By Referral Only Page 9

  Cole paused when I opened my mouth to protest that staring like dummies didn’t equal chemistry, but lying wasn’t my style, either. We did have chemistry. When I shut my mouth again, heart pounding at what might come next, he continued.

  “I helped you when your car wouldn’t start because again, you were the most beautiful lass in distress I’ve ever seen, and maybe it’s in my blood to play the white knight, but I didn’t like seeing you suffering.” He held up a hand to block my protest. “I didn’t know about the website until the next day. I had a computer science friend of mine hack you to figure it out.”

  I swallowed hard, my mouth dry and stomach in knots over his frank statements and the way his mouth spilled phrases like beautiful lass. “Why do you care so much?”

  My curiosity got the better of me. Cole seemed so confident in every aspect of life, but here he was again, clearly wanting the website taken down or censored. Or to prove to me that the ratings were wrong.

  A shiver crawled up my spine at the thought.

  “I try not to, but honestly, with two older brothers and an entire frat house giving me a hard time, it would make my life quite a bit less filled with shite on a daily,” Cole shrugged, his cheeks a little red.

  “How about this—you don’t even have to go out with me. You can just tell me why the ratings are skewed and if I agree that they’re unfair, I’ll take them down.”

  He shook his head, his full lips pressed together, that strange protective hunch returning to his shoulders. “No. It’s my business, and the girls’. I don’t kiss and tell.”

  The way he left unlike you unsaid raised my hackles again, and reminded me who lived underneath his suave and terribly charming exterior. “You mean, the way I do.”

  Cole shrugged, shifting his weight as though the conversation made him uncomfortable. “Like I said last time, it’s not that I disagree with your venture, but it has its flaws. I’m caught up in one of them. I’m only asking you to do the right thing.”

  “I don’t know that it is the right thing if you won’t confide in me, Cole.” The statement came out in a pleading tone that I hadn’t intended. I wanted him to trust me enough to share whatever made him fold in on himself that way—whatever secret made him afraid.

  He stepped forward, invading my space and then, probably encouraged by my tone, lifted a hand to my makeup-caked cheek. “You’re always beautiful, but more so the less makeup you wear. I’d love to see your face first thing in the morning, sleepy and bathed in the first rays of the day. It’s got to be the most stunning sight in the world.” His voice dipped, a little scratchy over the words, like maybe he didn’t want to say them but couldn’t help it.

  He’d thought about me waking up next to him.

  His gaze mesmerized me, and when it fell to my lips, my heart leapt into my throat. Heat sizzled through my blood until I wanted to drop the thistles and drag him away into an empty hallway and simply find out whether the website ratings were a lie the old-fashioned way.

  “You don’t have to shower me with all of these compliments, Cole. I told you I’d take it down if you told me why.” My own voice sounded far away.

  “I’m saying what I want to say. Because I want you to hear it, and I think you’re worth the scrapes from your thorns. Fuck your website.” He moved closer, edging me back against the wall and placing his palms on either side of my head. “I’ve wanted to nip those lips again for the past six weeks.”

  I closed my eyes, trying to control my breathing and get my shit together. I expected to feel him move closer, but a moment later, the warmth of his arms dropped from around me and I opened my eyes, embarrassed to find him watching me from a good two feet away.

  He ran a hand over the blond fuzz on his head, probably recently shaved for a swimming event. “I don’t…. You and I have more in common than you believe, Ruby. I don’t trust easily, either, which means we’re at an impasse.”

  Before either of us could say anything more, Liam rounded the corner, his eyes narrowed as he took in the two of us. The goddamn electricity in the hallway probably stood his hair on end. Thank goodness he hadn’t walked back here a minute earlier. I had no idea what had made Cole retreat, but it was a good thing he had.

  It might have been Liam. Cole seemed to have an ethical code of some sort, although how that allowed him to boot Chaney out in the middle of the night still baffled me, but cheating probably wouldn’t endear me to him.

  Not that I cared. I didn’t care.

  “Hey, baby.”

