All Over You (Unforgettable You, Book 1.5) (20 page)

Which is how I’m finally able to work up the will to end it, pressing firmly against his broad shoulders to separate us. “Scott, we can’t. Not here.” I glance around to see if anyone is watching. No one appears to be. But still…

Scott groans in protest but flashes me an unrepentant grin before reluctantly releasing me. I stand back as he opens the passenger door. He eyes me hungrily as I get in and buckle up so I know I won’t be getting a lot of sleep tonight. I don’t mind.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving with my mom, so we get to sleep in. On Friday we’re driving down to his home for a couple days, where I’ll finally meet his dad, who I recently learned is his mother’s chief of staff. Talk about keeping it all in the family.

I smile and let out a sigh of complete and utter contentment. The past month has been great. When we’d originally gotten back together, I’d wanted us to get back to what we’d had, not realizing how much better it could be. Well now I know and I wouldn’t trade what we have now for the world. It’s that good. Now we talk about everything. I’m secure enough in his love to know he will fight for me—fight for us—but it’s not something I’m constantly expecting or demanding of him.

My problem was I’d always been looking for Scott to prove his feelings for me regardless of all the obstacles I placed in his path. The no-sex thing had just been the latest in, what I’d come to see, a line of them. The other thing I learned is that I can’t expect him to know what I’m thinking, especially if I’m saying the opposite of how I feel. He’s not a mind reader. He wasn’t the only one in our relationship not being completely honest.

What’s incredible is how open Scott is now that he’s not operating under the fear of losing me. He can now reveal parts of himself I’d never seen. The guy who grouses about his parents’ too-high-profile careers and the strain it puts on their family. But at the same time, he’ll brag about an important bill his mother wrote or sponsored. He talks about high school and all the bad stuff. These are the things he would never have shared with me before. I love that he feels he can safely share it with me now.

I watch him circle the rear of the car and climb in. Dressed in a pair of dark-blue jeans, a black turtle neck and a light fleece jacket perfect for autumn in this part of Nevada, Scott looks good. As in smokin’ hot.

Instead of starting the car, he angles his body toward me, grabbing my left hand in his. I weave our fingers together.

“
So what are they like?” he asks softly.

I give his hand a loving squeeze. This is one of the many reasons I love this man. I launch into the details of the last two hours. I tell him how much Amy looks like me, same blue eyes and long dark hair and how Susan is the shy one of the three. He listens as I tell him about how Brandon wants to be a professional hockey player and plays in the Pee Wee league.

My siblings are really great. I enjoyed every moment I spent with them and look forward to seeing them again during Christmas break. Their mother, Renee, is so not at all the evil stepmother type. I mean how bad could she be to have brought the kids? But she’s even nicer than that; a person I could actually see myself liking and not just because she’s their mom.

“
Your dad was here,” Scott says quietly, watching me closely.

My heart does a little jump and I’m momentarily breathless. I swallow hard. “He was?”

Scott nods. “I saw him when his wife got into the car. It was about ten minutes after you went in.”

We’d all met at the designated spot on the lower concourse of the mall. Even if I hadn’t already seen pictures of them, there’s no way I wouldn’t have recognized them instantly. Even Renee looked like the picture I’d seen of her three years ago.

After Renee had performed the introductions she’d left the kids with me, insisting we needed time alone to get to know each other. She’d left, telling me to call her cell if I ran into any trouble, but she hadn’t said where she was going…or who’d she’d be with.

“
Are you sure it was him?”

“
Becca, he looks like you. I mean you look like him.”

Yeah, that’s the impression I got from the family picture I’d seen on Facebook. Plus my mother is super fair, has dirty-blonde hair and hazel eyes. I certainly hadn’t taken after her, which leaves my dad.

“
Why do you think he came?” I ask, even though I think I know why.

“
To see you,” Scott replies, his voice unshakeable in its certainty.

“
You think?”

I told him I didn’t want to see him and he came anyway. But then I didn’t see him, he saw me. I should be upset with him but oddly I’m not. He did say he wouldn’t stop trying and so far, he’s been true to his word.

“
I know.” There’s firm conviction in his voice.

We sit in silence for a few more seconds, holding hands and staring into each other’s eyes.

“
I love you,” I whisper, not for the first time today, this week or this month… Or the last.

“
I love you too.”

“
Thank you for telling me about my dad.”

In response, Scott pulls me in for a kiss. Deep, wet and hot. And all too brief.

“
Maybe next time you’ll see
him
.”

“
Maybe I will,” I say with a smile. I probably will.

Scott starts the car. “Okay, you ready to go home?”

“
Yes, let’s go home.”

