Page 61 of Pinkie Promise

She’s searching my eyes, trying to understand my emotions. Worse still, I think that she’s trying to work out if what happened to her is normal or not. Safe to say, being grounded from the age of seventeen to eighteen is not fucking normal.

“Well, yeah,” she says quietly, crossing her arms over her chest and her brow pinching in the middle. Then she lets out a small humourless laugh and says, “Obviously it made having friends a little impossible but being in my room gave me the time to study, to teach myself things. I was still on the cheer squad for the national high school comps, but that was the only extracurricular that they would let me out of the house for. Onthe plus side, I used to borrow books from the school library and it was an escapism that I couldn’t believe even existed. Books were a lifeline for me and they kind of still are. I’ve honest to God cried at every happily ever after that I’ve ever read.”

She gives herself a moment before she continues.

“I knew that college would be the time that I could start my life over, so I swatted up like crazy, aced my way to my sport scholarship, said adieu to my parents and” – she shrugs – “here I am.”

She lets out a small laugh, as if the severity of her self-sufficiency hasn’t even registered in her mind yet.

It’s clear as day to me that this is why she doesn’t like getting close to people or letting people get close to her. No wonder she doesn’t want to risk leaning on anyone for a little help here and there. If she wasn’t even safe to trust her parents then how the hell can she be expected to trust anyone else?

“So that’s why I can’t go back home – it was never my home to begin with, really,” she finishes. “That’s why I want the grant: so that I can have one more year at Carter U, the only haven that I’ve ever known. Maybe I can work on this manuscript that I’ve been writing – not that I’ll do anything with it but, you know, it’s kind of my happy place. And then once I work out what the hell kind of job someone like me can do once they graduate, maybe I’ll get my own happily ever after.”

The shy smile on her face makes my heart crack in two.

Suddenly she presses her face into my neck and whispers, “Sorry for unloading. I should’ve just kept my mouth shut, shouldn’t I?”

I can’t take it anymore. I tug her head backwards until she’s tilted up for me and I crush her mouth with mine, groaning when she sighs happily.

“Stop saying sorry,” I murmur, as she lays her palms over my pecs. I press a few more kisses to her lips and say, “It was realstrong of you to tell me all of that and I promise we don’t ever have to talk about it again, unless you want to. I’m so fucking angry for you.”

She makes a small whimper as she stands on her tip-toes, helping me get the angle to slide my tongue inside of her. I compress her entire body against my front and make a gruff sound as I feel my way around the backs of her bare thighs.

“We’re gonna get you that money,” I tell her as her head falls backwards, letting me scrub the bristle on my jaw down the curve of her throat.

I try not to think about the fact that I’ve already deceived her when it comes to cash, facilitating the job for her at the diner while knowing damn well that she’s got this whole independence complex. Now that I know the reason behind it I feel even goddamn worse about it.

“You’re always so confident,” she whispers when I tower over her again. “And determined. You must always get what you want.”

My stomach muscles contract. I wipe my palms over her cheeks, getting rid of all traces of her tears.

“The weather’s getting worse,” I tell her, changing the subject. “I wanna give you a ride. A ride home, I mean,” I say quickly.

She makes a humming sound and maintains our eye contact, giving me a playful head tilt that tells me exactly what she’s thinking about. That she’s thinking about what I’m thinking about. That she knows how badly I wanna ride that tight little–

“We’re doing the handstand lift today,” she announces, back-stepping out of my arms only for me to grab her waist and pull her against me again.

“No way. I’m taking you home, like right now.”

“But we’re already here. How much worse could the weather really get?”

I hoist her around my middle and then cart her over to the window so that she can see the fucking blizzard that’s going on out there.

“Hm,” she says.

I keep her dangling above the floor as I walk over to grab her phone and her little lilac gym bag, handing her the cell and throwing her bag over my shoulder.

“Tell me that you didn’t walk here in your cheer outfit,” I say to her as I walk us down the stairs of the sports building, her thighs rubbing me up and down with every step that I take.

She grins up at me. I lean down to kiss at one of her cheek dimples.

“No,” she admits. “The bikini that I came here in is right there in the bag.”

I breathe out a laugh and grip her thighs a little tighter.

“Kidding,” she says quietly. “I’ve got pants and a jumper in there.”

I grunt. “Good.”

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