Page 3 of Stay Toxic

I’m here because California isn’t like back home. My father was the mayor in a small, backward town near Albuquerque, my mother’s a conservative senator. They shackled me with their expectations from the moment I was born, choosing every single thing about my life, and punishing me severely when I dared stray off the path.

This was my chance at freedom.

Is.

This is my chance at freedom.

I’m not letting anything—or anyone—blow it, however literally.

I march all the way back to the dorm, and make my way up the elevator, until I’ve reached the fourth floor, door number 17.

I have my key card in hand again, ready to fight my battle, when the door flies open.

In front of him.

2

“Hello, pervert.”

I don’t register the words, because he’s right in front of me, with those wide shoulders, and that smirk, and those piercing eyes that seem to dance with amusement as he stares at me.

Even though I have no clue what he just said, I notice that voice. Oh my god, that voice. It’s deep, it’s slow, it’s sensual, teasing and downright infuriating.

I stand there, gaping like a particularly dimwitted fish.

The stranger blocking the entry to my room chuckles, and I feel myself flush in embarrassment. After all, when I saw him half an hour ago, he had his cock out. A very large, hard cock, too.

My face is on freaking fire.

“Hi,” I squeak, my voice coming out wrong. I clear my throat. “Yes…” What I’m acquiescing to, we’ll never know. “This is my—err, this is my room.”

Words, Tia. You know how to use them. They form sentences, normally.

“Figured as much, given the fact that you have a key,” he replies like I’m making sense. “And all those bags.”

He lifts his chin in the direction of the two duffle bags over my shoulders.He doesn’t sayway to state the obvious, idiot,but it’s heavily implied.

“Ari’s in the shower with Roman,” the stranger tells me, stepping out of the door frame to let me in. “You might not want to go in yet, to avoid offending your sensibilities again, Miss Prissy.”

I narrow my eyes. “I’m not prissy.”

Yay! I managed three words in a row. Mostly because I’m no longer looking directly into those intense blue eyes.

Amusement curves the corners of his lips even higher. “If that were true, you would have joined in, instead of ogling us like a little pervert. Certainly looks like you wanted to.”

I gasp, shocked that a guy I’ve never seen in my life before the last half hour could say something so openly lewd. I’d like tothinkI’m not prissy, but there’s no denying that people don’t act like that around me. Especially guys.I’m just not used to it. Is this how normal kids flirt, outside of my acquaintance? No one back home would dare speak like that to Senator Cole’s daughter, but maybe that’s how boys would have treated me if my mother wasn’t who she is.

Not that this guy’s a boy, as such. No, the defined muscles, tight jawline, and five-o’clock shadow obscuring his chin all firmly say man.I don’t know how old he is, but I’d say closer to twenty-five than twenty. He’s likely a grad student like me.

Maybe I’ve only ever metboys, but it’s hardly my fault. My school was girls only. The clubs I was allowed to join were reserved for people just like us. And I stayed home through college, firmly under my mother’s thumb. She wouldn’t allow otherwise, and it wasn’t worth starting the fight that early.

The finish line is my twenty-fifth birthday. There’s no point trying to rock the boat until much closer to that.

At long last, I find my voice. “I didnot.”

Three words again. I should pat my own shoulder.

The infuriating stranger laughs in my face. “My mistake. And there I was, so certain you licked your lips as you watched my cock like it’s made of candy.”