Page 32 of Dirty Roulette
“Forget I mentioned anything,” she shakes her head, eyeballing the locker room for an escape route. I hold onto her waist tighter.
“How do you feel about me?” I ask again, but she bites her bottom lip. I run a hand over her smooth forearm and grasp her palm, placing it against my chest with a heartbeat pounding harder than anything. “This is how I feel about you. I can’t get it to calm down. Trust me, okay?”
She fists the shirt in her hand, pulls me closer, and says, “Can you go slow?”
“I can do that.” But I can’t stop myself from what I’m feeling. My mouth finds hers and she makes the sweetest gasp in the world when our lips meet. Minty gloss finds my taste buds and my hands squeeze her waist as I pin her against me. Her fingers tangle in my hair. There isn’t a way for me to catch my breath. I tilt my head and she opens her mouth wide enough for me to explore territory I never thought I’d be attracted to. She tastes good, and the thought seems wrong. I run a hand over her pink cheeks as our tongues lap together. I almost wanna whine when she pulls away, biting her bottom lip.
“Meet me later.” I manage to get the words out as she pecks me again. “After practice?” I push a wet strand of hair off her face.
The freckles on her nose taunt me.“Trouvez-Moi,” she says not even an inch away from me.
“I always do.”
Chapter eleven
Payton
It’s nearing the end of French, my last class of the day, when we have to group up and describe ourselves to partners. When I’m in my second group, we finish early and the guy with a hoodie stands next to me, licking his lips, looking me up and down. “You’re the chick who broke into the men’s locker room?” He lifts his chin and eyebrows in sync. “I saw the videos, damn girl!”
What?!I’m mortified.
He’s seen a video? Of what? Me storming the men's locker room? He’s staring at me waiting for a response with his two down-turned eyes about to pop out of their sockets. It’s not a rumor floating into existence, but he’s seen it. A terrifying chill runs down my spine, and all the blood drains out of my body and into a puddle on the floor.
“I dunno what you’re talking about,” I say. The lined paper folded in my palms crumbles into a tight ball. For once, can I not be the main character of a red carpet premiere?
“No, it was totally you.” The room shrinks and he stands too close for comfort.
My throat dries and shrivels up like a raisin. I don’t want to rub him the wrong way and seem rude, but I’m leaning back to avoid his face six inches from mine. The dark pores on his nose stare into my retinas. “I think you know what I’m talking about.” He runs a hand through his spiky brown hair with blonde tips. “You beat the shit out of Brody, didn’t you?”
“Payton...” Charlie hisses my name and I spin around and she's waving a hand over to me. Without another word to the guy, I step away and weasel myself into her group, pretending I’m partners with her.
“What the hell is up with him?” She dips her head, with a nose wrinkling.
“Nothing, he’s just being weird.”
“Why? What does he want?” Charlie asks and cocks her eyebrow up at me. “Weren’t you wearing something else earlier?” Please don’t tell me she overheard the conversation. “Is that Ryder’s shirt?” She tugs at the baggy fabric of the shirt with an eyebrow lift. If other classmates hear about my sleazy video and me crashing the naked dick fest in the locker room, I’ll never hear the end of it.
“You heard him, didn’t you?”
“So, it’s true?” Charlie’s cheeks pucker as if she tasted a sour lemon.
“Damn right, it’s true. The girl is nuts, but she’s from trailer town, so I guess it comes with the territory.” The hoodie guy leans his head back and there is no way to stop me from rolling my eyes like a straight-up bitch.
“Mind your damn business,” Charlie mean-mugs him. “Don’t you have something better to do?”
“I’ll mind my business once you show me those sweet tits of yours.”
“When your balls drop, and you don’t sound like a little girl, maybe I will.” Charlie deadpans, and throws her smug remark back, and the group overhears. In unison, they all chant, “Oooh!” The older crowd huddled in their group shook their heads with annoyed faces.
“Is your brother okay?” He asks her.
Charlie crunches her brows and tilts her head to the side. “What do you mean?”
“The grapevine says Brody is going to jump him.”
“What the hell?” Charlie turns to me.
I tap a pencil against my thigh, my nails stabbing the crumbled paper in my other hand. If I wasn’t already in deep shit with Brody, I’d knee this guy in his slimy wrinkled ball sack.
