The Studying Hours (How to Date a Douchebag 1)

“Together?”

“Unless you don’t want to. I just thought—shit.” I run a hand through my hair then drag it down my face. “Never mind what I thought. I’m an idiot.”

“No! No. Sorry, I just. Gosh, Oz, I just assumed you’d be with your friends.”

“You’re my friend,” I point out, giving her a lopsided grin.

This pleases her and a smile brightens her face, one that makes me want to kiss her through the damn phone.

“I am, aren’t I?”

“You are,” I enthuse quietly into my phone. “Am I yours?”

“Yes.”

“I love it when you say yes like that and do it with an eye roll. So sexy.”

Jameson laughs, tipping her head back until it hits the white pillow propped against her headboard. “I know you do.”

“Know what else I love?”

“What?”

“I love your hair,” I blurt out.

Her eyebrows shoot up, surprised, and she touches the long gleaming locks self-consciously while holding her phone with the other. “You do?”

“Every time I see you, I want to touch it, run my fingers through it.”

“You do?” She looks back at me apprehensively.

“There’s a lot about me you don’t know.”

“I can see that.” Jameson fidgets on the bed. “What else are you hiding from me?”

I wanted to wait, tell her all this in person, but since she’s asking—and so fucking adorably—I reluctantly say, “Those dreams I was telling you about the other day?”

“The nightmares? Yes, I remember.”

“I wasn’t kidding when I said they were about you.”

“Oh?” Her mouth forms a tiny circle.

Clearing my throat, I glance around, checking the bus for anyone who’s awake, making sure my teammates are otherwise occupied before I continue pouring my damn black heart out into the small screen on my phone.

“What was so horrible about them then?” she teases, attempting to make light of this tension-filled conversation.

“I dreamed that you…” I exhale. “It was really fucked up.”

“It’s okay if you don’t want to tell me Sebastian. I’m sensing it makes you uncomfortable, but it obviously changed how you’re seeing me.” Does her voice sound throatier than usual? “We’ve been off the past few days, and…if there’s something we can do to fix it, I’d like you to tell me.”

“No, we’re fine—that’s just it. Maybe I don’t want us to be fine any more.”

Jameson juts out her bottom lip, pouting. “I’m not sure what you mean. Are you breaking up with me?”

“See? That’s just it. This is why I need to see you in person.”

She furrows her brow. “Oz, you’re kind of weirding me out.”

“It’s just not something we should be talking about over the phone.”

“Right. That does me no good, because for the next few hours I’m going to be freaking out,” she says.

“Don’t. It’s nothing horrible.”

Jameson sticks out her tongue. “Says the only one of us who has a clue what the hell is going on.”

“Can you come over later?”

“To your place?” She tucks an errant hair behind her ear.

“Yeah, my place.”

“Um, yes. Of course.”

Pretty sure a goofy grin crosses my face. “Great. I’ll text you my address.”

“Okay.”

“It’s two blocks from campus, a barf pink color—you can’t miss it.”

She giggles. “Okay.”

“I’ll be back around eleven thirty. We have to unload and shit when we get back to school, then I can take off. Give me a few to get home and change. How does eleven forty-five sound?”

“Uh, sure.”

“James?”

“Yeah?”

“Unless you want me to come to your place?”

Is that crossing a line with her? The last time I showed up at her house, it didn’t work out so well.

“No, your place is better. My roommates are nosy, and… I’m not sure what they’re doing tonight. Plus, Sydney was planning on staying home, so...I mean… Unless you want to see her.”

Sydney.

Right.

Best to avoid that shit.

“I don’t want to see her. I just want to see you.”

Sebastian

Jameson is in my house.

In my room.

On my bed.

Planted near the headboard of my king size bed, she’s wearing a fitted white tee and a pretty pink cardigan. Tight skinny jeans. Her heels? Those are on the floor by the door.

Heels from those sexy, petite little feet of hers.

I watch her dangle them over the side of my bed, toes painted a neon purple, then tuck them under her legs when she curls up, moving closer to the center.

She looks fantastic.

She beams up at me from the bed, urging me to, “Sit down, would you? Your pacing is making me nervous.”

“Sorry, I can’t help it.” I lower myself to the edge of the bed and wipe my sweaty palms across my jeans. The impulse to bounce my knee is strong. I crack my knuckles instead. “I have all this pent up energy from sitting on the bus all night.”

“Do you want to go for a run?”

“Do you?”