Clash(20)

The crowd was chanting, “Ry-Der. Ry-Der. Ry-Der,” and my heart was beating two beats a syllable. He’d changed into a snug fitting white v-neck tee and dark jeans that hung off his hips, finished off with his worn pair of Converse.

Over a year on and off together, and the man could still make my stomach clench just by looking at him.

As Jude and Adriana blazed through the crowd, it began to part, opening up to where I leaned against the ramshackle sofa table, hand on hip, eyes and mouth ready to carry out their orders when he looked my way. Holly couldn’t have placed me in a better location.

Adriana’s eyes landed on me first, and her face screwed into a smirk as her hand curled deeper into Jude’s muscled forearm.

But I didn’t deviate from the plan‌—‌resisting the urge to smirk right back at her‌—‌and my willpower paid out in spades. Jude’s gaze didn’t only shift to me‌—‌it skidded to me. Stopping in his tracks, he held me in his eyes. He never even blinked. “Wow,” he mouthed, running his eyes down my body.

Inhaling through my nose, I pushed past the muscles clenching tighter in my stomach brought on by the way he was staring at me. Opening my eyes wider, I blinked them slowly, infusing as much innocence as I was capable into them. Then, biting my lower lip suggestively, I parted my mouth just how I imagined Holly would have wanted it.

Jude might have just wavered in place. Adriana’s scowl screwed deeper, resembling a rare form of outrage.

I owed Holly big time.

Weaving out of Adriana’s death grip, he cut through the rest of the room towards me. Adriana slammed her hands on her hips, looking one quake away from exploding. It was a beautiful sight.

Even more so was the one grinning at me as he shoved through the rest of the crowd, moving as fast as he could. Stepping in front of me, his eyes were swirling pools of silver.

“Damn, Luce,” he said, sounding out of breath, appraising me with his eyes again. Looking at me with the excitement and anticipation of unwrapping a present.

I didn’t have words for the man standing before me, worshipping me with all he was. Flattening my hands over his chest, I pressed against him. His mouth parted with a surprised inhalation. The heels made it so I didn’t have to press onto my tip-toes when I crushed my mouth into his. My mouth was unyielding against his, smoothing, sucking, and smashing his lips like all we had left in life was this moment.

After his surprise passed, his hands lowered into place over my hips, kneading into them with an urgency that tightened the muscles in my thighs. By this time in our public make-out session, the crowd had starting hooting, and when Jude’s hand rounded around to my backside, digging into the flesh back there, they started hollering.

My breathing was becoming irregular, what amount I was able to manage in this state of tongue tangledness low. Running my hands up his neck to cradle his face, I pulled it back. Looking up into those hungry eyes, feeling the warmth of his breath gusting over my face, I smiled.

“Good game.”





CHAPTER SIX


“You better not be staring at what I think you are, Kurt,” Jude warned, reappearing with a couple of beers in hand and clearing up the K kicker’s name.

“I most certainly am not staring at what you think I was,” Kurt said, tilting his beer our way before fading into the crowd.

“He most certainly was,” Jude said, handing me one of the beers before resting his hand on my side. “Not that I can blame him.”

Clanking my bottle against Jude’s, I took a drink. “But you will beat him if he does it again,” I guessed.

“Hell, yeah I will,” he said, nuzzling my neck before he laid a path of kisses down it. The slippery glass bottle almost fell from my hands. “That goes for you too, Denoza,” Jude said, peering over at one of his teammates while his mouth continued to wet the skin above my collar bone. “And I’ll start by prodding out those wandering eyes.”

“Sorry, Ryder,” Denoza said, smiling sheepishly between the two of us. “What can I say? Your girl is meant to be stared at.”

“That’s right. She is,” Jude said, straightening up and putting himself in front of me. “By me.”

Denoza lifted his hands in surrender. “No harm, no foul, man,” he said before setting his sights on a single girl sprawled out on the stairs and beelining her way.

“Not in my book,” Jude muttered after him, before turning around. “You’re gonna get me killed, Luce,” he said, his face twisting when he took another look at me. “I’m one tough son of a bitch and I can fight off every one of these guys one loser at a time, but I think they could take me if they all came at me at once.”