Page 33 of Study Games

“This happened real fast,” I agreed. “And it’s only a little bit terrifying.” And not, all at the same time.

“That it is.” He laughed, dipping his head to kiss me, slow and gentle. I leaned into him and let him whisk everything away for a few more precious minutes.

“I don’t want you caught up with the twins.” Reality offered the coldest slap as the words slipped from my tingling lips between kisses. I tried to pull away but he held me tight, leather and smoke winding around me as he shifted. “No, really. You’ve been through enough.”

“I have. And now I’d like to be able to share that with someone. Someone I trust,” he murmured, hanging onto me tight.

I recognized the degree of desperation in his touch, his voice, because I had that same need. His connotations didn’t slide past me. “I do trust you,” I whispered, my heart aching. “I’m just scared I’ll infect you with my poisoned life. And I have no time. There’s two assignments to get in by later tonight. Like a few hours.”

“Fuck them.”

“What?”

“Fuck. Them.”

“Jax. I’ll lose my scholarship.” That was the other part of the deal. Threat, whatever, I had with the twins. I did this and their pale as fuck mafioso psychosis stopped my scholarship from slipping away.

The best torture of all worlds. This way they got their plaything and could torment me endlessly too.

“No, you won’t. Hear me out.” Jax held up a palm. “But first…will you change into what you sleep in? Then I’m going to put an idea past you, and I want you to tell me what you think you are and aren't comfortable with. Touching, kissing, sex, eating, socially…kinks. I want to cover everything but we can do those another night, bee girl. And I’m going to draw. You.”

“Uh—” This was a bad idea on so many levels. “You’re going to run, far and wide.”

“Trust me.”

I closed my eyes, letting him kiss me again. My heart beating too fast in my chest, I got up and headed into my bedroom, ignoring the pile of books heaped next to my door that didn’t belong to me.

I curled up in the nest of soft nest of blankets Jax made in my bedroom dressed in my lavender singlet top and boy shorts. They were a matching set that I’d kept from my first year, one of the few small indulgences I didn’t hide behind after Key and Kash decided to screw with my life.

When I walked out, my arms wrapped around my curved hips and tummy, Jax’s look froze me on the spot. He clenched his hands on his knees, staring at me as though he was eating for the first time after being starved forever. When he rose and took a few measured steps my way, his golden eyes darkened. My heart paused as he stopped before me, skimming his hands over my arms, drifting to my thighs, sweeping his fingertips along my back.

But other than that, he hadn’t touched me.

I missed the contact almost immediately, and typically, I wore my emotions on my face.

Laughing softly, he leaned down to graze his lips over my ear. “I don’t want to rush you and if I kiss you now…I’m scared I’ll hurt you.”

“What if I want you to?” I whispered back.

He stilled. “Rush you, kiss you, or hurt you, Waverly? Be real fucking specific right now.”

I swallowed, my voice the thinnest whisper, but clear. “All of it.”

He exhaled with purpose, his darkened gaze never releasing mine. “You can wait until I’m done drawing. Then, you choose.” He leaned a little closer, barely grazing his lips across mine. “Or I will.”

Keeping it fair, he stripped down to his boxers. Though he worked out with the hockey captain, his body was all lean, hard muscle, not the built up sort I usually associated with pro athletes, because he wasn’t one. And ink covered a lot of surfaces in patterns that exposed skin in as many artistic spaces as it concealed.

His scars were on display, especially a section of mangled skin at his ribs he touched occasionally that looked like letters were carved there. Despite whatever abuse he’d seen, he exhibited zero shame or self consciousness about his. So, I did my best to return the favor and pose as he asked while he drew, shifting my legs when they went numb, talking when he prompted me.

Unlike my personal idea of portrait posing, he didn’t require me to stay in one position for a long period, letting me wave my arms as I needed to talk. By the time my alarm went off, scaring up both, I’d fallen quiet, had long run out of things to say when talking about myself was my least favorite thing to do. I flicked off the alarm, staring at it. For the first time since I’d started college, I hadn’t done what the twins demanded of me.

Jax smiled at me like he was proud of me.

I was absolutely fucking terrified.

“You’ll be fine. We’ve got this.” Jax wrapped his arms around my stomach and peppered kisses along my shoulders until I lost myself in giggles and soft whimpers.

My body overheated where his bare skin pressed to mine. “I don’t even know what this is.”

---