[Ryan]

She stands and walks around the small living room. I try not to stare at her ass but fail. I may be a nerd, but I’m still male and her curves are amazing. “How is it you get to live in a mod? I thought they were reserved for seniors.”

I’m not about to share my dysfunctional family dynamics with the person turning me into the very thing I’ve spent my life trying to avoid becoming. “Delta made an exception for me.”

She gives me a look. I’m not sure if she’s jealous or pissed. Or both. “They don’t want you in their house.” It isn’t a question.

I lose what little smile I have as I turn away. How’d she know that? Guilt and shame weigh me down, lowering my shoulders. “Not exactly.”

“Then how’d you swing it? Got dirt on Brad or something?”

“My dad made a call.” I gauge her reaction. If she knows who my dad is, she doesn’t let on. It convinces me she has no idea I’m Stuart Ryan’s son.

“What, is he like the president or something?”

“Or something.” I’m not about to tell her who my dad is. Brad knows, as do the Delta officers, but no other students know. I want it to stay that way.

“Okay, okay. Touchy about the dad. Next subject. Let’s get to work on turning you from zero to hero.”

This woman is brutal to my ego. “Why do you keep calling me a zero?”

“Oh, come on. It’s just something I say. Don’t take it so personal.”

I give her a sideways look. “Kind of like when Brad told you your friend was the hot one. That didn’t bother you at all?”

“You heard that?”

“Yeah, I heard that.” It took everything not to jump across the bar, over the table, and beat Brad unconscious for that comment. The guy is blind for thinking Emma’s friend is hotter. Emma clearly tops the hotness scale. Her friend is too…much. Not Emma. She’s exactly…much.

She rolls her eyes to blow off my comment, but I see right through her false bravado. Her eyes soften, sadden. I want to take back what I said but can’t. Instead, I’m forced witness all those emotions pass through her expression before she settles into her role of pretending not to care. “Okay, fine. I’ll give you that one. But he said it to piss me off. I’m not calling you a zero to make you mad.”

“Then why call me that at all?”

“It’s a frame of reference. Jeez. Are you going to continue to act like a whiny little bitch or are we going to do this?”

I can’t help but chuckle. “Did you just call me a whiny little bitch?”

“That I did.” She laughs. “We’ll be fixing that, among other things. Attitude is everything.”

I nod and push my nerves aside. This is what needs to happen. I have a father, grandfather, and big brother constantly telling me I’m not good enough. My brother is convinced I’m adopted. They’re athletic, all-stars in high school, all-conference in college. I was captain of the knowledge bowl team in high school and am the floor supervisor for one of the computer labs at BU. Being forced into the Delta house is my dad’s way of fixing me, as he says. Like I said earlier, if I earn a spot inside the Delta house instead of tossed into the backyard, my dad will stop riding my ass. My brother may even pat me on the back when I come home for spring break. I hate how their approval matters to me, but it does. They’re family. It just does.

“What is it?” she asks and rests a hand on my shoulder.

Aside from the gamers I talk to online during my Saturday night gaming session and my coworkers, I don’t talk to anyone else. None of them know about my family. I’m not about to say anything to a pretty girl I took home from a bar. “I’m nervous.”

“I promise to be gentle.” She pats my arm and moves away to grab her beer. “How’d you get to be a Delta anyway? I thought they were really picky on who they let in. No offense, but you really don’t seem the Delta type.”

Time to come clean. Sort of. “I’m what they call a legacy. My dad was a Delta. His dad was a Delta, as was his dad. Even my brother was a Delta, just not at BU. Of course, they were all massive jocks. I’m, well, not. But the rule is, once a Delta, always a Delta. I’m a fourth-generation Delta. That’s like royalty in this house.”

“And yet they have you living in the backyard,” she points out, acid dripping from her tone. “I don’t care that your daddy made a call. Something’s not right.”

“Why are you so mad about this?”

“Because it pisses me off that you don’t see it.”

“See what?”

“Exactly.” She thrusts her fingers through her hair and I’m mesmerized at the way she pulls it off her face. How do girls do that, render us guys completely helpless with nothing more than a hair flip? “Okay, because I’m your friend, I’m just going to come out with it. They don’t want you, Ryan. The truth hurts, babe.”

She says it like I don’t already know that. What kind of idiot does she take me for? I’m not blind. Or deaf. But I’m a Ryan, and my family would flat out disown me if I didn’t at least try to fit in. Hell, they may disown me anyway for majoring in computer engineering instead of business.

I don’t want to think about that right now and focus on why Emma Rae is inside my mod. “How exactly are you going to turn all of this into something girls want?”

“First, don’t call us girls. Call us ladies. Or women. We stopped being girls when we got our period.”

