2B or Not 2B (Roomies Series) (10 page)

"Where are you going?" The panic in my voice was loud and clear
, and it halted his steps. He turned around and shrugged.

"It's easier to do this on my bed."

I watched his face, trying to find there some kind of devilish scheme, but I found nothing. He was seriously not seeing any problems with having me on his bed after the kiss almost two weeks ago. He wasn't concerned about the fact that I'd have to give him a back rub on his bed, a back rub being a well-known kind of foreplay. I didn't know if I should be relieved or offended. But that proved something, he didn't care one bit about the kiss. Nothing. Nada.

"I'm not g
etting on your bed."

"Why's that?"

"It's just … I … I'm your roommate, not your replacement-until-your-booty-call-is-here."

He walked to me in two strides and grabbed my head, delving his hand in my short cut hair. He was intense and I was
… wobbling. "If you think for one second that you're a booty call, you're mistaken, London." His eyes traveled down my face and stopped longer on my parted lips. Then, I saw something that made my breath stagger. His eyes darkened, and I knew it wasn't with anger.
Wow
. "Another girl would have been in my bed, naked and wet, for a while, and she'd been out of this place for a while, too."

"How should I take th
at?"

"That you're more than a booty call. That you’re
…
you.
" He released me and resumed his walk to his bedroom. He looked back once and just that look, authoritative and hot, made me move without another word. I followed him in his small bedroom.

It was as neat as the only other time I went inside
―the night of the kiss. Byron sprawled on his bed and messed with his top sheet. He positioned himself on his stomach, his face on his pillow and his hands under it. His back stretched, and I walked to the bed. The last time I felt so nervous and unsure was when I lost my virginity with Ryan in his father's SUV.

But I was almost a twenty year-old woman now! I wasn't a virgin, I wasn't innocent
, and I sure wasn't the kind of girl who turned her back to a challenge. I knew this thing was another one of Byron's challenges. I wasn’t sure if it was something to try to drive me away or if he enjoyed toying with me, and I didn't care. I was known to be challenging in all senses of the word, and that was why I was so difficult. I wasn't about to back down. It was just a fucking back rub! Nothing major after all. Just my palms and fingers on his skin, molding his muscles into submission.

I took a deep breath and climbed on the bed beside him, my left thigh plastered against his hip as I stretched to put my hands on his back. There wasn't something like a bolt of electricity coursing through me, or some
thing ridiculous like that. No, what I felt when my soft skin touched his hot skin was something worse. Something real. Something that will bite me in the ass one day. Lust. Complete lust that echoed everywhere through my body and mostly between my legs.

His skin was so smooth and hot
. His muscles felt hard and unyielding under my ministrations, and I was trying very hard to not look at his body. Or his ass, still covered by his jeans, but it was on full display for my eyes only. That I could ogle all I wanted without getting caught. Though, it would only add to my weakening resolve.

"That's how you give
a back rub, Bridge?" he mumbled in his pillow, not moving. When he talked, I felt it under my hands, his voice rumbling inside him.

"What now?"

Without looking, he grabbed my left wrist and tugged until I was almost sprawled over him. I shot upward like someone was poking me on my most ticklish spot and straddled his hips while he was still on his stomach. I could feel his ass, very hard and calling for some poking of my own.

"That's how you can give a proper back rub."

I looked at his light brown hair with my mouth hanging open. I was flabbergasted. He got me with my thighs open, and I was pretty sure that this fact wasn't lost on him. This guy was dangerous, but it had nothing to do with his military training.

"You should have told me that you wanted me to be all over you," I said after a while as I started my back rub from the beginning.

If I was being honest, he was right. Giving a back rub like I was starting to do was not the best option.

"You're not that kind of girl." His voice was gruff between sighs. Even when he was sighing
, he sounded sexy. I needed to stop playing this game with him. I wasn't even his type of girl!

"Because I don't bat my eyelashes like I've got some dirt in
my eyes while using a voice even a five year-old girl would be ashamed of?"

He chuckled and I gripped his shoulders, afraid to fall face down. He tensed
, and I released my grip. His shoulders were a thing to behold. I wondered what it would be like to claw at them while … I can't believe I was starting to imagine
that
. What was wrong with me?!

"That
, and you're real. You created your very own category, Bridge, and that's a fucking good thing."

My throat was closing, but I needed to finish this back rub and get the hell out of his bedroom.
Soon
. I knitted his muscles in the middle of his back, my hands gliding softly but with the right amount of pressure to make him sigh again. Goosebumps appeared on his golden skin, and I felt flustered.

