Page 30 of Not Your Pucking Girl

She takes a deep breath and shakes her head, her determination to get the words out stronger than I could have ever known. “I started dating Brett two years ago after we met at some bullshit party the swim team put on. He swept me off my feet, right from the get-go. You could say it was love at first sight.” She scoffs and rolls her eyes. “I was crazy about him, and we were inseparable. A few months in, he was begging me to move in with him, but I loved living in the dorms with Sophie, and call me old-fashioned, but I didn’t want to move in with a man who my parents hadn’t met and approved of yet. So, we waited out the year, and over Christmas break, he came home with me and charmed the pants off my parents. Even went as far as asking my father for his blessing to marry me. Which of course, my dad happily gave.”

She pauses and takes a deep breath, and I can tell this is where it gets hard for her. “So, when we got back, I moved in, and it was magical. Well, the first few months were. He started failing his business degree and would come home stressed out and angry and would snap at me about little things. I always did my best to make sure the washing was done and dinner was cooked so he could focus on his studies. Looking back now, it makes me sound pathetic, but I loved him, and I wanted everything to be perfect.”

She gives me a tight smile and looks out toward the road, watching as the cars silently drive by. “I had gone out with Sophie and Jared to this bar for her birthday, and even though it was pretty trashy, we were having a great time,” she smiles. “Right up until Brett showed up to find me dancing with Jared. He stormed in, grabbed me under the arm, and hauled ass out of there. He called me every name under the sun, even though I’d told him a million times that Jared was gay. Apparently, that didn’t change the fact that I was still a whore. I didn’t realize until the next morning that my arm was covered in bruises.”

My body tenses under her, knowing that dickhead put his hands on my girl, and feeling the movement, she turns in my arms and gives me a dazzling smile that breaks my heart. “Calm down,” she murmurs, almost teasing. “I haven’t even got to the best part yet.”

“Please tell me it doesn’t get worse than that?” I beg of her.

Dani squeezes my hand, and suddenly she’s the one giving me support. “Oh, it got plenty worse,” she says with a scoff. “It started with the name-calling and not letting me go out. He got super possessive, and one night he left his phone out on the bench when a text came through. I saw a girl’s name and I couldn’t help myself. I unlocked the phone and opened the text to find she was confirming the hotel they were going to meet in and if he wanted her to dress in black or red lingerie.”

“Fuck, babe. You don’t need to tell me the rest,” I say, knowing where this is leading. I don’t want her to have to relive it again.

“No, I need to tell you,” Dani insists, squeezing my hand. “I want you to understand me and to know why I have such a hard time letting you get close.”

I give her a nod and pull her against me once again.

“Okay,” Dani breathes, tears welling in her green eyes. “So, I asked him about the girl and he lost his shit, saying he fucks her because I’m a whore and that it’s my fault I wasn’t woman enough for him. He had been drinking and we got into this huge fight. I said I was going to leave. I’d had enough of his bullshit, so I went to start packing . . .” she pauses, taking a breath. “He grabbed me by the hair and yanked me back to him, saying I was his and wasn’t leaving until he was through with me.”

Dani wipes at her eyes and continues. “I broke free of his hold and started packing anyway. There was no way I was staying there with him. He must have thought I was just cooling off in our room, and when he walked in to find me ready to leave, he lost it. He didn’t even give me a chance to defend myself, just reared back and let his fist do the talking. He stopped immediately, realizing what he’d done, and began apologizing, but there was no going back for me. He’d already put me through hell, and I wasn’t sticking around for more. So I left and moved in here with Sophie.”

She sits in silence beside me, and I grab her around the waist to pull her up onto my lap. “You’re more than woman enough for me,” I promise her. “You’re fucking everything.”

Dani wraps her arms around me and nuzzles her face into my neck, and I feel her smile against my skin. I can’t help but hold her tight, content to sit here outside her home for the rest of my life.

We sit in silence for a short while before I realize she’s fallen asleep, and a soft smile spreads across my lips. Scooping her up in my arms, I make my way inside and down to her room before slipping her under her blankets. I watch her a moment before realizing I’m being a fucking creeper and turn to leave when her soft whisper fills the room. “Stay with me.”

Her words are like music to my ears, but I shake my head. “God, babe. Don’t tempt me,” I beg her. “You have no idea how badly I want to spend the night with you, but I know you’ll regret that decision in the morning.”

“I know,” she admits. “But stay anyway.”

I walk over to her bed and lean down over her. “Goodnight, sweet girl,” I say, pressing my lips to hers.

Dani grabs me and moans against my lips, melting into my kiss as she tries to pull me down to her. “Please, I need you,” she says, gripping the fabric of my shirt and trying to pull it up my body.

“Not tonight, babe,” I smirk, hating myself for being such a fucking moron. “Try me again tomorrow when you haven’t drunk the whole bar.”

“Fine,” she grumbles, gripping her blankets and pulling them up to her shoulders. I press my lips to hers once more and get the softest kiss in return before making my way back to her door. And just as the door is about to close between us, I hear a devilish purr coming from her room behind me. “I guess I’ll have to take care of it myself.”

My dick hardens painfully in my pants, the worst kind of punishment for leaving her high and dry. Though from the sound of it, my girl is soaking wet.

Closing the door behind me, I mentally scold myself while I walk out of her home, and as I hear her muffled moans and the sound of my name on her lips, I know without a doubt that I will never walk away from this girl.

Chapter 11

Danielle

“Shit,babe,you’vegotto wake up,” Sophie laughs as she launches herself onto my bed.

“Go away,” I groan, attempting to push her off.

“Hell no, you’ve got to see this,” she says, still in a fit of laughter as she thrusts her phone toward my face.

I squint up at the morning light as a killer hangover makes itself known. A collection of horrendous memories come crashing through my mind, and I start to feel the uneasy ache in my stomach needing to eject last night’s mistakes.

Sitting up in bed, I rub my hands down my face and grab her phone, trying to figure out what’s got her all worked up at such an ungodly hour. Focusing on what she’s so desperate to show me, I find the Dragons’ Facebook page staring back at me with a photo of myself dancing on the bar in nothing but a Dragon’s jersey, the nameCAINwritten across the back. My stomach drops, and I glance down at the caption; ‘Cain’s number one girl’.

“Ahhh, fuck,” I groan. “Who the hell posted that?” I click on the photo and bring up the details to see that it’s now been viewed over four thousand times and shared another three hundred.

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