Read Online Only With You by Monica Alexander - Free Book Online

happened to be listening when we walked in the front door.
    There were people everywhere, and the music pumping throughout the house was deafening. Jake motioned for me to follow him upstairs to the deck. Thankfully it was quieter the higher up we went.
    “So Kyla’s here,” he said, walking backwards up the stairs.
    “Great,” I said with false cheer.
    He thumped me on the shoulder with the flat part of his palm. “Dude, it is great! She’s so hot!”
    “Isn’t she dating that Sigma Chi guy she went out with after you told her you wouldn’t be exclusive with her?”
    Kyla had been Jake’s hook-up pretty consistently back in the fall, but after three months, she gave him an ultimatum, and he dumped her. I’d heard she’d hooked up with some other guy at the start of the semester.
    He grinned. “They broke up!” he announced, as he did a little dance up the last few steps. “And Kyla wants some Jake-lovin’.”
    “Awesome for me,” I said sarcastically. Kyla was a screamer. It was annoying.
    “It is awesome for you! She brought Kirsten with her!”
    “No,” I said, stopping in my tracks. “No way. Get her out of here.”
    “No way. She’s hot.”
    I rolled my eyes. Kirsten Branson was the most annoying girl on the planet – mostly because she seemed to be able to see right through me and had no problem telling me exactly what my problem was. We’d dated for two months in September and October after I decided that I needed a girlfriend to take my mind off of Sydney. It hadn’t worked.
    Of course Kirsten knew I was in love with someone else. She just didn’t know who, but she had no problem calling me out on it every time I had Syd on the brain. It was usually after I’d talked to her and was reminded of how much I wanted her. Kirsten would come over to hang out, and she’d yell at me, we’d fight, and then we’d have sex. It was pretty much the extent of our pathetic relationship. If you could even call it that. I didn’t.
    “Dude, she annoys the fuck out of me.”
    “She’s a good lay, though,” Jake pointed out, and he was right. It was why I’d stayed with her as long as I had. The sex was phenomenal.
    I leaned back against the wall in the hallway and let my head fall backward. “I’m not sleeping with Kirsten tonight,” I told him.
    Jake’s head fell forward as if he was too exhausted to hold it up. “Ryder, man, you’re my boy, and I love you, but come on . You need to get over this shit with Sydney. She’s not interested. She didn’t even look at you once tonight. It’s done, seriously.”
    He ’d noticed too. It had been that obvious.
    “I know,” I said, closing my eyes , knowing it just wasn’t that simple.
    “Dude, I’ll be on the porch if you need me,” Jake muttered, obviously knowing I wasn’t going to snap back as quickly as he’d hoped. Then he left me standing alone in the hallway with my pathetic thoughts.
    “Well, well, w ell, if it isn’t Ryder Thompson.”
    Ugh , I knew that voice.
    “Hey Kirsten,” I said through gritted teeth, my eyes still closed, my head pressed back against the wall. Maybe she’d just walk by me.
    Nope, I knew I wouldn’t get that lucky, I thought as she pressed her entire body against mine. She was so close I could smell her beer-soaked breath when it hit my face.
    “Hey stranger,” she said, as her hand ran up the side of my body.
    I finally opened my eyes to see her about an inch away.
    “Have you missed me?” she asked, batting her eyelashes as she did.
    No.
    “Sure, I missed you,” I said, about as unenthusiastically as I could.
    Then she smacked my chest. “You’re a liar.”
    Yup, sure am.
    “Um, ouch,” I said rubbing where her hand had landed. She’d hit me hard.
    She was standing in front of me, her arms crossed over her chest. “You are unbelievable.”
    “I’m not the one who just hit someone for no reason,” I rationalized, and she shook her head. She was such a psycho.
    “Come on,” she said,