The next time Carter and I had class together he dropped a drink in front of me. It had been a week later since the beach incident and he had been slowly growing on me.

Like a parasite.

I peered at him slowly before turning back to the Starbucks in front of me.

"What is this?" I asked as I inspected it.

His laugh broke my focus and I turned back to him.

"No thank you, no nothing. Just suspicion?" he asked, teasing me.

I smiled at him wryly.

"Thanks," I threw out. "Now what is it?"

"Just try it."

"What if you poisoned it?"

He shook his head at me like he thought I was cute. "I promise I didn't poison it. Just try it."

I looked at him before sucking the straw in my mouth. "Just remember we're in a class full of witnesses," I said as I took a baby sip.

I smacked my lips after the taste entered my mouth. The rush of sugar making me smile. "It's good," I finished, turning to face him.

I watched him stare at my mouth before he broke off into a grin. I then watched as his hand got dangerously close to my face. And for some reason I didn't flinch or anything. I shut my eyes actually, and felt his thumb swipe my upper lip.

"Whipped cream," he muttered.

I opened my eyes to see him lick it off his finger, casually, like he didn't even think about it. To which my body rooted in place and my mouth gaped like a fish. And that's when I felt it. The dreaded tingle.

I knew Carter was hot. It was obvious. You had to be blind not to see it. But now... I was catching even more feelings. Feelings that would lead to other ones, and that thought was terrifying.

I was saved by the bell, or the professor technically, (colleges didn't do bells) because he threw his briefcase on his desk and immediately started lecturing.

***

After class I decided that I was not going to make this weird. We could keep this friendly. I didn't have a lot of friends, due to my homebody nature. However, I didn't have time for boys, especially not player boys who licked whipped cream off their fingers.

After most people shuffled out of the room I turned to him. "Thanks again for the frappuccino," I said as I packed up quickly. "Next time my treat."

He shook his head. "I think instead you should let me take you to dinner," he said to me, while leaning back in his chair.

My heart kicked in. Well, that was forward.

"As friends?" I asked, giving him an out that I needed him to take.

"If that's what you want to call it."

"Is that not what you want to call it?" I asked nervously.

"I'm asking you on a date Spencer." he told me. Very slowly.

"As friends?" I repeated again, in the same slow way he spoke to me.

He shook his head at me.

"Sure Spencer," he said like he thought I was joking, narrowing his eyes at me like I was the one being weird. "I'll take you out to dinner as friends. And we can eat as friends, and then I'll take you home as friends. And then maybe if I'm lucky we'll kiss as friends."

I scowled at him. Still freaking out but with hints of anger now. I wasn't going to be a notch on his bedpost, the asshole. I should have trusted my instincts with him.

"I don't know what kind of friends you have but I don't do that with my friends," I told him. "I'm not that kind of person."

"Spencer, I didn't ask to do anything more than go out to dinner," he said looking at me like I had lost my marbles.

I sighed, reining my fear masked as irritation in.

"Listen, I know you can get any girl you want with the crook of your finger." I told him while I watched his expression go from neutral to agitated. "But that isn't me. I'm not going to let you play me."

He stood up at that last sentence, towering over me with his insane height. Looking annoyed, looking at me with like I may have actually hurt his feelings. In fact at my words that sexy flirty look he always had went right out the window. 

He went quiet and tt was at this moment that I noticed everyone else in the room had left.

I wasn't scared. Carter made me feel a lot of things but fear wasn't one of them. He had a way about him. I knew he'd never hurt me.

Still, I was nervous. I mean I was in a room alone with a cute guy. Anyone would be nervous.

"Spencer, you realize you're putting your own shit on to me, and you didn't even think to find out if it was true?" he asked looking at me with mild annoyance. "You don't even know me."

I felt a lump grow in my throat as he continued.

"Maybe I pushed too hard. My mistake. But I would have never played you. I pushed, not because you're some toy, but because you're wrapped up tight," he told me. "I get why you might be but you have to know not everyone is out to get you. Some people just like you."

I felt my temples throb. He wasn't wrong but he didn't get it.

I shook my head right back at him. "I've known you for 2 weeks. You can't possibly think you have me figured out. You don't know me either."

He glowered angrily when he said, "You know, I've been paying attention to you these past few days. There's something not right here and I don't know what it is. Maybe other people miss it, but I don't, I see you. You're scared of something."

I scoffed, feeling exposed. "Yeah, I'm so sure. What would I have to be scared of?"

"Spencer, you know, you haven't given me one piece of information that I haven't forced out of you?"

"I'm just a private person," I retorted in exasperation.

His annoyance came to the forefront as he started moving towards me.

My back was already to the wall so I had nowhere to go. I just watched him, pressing my shoulders deep into the wall behind me as he neared me.

My heart was wildly thudding in my chest as I glared. Starting to lose my cool.

When he stopped moving about a foot away from me I refused to tilt my head up to look at him. I wasn't entertaining this game any longer but it seemed Carter still wanted to play.

He bent his head down low. Almost kissing my ear when he spoke. The deep bass flooding my senses, knocking me out of space and time.

"No, Spencer, you're a person who freaks the hell out when someone asks you on a date, instead of just saying no."

My mouth slammed shut. Because fucking hell, he was right. And that thought literally stunned me into silence.

And without the anger a feeling overwhelmed me. Made the room heavy. Thick with something that made me drowsy.

I didn't know what I was going to say next, but I was going to say something. I had to.

Mixed in with my dampening irritation, a new feeling struck.

