I was hating this already. Sunny was dressed to impress. Well, as much as it took to impress a college guy, that was. The rule was basically this: show as much skin as possible. The end. She was in a tiny crop top that barely covered her girls and painted-on skinny jeans full of rips and tears. I wore my usual ensemble of black leggings with shit-kicking combat boots and an off-the-shoulder black cropped sweater. You could take the girl out of New York, but you couldn’t take New York out of the girl.
We pushed through the front door and were greeted by a ridiculous amount of people. All the lights in the house were on, and from a quick sweep of the room, I could see there seemed to be an equal ratio of guys to girls, which was surprising. Usually, at any party, one gender outnumbered the other by a significant amount.
“Woohoo! I can’t believe we’re actually here,” Sunny shouted over the noise in my direction.
I hated that she was so starstruck over these guys.
“It’s a college party. We’re in college.” I leveled her with a hard stare. “Where else would we be?”
“But it’s the baseball team. I mean, Mac Davies and Chance Carter are somewhere in this house right now! So are Colin Anderson and Dayton Mawlry. Hello! How are you not excited?”
She waved a hand in front of my face, but I refused to blink and pretended to be bored.
I wished I’d had no idea what those names meant or who she was talking about, but I did. I’d recognized every single one as she rattled them off. I could have blamed the fact that I’d worked in sports tutoring for the last three years before I stopped, but it was more than that. There was no way that someone could go to school here and not eventually learn the names of the athletes who were likely to go pro. It was literally unavoidable, no matter how hard you tried.
Posters of the teams littered the campus walls at every turn, changing out, depending on the season. But in the meantime, they were everywhere—on the buildings, in the girls’ restroom, wrapped around light poles. The art department spray-painted graffiti depicting certain players outside their halls. Even the campus bookstore had their walls strewn with the faces and names of various athletes. And they sold postcards of the teams that you could buy and mail out. Postcards! For mailing! Who the hell wanted a postcard of a bunch of guys they didn’t know?
“Ladies.” The voice pulled both of our attention.
Mac Davies. I knew who he was the second my eyes followed his voice. He was actually adorable—as far as surfer-looking, light-haired guys went. But he wasn’t my type. I liked my guys tall and dark. Not that I was looking since I had a boyfriend and all that.
“I’m Mac. Your host for this evening.” He winked, and before he could say another word, I started to leave, accidentally ramming into his shoulder on my way out. He grabbed me, most likely to help steady me on my feet, but I didn’t like it.
“I’m not interested,” I said before maneuvering out of his grip. “But she probably is.” I thumbed toward Sunny, who was standing there, blushing like a schoolgirl with a major crush.
I knew I came across abrasive to some people, but I honestly never really meant to. It was just that the attitude here was so different from back home. No one was ever offended by my remarks or opinions in New York. But out here, they acted like I’d slighted them somehow or hurt their feelings when I was just being honest. I wasn’t the type to beat around the bush or act fake, and that seemed to be what Californians had been raised on. Sunny always encouraged me to deliver my words in a softer tone, but I didn’t know how.
Walking away from Sunny and Mac, I looked around the space, wondering where the best place to escape might be. I knew I couldn’t hide in a bathroom all night even if the idea sounded good. Someone would eventually need to get in there, and I didn’t want to be lounging in the tub, reading a book, while they broke the door down to get in. After seeing how crowded the kitchen and the living room were, I decided to wander into the backyard, hoping for a dark corner. I wasn’t trying to be antisocial, but I usually went to parties with Jared, and whenever he wasn’t around, it looked like I was single and ready to mingle. Some guys didn’t take no for an answer very well, especially when you added alcohol and egos into the mix.
The backyard had little twinkling lights hanging all around, and instead of being annoyed by the cheesiness of it, I found it endearing and almost calming. A small group of people were standing around a keg, but a knee-high concrete wall ran the length of the yard, away from the lights. I made my way over toward it and sat down, hoping to blend in with the bricks or the dark night sky.
“You purposely sit here?”
I turned to my right and jumped. How hadn’t I seen the guy sitting less than ten feet from me? He wasn’t even dressed in all black, like I was, but he seemed to want to hide even more than I did.
“Shit. You scared me.”
“I scared you?” he huffed out an annoyed laugh. “You didn’t see me here?” he asked with disbelief in his voice.
He obviously assumed that I had sought him out on purpose, hoping to be near him. Arrogant prick of a baseball player.
“I actually didn’t, or I would have sat somewhere else,” I bit back, trying to make it crystal clear that my being anywhere near him had been purely accidental.
“Parties not your thing?”
“Baseball players aren’t my thing.”
“Then, you’re in the wrong place,” he added, actually sounding a little amused.
“Trust me, I’m aware. This wasn’t my idea.” I angled my body away from his, not that I could see him that well anyway and he wasn’t making any moves to change that fact.
He sat perfectly still in the dark, and to be honest, I was okay with it.
“Let me guess. Overenthusiastic roommate who didn’t want to come alone?” He had nailed my situation far too easily.
“How’d you know?” A small laugh escaped from my lips as I realized that he was way too familiar with how we girls worked.
“I’ve heard that excuse once or twice before,” he said.
I wasn’t sure if he was trying to be insulting or not. Did he think I was making things up just to get close to him? He probably did. He was a baseball player after all.
“You think I’m lying?”
“I don’t know you, so I don’t think anything.”
“You know, you’re kind of a dick,” I said, my accent growing as thick as my irritation. It always came out stronger whenever I started to get fired up.
He laughed, his voice throaty and gruff. I hated that I liked the way it sounded when I was supposed to be irked by his very existence.
“What’s your name?” he asked, and I took it as my cue to stop whatever this was before it started.
“I have a boyfriend,” I said before pushing up from the wall and heading back inside toward the chaos, leaving Shadow Guy in the dark.
Sunny was still with Mac, his hand on her waist. I figured she didn’t need me around anymore and wouldn’t care if I went home to finish reading my book. Which was exactly what I planned on doing after I made sure she was cool with it. Why? Because the boys in books were way better than any guy at this party could ever be.