Page 134 of Let the Game Begin

“Don’t screw with me!” I grabbed her elbow and felt her shivering. I needed a real—and precise—answer.

“Why, are you jealous?” she taunted me. She had no idea the dark things this conversation had really awakened in me. No, I wasn’t jealous, but I certainly would have castrated any man who tried to assault my women, whether it was my sister or my…her.

“Don’t joke about that kind of thing, Selene. Jealously has nothing to do with it! You and I are not together, and I would never try to forbid you from fucking whoever else you like, but if someone tried to assault you… Well, I wouldn’t be responsible for my actions,” I confessed, willing her to understand that it was the sexual-abuse element that had the alarms going off in my brain and all of my instincts leaping to action. It was true, after all,that I would never have kept her from sleeping with someone else. I had no right to do that, even if…

“Really? So, if I got down with Xavier or Luke or someone else from the university, you’d be just fine with that?” she teased me, the smirk on her face so impertinent that I could have bitten it off.

No! Of course I wouldn’t allow Xavier or Luke to touch her, because they were twisted perverts like me. They were worse, even—they were genuine sleaze bags. Plus, I was very familiar with their sexual fantasies—I’d even participated in a few of them—and none of it was right for an innocent woman like her.

I would never have done anything like that with her.

“Some other guy at school, sure.” I pasted on a cocky grin, because I could accept that, but only once I’d gotten tired of her.

She could have other men but onlyafterme.

“But for the moment, Tinkerbell…” I leaned into her and breathed in her coconut smell. She smelled freshly scrubbed, something that drove me crazy in a woman. “You’ll just have to settle for my cock,” I whispered, making her jolt.

Oh, yes.… She rubbed it and stimulated it at length the previous night. She had examined its length and diameter, and I was confident she wouldn’t easily forget it.

“What the hell was going through your head!”

My lustful reminiscences were interrupted by a furious Logan, who burst into the room without even bothering to knock. I turned away from Selene and braced myself for another tedious lecture from my brother.

“It was an accident,” I said mockingly, and Selene turned red, sitting back down on the bed. Logan was so enraged that he had thus far ignored her presence.

“An accident?” he repeated, looking first at me and then, finally, at Selene. “Neil! Losing your phone is an accident; a fender bender is an accident; knocking over a vase is an accident. Sleeping with Matt’s daughter is not an accident, for God’s sake! What were you thinking?” he snapped, and I glanced at Selene, who was looking extremely troubled.

Logan followed my eyes and allowed his shoulders to slump, scrubbinga hand over his face. “Selene, I know you’ve have a rough day, but I really need to talk to this dickhead.” He gestured at me, and I looked back at him, threateningly this time.

“Be careful,” I warned him, because he was approaching a line.

“Do you have any idea what is going to happen when Matt finds out about this?”

“Keep your voice down,” I hissed through gritted teeth. I hated verbal aggression; I hated it when people raised their voices at me. I knew that I’d fucked up and that sleeping with Babygirl was a huge mistake, but Logan knew how I was.

“How long has this been going on?” My brother looked exclusively at me, possibly because he blamed all this shit on me or possibly to avoid embarrassing Selene. If that was his goal, though, he was failing miserably at it.

“Since two weeks after she got here,” I admitted evenly. After all, it wasn’t like I killed someone. I had sex with a girl I liked. What was so wrong about that?

“So, for nearly a month, you mean?” he exploded, running both hands through his hair.

What a drama queen.

“I told you to lower your voice,” I repeated sternly, moving closer to him with my usual despotic authority.

“You didn’t even give her time to unpack,” he commented. “I’m used to your bullshit, but even I didn’t think you’d do something like this,” he continued, sounding anxious.

“I already told you; it was an accident.” I answered him with a false air of calm that I hoped wouldn’t completely evaporate.

“Yeah, tell it to someone else,” he snapped back.

“Neil’s telling the truth. We were both drunk.” After a prolonged silence, Selene’s delicate voice pushed in between us, drawing both of our attentions to her pallid face. She was visibly exhausted by her nightmare day. “It happened the night I got drunk, and…”

“And I took you back to your room,” Logan guessed with a heavy sigh before giving me a speculative look. “And you were drunk, too? Why?”

I didn’t know if that was a serious question, but I gave a nonchalantshrug either way.

“That’s none of your business,” I answered bluntly, mincing no words. I couldn’t tell him the real reason I was getting trashed with Selene right there. I would have, if we were alone and I hoped he could see that.