“It doesn’t have to change anything.”
“You know it will.”
“It might not.” I bring a hand up and cusp it around his wrist. “If I were any other girl, you would have kept going.”
“But you’re not any other girl. You’re you.”
“I’m starting to think that’s not such a good thing right now.” I glance away briefly. “You know how you hear about people who practice kissing with their best friends because they know that things won’t go too far?”
Mav raises an eyebrow. “Yeah.”
“So, I was thinking we could do something like that.”
“You want to be my booty call?”
“Maybe.”
He chuckles. “You can’t be my booty call, Rocky.”
“Why not?” I frown. “I’m serious. You have other booty calls.”
“Yeah, because I don’t care about them. It’s a mean thing to say, but I don’t. I didn’t even do that until recently. You know that.”
“Because you were still hung up on your ex,” I say.
“I was not hung up on my ex.” He chuckles. “Do you realize how ridiculous this entire conversation is?”
“I do.” I press my lips together. Maverick searches my face. “I want you.”
“Why now?”
“I don’t know. Why’d you kiss me? Why’d you hold my hand? Why now?”
“I don’t know.” He folds his hands on his lap and looks at me. “Okay, I do know. I’ve liked you forever, Rocky. You’ve always been the prettiest, smartest, funniest girl in my book, but I love that I get to keep you forever, you know? I don’t know if I can keep a girlfriend forever, but you, my best friend? Definitely.”
“So, hook up with me and pretend it never happened.”
He laughs. “You’re serious about that.”
“I am. I never wanted to lose my virginity before, because of well, you know.”
“Because you’ve been waiting for someone worth giving it to,” he says, reciting back my exact reason.
“Exactly.”
“And you think you’ve found that in me somehow? The guy who swore he’d never become a manwhore, yet somehow did.”
“You’re not a manwhore, Mav.” I roll my eyes. “Sure, you’ve hooked up with more girls this year than ever, but you’re just doing normal college stuff.”
“I don’t deserve you.”
“I don’t care. I’m not asking you whether or not you deserve me. I want to do this with you and get it over with so that at least I know the first man I slept with was someone I trust and love.”
“Why not wait for someone you trust and love for real?”
“This is for real.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Because. I’ve waited and nothing has happened.”
“What about Brian?”
“What about him?” I frown.
“You stayed at his place the other day.”
“I lied.” I bite my lip and glance away. “I was at Leyla’s.”
“Why would you lie about that?”
“Because I didn’t want to sound like a loser.”
“Wow. You think not sleeping with someone will make you sound like a loser? Who are you and what have you done with my friend?”
“Mav.” I groan. “Are we doing this or what?”
I watch as he thinks about it. I can practically hear his thoughts, everything he’s trying to weigh out in his head. If we do this, our friendship will change. We both know that. If we don’t, I’ll lose my virginity to some frat boy and it won’t be memorable. He knows that too. It’ll boil down to which one he’d rather live with and I’m really hoping the answer to that is as simple for him as it is for me. I’d rather do this with him than anyone else because even if our friendship changes, it won’t be broken. We’ve been through too much together for that to ever happen. He brings a hand back up to my face, beckoning my eyes to his, and I know before he says anything that his mind has been made up.
A flutter of butterflies swarms my belly as he leans in and kisses me, his lips touching mine ever so gently. I sit up on my knees and hold both sides of his face, deepening the kiss. It’s soft and sweet, unlike everything Mav makes himself out to be, this massive hockey player with a chip on his shoulder who people are afraid of on the ice, but is really the kindest, sexiest human being. His hands make their way down my arms as he starts to undress me slowly, taking my shirt off and tossing it. He rocks back slightly on his knees and looks at me.
“Damn,” he breathes out, closing his eyes for a moment before opening them again as he attacks, his hands and mouth on my breasts, playing with my sensitive nipples. “Damn, damn, damn,” he says between licks and sucks.
“I think I’m going to come,” I whisper, “if you keep doing this.”
I’m not joking. If the pool between my legs is any indication, I really think I might. I’ve pleasured myself before, with my hands, a small vibrator I bought a couple of years ago, closing my legs tightly until I find release, but in all that time I don’t think I have ever been this wet, this needy, this horny. He moves his mouth from my breasts and makes his way down my body. I reach out to touch him and gasp when I close my hand around him. He’s so hard and so large, I’m almost positive he’ll rip me apart. It’s a price I’m willing to pay. We kiss again, wantonly. Our mouths in a frenzy, our hands bewildered, touching, probing, our breaths ragged. He runs his thumbs over my nipples as I undress him, pinches them as I take off my panties. Pulls back again to examine me and shakes his head with a low, deep chuckle, that I can only categorize as turned on, which is perfect since I am so turned on, and seeing him naked for the first time is mind-blowing. He’s perfection. I already knew that, but now that he doesn’t have anything on his skin at all, it’s confirmed. Perfection. He reaches for me again, his mouth soft on my lips, my neck.