Page 64 of The Change Up
Leah turns with a gasp. “Yes! Let’s do that!”
“No, no, no,” I say with a shake of my head. “We are not letting the just barely legal eighteen-year-old dictate our night.”
“Boo!” both girls yell at me.
But I don’t even care. Cody’s only shared bits and pieces of his life at home, and if Leah is under any of the same pressures that Cody has been under, she’s going to be ready to break free. Which means we could have a very crazy night on our hands. As much as I think it would be fun, I feel like someone needs to be the responsible one.
“Here,” Leah says, handing me a fuchsia satin mini dress with a halter neckline that flares in an A-line hem. The back is completely exposed, and a sly grin spreads across my face. Cody is going to lose it when he sees me in this dress.
“Bitch, I know that look!” Brynn laughs as we make eye contact through the mirror. “It’s like the night I wore my leather mini skirt, black see-through mesh shirt over the top of a black bra, with my sky-high heels, and we ended up breaking Q’s table. You’re going to walk into that party, and jaws will drop.”
“With a lead-up like that, I know you girls are going to make tonight the best birthday celebration.”
I smile at Leah from across the room. “It’s going to be a good night.”
An hour later, the four of us are walking up the sidewalk that leads to the Baseball House in mini dresses and high heels. Quinton stuck around while us girls got ready. He’s a saint for waiting. The three of us took way too long to figure out what we were going to wear. Cody was blowing up my phone for the last half hour wondering what was taking us so long and curious if his sister was causing trouble.
After spending a few hours with Leah, I see similarities between her and Brynn. And now I know why Cody and Brynn became best friends. Both are just trying to find their way in a world where they’ve been forgotten. Leah might not have suffered the same heartbreaking childhood as Brynn, but she’s suffered at the hands of her father who has placed such high pressures on his children. Not only does he expect the world from them, but he constantly finds ways to knock them down.
I also found that Leah was accepted to CTU, but she’s holding out on accepting until she hears back from West Coast schools. She hasn’t told her brother this, and I promised I wouldn’t tell him. I hate keeping secrets from Cody, especially since we’re just now getting to a good place. Secrets kept us apart once, and I don’t want a repeat. But I’m hoping that once Leah gets her acceptance letters, she’ll open up to him.
Quinton leads us up the walkway that has students piling out over the yard. The thumping from the music can be heard from outside. Q pushes open the front door, and we are met with chaos.
Loud music blasts from the speakers. Bodies are grinding against each other on the makeshift dance floor in the living room. A few couples are making out on the outskirts of the room, most half-naked or in the midst of ripping one another’s clothes off. The party has barely started, but I can already tell it’s going to be quite the night of debauchery.
Moving past the living room, I find a set of familiar faces, a group of guys both from the baseball and football teams lined up around the dining room table where beer pong has been set up. Scanning the line of guys, my eyes catch on hazel eyes that are already staring back at me. Cody’s eyes skim my body, and I swear I can already feel his touch. A cocky smirk moves across his lips.
I send him a wink before pulling Leah by her hand to the dance floor. The DJ is playing the hit “Baby Boy” by Sean Paul—an oldie but goodie—and the beat has our hips shaking as soon as we find a space in between bodies. Leah’s lithe body moves seductively, and I can only imagine how Cody is feeling right now. He’s so protective of his sister, but it’s her birthday weekend, and she deserves to have some fun.
Brynn and Quinton disappeared when we got here. I assume they’re off to make out in the corner. The two of them can never keep their hands off each other.
It’s crazy to think that at the beginning of the semester, I was the one on the outskirts, the wallflower hiding in the shadows. Now I’m in the midst of the chaos in a dress that barely covers my body dancing with Cody Jacobs’s sister.
All the cyberbullying from the photo on the Gossip Gazette has started to die down. Cody went crazy in the comment section threatening anyone who looked at me the wrong way or said one more nasty thing about me. I appreciated it especially after he came to the townhouse and made me feel seen. That night shifted everything between us.
Leah and I are dancing through our fifth song when I feel a warm body sidle up behind me. It’s the first guy to come up and approach us, which surprises me considering Leah’s dance moves. I wonder if Cody threatened everyone who walked in here that his sister was going to be here tonight and is off limits. If that’s the case, she’s going to be pissed.
While we were getting ready, Leah was telling Brynn and me how she ended things with a guy she was casually seeing. It wasn’t anything serious since she refused to get tied down with anyone from her hometown since she wanted to move across the country. But that meant she was a free woman who was now a legal adult looking for fun.
“Damn, girl. This dress is sexy,” his voice comes from behind me, and I feel his fingers graze my exposed skin. “Gotta boyfriend?”
Leaning back into his touch, my ass meets his front. “Nope. No boyfriend.”
He growls before leaning his head closer to my ear. “What the hell, Wildflower?”
Spinning in his grip, I find dark, broody eyes staring down on me. It’d be intimidating on anyone else, especially since he towers over me by a few inches even in my heels. But I know Cody would never do anything to hurt me.
I quirk my brow at him. We’ve never had the “talk,” but it’s pretty clear as day that both of us are together in a very much exclusive manner. I just love to find ways to get under his skin.
In one swift motion, his hand flies to my neck where he grips it tightly, tilting my chin up to meet his steely gaze. His grip is tight enough to make me gasp as wetness pools in my barely there panties. A soft moan escapes from between my lips.
“You’re fucking mine, Wildflower.” The words leave his mouth in a growl as his lips find mine. His tongue dips inside, and the kiss quickly turns heated as his fingers, still wrapped around my neck, tighten. I didn’t take myself to be someone who liked to be choked, but damn, I can get behind this.
The way he’s dominating my mouth with his tongue has me wanting to drop to my knees and worship him. Right here. In front of the whole damn party. Being with Cody brings out a side of me that I didn’t know I was hiding. She’s dark and sexy. A devil dressed like an angel.
My body is turning into a puddle, and my knees are about to give out on me just as Cody’s opposite hand grips me tighter, and he pulls my body closer to him. I can feel his hard length pressing into my stomach, and I wish it was pumping inside of me. We still haven’t even had sex yet, but I can’t stop thinkingabout the two of us together. Him tossing me around the bedroom as I’m wet and needy.
“Get a room!” Leah shouts from behind us, and I feel a devilish smile spread across Cody’s face.