"Does that mean that you're keeping me
, and we can forget the trial?"

"Dream on."

"You're an ass."

I
finished the rest of the back rub and jumped off his bed as he slowly sat up. As soon as his eyes locked on mine, only one thing was on my mind.
Get. The. Hell. Outta. Here. Now.
Everything in him was screaming hot sex. His eyes were hooded, his body was half-naked, his muscles were playing softly to entice me more than I already was and his lips were turned up in a wicked smile, the kind that was too naughty to be seen by underage girls.

"I have to go to sleep."

He arched an eyebrow and chuckled. The fucker chuckled at me. I pursed my lips, and his eyes landed on them. "It's not even five in the afternoon."

I opened my mouth
, but I couldn't find a come back to save me. I tilted my nose up in the air and shrugged. "Yeah, well, I'm tired."

"I don't believe you." He stood up and walked to me. "I think you can't take this sexual tension between us. It scares you because you want me. Badly," he whispered in my ear, his breath brushing my neck. He pulled back just enough to look at me. He was so close that it made me think about the feel of his lips on mine, the way he tasted.

I straightened my back and snickered at him. "Are you trying to lure me to your bed, Lord? Is it because you want me to do the things I did to Jordan?"

"Don't talk about him."

"Why? Because—‘’

"Because th
at son of a bitch doesn't deserve you, and because I don't want to think about that," he retorted, cutting me off before I could even finish my sentence. His eyes blazed with the same anger I saw earlier, the kind that empowered all his features to turn them into hard and sharp lines. Even angry he looked insanely good.

"I'm not a good girl, Byron. Stop this white knight thing."

"Good girls are no fun."

I looked away and took a few steps away from him and toward the door
, which was still open. I flew away and closed the door to my bedroom. I was breathing so hard and loud in the quiet room that it was painstakingly obvious that I was both turned on by his alpha male behavior and afraid of what could happen. I could lose myself to him. He could crush me; he could break the last part of me still holding together.

This guy was a mix of all the guys I called my book boyfriends
, and it wasn't as fun as I thought it'd be, considering that my place out of my parents' house was at stake. Why didn't I agree to live with the guy obsessed with World of Warcraft?

Chapter Ten

DAY 20

The bar was going for that English pub feel with the wooden panels on the walls, the old looking tables and the bar carved in a dark and shiny wood. On the dark walls, old
-fashioned beer and whisky ads almost gave it an authentic feel.

The patrons, mostly a young crowd
– sometimes even too young to legally order alcohol, thank you fake IDs ― were quite rowdy tonight. Some guys were cheering loudly for one of their friends who was drinking his third shot, while other groups of friends were talking animatedly and laughing. Our table was the odd and calm one out.

Macon walked back to our little table for two with a beer for him and a girly drink for me
― a cosmopolitan. Without saying a word, I grabbed the glass and downed half of it, eyes closed and ears assaulted by the loud music playing in the bar. That bar, The Spot, was well known by every college student who didn't live in a cave. The reason was simple; they didn't card very often.

Macon and I weren't that into bar hop
ping, but sometimes when it was a weeknight and there wasn't any interesting party, we had to take matters into our own hands. Tonight was a night that called for some alcohol, even if I knew I'd regret it tomorrow when my alarm would be screaming. Though, I wasn't about to get plastered; I just needed a little buzz to ease my thoughts that were getting out of control.

"Will you tell me what happened to you?" Macon asked me
distractedly, his dark eyes already scanning the patrons. He wasn't paying much attention to me, and it was annoying. "Because the scowl on your face is really not attractive, baby."

My scowl deepened
, and he chuckled at me, shaking his head. He shaved today, and it made him look younger with his smooth cheeks. His hair was still all over the place, though. I remembered how Macon was angry the day of our high school graduation. I had to beg him not to confront Ryan, to let it go, because in the end, it was useless. I wasn't very eager to see his reaction at hearing about Ryan trying to worm back into my life for more sexy-sex action.

I glanced at the time on my cell phone and sighed. It was barely past eight. I couldn't go back home yet. Byron wouldn't be asleep
, and I wasn't ready to face him again today, not after the back rub thing.

"I saw Ryan."

