Which was an hour ago.
Laurel rolls her eyes. “I know. I meant pizza or something. I think Luigi’s is open until one.” She checks the time. “We have tons of time.”
“You want to get pizza?” With me?
“Unless you’re not that hungry? I think I have a granola bar stashed in my bag somewhere if you want it.” Laurel leans, making a show of unzipping her floral backpack and sticking her hand inside. “Or maybe an apple?”
“I could do pizza,” I say it slowly, weighing my words.
I’m going to regret it later because binging on pizza is a terrible idea with a weigh-in looming; I have to make my weight class or I’m fucked, but if this girl had suggested we eat a steaming pile of dog shit, I’d have gone along and eaten it without protest.
Fuck it. I’ll eat the goddamn pizza.
Her eyes light up. “Really?”
“Yeah. Let’s go.”
When she stands, arching her back to slide into her jacket, there’s no stopping my eyes from straying to the thin fabric of her shirt, roaming across her breasts. They linger on the nipples showing through her bra.
My throat tightens and I swallow, glancing away guiltily. Pack up my shit alongside her, hoist my backpack. Instinctively place my hand near the small of her back, guiding her toward the heavy set of exit doors.
“My car is outside if you’d rather drive?” I point in the direction of my vehicle—the black Jeep Wrangler I’ve had since I turned sixteen, the one that’s seen even less action than me.
“Want to walk?” Laurel stalls on the sidewalk. “It’s so nice out.”
Walking feels intimate, especially in the dark, so I waver. “Uh, sure.”
“Let’s at least put our bags in your car though—I don’t feel like hauling my backpack four blocks. I’m not nearly strong as you.”
She smiles serenely over her shoulder, and I wonder what it would be like to have a pretty girl like her smiling at me like that for real, like she meant it.
Like she was attracted to me, even for a short time.
“Good idea.” I walk around her, reach for the handle of my Jeep, unlock it with the key. “Here, let me get the door. Hand me your bag.”
“Thank you.”
Our fingers brush when she hands me her backpack by the shoulder straps. I ignore the spark, tossing her bag in the front seat, followed closely by mine. I grab a baseball cap off the dashboard, fitting it to my head backward.
We start through campus, our destination straight on the other side, four blocks away.
It’s dark and dimly lit despite all the prospective student information bullshit they give you about blue panic lights and security. It’s not entirely safe—not if you’re female. The wide center quad is hazy, a grassy knoll dissected by four merging sidewalks, fountain in the center.
Laurel stays close, hands at her sides, shifting as we walk, hips swaying, occasionally bumping into me, so close I can smell her.
We walk in companionable silence, mostly because I have no fucking clue what to say to her. None at all. Do I talk about the damn weather? I don’t want to bring up my friends—or hers, for that matter, because they seem like little bitches. School? Hobbies?
Shit.
“So what do you do besides wrestle?” Her soft question breaks the silence as we cut across the lawn, hanging a left at the poli-sci building that’s been under construction all semester.
“Good question. I…” I pause.
I almost tell her there isn’t anything besides wrestling, but I stop myself. Think. Rack my brain, trying to come up with other shit I enjoy doing so I won’t sound like a pathetic loser who does nothing but go to the gym every day with nothing else to fill my time. Workout. Watch every fat calorie and carb that hits my lips so it doesn’t impact my weight class.
I can’t tell her I sit home on the weekends because it’s too expensive to fly or drive home to visit my family. I don’t go out and party often because I don’t drink much—too many wasted calories.
“Do you like movies?” she supplies, glancing over in the dark. The sound of leaves crunching under our shoes accompanies us on our walk.
We have two blocks to go.
I can already see Luigi’s lit-up sign glowing in the night; my stomach senses it, too, because it growls.
“Yeah, I like movies. What about you?”
“I love movies. I love going to the movies.” Laurel clears her throat. “It’s been forever since I’ve been to one.”
More silence as she waits out my reply, but I don’t know what she wants me to say, or if she’s hinting at something.
I feel like a freaking idiot.
“What’s the last book you read?” I finally ask when we hit a crosswalk, looking both ways before stepping down into the road, crossing to the next city block.
“A romance novel. It took me two weeks because, well, studying and stuff got in the way.” She hops down beside me, keeping stride, her elbow brushing my arm. “What about you? Do you like to read?”
“The last book I read was a mystery. I…”
I hesitate, not wanting to sound lame.
“You what?”
“I, uh, spend a lot of time at the public library.”
“The public library?”
“You know, the city library, where they have more fiction than at school. I study there, too. Mostly on the weekends.”
Laurel makes a little humming sound. “I never thought of studying there—maybe I should come with you next time, if you don’t mind the company.” She’s teasing me again, giving me a little bump with her hip.
Mine singes from the contact.
“It’s quiet. I can hear myself think.”
“Do you miss your friends from Louisiana?”
I shrug. “I don’t think it’s the same for guys as it is for girls. Most of my friends were teammates, and they were pissed I left the team. Haven’t talked to most of them in a while.”
“I bet.”
We arrive at Luigi’s. I get the door, hold it open so she can enter first.
When Laurel brushes past me, I catch another whiff of her. Whatever she’s sprayed on herself or in her hair, it smells fucking fantastic.
She steps up, over the threshold, shooting me a look over her slim shoulder.
“Should we sit there, by the window so we can people watch?”
“Sure. We can watch the drunks heading to the bars.”
“That’ll be fun. I’ll sit while you grab a menu?”
I grab one, head back to the table.
Her eyes rake me up and down, crinkled at the corners, watching. Always smiling at me like she has a naughty little secret, looking me up and down as I move across the room. I fight my initial instinct to look away.
Chin in her hands, Laurel’s intense gaze starts at the tips of my black tennis shoes. Lands and holds steady on my crotch. Roams up my chest, my shoulders, the pleasant smile never leaving her face.
Mischievous.
Playful.
Sexy, even with her flaming red hair piled on top of her head like a rat’s nest. She has a cute silver headband in her hair, too.
I join her at the table and watch as she reveals a tube of strawberry lip balm, coats her top lip, then her bottom. Smacks them both together, puckering before tucking the tube away, satisfied.
Rubs them together again as she watches me.
When I clear my throat, her eyes flicker to my neck.
“What are you in the mood for?” I ask.
Laurel hums, a little smile playing at her lips as she picks at the corner of the menu. “What am I in the mood for? Good question.” Pauses. “Extra cheese? And whatever else you want?” Her smile, by all accounts, is perfectly innocent. “I love pizza—I could eat it every day.”
She hands the menu back across the table.
I unfold it, pretending to study the damn thing but mentally calculating the money inside my wallet. I think there’s a twenty tucked away somewhere, possibly a ten and a few singles to cover a large?
One thing is for sure: I cannot charge this meal on my credit card, although it’s possible dinner with a pretty girl would constitute an emergency charge, at least to my mother.