Page 23 of Wait for Him

My jaw is screaming, my head is ringing, and I'm still trying to reconcile the fact that thirty seconds ago Rose's hand was on my dick and now I'm getting my ass beat by her brother.

“Nothing happened; we just kissed.” Rose gets between us before he can come at me again, shoving both hands against his chest. “You don't dictate who I kiss!”

“The fuck I don't when it's him.”

“Back up, Bennet.”

She shoves him again, harder this time, but he barely seems to notice. His breathing is labored, his skin flushed an angry red, and he's staring straight over her shoulder at me with enough fury in his eyes that I'm pretty sure if she weren't standing between us, round two would already be underway.

“He's a fucking kid, Rose!”

That gets me moving.

“Fuck you! I'm a grown fucking man. Matter of fact, I'll tell you how much of a—”

“Shut up, Jackson.”

Rose doesn't even turn around when she says it.

My mouth snaps shut mostly from surprise.

Fuck. This is getting out of hand.

“We're all drunk,” she says, and I hear her deliberately pull the anger out of her voice. Both hands stay planted on Bennet's chest while she waits for him to actually look at her instead of trying to murder me over her shoulder. “Nobody is thinking clearly. I kissed him. He pushed me away. There's nothing happening here. Jackson and I are close friends, and that's all it ever was or will be. So, calm down.”

For a second, I forget about my jaw.

He pushed me away?

I stare at the back of her head, waiting for her to turn around, because there is no fucking way she just said that with a straight face.

She doesn't look at me.

I mean, why would she?

Thirty seconds ago, her hand was rubbing my cock through my jeans. Then she kissed me back hard enough that I can still taste her, smiled at me when I called her baby, and told me she liked it. She looked at me like maybe, for once, there actually could be a from now on.

And now I ‘pushed her away.’

Now we're ‘close friends.’

That’s all we ever were and ever will be.

The worst part is that I know exactly what she's doing. She's trying to calm Bennet down. He's drunk and furious and clearly willing to beat my ass into the Pacific Ocean, so she's giving him the version that makes this stop before one of us ends up in the hospital.

I know that.

Doesn't make hearing it hurt any fucking less.

Because I've heard this version of Rose before.

It never happened.

Same fucking trick. Different night.

Something happens between us that she can't pretend she didn't feel, and the second the rest of the world gets close enough to see it, she starts burying the evidence.

I push myself fully to my feet and work my jaw from side to side, tasting blood where my teeth caught the inside of my cheek. Rose is still standing between us, protecting me from Bennet while simultaneously gutting me with every word coming out of her mouth.