  My teeth clenched at Liam’s forgetfulness. His eyes cut to Cole, then lingered on the massive pile of flowers in my arms, and I wondered if he’d forgotten at all, or if it the term of endearment was some sort of misguided way of marking his territory.

  “Hi.” My gaze slid over his street clothes. “You changed already?”

  “We finished a half an hour ago. Aren’t you ready to leave?”

  “Um.”

  Cole cleared his throat, not letting me get away with bad manners, and I closed my eyes for a moment. “Liam Greene, this is Cole Stuart. Cole, Liam.”

  Cole stuck out a strong hand, thicker and tanner than Liam’s thin fingers, and they shook. It lasted too long and looked a little too tight from where I stood, and my eyes hurt from rolling.

  “You must be the boyfriend,” Cole said, his voice friendlier than the hard set of his jaw suggested.

  My stomach sank. Great.

  Liam didn’t even look my direction, just smiled and dropped Cole’s hand. “I don’t know about boyfriend, but I’m the one tumbling her hot little ass, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  My cheeks burned from embarrassment. It wasn’t that I had a problem with Cole knowing Liam and I were sleeping together—he’d surely assumed—but the fact that it now appeared to Cole that I thought it was more than that humiliated me. Why had I lied about Liam being my boyfriend? And why had Liam felt the need to toss our business out there like that?

  “I’m going to go change,” I stammered, unable to meet either of their gazes. “Thank you for the thistles.”

  “I’ll meet you outside,” Liam said to my retreating back.

  ***

  It took longer than it should have to calm down, and the fact that Liam’s uncouth pronouncement had made me cry, even in private, irritated the shit out of me. He needed to be put in his place, and I was officially sick of his crap. The sex wasn’t nearly good enough to put up with his increasingly snotty attitude.

  The last thing I needed was to run into Cole, but he lurked outside the theatre’s back door like some kind of handsome Scottish stalker.

  I glowered at him, determined to assert my brain over the rest of me. “Don’t you have anything better to do than irritate me?”

  Cole stepped in my path, blocking me from the parking lot and my escape. “I wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

  The soft edges to his words almost brought back my tears. How long had it been since a guy had genuinely sounded as though he cared? Too long, but even if Cole thought he cared, it would only last as long as it took for me to meet his friends, or his family. The lectures on the proper type of girl would follow, and then he’d decide he didn’t care about me as much as his reputation.

  Cole had already made it clear that his reputation meant something to him, otherwise he wouldn’t be so worried about being the biggest chump on my referral site.

  My brain knew all of this, but my heart melted a little at the concern in his eyes.

  “I’m fine. A little embarrassed, but fine.”

  His hand snaked out and touched my wrist. It comforted and singed at the same time. “You have nothing to be embarrassed about, Ruby. That was a wanker move, and you deserve better.”

  “It’s not his fault. Things are casual between us.”

  “I don’t care if you two are nothing but a long-running booty call. It was shitty of him to throw it in your face.”

  Cole and Emilie both thought I deserved better than
Liam. I appreciated the sentiment, but when going after someone better meant being emotionally destroyed, it felt like too big a risk.

  I shook my head and gave Cole a small smile. “Thank you for waiting, but I’m really fine.”

  “You should be with a guy who makes you feel more than fine.”

  ‘Like you?” Cole managed to turn me on and make me want to put on defensive armor with equal ease.

  “You seem pretty convinced that wouldn’t work out.”

  “I have my reasons. Like you have your reasons for not confiding in me about the ratings.”

  “You’re saying if I tell you why the girls I’ve dated have walked away unhappy, you’ll tell me what makes you so sure you don’t want to go on a date with me?”

  Cole didn’t want to talk about what had happened in his bedroom over the past three years, but the truth was, I didn’t want to chat about mine, either. Talking about the way Michael had treated me, how my heart still hadn’t quite healed, wasn’t an option.

  The truth was, I did trust Cole. I trusted him to behave exactly as I knew he would.