One that made my palms sweaty.

Fucking hell, we were so close. I was noticing it clear as day, now that I wasn't behaving so irrationally.

My pulse picked up when my temper dissipated and I felt my eyelids drag. Heat swarmed the room and I grew flustered. My nerve endings awakening, prickling with anticipation.

My breasts were inches away from his chest and if I bent forward, just a little bit, my hands could slide up his shirt and I could touch him. Get on my toes and kiss him.

The feeling was one that was clouding my judgement and had me staring at his mouth. His lips. His shoulders. His arms. His body, big enough to pin me down.

I didn't know why the air in the room had changed but I was worried Carter could tell. I flicked my lowered lashes up to his to gauge his reaction but he was just as distracted, fixated on my mouth.

As soon as his eyes moved from my lips to my eyes, he must have read something in them, because only a second passed before he locked his arm around my waist and kissed me.

Immediately, like I couldn't even help it, I moaned into his mouth. I felt one of his hands trail my waist and the other clench into the wall near my face. Like he wanted to touch more of me but was containing himself.

And I didn't know what had come over me but I wanted him to be uncontained. To touch me everywhere he could.

His body melded to mine as he trapped me against the wall. And I felt him everywhere.

I wouldn't call it delusion, but now I knew why I had been so charged up recently. Why everything felt so intense with him.

It was all of that untapped sexual tension.

Deep down I think I knew what was going on. But I was trying really hard to pretend I didn't and obviously it wasn't working. And now with his body touching mine, kissing me like he needed it more than air I couldn't ignore it much longer. Those feelings that I had stumbled upon earlier were now wide open.

Something I wanted him to fill.

Against my better instincts I found myself whimpering into his mouth, clawing at him for more contact. My hands went up his shirt and I felt him lift me off the ground and wrap my legs around his waist.

I cried out when he ground into me, feeling it in between my thighs. I pulled at his back wanting more and I heard him curse under his breath as he kissed down my neck. Palming my breasts and playing with my nipples through my bra.

I heard his groan of approval when I arched my back, forcing my body in his hands.

"I want nothing more than to bend you over that desk right now and fuck into that pussy. Feel it tighten up around my dick," he said roughly, continuing to grind into me. "But I can't. And I won't. I made the first move, and the second and the third. So I'm telling you now that I won't blow into that pussy until you ask me for it. And I promise you Spencer, the longer you take, the rougher it's going to be."

At his words, at the friction between my thighs, and his hands on my breasts, I felt it build up until I was coming. Shaking and trying my best not to scream.

I probably wasn't successful because Carter kissed me again, muffling my sounds.

"There it is," he said gravelly, as he continued to talk me through it.

As I came off my high he watched me with dark eyes. Eyes that only lit my flame once more.

I was going to kiss him again until we heard a noise from outside the door.

The moment was shattered and in a panic I pulled my shirt down as he cursed. Looking at me in a way that felt apologetic.

"Christ, Spencer," he said. "I'm sorry."

Still a little sex drunk, I blinked. "Why are you sorry?"

He shut his eyes and leaned his forehead against mine.

"I haven't been able to get you out of my head since the first night I saw you. I think I'm losing my mind," he admitted carefully. "Still, I need to take care when it comes to you. I shouldn't have kissed you. I shouldn't have touched you. I only let things get that far because you seemed into it. But you should know that if you want me to lay off. I will. Genuinely, Spencer."

His guilt radiated off him in waves and I tried to lower myself to the ground so I could gather my thoughts.

I slid down his legs only to stumble a bit when I reached the ground, and his hands came to steady me.

"You okay?" he asked.

I nodded, a little embarrassed now. I had never come that hard. And we weren't even having sex. I had to admit I was a little afraid of my vagina now. I mean he'd barely touched me. And that made me realize that sex with Carter might actually kill me.

"Spencer," Carter spoke softly. "Talk to me."

My face burned.

"Don't be sorry. I liked it. Obviously." I babbled. "And well, I think you were right. I think I do have trouble letting people get close to me. And sometimes I need a push to get there."

"Still I didn't have to do it like-"

I interrupted him, still embarrassed but needing him to understand. "I haven't- I don't usually feel like this. It's scaring me. If it was anyone else Carter it would have pissed me off. And I wouldn't have even let it get that far. But it was you. If I wanted it to stop I would have been more clear. I was into it."

The orgasm must have rewired my brain because I was giving way too much away too fast. But I had to. I didn't want him to feel guilt about us. I wanted him and I deep down I knew had been lying to myself when I said I didn't.

"Also, I want to apologize for assuming things about you," I told him while looking at the floor. "You didn't deserve that."

I felt his lips touch my forehead as I closed my eyes. Feeling way more on display than I wanted to be.

It was all too much. The level of vulnerability was far too much. And it was on that thought that I was done. I had to go.

I sidestepped around him and watched his brows draw together in confusion.

I grabbed my bag quickly before he could stop me and made it to the door before turning to him and saying, "thanks for everything."

I pushed out the doors, ran down the stairs and through the quad. I had to get out of there. Carter was far too dangerous for a girl like me.

I could just tell he'd break my heart and for a girl who's heart was already embarrassingly weak, he would destroy me. If I let Carter in, he'd recover. I don't think I ever would.

***

It wasn't until 1 am while I laid in bed eating a quesadilla, that I realized that I had thanked him for an orgasm and then ran away like a psycho.

My face flamed at the thought and I groaned into my hands, knowing this was going to be a long night.