Macon put down his beer bottle with a little too much force. I heard the noise of the glass against the top of the table, and it wasn't an easy fit with the loud music and the people enjoying their night. He leaned toward me above the table, his eyes never leaving mine. When he did this, it was like facing my father, and yet, my father wasn't like this at all. In fact, I had my father wrapped around my finger if I needed him. Macon wasn't as easy to lead.

"What did he do?"

I didn't hear him, but I read his lips. I waved him off. "Just some shit about sleeping with me again."

"Don't do it again."

"Are you out of your mind? I'd never go back to him."

He relaxed and smiled before he took one of my hands in his delicate one. I squeezed his fingers, happy to have him with me when I wasn't feeling so hot.

"Tell me what's going on, then."

"Byron."

"Frustrated?"

"I asked him for help to deal with Ryan. We waited for him to walk out of his class
, and Byron played the jealous guy, making a show of his past as a soldier and everything."

"It must have been so hot. Lucky you."

"Can you be serious a second?"

He frowned and took another sip of his beer. "You're not serious
that often. And we're talking about your roommate, not the president. Relax."

"Hear me out
, and tell me then if it's that easy to relax." I took a deep breath, leaned above the table, my boobs now splashed on the not so clean surface. I preferred not to think too much of what was on these tables. "When we were back home, he asked me for a back rub as payment."

"Shirt on or off?"

"Off."

"Woah. You're one lucky bitch."

"When you see the number of girls passing by his bed, I'd say that I'm not that lucky. You have to have boobs and a vagina, and you're good to go. You’re immediately granted a free ticket to touch Byron." Though, and I didn't want to voice it, I wasn't his type of girl at all. Maybe that was why I was so uneasy about this, because I couldn't fathom why he'd try to seduce me. Or maybe he really wanted me out of his place, and it was the easier way to do so before the end of my two-month trial. I still had a month and one week.

"Did you kiss again?"

I shook my head and swept away my bangs, cursing at them. Maybe I should go back to have a hair cut. My fine hair felt like silk under my fingertips. In high school my hair was longer. It was shoulder length, perfectly straight and completely boring. I thought that was what Ryan wanted, when in fact he just wanted someone willing to put out without saying a word to anybody besides her best friend. As soon as the graduation ceremony was over and I left for a whole week without saying a word, I went to the first hair salon I found and got my hair cut the same way I had it today. I embraced my craziness wholeheartedly, from now on never trying to hide it to please someone.

"We didn't kiss, but he was intense." I sighed and glanced around us, but nobody caught my attention. I didn't want to find someone to go back home with and give the guy a blow-job just because I was scared by the sex appeal of my roommate. It was pathetic
, and I wanted to stay as far away as I could from my pathetic side for a while longer.

"Nothing new
. The guy is intense."

"Yeah, but it's like
… I don't know. It's like he's trying to make me surrender or something."

"Sleep with him
, and get over it, then."

"And risk
losing my room at his apartment? I'm not ready to go back to my parents'. I can already imagine what my mother would say."

"You're obsessing over it." He released my hand. "It's been a while
since you obsessed over a guy."

"It
was good to me before, right?" I retorted, using sarcasm as a poor defense. I hated this. "Why has this guy succeeded in getting under my skin like this? He's not even my type!"

"Please! Baby, Byron is way more your type than Ryan ever was
, and I'm not saying that because he's a fucker. Byron is sexy, witty, and gives you as much as you give him. He's a guy I'd see you with because he is able to support your craziness; he goes along with it. And he is as reluctant about relationships as you are. You're a match."

"No, we're not."

"Yes, you are. Sooner or later you two are going to sleep together, and it's going to be … interesting to say the least."

"I won't sleep with him. But I guess I need to find someone to distract me."

"That's why you asked me to drive you to The Spot? You're looking for a guy to sleep with?’’ He shook his head and sipped his beer.

"Are you that surprised?"

"I am, baby. Don't sleep with a guy just because you're freaking out about this thing with your roommate. After all, maybe it's just because you're not used to being so close to a straight guy."

"We kissed
, and we're teasing each other. There're no mistakes as to what it is on my part, but I don't know about him. He can't be attracted to me."

"Please, I'm not in the mood to hear you telling me how not pretty you are."

"But, Macon—‘’

"No, London! Let's go. I don't want to be a part of your master plan. If you really want to sleep with a guy, pick him up on your own."

I stood up and followed Macon to his car. The silence between us was hard and cold. I hated this, hated to feel so out of my depth, so afraid. Why couldn’t life be easy and carefree all the time? Why was I over thinking everything? Why Byron was so mysterious, sexy, and thrilling?

