on them. Her hand looks like it’s from a horror film. She squeezes my leg. “Everything about you is sexy,” she purrs.

I want to tell her that despite what she thinks, this whole spiel of hers is absolutely not sexy. I guess if I wanted to get laid with a total stranger, all I’d have to do is ask if she wants to go to my car. She’d probably disappear in a cloud of dust, and be waiting for me with her clothes stripped off.

That is not a sexy look at all.

This kind of shit happens all the time when I’m on the road. It’s even worse when I’m with the guys, because then a group of girls who are all copies of Miranda will crowd around us, each choosing the guy they want so they can fling themselves on us. Teenage me would have thought this magnetism to women was the coolest thing ever.

But now all I can see is STDs and waking up next to a stranger that reeks of booze and vomit. Not sexy. Not attractive. Not anything I’m going to do tonight.

I may be hurting over Jenn ghosting me, but I’m not about to trade those feelings for the fleeting touch of some strange woman I just met.

I shift on the barstool and her hand falls away. I have no interest in this girl but I also don’t want to be a total asshole to her. I take a menu from the bar and flip through it, acting as if I’m interested in the food. All I wanted to do tonight was have a drink or two alone so that I could try to get over the pain of Jenn ditching me.

“You’re the dirt bike guy, right?” Miranda asks.

“Probably,” I say. She quirks an eyebrow.

“There are a lot of dirt bike guys in this town since it’s home to a motocross track.”

She rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean. You’re that famous guy everyone’s talking about?”

“What are they saying?” I ask.

“Who?” she says, sipping from her drink. Not only is she overly flirty, she’s also forgetful.

“The everyone that you just mentioned.”

She shrugs and finishes her drink, signaling for another one. “The guys in this town are jealous of you and the girls want you. That’s about it.”

I snort and take a sip. The liquor burns down to my stomach. That’s all it does. It doesn’t make me feel better, and it doesn’t take my mind off Jenn.

Next to me, Miranda orders three shots and she downs them the second they appear. The bartender asks if I want anything and I shake my head. I’m still working on my second Jack and Coke. I’m not about to get too drunk to drive my sister’s car home.

Marcus would kill me if he knew I was drinking. Alcohol isn’t good for an athlete’s body, he’d say. He’d demand that I flush it out with a gallon of water and jog five miles to make up for it.

I take another sip. What Marcus doesn’t know won’t hurt him.

Miranda is talking to me, but I only half pay attention. She’s talking about motocross and how her dad and brothers ride dirt bikes. She’s the kind of person who can have an entire conversation by herself, so luckily it leaves me out of the obligation of talking back. I just nod every few minutes.

I check my phone but there’s no new messages. It’s late enough that Jenn would be off work today or out of school, or finished with whatever thing she had to do that would keep her from messaging me.

I sigh and consider sending her a text. I could ask if she wants to schedule a new fake date, or maybe keep it simple and tell her I saw something funny that reminded me of her. My finger hovers over her name on my text list, and I’m so tempted to tell her hello.

“Oh my God, you shouldn’t be on your phone when you’re with me!” Miranda says, shoving my arm.

At some point, she got another drink. Her eyes are glassy and she’s touching my leg again. I think her barstool somehow got closer to mine as well.

She leans closer. “It’s so rude to be on your phone when you’re with a hot girl.”

I’m about to tell her I’m not with her. I’m sitting next to her, quite out of my own control since she chose to sit next to me. But I can see in her eyes that she’s drunk and I wouldn’t put it past her to make a big obnoxious scene in front of everyone if I say anything that pisses her off.

“Sorry,” I say, putting my phone away. “What were you talking about?”

“I was saying I give the best head,” she says, blinking up at me. Her hand rises up my thigh. I put my own hand on top of hers to stop her, but she must think I’m trying to hold her hand because she grabs it and stretches out my index finger then brings it to her mouth.

I freeze, feeling one hundred percent embarrassed as she literally sucks my finger. The horrifying moment only lasts for one second, but I am mortified. What if someone saw? That’s disgusting. My hands aren’t even that clean.