I cringe and shudder.

She rolls her eyes at my reaction. “What is it with guys and periods?”

“We don’t have them.”

“Well, duh. But you don’t have to act like I just described something out of a Final Destination movie.” She touches her hair again and I want to touch it, too. “Moving on.”

“Thank God.”

“Oh, stop being such a baby. Okay, we’ve already got the name out of the way.”

“Wait,” I speak up. “Why do I have to go by my last name? What’s wrong with Harold? That’s the same name as a British prince.”

“If you were English royalty, you could get away with it.”

“What about Harry Potter?”

“Not helping your case.”

I sigh in frustration.

“What’s your middle name?”

“Bartholomew.”

“Harold Bartholomew? Did your parents want you to get beat up a lot? It’s like they picked the two worst names to call you. Why not give you a girl’s name to really make your life hell. What’s your full name?”

I hesitate, knowing what’s coming when I tell her. My mind drifts back to the woman outside the club. She knew my name. How’d she know my name? Why does Emma want to know my full name? She’s already decided to call me Ryan. I have to admit, I don’t hate the idea.

“Harold Bartholomew Francis Ryan.” I’m embarrassed as shit and drop my shoulders when she laughs, which immediately shuts her up. “And yes, it got me beat up. A lot.”

“Then we stick with Ryan.”

“Ryan it is.” At least then people wouldn’t give me that look when they hear my last name, not if they think it’s my first name. We have Hawks Stadium, courtesy of the Ryan Foundation. And several grants for football equipment, as well as funding for the next several years for some of the top disease research scientists in the world.

My dad, Stuart Ryan, is the head of the board that runs it all.

Could I get girls by dropping that little bomb? Sure. Are they girls I want? Hell, no. Why would I want someone only interested in my status? Or the amount of money in my family’s bank account? Now that I’m going to be a true Delta, I’ll have to become shallow, so maybe it’s time to let the news out. My brother has been using it to get laid for years, so it obviously works.

“Earth to Ryan.”

I snap out of my thoughts. “What?”

“What were you just thinking about?”

I’m not about to tell her. “What’s next?”

She nods, closing the subject. At least she doesn’t push the issue. “How blind are you without your glasses?”

I join her at the counter and make sure I’m stationary before I remove my glasses. “Hold up some fingers.” When I see a blur of what I think may be a peace sign, I blurt out, “Two.”

“Try again.”

Nothing changes from what I can see, so I wait.

“Well?”

“Did you change them?”

“Yes. Can’t you see my fingers?”

“No. And,” I say and slip my thick specs back on. “I couldn’t even see your hand, let alone which fingers you had up.”

“Wow, you really are blind. Do you have contacts?”

“Yeah, but I don’t like wearing them. I have this thing against sticking stuff in my eye.”

She gives me a knowing smile and damn if it doesn’t make me smile in return. “If you want to stick anything else into, well, anything else, lose the glasses.”

I can’t breathe. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

She rolls her eyes and laughs at my expense. “Do I have to explain everything? I’m trying to get you laid, Ryan.”

“Right. I knew that.” I didn’t really know that. Well, I sort of knew that. Why do girls—ladies—insist in talking in code? Why not just come out and say it? Not for the first time, I question whether this is a good idea.

“Sure you did. Now, do you have a pair of scissors?”

“Why?” I lean away from her, not trusting that look glimmering in her eyes.

“Because I want to run with them.”

“In that case.” I jump up and grab a pair out of the drawer in the kitchen, and slide them across the counter toward her. “Knock yourself out.”

Without warning, she yawns and it pops her jaw. “Come here. I’m going to cut your hair.”

“Not after you’ve been drinking cherry syrup.”

She lifts her beer. “I’ve moved on. Now get over here.”

“No way. Not until you sober up.”

“It’s not like I’m falling down drunk.” She yawns again and blinks wide. Damn, she’s fading fast.

“You’re barely keeping your eyes open.”

“Fine.” She sets the scissors on the counter. “Let me pierce your ear then.”

I cover my ears and literally feel the blood drain from my face.

She laughs. “Oh, my God. You look like you’re five right now.”

I love her laugh. It’s husky, like she pulled the sound from the depths of her soul. “No piercings, not even when you’re sober. I draw the line at needles.”

“I suppose tattoos are out of the question, then?” She wiggles her flirty brow.

I’ll pass out at the sight of the first needle, but keep that to myself. “Listen…uh… Hey, I don’t even know your name.” I really want her to tell me so I don’t come across as a complete stalker.

She winks and I’m ready to come undone. “See? You really are more like a Delta than you realize. You’re taking a woman home and you don’t even know her name.”