Strung(25)

“Hey, Tegan. I’ve been looking all over for you. Are you okay? You disappeared with Micah and I didn’t see where you guys went.”

I nod and force a small smile.

I’m far from okay, but I can’t let either of the boys know that.

“I’m good. We’re good. He just wanted to talk for a minute about something my brother told him.”

Parker smiles and finishes off the drink he must’ve gotten when I was inside with Micah. “Okay, good. I was worried for a minute that he was trying to steal my date.”

I shake my head and swallow. “No. I’m sure Micah can have any girl here that he wants . . .” I look up in just enough time to see some blonde chick cling to him. My heart sinks at the sight. “In fact, he’s with some trashy blonde right now.”

Parker’s smile widens as he looks over in their direction just as the blonde bimbo wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him on the cheek. “That’s surprising. As far as I can remember he’s already slept with Gwen. Once is usually his limit. It seems to be Micah’s way when it comes to women. He’s sort of a dirtball if you ask me.”

“He’s slept with her?” I whisper, mostly to myself. “You really think he’s going to sleep with her again?”

“Who knows.”

Seeing another girl all over him when he was just kissing me has my temper flaring, especially knowing that she’s experienced him in the same way I have. All I can think to do is find another drink before I explode with jealousy.

“Shots. Let’s do some shots.”

“That sounds really good right about now,” I say stiffly.

I force myself to not look Micah’s way anymore because the jealousy that I’m feeling is making it hard to act normal. I know he’s not mine, but seeing him with another woman is harder than I thought It’d be.

I don’t like the feeling one bit. In fact . . . I hate it.

I’ve never wanted to punch a girl’s face in before now.

Focusing my attention on Parker, I down a few shots and try my best not to wonder what Micah is doing with that other chick right now.

But the more I try not to think about it, the more I end up thinking about it, and I find myself looking around to see if I can find them.

“Are you okay?” Parker asks with a cute little smile. “Have you had too many shots? I can get you some water.”

I shake my head and smile. “I’m good, thank you. I’m just a little hot.”

“A little hot?” He steps in close and runs his hands over my ass, before squeezing my hips with a small moan. “You’ve got me hot too. You have no idea how badly I want to kiss you right now.”

Before I can refuse his kiss, his hands move down to squeeze my ass and his lips cover mine.

I barely even have time to react before he’s yanked away from me and Micah punches him across the jaw, knocking him on his ass.

Parker looks up with surprise as he places his hand over the red area Micah’s fist just left. “What the fuck, Man?”

“Touch her again and I’ll kill you, Parker.”

“She’s here with me,” Parker yells from the ground. “She’s my fucking date. What the hell?”

Everyone around us stares as Micah picks me up and begins escorting me away from the party as if he’s in control of me.

“What the hell!” I slap at his back as he walks us around to the front of the house and I don’t stop until he sets me down next to his truck. “What did you do that for? Shit, Micah!”

He backs me against the truck. “Because his hands and lips were all fucking over you, that’s why,” he growls out in anger. “I should’ve fucking killed him then and there instead of warning him.”

Angry, I push him away from me. “What the hell, Micah? I can take care of myself. I was going to stop him, but you didn’t even give me enough time to.”

“It’s kind of hard to ask him to stop when your lips are on his. It looked to me like you were enjoying it.”

“He barely kissed me. It lasted for a whole three seconds before you came along and punched him. Fuck, Micah.” I grip my hair and begin pacing around the truck. “You punched him really hard. You might’ve broken his jaw. I can’t believe you did that.”

“I took it easy on him,” he grinds out. “He got lucky. I saw the way his hands were groping all over your ass. You don’t do that to a girl who’s been drinking.”

“Dammit, you should’ve let me handle him. I may be a little buzzed, but I know what I’m doing.”

I stop and look at him as he opens the door to his truck.

“Get inside. I’m taking you home.”

“You’re unreal,” I mutter, while stepping up into his truck. “And an asshole.”

