“Why not? It would be fun. Wanna call someone now?”

“No,” he said with a shake of his head. “I want to f**k you; I don’t want to f**k someone else. You seriously want to bring someone in here? What the hell? Are you f**king someone else?”

Her brows came together this time as she said, “Why not? I mean we aren’t dating. We are having fun; I thought we could spice it up.”

“No,” he said again, sitting farther up, his body shaking, not with want anymore, more like anger. “Dating or not, I am f**king you, you are f**king me, and that’s it.”

“Come again?”

“That’s what I’m trying to make you do, Reese, but you want to bring someone else in the bedroom or wherever else we have sex in, and I’m not cool with that. I want to be the only one you’re with.”

“That’s dating,” she said, and she started to move out from underneath him.

And he let her as he said, “No it isn’t. It’s a courtesy. Kind of like a tradeoff. I make you come, and you f**k only me.”

“No, you’re falling for me,” she exclaimed as she sat up, taking the pillow to cover her body.

“What the f**k? No, I’m not,” he said, and he wasn’t really lying.

Was he?

“You are! If you weren’t, then why would you want only me?”

“Because I like you. We have fun, and you f**king blow my mind. Don’t act like that isn’t how you feel either.”

She shook her head quickly, and something broke inside him. “No. No, that isn’t how I feel. You need to go,” she said, rolling off the bed and grabbing her bathrobe.

“Are you serious? What the hell?”

“I can’t give you what you want. I’m not that person, and I told you that.”

“What the f**k do I want?” he asked, standing up, still completely naked.

“A girlfriend. I’m not girlfriend material. So just go.”

“That’s not what I’m asking for. I’m asking for you to do only me, is that too much to ask for? I don’t see a problem here.”

“Well, there is,” she said, her defiant little chin up in the air as she crossed her arms across her chest. Gone was the Reese he truly enjoyed, and bitchy Reese stood in front of him.

“I can’t give up having sex with other people.”

Whoa. Wait.

“What the f**k does that mean? You’re f**king someone else and me?”

“Uh yeah, have been since the beginning.”

The air was thick with tension. His heart was pounding, but also breaking at the same time. He said he wasn’t in love with her, but maybe he was. He thought they had something. He thought she liked him, could maybe even love him. Why wasn’t he f**king enough? Wow, this blew his ego to shit. Looking down at the ground, he reached for his boxers and slowly slid them up. He couldn’t trust himself to say anything else, so he continued to get dressed without even a glance at her. When he pulled the zipper to his jeans up, he turned to look at her.

“This doesn’t affect you and Claire, okay? Give me that.”

“No problem,” she said after clearing her throat. He thought maybe her eyes were glossy, but he knew that couldn’t be true. She didn’t care about him.

Her walls, her heart, were solid rock. There was no breaking through that. No matter how hard he tried to score.

“Okay, well, it was good while it lasted.”

“It was.”

But now it was over.

Chapter 14

PHILLIP WOULD like to say that for the next two weeks, he slept with anything with tits and completely forgot about Reese but if he did, the good Lord above would shoot him down with lightning. So instead, he would admit that he was miserable. For two weeks, every single  p**n  he watched, every single girl he touched, anything Claire said and did, reminded him of Reese. He was an ass**le to everyone. Yelling, slamming things around. He knew no one wanted to be around him, and it was all Reese’s fault. He missed her. So bad it hurt. He had so many drafts started with just simple texts like:

Hey, what’s up?

How ya doing?

Wanna meet up, f**k this out?

I miss you so much.

The last one he deleted, but he had typed it and almost sent it. He knew it would do nothing but cause her to push him away even more, but it was true. He craved her touch, her kisses, her eyes, her body, her mouth, everything… he needed her. It didn’t matter what he did, who he f**ked, he just couldn’t come. He wasn’t a Miley Cyrus fan by a landslide, but it was easy to say her song, “Wrecking Ball” was on repeat on his iPod because Reese had wrecked him.

And it was killing him.

He just couldn’t wrap his brain around it. Did he not matter? Was he not enough and if so, why? He f**ked her good. He could make her body sing for him, and he knew that she cared for him. Was it all lies? Was it all in his head? Did he crave her love so much he started imaging it? Would he never be enough? Ugh, he was so tired of thinking of this; he was so tired of doubting himself. He was a great-looking guy, could f**k a girl any way she wanted, and damn it, he was the best damn hockey player in the league. He was a catch! So why couldn’t a woman f**king love him? He wasn’t good enough for his mom, he wasn’t good enough for his first love, and now he wasn’t good enough for Reese. He knew he could find a girl and she would make him believe he was enough, but he wanted it to be real.