Playlist
Drinks - Cyn
Like I Can - Sam Smith
Moment of Weakness - Tenille Arts
Bad Bitches - Lil Jon, Kronic & Onderkoffer
when the party’s over - Billie Eilish
Real Talk - Angie K
Telephone - Lady Gaga (feat. Beyonce)
Bill Murray - Matt Nathanson
Hiding - Florence + the Machine
Lover to Lover - Florence + the Machine
If There Was No You - Brandi Carlile
The War Is Over - Kelly Clarkson
You Are the Reason - Calum Scott
There’s No Way - Lauv (feat. Julia Michaels)
Guilty - Paloma Faith
River Lea - Adele
Like That - JP Saxe
Sky Full of Song - Florence + the Machine
Forgive Me Friend - Smith & Thell (feat. Swedish Jam Factory)
Kill - Jimmy Eat World
that way - Tate McRae
unbreak - Camylio
Can I Sleep in Your Brain - Ezra Furman
One More I Love You - Alex Warren
Please Notice - Christian Leave
I Lost a Friend - FINNEAS
Shrike - Hozier
Prologue
Raelynn
“Wanna fuck?”
My lips tipped in my best fuck me smile, growing a little sinister the longer he took to respond. Maybe he hadn’t heard me. Except I knew he had by the way that sexy muscle in his cheek twitched at my bold words.
I probably should have flirted and batted my lashes before propositioning him, but that wasn’t me, and I didn’t like beating around the bush.
Just as my patience almost snapped, he finally turned my way, adjusting his gaze down to my height. I wasn’t short, but he had to be well over six feet—packed in with muscles I’d been fantasizing about licking since I saw him standing in the corner of the frat party. I’d studied him subtly until curiosity got the best of me, and I had to know if he was just as big everywhere else.
I could almost taste the salt on his skin. I slid my tongue along my lips in anticipation and was rewarded when his eyes landed there first. Then, finally—fucking finally—they lifted to mine. Across the room, they looked muddy, but less than a foot away, they cleared to green, barely rimmed with a deep brown that matched my eyes.
It was fate.
I’d felt his eyes on me all night, and I was ready to feel his hands, too.
Would he be soft? Hard? Or would he—
“No, thanks.”
Like a record screeching to a halt, my fantasies stumbled over the unforeseen roadblock and started to crash.
“Excuse me?” Surely, I heard wrong.
“No. Thanks.”
His deep, rumbly response curled around my senses, sending shivers up my spine, only serving to piss me off more than how much his shocking answer already did. Trying to hide my reaction, I stiffened, pulling my shoulders back and looking as regal as every etiquette class taught me to. “What do you mean, no thanks?”
His lips—those perfectly shaped lips—tipped into the most delicious smirk I’d ever seen a man pull off. “You don’t hear that very often, do you?”
“Never.”
I was Raelynn Vos. No one turned me down. If I wanted you, I had you. I didn’t say it with arrogance but with confidence. I was hot, and I knew it. I’d been in college for two years, and I’d worked my way through the campus population, searching for who I deemed worthy.
And this specimen before me screamed more than worthy. His attention over the past hour stroked along my spine, almost begging me to come get him. Yet, there he was, turning me down.
“Sorry to be your first,” he apologized.
“Don’t be,” I said, rolling my eyes away to scan the room. “I’ll find someone better.”
“Doubt it. I’m the best.”
I snapped my attention back to him, hating that he got a reaction from me. Hating that his confidence only made him sexier. “Arrogant much?”
“Just honest.”
With a scoff, I forced my gaze away again. Across the room, I saw my out when my best friends, Vera and Nova, came into view. “Whatever. I have better things to do. Bye.”
Walking away, I waved my hand as if I was shooing him off, and I hated that—even though I didn’t turn back—I knew he was watching me with that same damn smirk.
“Asshole,” I muttered.
“Who’s an asshole?” Vera asked, fingering the pearl necklace she never took off.
“That guy back there.”
“Why’s he an asshole?” Nova asked. For a second, my calm friend’s eyes flashed as fiery as her hair.
“Ugh. He turned me down.”
Both sets of eyes shot to me—wide, mirroring the same shock still reverberating through me. I’d met Nova and Vera at the start of college, and we hit it off, complementing each other perfectly. In all the time I’d known them, I’d never not gotten someone I wanted.
“Like, did he know you wanted him?” Vera asked.
“Uh, yeah. I very clearly asked him if he wanted to fuck.”
“Jesus, Rae,” Nova chided, her cheeks now matching her hair.
I shrugged it off, trying to be aloof when I was anything but. “Whatever. There’s a whole ocean of fish. I’ll just find another one.”