The Learning Hours (How to Date a Douchebag 3)

Groans.

Moans.

Swiveling hips and labored thrusts upward, I’m perilously close to banging my head on the chandelier above the table as I ride him, up and down, head listed back, his nose buried in the crux of my neck.

Those hands hold me tight, grasping my hips, pulling me onto him, deep as he’s ever been. Rhett’s strangled moans in my hair send my eyes rolling to the back of my head. Intoxicating.

The table groans under our weight, under the thrusting and grinding from our loud, fervent lovemaking and impassioned kisses.

My body is not my own.

My soul?

His.

Rhett’s expression is so raw, so real and exquisitely pained as he comes, it almost has me saying the words out loud.

Laurel

“We should probably talk about the fact that we didn’t use a condom this weekend.”

We’re in the library on campus, alone in the back corner; I chose it because it’s secluded, dimly lit, and private—the perfect spot for me to mention our slipup. Although when I say it like that, it sounds so trivial when in fact, it’s not.

Rhett’s entire demeanor changes, body ramrod straight, pen suspended above his paper, mouth drawn into a firm line.

“Is it somethin’ we need to talk about? Are you…”

“Don’t freak, I’m on birth control—you know, the pill—but we never talked about it before you, you know…went bareback, and we should have.”

“I’m sorry.” He plows a hand through his hair, frustrated. Blushing. “I wasn’t thinkin’.”

“This isn’t on just you; it’s on both of us. Now that we’re talking about it, I wanted to, um…” The blinking cursor on my laptop blinks back at me, winking from the stalled Word document. “I think we can agree that we’re exclusive?”

I prattle on, unable to control my mouth or my emotions. “I want you to feel me—and I thought since we’re adults, we should have an honest talk about it.”

He’s staring at me, color still high on his cheeks.

“We’re both safe, I assume? I haven’t had sex with anyone in months, and he and I were a thing.”

Though when I suspected Thad cheated on me, I went and got tested, despite his always wearing a condom. He’d never really trusted anyone not to trap him into a relationship with a pregnancy—not with him getting ready for the NFL Combine his senior year.

Still, I was tested, with clean results.

“I’m not dating anyone else and don’t plan to.” Rhett doesn’t reply, so I prompt him. “Do you?”

He finally responds with a smirk. “The fact that you’re even askin’ makes me wonder about you sometimes, Laurel,” he jokes.

“What do you mean?”

“Take a look around; there’s no line at my door.”

My brow creases. “Aren’t you still getting random text messages?”

“Well, I mean, yeah, but it doesn’t mean anything.”

“How many?”

“I don’t know, a few a day?”

A few a day? How did I not know this? My face gets hot at the thought of random, slutty girls messaging him. Girls who would willingly blow him off or let him screw them.

“There’s nothing stopping you from responding to them, is there? I have to trust you.”

“None of them actually want to fuck me, Laurel, and if they do, they’re the type of girl that will fuck anyone.”

“How do you know?”

He actually looks impatient. “I just do.”

“Come on,” I push. “They can’t all be easy. I bet a few of them are actually respectable, upstanding citizens.”

His brown eyes roll toward the ceiling. “I still would have no interest in screwing any of them.”

“Would you mind showing me?”

I’m dying of curiosity and it’s the first time I’ve asked to see his phone. Consider it personal, but I want to prove a point—he has girls bombarding him with offers of sex, so why bother with me?

I never want to sound jealous, or possessive, but here we are. I am—have been this entire time, if I’m being honest with myself, just not recognizing the signs.

“You can see it.”

He hands over his phone, messenger window open.

My keen blue eyes scan the screen.

Face flushes, hot.

Message after message appears on the small display, scrolling past as I move my thumb, each of them an unknown contact.

“I thought you said it was only a few.”

There are hundreds. My finger swipes and swipes, sending each text flying past, one lewd phrase after the next. Photos. Memes.

He leans over, pointing to the screen by way of explanation. “These go back a few weeks. I only get like ten a day now.”

“Just ten a day? Lovely,” I deadpan.

“You seem upset.”

“I’m not upset.” I’m something else entirely.

I’m jealous—so jealous I wish I’d never brought up the subject or asked to see the stupid phone.

“Girls are throwing themselves at you.”

“So?”

“So?”

“That’s how we met, why do you care?”

“Because.” I huff, exasperated. “That’s how we met.”

“I delete most of them.” He studies my face. “Laurel, you sound…I don’t know, jealous or somethin’.”

“That’s because I am!”

The poor thing looks so puzzled. So adorably clueless. “Why?”

“Are you being serious right now?”

“Are you?”

I flinch. I loathe sounding like one of those insecure, clingy girls I cannot stand to be around. All because he refuses to admit that he likes me. Hasn’t told me how he feels. More importantly, he hasn’t admitted to himself how I feel about him.

I crave those three little words, so starved to hear him say them I don’t know what’s come over me. It goes so much deeper than the lust I feel for him every day or how I long to see him when we’re not together. Or how just the sight of his name on my phone or his car parked on the street makes me shiver.

The sound of his voice when he says my name.

The way he looks when he’s excited or confused.

I’m falling in love with him.

And that has been our issue all along, hasn’t it?

The realization dawns on me: I know how I feel, but does he? Rhett has convinced himself a girl like me—whatever that means—couldn’t sincerely like him, let alone fall deep.

My hearts sinks.

“Rhett?” I hand his cell phone back.

“Hmm?”

“I…” I hesitate. Do I tell him? I shouldn’t say it now—this isn’t the right time or the right place—but I’ve always been a bit too impulsive for my own sake.

I want to call Lana for advice; she’d talk me down off the ledge. I do not know how to navigate a guy like Rhett, one who has his shit together. Who doesn’t chase girls because he doesn’t have the confidence.

Who knows what he wants but not how to take it.

I draw a deep breath into my lungs.

“I think I care because I’m…I think I might be, you know.” My face is on fire, burning to the roots of my hair, praying he takes the hint. “I might be.”

“You might be what?”

I can’t gauge his reply, whether he’s anxious or irritated or—

“You can tell me, Laurel. Whatever it is.”

Rhett

“Just spit it out—it’s like ripping off a Band-Aid.” Jesus, whatever it is, I wish she’d say it. Put me out of my damn misery.

She looks nervous. Guilty.

What the hell could be so hard to say? Is she seeing someone else? Is she dumping me? Fuck—that would kill me.

“Laurel?” I can barely get her name past my lips, the stretch of her silence making me want to fucking vomit.

When she opens her mouth, releasing a sigh, ten words I never expected her to say come pouring out: “I think I might be falling in love with you.”

I blink.

Flushed, down to my boxers. Swallow down the lump that’s formed in my throat. Repeat those ten words over and over in my mind until they’re playing on a loop.