“That’s… enough,” I say, trying to smile politely as I take my hand back, drying my finger on my jeans.

“There’s more where that came from,” she says with a drunken wink. “Let’s get out of here.”

“I have a busy day tomorrow.” I hope she can’t hear the lies in my voice. “I need to go home soon.”

She frowns, then looks around the restaurant. “Ugh. You’re the only hot guy here,” she whines. “If you won’t go home with me then how the hell am I going to piss off my boyfriend?”

Whoa.

I don’t even know what to do with that information. She flicks an annoyed gaze my way and then drops some cash on the bar and reaches into her purse. She drops it, and has to pick it back up, then when she finds her keys, she drops those. She stumbles out of her stool and hits her head on the bar when bending to get her keys. This girl is a wreck.

“You’re not driving home,” I say. I fish some cash out from my pocket—probably way more than what my bill costs—and leave it for the bartender. I take the girl’s keys and then hand her purse to her.

She looks up at me with a drunken smile and presses her finger to my chest. “Does that mean you will come home with me?” Without warning, she leans forward and runs her tongue up my neck. A literal shudder goes through me, and not the good kind.

“It means I’m taking you home,” I say, pressing my hand to her back to guide her.

We weave through the packed restaurant and out to the parking lot.

“Where’s your car?” I ask.

“Right here,” she says, drunkenly swaying as she points to a blue SUV. “But I live over there.” Her finger swings across the street to the apartment complex.

That’s convenient. I can drive her home and then walk back. I help her get into her car, and she starts giggling as the alcohol takes over her inhibitions.

“I wanna suck your—” she says. I close the door so I don’t have to hear the rest of it.

I get in her car and drive across the road. She points to the building that’s hers, and I park, then peel her hand off my thigh again. This girl is touchy as hell.

She doesn’t get out of her car on her own, and I have to walk over there and pry her out. She wraps her arms around my neck and starts kissing it, trying desperately to reach my lips. I turn my cheek away.

“Miranda,” I say, forcing her away from me. “Focus. Which apartment is yours?”

Her hooded gaze smiles up at me. “I’m going to make you feel amazing,” she purrs. “You’ll never want to leave.”

“Uh huh, sure,” I say as if I’m talking to a toddler. “Show me which apartment is yours.”

She starts walking and I hope she’s going the right direction. Headlights pull into the darkened parking lot and then they shut off abruptly. A truck door slams and footsteps approach.

I turn around just in time to see Jay, stone-faced and bowed up.

“The fuck?” he says.

Miranda gasps and then grabs onto me, wrapping her hand around my arm. “Go away,” she tells him. “I found someone better.”

Jay’s jaw tightens. “What the fuck, dude? First you steal my girlfriend then you steal my side piece?” He waves his hands through the air. “There’s not any other girls in his damn town for you?”

It dawns on me in an instant. This girl is the one Jay cheated on Jenn with. This is the girl Jenn hates. And she’s currently pressed up against me so much you’d think we were about to go upstairs and hook up.

I peel her off me. “I’m just getting her home safely,” I say, dropping her arm.

“No he wasn’t!” Miranda shouts. “He appreciates my talents and he wanted to get laid by someone who knows what she’s doing.”

Jay snorts. “Are you going to tell Jenn, or should I?”

I would give anything to have my wrist out of this cast so I could knock this guy into the next century. Anything. He’s going to call Jenn and it doesn’t matter that I had no interest in this girl, she’s going to hate me.

“Look man,” I say, trying to level with him. “I was just trying to do the right thing and get her home safely. She’s all yours now.”

Miranda reaches for me, pouting out her lips. I ignore her, toss her car keys to Jay, and start walking back toward the restaurant.

“Yeah you better walk away,” Jay calls out. But he waits until I’m pretty far away, far enough that his words are just a meaningless threat. I know he doesn’t want to fight me. He’s just all talk.

He’s lucky because I have no words for him. I hold up my middle finger, and I don’t look back.

If he tells Jenn what he saw tonight, this will all be over. But I guess if something was never actually real, it was over from the start.