Again by Lisa Burstein Page B

front of her trying to explain it.
    “What the hell are you doing
here?”
    I hadn’t thought about my answer to this
question, I just needed to stop whatever was about to happen as soon as the guy
in the wife-beater targeted in on her.
    I didn’t believe every situation in a
frat house would turn out the way Jeanie’s did, but when Kate was about to put
her arms around his neck there was a fire, a wrath coming from my core that
hadn’t been there in years.
    Jealousy.
    I wanted her to put her arms around me,
but I couldn’t explain that any better than why I was there.
    “Hanging out,” I said. Who
was I kidding? I hadn’t hung out anywhere in three years.
    Honestly, I had been on my way home
from the library when I saw Kate standing on the front porch of Delta Tau. She
was so drunk she was swaying like seaweed under water. I was only planning on
stopping in and checking on her.
    When she was about to dance with that sleazy asshole, I had to do
more than watch. I had to do something.
    She tried to focus on me. Her legs were like empty skin blowing in
the breeze beneath her. She was even drunker than I’d thought and I’d thought
she was pretty drunk.
    Poor Kate, I guess
some of the emptiness in her eyes was actually a cry for numbness. A need to
make all the pain she’d ever been through float away.
    “You’re hanging out in your winter
coat?” she asked, clearly not believing me. Her words came slow and slurred.
    I leaned back on my heels and put my
hands in my pockets like I was trying to prove it. Even when I was in a frat I
was uncomfortable at parties. I was thankful for alcohol then because at least
it gave my hands and my mouth something to do.
    Without it I appeared as out of place as
I felt.
    “You’re hanging out in your bra,” I
replied, the word elusive like a secret on my tongue. I loved Kate in her bra.
I just didn’t like sharing the moment with fifty other horny guys.
    I just didn’t like that her being drunk
was the reason.
    As I continued to watch her, the blood
rushing to my cheeks, to my dick, it was hard to deny I was a horny guy too. It
was dizzying, especially considering she was the first live girl in front of me
in years.
    “I was hot,” she said, her
arms tight against her chest, making her cleavage more evident.
    “Are,” I said, glancing down
without even meaning to.
    “I thought you were at the
library.”
    “It closes at eleven,” I
said. I needed to get her off of why I was there and try to figure out how I
could get her to leave. There was no way I was walking out of here without her.
That was the only sure part of my plan. I needed to get her back to the dorm
safely. “Here,” I said, trying to give her my jacket.
    She shook her head. “You’re the only one
in your coat,” she said. “I’m not the only one in my bra.”
    It was true, a lot of the girls were.
“None of them look as good as you, though,” I said before I could stop myself,
my dick clearly doing the talking. Not caring about my plan.
    She smiled—the kind that could blow
someone’s hair back.
    “Maybe you should take off your jacket
and stay a while,” she said, reaching for it.
    I considered her invitation. It would be
nice to be normal for once. I deliberated getting wasted and then doing
everything my brain had kept me from trying to do to Kate all week long, until
I saw Alex and Steph.
    Something about the way they were
dancing, the way they had themselves on display, like cheap jewelry spinning in
a case, made me want more for Kate.
    She was valuable.
    I also had to get her out of there
before they had a chance to say anything about my past. My at-the-moment,
considering where we were standing, very relevant past. It was clear they
hadn’t told Kate yet, if so, she would not still be talking to me.
    “We should go,” I said.
    “Make me,” she said, her lip
curled up on one side.
    She might have been
flirting, but I decided to take that as an offer, as a cry for help she
couldn’t