“I’ve never felt the need to act like this in public before. There’s just something about you that brings it out in me,” he answered as he opened the door for me. “And don’t think I didn’t catch the yet at the end of your sentence. I’m just going to take it to mean that you’ve conceded to the fact that tomorrow night is a date. In fact, I think you could almost say we are dating already since we had breakfast together this morning. Technically, tomorrow night will be our second date.”

CHAPTER 6

Jackson

I stayed until Kaylie closed the bar down and waited to make sure she and her roommate made it safely to her car. I didn’t like the idea of Kaylie being alone in the bar’s parking lot this late at night with all the guys who had been drinking there all night. But I didn’t want to freak her out any more than I already had by letting her know that I’d waited for her, so I watched from the convenience store parking lot across the street. She’d backed down when I asked her to change her shirt and seemed to enjoy the kiss, but I didn’t want to scare her off with these possessive urges that were rising up inside me.

I’d always been a little intense, but it had never affected how I treated women out of bed. If a girl I wanted to bang wasn’t interested, it was no big deal because there were always others. If she was with a different guy the night after I’d slept with her, it didn’t bother me at all. In fact, it was a relief because it meant she knew the score and wouldn’t freak out when I didn’t want to go back for more. I certainly couldn’t give a shit how they were dressed and if other guys noticed. The more provocative, the better.

But when I walked into the bar and found that hick practically drooling over Kaylie’s ass, I’d had to restrain myself from tossing him out. It hadn’t mattered that she’d just been doing her job and that her shirt had probably increased her tips for the night. There was no way I’d have been able to last the rest of the night without beating the shit out of someone for making a pass at her because they’d gotten the wrong idea about her because of that damn shirt. Thank fuck that guy had thought I was her boyfriend and she’d been willing to change. Because I wasn’t sure I would have been able to restrain myself otherwise.

That freaked me out because I never had a problem with self-control. I’d been doing karate since I was little and had always been able to center myself. But with Kaylie, I felt like I had been thrown into the deep end of the ocean with no idea how to swim. It was thrilling and scary at the same time. I didn’t know which way I was going to get tossed next. I just knew that I was going to enjoy the ride.

I made it back to the frat house before I knew it since my thoughts were still on Kaylie. I could hear the music blaring before I even opened my truck door and realized that the guys had thrown together a party of some sort while I’d been gone. Not that it was unusual for a Saturday night at the house. Unless there was a big bash somewhere else with free booze, you could pretty much plan on us partying together. What was unusual was that I wasn’t in the mood to join them, but I wouldn’t hear the end of it if I didn’t at least make an appearance. As the frat Treasurer, I had certain responsibilities to uphold, some of which had nothing to do with our finances.

I grabbed a beer from the kitchen before joining everyone in the living room. The party was in full swing with the guys chugging down beers like they were water and girls dancing in skimpy outfits to the dance music they were playing. The only time you ever heard that shit in the house was when the guys had girls over for a party. It just wasn’t a party unless you had drunk girls gyrating to the music.

I wandered over to a group of my buddies to hang out when all I really wanted to do was drink my beer and head upstairs to my room to crash. I might have gotten over that bug from last night pretty quickly, but I was damn tired now. And I wanted some peace and quiet to think about what my plans would be for dinner tomorrow night. If I was going to take Kaylie on a date, I figured it was worth putting a little energy into it. Might as well make it worthwhile if I was going to break my ‘no dating’ rule for her. Because I sure as shit was going to catch hell for it from the guys, my sister, and other girls on campus once word got out.

Speaking of other girls, the sharks were starting to circle as the night wore on. I could practically smell the desperation in the air. It had been like this the last month or so once I’d stopped hitting on the girls on campus. They didn’t know what to think about the change in my MO. Usually, I would take my pick of the girls at the party up to my room for the night. Or at least part of the night, because there was no way in hell I ever let them sleep over. I had my fun, made sure they had a good time, and then showed them the door. If I was feeling particularly lazy and she was a good lay, I might decide to go back for more the next night. But that was it.