Ritual - Palm South University

“FUCK OFF, KADE.”

A laugh bubbles out of him, and I flick my right foot up to my ass long enough to snatch the heel off it and hold it up over my head in a threat to squash him like a bug.

Kade holds up his hands, eyes bulging out of his head. “Jess, come on,” he says, but that motherfucker is still smirking. “Look, I’ve apologized. I’ve all but groveled at your feet, for Christ’s sake. I know I was an asshole.”

“It’s not about you being an asshole,” I seethe, still holding my weapon of choice ready to strike. “It’s that you wasted my time.”

“I’m an idiot.”

“You act like that’s news to me.”

He softens, that stupid smirk still on his face as he takes a step closer to me. I cock an eyebrow in warning, holding the shoe up a little higher, but he reaches for it, gently lowering it until it’s between us and no longer a threat.

“Look, I really am sorry,” he says, more sincerely. “I asked for your help and then I blew you off. I can’t help it, I’m a stupid boy.”

I scoff.

“But I’m serious now. And I want another chance.”

Inside me, there’s a bear growling and tearing trees to shreds. On the outside, I’m cool as a cucumber. Kade is a junior who I met last semester when he rushed Alpha Sigma. He’s close friends with Kip, Skyler’s boyfriend, which made him part of our group pretty fast.

When I first met him, I was annoyed with everything he was.

The more he talked to me and flashed his corny pickup lines, the more that annoyance turned to something between curiosity and the urge to bang him.

And when he made a proposition that I should hang out with him this summer, teach him how to have better game and how to be better in bed, in exchange for getting to drive his car and have guaranteed sex anytime I wanted it? Well, I thought it was the most ridiculous idea I’d ever heard of.

And yet, I’d agreed — for no other reason than I was bored and needed a distraction from Jarrett and the heartbreak that was forever lingering in his absence.

It had seemed like a good idea.

Until this twat rag blew me off and made me look like the idiot.

“Well, good for you,” I snap, tugging my heel back on and crossing my arms. “But I don’t give second chances. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a recruitment to run.”

Before I can shut the door in his face, Kade blocks it with his hands.

And then, the motherfucker falls to his knees.

“Oh, please, Jess,” he says, so loudly that his voice echoes off the walls in the Kappa Kappa Beta house foyer. “Please, give me another chance. There’s nothing I want more than to rub your body down and learn your kinky ways.”

My eyes bulge, and I kick my heel right into the middle of his chest until he tumbles backward onto the house porch. I slam the door shut behind us, fuming.

“There are potential new members in there, you asshat.”

He’s still flat on his back, holding up his hands in surrender.

And I hate myself a little, because in that moment, he looks a little like he did the first night I threw him down on his bed and rode him until he moaned my name.

“Get up,” I said, pretending to be disgusted. “You look like a fool.”

“Only a fool for you.”

I roll my eyes, sighing with as much dramatic flare as I can manage when he’s standing again. “Why should I give you another chance? This whole…” I wave my hand at him. “Training thing was your idea in the first place, and then you bail. What are you even looking for? What’s the motive here?”

“I already told you,” he says, stepping into me. “I know I flaked this summer. There was…” He swallows, looking down Greek Row as if it were a hall of ghosts. “I had some family stuff to handle, and I wasn’t in my right state of mind. Okay?”

He looks like a puppy that’s just been kicked, and I hate that I care.

“But I mean it this time. I have zero game, and I need your help. Plus,” he says, smirking as he steps more into me. His hand creeps up my arm, tucking a strand of my hair behind one ear. “After our first round, you can’t tell me you don’t want more, too.”

Heat snakes up my neck from where his fingers brush the sensitive skin, and my eyes flutter before I shove him back with two hands.

“I can get hot sex from anyone I want,” I remind him.

“I know that.”

“Then you also know that you’re wasting your time.”

“Jess,” he says, seemingly exhausted now. “Come on. I’m sorry. I have now literally groveled at your feet.” He swallows. “I need this.”