Tutoring the Player (Campus Wallflowers #1)(55)

“Why’d you think I was Liam? He’s not here?”

I shake my head. “No. He disappeared after practice.”

“Uh-oh. That doesn’t sound good.” I can barely hear her over Jenkins’ smack talk to Warren.

I lean closer. “Practice was pretty awful.”

Her response gets lost in another wave of noise, but her mouth turns down in a sympathetic frown. I stand with her, and we go into my room. After kicking the door closed behind us, I flop down on the bed and hold my arms out. She sits on the edge of the mattress, looking all unsure and adorable.

“I can’t believe you’re here,” I say, dropping my hands around her.

“I wouldn’t be if I’d thought it through. I should have realized you’d be hanging with friends.”

“You’re a friend.” I hook a finger through a belt loop on her jeans. The denim gaps around her hip bone. I don’t pull, but she leans into me anyway.

“Is that what I am?”

She smiles as I bring my mouth to hers. Has it only been a little more than a week? Damn. I missed her lips.

“Hello, friend,” I tease and sweep my tongue against hers.

Most of the time, when girls start trying to have the what do we mean to each other conversation, it freaks me out. I’m not anti-girlfriend, exactly. I did it once, and it didn’t work out, but that isn’t why I haven’t seriously dated since. The truth is, I like hanging with my friends and doing what I want without worrying about another person.

With Daisy, though, I don’t get the feeling that she’s trying to trap me into a label, so much as she’s taunting me. She’s supposed to end up with someone smarter, nicer, just generally better. Someone like Liam. Fuck, they’d probably already be an item if I hadn’t interfered. The thought places an uncomfortable weight on my chest.

She places a hand softly on my side. Unassuming and tentative, she’s slow to touch me, like the week apart has made her more unsure. I tug her down on me and encourage her with deep, hungry kisses that only show her a fraction of how much I missed her—missed this.

My phone vibrates in my pocket, and I groan because I know I have to check it in case it’s Liam. I dig it out without breaking the kiss.

“Is it him?” Daisy asks, pulling back.

“No. Still nothing.” As a last-ditch effort, I texted some guys from class that I thought might be around, but no one’s seen him.

Daisy leans over my outstretched legs and props herself up on an elbow. “I’m sure he’s around somewhere. Where would he go? Bar? McCallum’s apartment?”

Damn, she looks good laid across my bed.

I settle a hand on her hip and up the curve of her stomach. “He’s not at either of those places. Or The White House. I’ve texted everyone that’s in town. No one’s seen him.”

“You’re really worried about him?” It isn’t a question so much as her pointing out a fact she just discerned. Her brows pinch together.

“It isn’t like him to go off the grid.”

“Yeah. That doesn’t sound like him.” She gets that contemplative look like she does when she’s studying. She stands and moves to the door. When she opens it, she looks back at me. “Are you coming or what?”

“Where are we going?” And how do I get her back on my bed?

“To find Liam.”





Campus is a graveyard. I pull the hood up on my sweatshirt, and Daisy zips up her coat and shoves her hands in her pockets.

“Any other ideas where he might have gone?” she asks.

“Not really.”

“Where are his favorite places?”

“I don’t know. The arena.”

“Did you check there?”

I hang my head, and Daisy laughs. “We’ll go there first.”

Damn. It never even occurred to me that he might have stayed at the rink, but it makes sense. It’s a good ten-minute walk to the arena, and we move slowly.

“Did you have a nice time at home?” I ask.

“Yeah,” she answers immediately and then adds, “I was kind of bored.”

I can almost picture Daisy sitting all alone in a room with her sketchbook.

“My parents aren’t evil or anything.” Soft laughter falls from her lips. “I realize I might have made them out to be awful, and they aren’t.”

I hold her hand, swinging it lightly between us. “I don’t think that.”

“I don’t want to be like them,” she says. “Someday, when I have a house, I want it to be loud and chaotic. That’s my favorite part of living with Vi, Dahlia, and Jane. It’s never completely silent.”

My mouth hitches up with a smile. “You like loud, huh?”

She nods.

We’ve reached the arena. I tip my head back into the still night and shout as loud as I can, “Daiiiissy!”

She’s laughing when I pull her against me. Her nose is cold against my face as I kiss her.

“You’re cold.” I slide my hands under her coat and shirt. She inhales sharply as my freezing fingers walk up her sides.

“So are you. We should go inside.”

I pin her against the building, kissing her until we’re breathless, and the only next step is getting naked. I’m so hard it’s painful.