The last thing I want to do is face anyone at this party after the scene that Micah just made, which is the only reason I’m agreeing to leave with him right now.

Yes, Parker touched my ass and kissed me, which did make me feel uncomfortable, but Micah could’ve at least let me handle it before laying his ass out.

Parker is a nice guy and I know he would’ve stopped if I had asked him to. He just got a little excited and misread the situation between us.

“So I’ve been told.” He slams the truck door shut and walks over to jump inside himself. “But that’s part of the reason I turn you on so much. Admit it so we can all move past it.”

I ignore him and turn away, but he’s right. There’s something about the way he takes what he wants and tells it how it is that completely turns me on.

It makes me want to punch him just like he just punched Parker.

And what makes it even worse is that watching him punch someone was somehow hot.

He’s got me completely screwed up and the feeling is somewhat addictive . . .





THE TRUCK BARELY COMES TO a stop before I jump out and slam the door shut behind me, feeling as if I’m suffocating.

The moment the fresh air hits me I feel as if I can finally breathe once again. Being inside Micah’s truck felt like all the air was being sucked straight from my lungs. It was stifling.

The tension was too much for such a small space.

There were things left unsaid, but neither of us was sure if we should say them or not. At least I know I had things to say.

The sound of Micah’s door slamming shut has me flinching and I take a deep breath, expecting him to close in behind me so we can argue our way to the house, but instead he takes off around back.

He doesn’t even bother looking at me. He just dives into the pool, fully dressed, as if he can’t get away from me fast enough.

This makes me angrier than I was before.

Why the hell should he get an escape? This is all his fault to begin with.

First he had the balls to kiss me and then act like it was a mistake, but God forbid someone else kisses me and he has the nerve to nearly knock him out.

He’s so infuriating that I have half a mind to jump into the pool after him and rip him a new one for being such a pain in my ass.

But the moment his intense gaze meets mine from over the ledge of the pool, I decide it’s not worth it and walk away.

Once in my room, I strip down to a t-shirt and panties and pull my laptop out, deciding to respond to my unanswered emails as a distraction. A few people have been asking me when Still Breathing is releasing and one person wants to know if I plan on writing a book for the supporting characters from my first release.

There’s not nearly enough emails to keep my mind distracted from Micah and how much of an asshole he’s being, so I log into Facebook and check my notifications.

An hour later, Micah is beginning to fade from my mind when a sponsored ad for Express pops us, stating that the grand opening will be in six weeks.

The ad has a photo of Micah sitting on the stage with his guitar, looking drop dead gorgeous.

“Well, apparently the internet is an asshole too.”

Grunting, I slam my computer shut and crawl into bed, wishing I was tired enough to fall asleep.

I try everything from listening to an audiobook to binge watching Shameless, but it does nothing to stop me from wondering what Micah is doing downstairs.

We’ve been home for three hours now and I haven’t heard a peep from him. It makes me wonder if he took off again and I just didn’t hear his truck over the noise from the TV, but when I sit up and look out the window to check, his truck is still parked outside and my brother is pulling up on his motorcycle.

It has my nerves shooting off like crazy, because I have no idea if Parker told him about what went down earlier at the party.

Once he finds out that Micah went mad and punched Parker for kissing me, he’s going to either be thankful that Micah was looking out for me or get suspicious that he did it for a whole different reason.

Hell, I’m not even one hundred percent sure of the reason he did it.

He was with another girl just minutes before, allowing her to kiss and hang all over him. I didn’t like it, but I didn’t go bat-shit crazy on the bitch either.

The memory has me angrily turning off the TV and slamming my head into the pillow beneath me.

I really need to get some sleep before my thoughts drive me crazy. Well, crazier.

It seems I’ve been crazy since the moment I set my gaze on Micah banging some chick nearly two weeks ago.

My brother takes his time coming upstairs and seems to be too busy taking a phone call to bother stopping by my room like he normally does, trying to make conversation on his way his.