Pretend I'm Yours (Pretend 1)

“Hey, we aren’t on the list. A mixup, I’m sure. Any possibility you can change that?” Serena asks, shoving me forward, so my body brushes against his.

I’m going to kill her for this later.

But it does the trick. Sebastian’s eyes glue to the cleavage the dress makes me appear to have, and then down to my abs, defined beneath the material.

“Absolutely!” Sebastian holds out his arm to me, and I nervously take it. I cut my eyes to Serena who winks at me as Sebastian leads me into his house.

“I’m sorry you weren’t on the list. I don’t know how I missed a beautiful woman like you. I wish we had classes together so I could have noticed you earlier.”

I bite my lip and blush. “We do take a class together. You are in my marketing class.” I don’t add we did a group project together last year in finance, and he has been in almost every single one of my classes starting freshman year since we are both on the same business track.

He doesn’t blush or show signs of embarrassment. I wish he would have noticed me before or realize who I am. I know his name and who he is.

“What’s your name?” he asks.

“Larkyn Day.”

He grins. “I love that name. I’m Sebastian King.”

His smoldering blue eyes look at me, and my heart is his. I don’t know how I ended on the arm of Sebastian, basically the king of the popular crowd, and I know that soon, he’ll be leaving me alone to enjoy his other guests, but I’ll remember this moment forever.

“Can I get you a drink?” he asks.

I nod, knowing this is when he dismisses me. I look hot, but I’m not hot enough. I’m wearing a nude colored sparkly dress, but it’s not slutty enough to compare with the women skirting around us in dresses that are so short they can’t wear underwear. Their dresses leave no curve on their bodies to the imagination. While I, I just hope this dress is enough to snag one decent looking guy that isn’t already too drunk to fuck me.

Sebastian leads me over to one of the bars and gets me a white wine without asking what I want. He gets himself a beer. I start peering around for where Serena is so she can help me find a guy for the night.

I feel a hand on my waist and glance down to see Sebastian’s hand wrapped around my waist, pulling me closer to him.

“Do you have a date for tonight?” he asks, leaning down to my ear so he can talk to me over the loud music blasting through the house. The band is out back, and we are in the front of the house so I can only imagine how loud it is out back.

“No,” I say, taking a sip of my wine, so I have something to do with my hands, and I can stop blushing. The wine tastes overly sweet. I don’t often drink, caring too much about staying healthy, but when I do, I rarely choose wine.

“Good, I needed someone to hang out with tonight

.”

Yep, now I’m blushing again like an idiot. I need to stop getting so affected by this man. I’ve had a crush on him since forever, but that doesn’t mean anything. He’s just being nice. He won’t be the guy that pops my cherry. Even though I should be searching for that guy, I can’t pass up an opportunity to spend some time with Sebastian first.

“You don’t have a date either?” I ask, finally getting my voice back.

He looks down at me, his eyes lingering on my cleavage. “Now, I do.”

My heart stops. Sebastian did not just say that. I must have misheard him. He’s the most popular guy at our school. He can date any woman he wants. He’s fucked most of the popular women. He doesn’t want me to be his date.

But the way his hand grips my waist, as he starts leading me outside, it seems I heard him right.

Eyes. That’s all I see when we walk outside, where the band is playing by the infinity pool. Everyone’s eyes are on me. The guy’s eyes rake over my cleavage and smirk at Sebastian approvingly. While the women alternate being glaring at me and giving Sebastian a sweet, come-here look.

I swallow, trying to get the lump in my throat to go down, but it’s no use. I’m not in my element. I don’t do parties. I don’t hang out in crowds. I don’t like attention. I prefer running down the road by myself with nothing but my playlist to keep me company.

Sebastian ignores the stares and leads me over to where a group of his friends is hanging out drinking their beer and wine around a cocktail table.

He greets them, but never takes his hand off my waist.

“And you are?” one of the women to my right asks. Her voice is much too high. And she chugs her wine in one motion, before she looks at me again, as she makes a noise in her throat that sounds like a threatening growl.

“I’m—”