  Instead of calling his bluff—I was sure it was a bluff—I gave him a tired smile. “I’ll see you at the mixer in a couple of weeks, Cole.”

  I stepped past him, and this time he let me go. Tears pricked the corners of my eyes. I was sorry I’d let Cole in as far as I had. I didn’t need him being sweet and protective, yet somehow vulnerable at the same time, and trying to change the course that had kept my heart safe the past two years.

  If he kept asking me out, it would get harder and harder to say no. It made me want to run away from him, not walk, and never have to face him again.

  One thing had become clear tonight—Liam and I were done. I thought about breaking up with him, but if I was just a girl who slept in his bed, I could probably weasel out of that and simply stop responding to his messages.

  Starting with tonight. Fatigue had settled deep in my bones. The familiar weight came partially from the loss of the adrenaline that had fueled my performance, and partially from the spent emotion over Liam and Cole. Either way, being alone in my bed appealed to me more than either boy.

  At the moment.

  Chapter 10

  “He said you deserve to be with a guy who makes you feel better than fine? And that you were worth the scrapes?” Emilie worked to keep her voice even, but the swoon underneath her words begged to break free. Her huge almost-black eyes filled with the kind of dopey look she got whenever we watched The Notebook or basically any cheesy shit on ABC Family.

  “Yes.” I glared at her. “But we don’t like him. He’s got a stick up his Scottish ass that’s been there for like, thirteen generations or something, and he sucks in bed. Apparently.”

  “Right. Yes.” Emilie snapped out of it, the dreamy clouds evaporating from her dark eyes. “But—”

  “No buts.”

  She rolled her eyes, reaching a toe across the space between our beds and poking me. “But, aren’t you the least bit curious about him? I mean, about why the girls are rating him so low?”

  “No.”

  “Ruby, you can lie to yourself if you want, but I’ve been your best friend for going on three years. I know you. Not to mention, I’ve watched the two of you stare helplessly at one another in class for half a semester while the rest of the room tries to not drown in the lust. You like him.”

  “I don’t like him. I might be attracted to him, but that’s unconscious. I can’t help it.”

  Emilie crossed her arms over her chest and cocked her head, fixing me with the kind of stare that made Quinn rethink whatever was about to come out of his stupid mouth. “Right. Why would you like a gorgeous guy with a hot accent and an even hotter body, who also brings you flowers and compliments your talent, thinks you’re beautiful, and turns you on like whoa? That would be crazy!”

  “I’m picking up on your sarcasm.”

  “Well, I should hope so, because I’m laying it on pretty thick.”

  I picked at my comforter, hating to show my stupid girl insecurities, even to Em. “I can’t like him, Em. It will turn out the same as all the others. Guys at this school…they seem to like me, but then their friends or their family turn up their nose at my tacky parents, and that’s the end of it. I can’t do it again.”

  She moved to my bed, sitting close enough that our hips touched, and put an arm around my shoulders. “If Liam taught you anything, though, it’s that guys in every financial bracket can be dicks who want to get away with putting in the least amount of effort. Cole Stuart has already put in more effort than Liam, and you aren’t even dating.”

  “Only because he wants to convince me to filter his ratings.”

  “You can believe that if you want, but I don’t think I do. In fact, I think it’s time for another infamous Ruby and Emilie investigation.”

  I snorted. “You mean scheme.”

  “Sure. You and I are going to find out what’s wrong with Cole Stuart, because now I want to know, too.”

  “What’s Quinn going to think about more scheming?”

  “Quinn loves my adorably cheeky side.”

  “He loves all your sides,” I replied as sweetly as I could manage.

  She grinned, her cheeks pink. “I know. I love him so much, Ruby, it’s like my insides want to expand to hold it all, but it just shoots out everywhere. I want you to have that, too, no matter how much money the guy has—you have to find him. Which means you need to stay open to the opportunities, not close them off.”

  I laid my head on her shoulder. “You’re so much braver than me, Em. You’re braver than any other girl in this house. It hurts, staying open.”

