Chapter 1
Kit
Every guy's got a girl that got away. One that rocked his world then fucked up his life. Yeah, I had one. Crystal Kerry. Shit. Just thinking her name was like driving a stake into my heart. Made my balls ache. She'd been perfect. My fucking high school sweetheart. Yeah, sweetheart.
I'd forgotten how fucking crowded New York was and had to cut through all the people on the sidewalk. Shit, it was insane. But, I was a face in a crowd. I wasn't Kit Kaswell, lead singer for Nightbird. I was just a guy lost in a sea of humanity. Thank fuck. My thoughts were on Crystal and I didn't need a fan to grab hold and want a selfie or an autograph across her tits. I wanted to wallow in the one that got away. No, the one I pushed away and crushed, like a tank rolling over a soft, sweet, innocent kitten.
Crystal had been the one. Had been kind and gentle, always a smile for me since the first day of tenth grade. She'd transferred to Whitfield Prep as a scholarship student. Our classmates knew she was from the wrong side of the tracks. Poor. They'd sniffed out her blue-collar background, even though she looked like everyone else in the navy and green school uniform.
It had been hard for her, being new. Being beautiful. All the girls who'd been flirting—and fucking all the guys, suddenly had competition. Not that Crystal ever did anything. Just being pretty was enough. The guys, they called Crystal fresh meat. With her blond hair and pale blue eyes, she was as upper crust looking as everyone else. But unlike her classmates, she didn't know her effect on others. Had no idea she was hot. Not just average hot, that any teenage boy would want to bang, but night after night of wet dreams hot. Or jerking off in the shower just thinking about her perky tits and long legs hot.
That was fine for me to lust after, but not anyone else. Especially not the assholes on the lacrosse team who'd made it their mission to see who'd fuck her first. They'd wanted that scholarship cherry and put bets on it.
I'd shut that shit down fast. My fists landed me with a three-day suspension, but I would have done it again in a heartbeat. No one was going to touch Crystal. No one…but me. She was mine. I knew it the first fucking time I saw her.
My parents had given me hell for getting into the fight. Hell for the suspension. Hell for the hours I spent playing guitar and writing music. I guess I dished it right back. For not being the prodigal son, the future CEO of Bullshit Bluebloods Anonymous, for not being a typical Kaswell. Hell, I'd been born with a silver spoon, but I'd spit it out and grabbed hold of a guitar instead. I'd been the fucking black sheep of the family. Still was. And living in that house after my two older brothers graduated from Whitfield and went on to Ivy League schools, the pressure had been on to measure up.
Whatever. I'd given up the chances for that when I was ten and wanted to take guitar lessons instead of playing Beethoven on the piano. I knew I'd never measure up. It hadn't been worth the effort.
As for Crystal, she'd wanted to succeed at Whitfield. Hell, it had been her chance, her opportunity to get out of the shithole household she had. With a mother who was a doormat to a father who drank too much and held too few jobs, she'd known it was her escape. And she fucking took it. Got A's in all her classes, was valedictorian. She managed to do all this even with me following her around like a lovesick fool. But I loved her, protected her. She was my life and I was so much more than just her boyfriend. I was her best friend. She’d told me everything. Given me everything.
Yeah, she'd taken one look at me and melted. Somehow, by some fucking miracle, she’d fallen in love with my rough edges, the fact that I didn't fit in, didn't give a fuck. She knew I was her protector, that I'd do anything for her. We might've been each other's firsts, but I hadn't taken that scholarship cherry. No. She'd given it to me one night in the back of my pickup. We'd been in love. Even said the words. I’d spilled my guts as she sank down on my lap, naked and wet and too much for my seventeen-year-old body to resist. Crystal and Kit. We were inseparable. I knew I didn’t deserve her. I was a spoiled silver spoon. I had never worked as hard as she had to. She'd been smart, so fucking smart, and I did what I could to keep her safe from the jealous bitches, and away from the jocks that noticed the same things I did. She wasn’t just smart, she’s was gorgeous, all curves and a killer smile.
I was the worst of them all. One quick smile, one hot kiss, and I would do anything she said, including study. And so perhaps she'd fucked me into graduating. Got my grades up so I could get my diploma, and listen to her sweet valedictorian speech. She’d dragged me along in her wake until we were both on our life paths, until she met me one Friday night with the news she'd gotten the scholarship to Stanford, that she was going to give it up for me.