Thank You

I hope you enjoyed Rebecca and Scott’s story. I know I enjoyed writing about them and getting to know them. If you did enjoy
All Over You
, I hope you’ll also consider taking a moment of your time to post a review for it. Second only to writing stories that our readers love, authors appreciate reviews (all kinds) more than we can probably articulate. Again, thank you for taking the time to read
All Over You
and I hope you’ll be coming back to read the final two books in the series:
Always Been You
(Fall/Winter 2013) and
Forever With You 
(2014).

ONLY FOR YOU

College freshman Olivia Montgomery is thrilled at the chance to start over, escape the rumors that plagued her in high school. And she can finally put her juvenile crush, Zachary Pearson, where he belongs—in her past. Then her unrequited love strolls into her French class, shattering Olivia’s newfound peace, and the feelings she'd thought buried for good come rushing back. Now she can't shake her unwanted attraction to the one guy who can twist her stomach into knots with just a smile...but has never given her the time of day.

Zach’s good looks may have always gotten him his pick of girls, but it's the star quarterback’s skill on the football field that gives him his pick of the Big Ten colleges. To escape the crushing demands of his win-at-all-costs father, Zach opts for a private university in upstate New York where, his present and past collide. And the one girl he’s always wanted but can’t have—and a class trip to Paris—turn out to be the ultimate game changer that has him breaking every one of his rules.

Chapter One

O
LIVIA

Did you know in your mind a lie can morph into the truth if you tell it to yourself long enough?
I heard that once.

As I’m sitting waiting for class to start, that’s the thought that goes through my mind the instant I spot Zachary Pearson framed in the doorway. It’s also the moment I fear I’ve fallen victim to the same phenomenon.

How? By fooling myself into believing that what I felt for him was something between antipathy and indifference.

It had all started on the first day of high school. I’d been fourteen—you know, the age when our bodies are a flux of surging hormones. The instant I laid eyes on him, I felt a physical attraction so powerful I swear it left me dazed. I think my heart had been in the smile I sent him, to which he’d responded by
giving me
the colder-than-arctic shoulder.

The memory of that look still sends shivers through me.

Beyond crushed is the only way to explain how I felt when he’d completely ignored me. At that point, disliking him had been a simple matter of self-preservation. Of course that’s not how I looked at it back then. No, back then I was just plain hurt, not to mention nursing a bruised pride. You see, by then I’d become accustomed not only to male attention,
but
their admiration. It hadn’t been anything I’d actively sought or was particularly proud of, it just was.

He hasn’t seen me yet so maybe there’s still a chance I can escape before he does. But the only exit means I’d have to walk right past him, which means I’m stuck.

Stuck with Zachary Pearson.

Stuck
on
Zachary Pearson.

I’m not even sure I know the difference anymore.

In high school, it’s not like I expected him to instantly fall at my feet or anything like that. What I had expected was that he, at the very least, acknowledge my existence. What I’d gotten was him looking through me like I was glass. Call me young and foolishly naïve, but it had taken me an entire week to finally get the message that he did
not
like me. And was never
going to
like me.

The clincher had been the first day of French class. Zach had arrived late and the teacher had instructed him to take a seat in the desk beside mine—one of only two available. His expression had given nothing away when he’d shifted his blue-eyed gaze in my direction, then to the vacant desk to my left. Without saying a word, he seemed to make it a point to bypass me to take the other desk at the opposite side of the room.

I can still remember how hot my face had gotten and how badly I’d wanted to get up and leave, aware of the curious stares and speculative glances being cast in my direction. Steely pride had kept my butt in the chair and my chin high.

And it was at that precise moment that any remotely warm feelings I’d had for him died. At least that’s what I’d convinced myself.

Here’s the thing, I believe in karma and I’ve always tried to conduct myself in a way to stay on its good side. Irony, on the other hand, is a cruel and heartless bitch. There’s no
reap what you sow
philosophy to it, more a
betcha didn’t see that coming
sort of thing.

Well, I definitely didn’t see
this
coming because when I arrived at college last week, memories of high school and Zach were just that, memories. I’d filed them away in the section of my brain where I stored all the other unpleasant things and never-to-be-relived events in my life.

But as usual, life has other plans for me. Filing Zach away is going to be anything but easy. Life, as I’m learning, likes to
eff
with me. And today, I’m not finding the joke it’s playing funny.

Nope. Not one little bit.

A shallow breath catches in my throat and my heart starts this fierce, uncontrolled thumping, as if it’s trying to escape my chest. I’m treading water, trying to wrap my brain around what’s happening.

Zachary Pearson is standing in my French class.
That’s what’s happening.

Yes, me and my one-time and all-too-brief high-school crush—but more notably my long-time nemesis—are attending the same college.

Zach.

At
my
school.

In
my
class.

My
French
class no less. That’s irony working overtime.

While part of me is mentally gasping at his appearance, the other part tries to convince me he must be a hallucination. Part of a bad dream from which, God willing, I’ll soon awake.