  “I know, Rubes. But great discoveries aren’t made by people too scared to leave home.”

  I had long envied Emilie’s devotion to the idea that a life without regret was the only thing worth having. It cloaked her with a surety and a confidence that allowed her to keep going after Quinn, and to find that wonderful new land filled with a crazy compatible love.

  Things worked out for her, but that didn’t mean they would work out for me. We weren’t the same.

  “Yeah, but I bet the Native Americans wished Columbus had kept his ass in Italy.”

  She laughed, nudging me. “Don’t be such a downer. First, let’s find out what’s wrong with Cole, then you can decide whether or not you want to adventure to the land of his pants. Deal?”

  The idea intrigued me more than a little, as did spending time with Emilie concocting a scheme. “Let’s do it. We can start with Chaney, and I can dig through the ratings on the site so we can corner the other girls who’ve rated him.”

  Emilie slapped my bare thigh, leaving a handprint on her way off the bed. I whacked her in the back of her head with a pillow, making her silky black strands fly in every direction. It felt nice having her here, even if it would only last the few nights Quinn was away in Istanbul.

  This was technically our fall break, but neither Em or I had anywhere to go. Auditions for the school’s fall production of Annie Get Your Gun were in a month, and Emilie had somehow lost her passport, so we were both stuck at Whitman.

  “I’m going to talk to Chaney. You get online.”

  Emilie flounced out and I dragged my laptop off the desk. Twelve girls had rated Cole now, all ones and twos, no referrals. Only one of the names was familiar, a girl who occasionally tried out for the musicals, and all we had for the rest were e-mail addresses. I couldn’t just e-mail them, though. That would be super creepy.

  The door eased open again less than three minutes later, letting me know Emilie hadn’t had any better luck downstairs.

  “Chaney’s gone for fall break.”

  “Yeah. I e-mailed you a list of the other girls. I only know one of them.”

  “The good news is, we have a few days to figure out a plan.”

  I smiled at her determination. “Want to go shopping while we think?”

  “And froyo?”

  “Would
I take you out on the town and deny you froyo? Come on.”

  The two of us changed into lightweight skirts and tank tops, slid on sandals, and giggled our way out of the DE house. The sight of Sebastian Blair, hand raised to press a buzzer, knocked the laughter out of both of us.

  “What are you doing here?” Emilie snapped.

  Sebastian, strangely, didn’t hold a grudge against my roommate for putting an end to his stranglehold on Quinn. Instead, he seemed to admire her for it, though the feeling wasn’t mutual.

  He tried a smile, an expression that looked odd on his evil but perfectly symmetrical face. His deep brown eyes were unreadable as the fall breeze tousled his too-long dark blond hair. “I was coming to talk to Ruby, actually.”

  “She doesn’t want to talk to you.”

  “Thanks, Em, but I can speak.” I rolled my eyes and nudged her out of the way with my elbow. “I don’t want to talk to you,” I told Sebastian.

  “It’s about your website.”

  “Christ, does everyone know it’s me, now?”

  “Only people who’ve taken the time to find out. Your computer expert set you up with shoddy security.”

  Fucking Noah. I knew I should have used an uglier computer geek. “Well, whatever. What do you want?”

  “I want to talk to you about advertising.”

  “What?” Emilie’s jaw dropped. “You want to advertise on Ruby’s site?”

  “Were the two of you heading somewhere? Perhaps I could accompany you and we could talk on the way? I’d hate to derail your afternoon plans.”

  “Whenever you start talking like that it totally creeps people out,” I told him.

  His eyebrows went up. “I creep people out?”

  “Um, yes. That’s not a secret.”

  “We were going shopping and to get froyo. Not quite the kind of afternoon Sebastian Blair enjoys.”

  Emilie walked past him, hopping down off the porch and turning back, raising her eyebrows, but his offer intrigued me.

  “You can come if you want.”

  The website had hopefully helped out some of my fellow Whitman Owls, but if it could line my pockets with some extra cash, too, why not?