Beautiful Broken Rules (Broken, Series #1)(21)

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Jaxon: We have that test today in Media Law. Come over to crash study with me? Pleeease.

Me: I’ll be over in 5. But it’s nice to hear you beg. ;-)

Jaxon: Bring breakfast. I’m hungry ;-)

Me: What do I look like… a maid?

Jaxon: Do you have one of those little outfits? If so, I’ll come over there right now.

*.*.*.*.*

The next couple of weeks of school and work went by pretty fast. I picked up a lot of shifts since tomorrow was the first game of the season and I knew I’d be taking off all Fridays and some Saturdays until the season was over. Ed complained that he would fire me, but I was the only female bartender, and I pulled in a lot of customers, so I knew he wouldn’t. I usually just picked up extra weekday shifts to appease him and the other bartenders that had to cover for me.

A couple of times I met up with everyone at some of the Frat parties after work. Jace usually didn’t go to those; Cole said he was pretty bogged down with pre-med. Every once in a while, I would see him on campus and he always had a new entourage of girls on each side of him. I couldn’t blame them though, the Riley boys were hot. I heard rumors every now and then about some girl saying she hooked up with Jaxon, but I never asked him if they were true. Micah had said that he was a lot like the male version of me. I did notice Rachel Morgan always sitting next to him in the cafeteria, but I knew they weren’t dating or anything. Not yet at least. Some girls took it upon themselves every once in a while to come and sit in his lap. He usually let them for a couple of seconds and I always laughed into my hand, as he would try politely to move them off.

We continued flirting with each other but nothing more ever happened between us. Mr. Patterson assigned us a huge midterm project that we had to have partners on, so Jaxon and I would meet in one or the other’s apartment to work on it. As we were walking out to his truck after lunch one day, I asked him if he was nervous about the game tomorrow, since he hadn’t played on a team in a couple years.

“No, I don’t think so, I’ve been doing well during practice. I worked my butt off the two years after high school so I could stay fit. I woke up every morning at 5 AM to practice before classes and then I would hit the gyms in the afternoons and evenings. I used to drag Jace with me every morning. He would bitch my head off for making him get up and throw me the ball so early in the morning,” he said while walking over to my side of the truck.

He opened my door and dipped down to grab my waist. This was always my favorite part. I told him once that I was completely capable of getting into a truck on my own, but he just ignored me and did it anyway. He lifted me up into the seat, looking right into my eyes. I swear, every time we did this his face got closer to mine and I almost leaned in to kiss him today. By the time I realized I should, he was already backing out to close my door. He came around to the driver’s side and slid in. His dark jeans made a slight scratching noise across the leather seat.

I realized I hadn’t replied to him yet. “You have a pretty awesome brother to get up every day at five in the morning for two years to throw a ball.”

“I didn’t say he liked doing it,” he returned.

“If he didn’t like doing it, he wouldn’t have been there, Jaxon. He loves you. Besides you said he stayed behind to go to community college with you when he obviously had a university fully ready to pay four years for him in pre-med.”

“Hmm… yeah I guess you’re right.” He said this like he’d never considered his own brother loved him before. “After a while I guess he became used to waking up so early because there were a couple of times that I just didn’t feel like getting up. I mean we did it every single morning even on the weekends. Jace would be there, slapping me upside the head to get me to wake up.” He laughed at the memory and I let him think about it the rest of the drive home.