* * *

DAY 20

Not only I didn't have a buzz and a guy to distract me, but I couldn't make Macon say a word to me before he drove me back home. He sped away with an angry scowl that wasn't that sexy with his smooth baby cheeks. I didn't know why, but guys with stubble could put out a scowl and appear mysterious or something like that. Macon could
, too. Usually.

I grabbed my keys and unlocked the door, mumbling when I saw that it wasn't even ten in the evening yet. "I hope Lord is not fucking another girl again," I added
, as the door was ripped open before I could even turn the knob.

I jumped away and brought a hand to my heart when my eyes landed on his angry face. Why
were all the guys in my life angry at me today? Was I more annoying today than the other days?

"Where were you? I thought you wanted to go to bed." His voice washed over me, the growl making me weak in the knees when I should only be scandalized by his alpha male behavior.

I pushed at his chest and pulled my hands away quickly before my brain could register how good his pecs felt under my palms. I walked in the apartment and gave him the joy of closing the front door with a loud clack that must have been heard to the beach and back. What was his problem?

"Why do you even care, Byron?" I tried with everything I had to hide my annoyance, but it was useless. Even to my ears I sounded on the edge of making a whole drama of a thing that wasn't important. I was being a real girl, exactly what he didn't want in a roommate.

"It's not safe to go out alone at night for a woman."

He ran two fingers along his scar, breathing loud in the quiet living room. The TV was on
, but it was muted, like he was listening to every sound to be sure he wouldn't miss me coming back home. It was ill, but knowing that I had that kind of control over this tough guy was thrilling. No guys ever worried about me beside Macon and my dad, but it didn't count since one was gay and the other one offered his spermatozoids to my mom to conceive me.

"Who said I was alone?" I replied, turning my back to him and throwing my green handbag next to the couch. This time I made sure my iPhone was in my jeans pocket before
letting go.

His frown deepened
, and his shoulders tensed even more. He gritted his teeth. The muscles in his jaw flexed under his scruff and everything in him sharpened. His blue eyes turned a cold silver that pinned me.

"What friend of mine did you give a blow-job
to this time? Eliott?" he asked deadly, his voice quieter than a second before.

I shook my head and bit the inside of my cheek to keep from saying something I'd regret. I might not have many filters, but I had the most important. I had the one keeping me from being a mean girl only trying to hurt someone else just because she was the one being hurt. I shouldn't even hurt to begin with
; I wouldn't if I hadn't given him the opportunity to hurt me. Our flirting game had gone way too far.

"I can do whatever I want, Byron."

He walked to me, grabbed both of my shoulders with his strong hands and held on. Even now when he was almost growling with anger, I could feel a desire awakened by the simple touch of his skin against mine. It wasn't sensual, wasn't soft, and sure wasn't with an afterthought, and yet, I was already aching for him in all the right—and wrong—places.

His eyes were unyielding and hard, but something was amiss. I couldn't point out what, but there was something there that shouldn't be.

"Who was with you?"

I shook him off me, but I regretted it immediately when I saw the pain in his eyes. I swallowed
, but I felt all wrong. It was like my body wasn't moving the right way, like my intake of breath wasn't in the right rhythm, like my feelings weren't the right ones because I shouldn't want to feel his big, strong arms around me when he was being … jealous? Was he jealous?

"Stop it!"

"Answer me! Or maybe you're ashamed of who you fucked."

I pushed him again. "You're a fucking asshole doubled with a hypocrite!" I yelled to his face, feeling dizzy as my breathing
became labored. My face felt hot. I wanted to slap him, but that wasn't me. I could never even slap Ryan, so I wasn't going to start slapping guys tonight. "You’ve slept with a different girl every fucking night for the past week, and you dare to treat me like a whore! What's your problem?"

He towered over me
, and even if our height wasn't that different, with his muscular body and the anger radiating from him, I felt tiny and fragile. I wasn't tiny, and I sure wasn't that fragile. It was … unsettling. I had a hard time not looking away from the intensity in his eyes, but I kept my chin high. He took a deep breath, briefly closing his eyes. He moistened his lips, and the atmosphere shifted. No, it didn't shift because the anger was still there, but now it was laced with lust. And frustration.

"You're driving me completely nuts. That's my fucking problem," he growled at me before he turned his back to me and walked to his bedroom, careful to close his door in what I was starting to call the
Short Fuse Lord
way.