Fuck ‘em and chuck ‘em was his style.
Asshole.
After she finally calmed down and drove away in her car, I started to walk back toward my house, but then I saw Dylan throwing his textbooks in the backseat of his Jeep. I don’t know what came over me. I just made my way over to him and shouted the first thing that came to mind. I had never been that close to him before. I’d never even looked his way or said a single word to him before that moment.
“How could you do that to Dee? She doesn’t deserve your bullshit. She’s a nice girl. She’s not like the girls you’re used to, okay? You owe her an apology,” I ordered.
He grinned.
He. Fucking. Grinned.
“Is this amusing to you? Do you like hurting girls? How many notches do you need on your bedpost, Dylan? What’s a few more right?”
He bit the side of his lip in a charismatic and magnetic way, and it was my turn to arch an eyebrow. I hated that he was trying to use his so-called charm on me.
“What? You’re just going to stand there and not say anything? That’s really mature, asshole.”
He scoffed. “I’m not the one throwing a temper tantrum, now am I?” he finally spoke with a rough yet smooth tone.
His voice was deep, deeper than I expected, with a bit of a Southern drawl. It was the first time I had ever heard it, and I would be lying if I said it didn’t catch me off guard. Everything about him did. I thought I knew what to expect when it came to him, but he proved me wrong. Which didn’t make any sense. I was supposed to have the upper hand, not him.
My eyes widened in shock. “This is not a temper tantrum, asshole. This is someone calling you out on your shitty behavior. Own up to your whorish ways, apologize to Dee, and we won’t have any problems.”
His patronizing eyes scanned the length of my body, starting with my pink toes, lingering on my breasts, and coming to a stop at my eyes. His expression was hard to read, and it did nothing but confuse me even more. I thought I was prepared. I thought I knew everything there was to know about him. I thought a lot of things, but I would learn soon enough that I had no idea what I was getting myself into.
It was one thing to think you knew, to assume, but when it was staring you right in the face, when he was looking only at you, it changed things. It changed everything.
The way his eyes barred into mine ignited a fire deep within me. He wasn’t looking at me. He was looking in me. And that I hadn’t expected.
That I wasn’t prepared for.
His reality being much more intense than my assumption, I never wanted to be one of those girls.
Especially not now.
The awkward silence was finally broken by his condescending tone. “Problems with you?” he stated as a question with a crooked grin and a cocked head, eyeing me up and down once again.
I watched as he slowly engulfed every inch of my body, making me feel naked and exposed. He bit his bottom lip again when he sensed what I was feeling.
“Yes, that’s what I said.”
We locked eyes.
“I’ll take my chances,” he retorted with an arrogant tone.
“Oh my God! You’re such a fucking asshole.”
“Darlin’, I think you’ve already pointed that out.”
“I’m just stating facts. None of which you’re denying.”
“Darlin’-”
“Stop calling me that.”
He pushed off his Jeep and strolled over to me with such purpose that I felt it down to my bones with each step he took. He stood right in front of me, lowering his face too close to mine.
“Darlin’,” he drawled. “I don’t know your name, and although Crazy Bitch seems fitting, I figured you’d appreciate Darlin’ more.” He smiled, breaking the harshness of his words.
Something about the way he was looking at me made me more uncomfortable than I already was, if that was even possible. I had never been that conflicted around a guy. I realized right then and there that Dylan McGraw was different, I just didn’t know in what sense, at least not yet. I could feel my guard escalating higher and higher as the seconds passed between us.
“I mean if we’re calling a spade a spade, I’m not the one who came at you, am I?”
I said nothing because honestly, what could I say to that? My outburst was spontaneous. I just wanted to rectify the Dee situation and his demeanor ruined my momentum.
Bastard.
“I didn’t think so,” he added, as if reading my mind. “You’ve called me a fucking asshole more times than I care to count in a matter of five minutes, and I’m still not clear on what I did wrong? Try again.”
“I already told you. What you did to Dee. You used her.”
He shook his head, narrowing his eyes at me. “I used her? That’s not the way I remember it. I would get your story straight before I go playing martyr, sweetheart.”
“Unbelievable, you’re going to try to deny it?”
I don’t know how long we stayed frozen in that moment but he suddenly leaned forward, closing the gap between us and bringing us back to reality.
“I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced,” he added. His cheek grazing mine, his face moved closer to my ear. I faintly felt his breath on my neck.
“You smell good,” he whispered, lightly brushing his lips on the sensitive area just below my ear. Shivers rippled throughout my entire body. The rhythm of my heart escalated, betraying my mind from the asshole before me.
“What the hell?” I snapped, roughly pushing back off of his hard chest. He didn’t budge.
“Who the hell do you think you are? You can’t just go around sniffing girls!”
“I believe I just did.”
“So is this how it works, Dylan? Am I supposed to spread my legs open for you now that you introduced yourself to me? Just like every other girl?” I crudely mocked, letting him know that he couldn’t intimidate me. “I will tell you one thing… I’m not impressed. You’re a boy trying to be a man, and not even a good one at that.”
He snidely chuckled, “You have no idea, suga’, what I'm capable of. How about I show you just how much of a man I am? I have something right here for that pretty little mouth of yours that seems to know everything." He gestured toward his dick.
“You cocky son of—” His finger came up and pressed against my lips, silencing me, and I barely resisted the urge to bite it off.
“Sticks and stones, darlin’, you best remember that.” He playfully tugged the loose ends of my hair that were lying across my cheek. “I paid you a compliment, it would do you some good to say thank you.” And with that he turned around and got in his Jeep.
I was dismissed.
“Woo-ooh-eee!” Jacob hollered beside me as I threw the Jeep into reverse.
“Someone just got chewed up and spit the fuck out,” he laughed, clapping his hands over and over again obnoxiously. “Damn, I would pay good money to see that again, bro!”
“Shut the fuck up,” I snapped.
“What pussy did you piss off this time? Two? Damn, this is a new record for you.” He just didn’t know when to quit, and that was always the problem with Jacob. “Who was that anyway? Is she new here? Maybe I should show you how it’s done, fucker. I’m marking today as the first time Dylan-fucking-McGraw couldn’t seal the deal.”
Jacob was my childhood friend. He was more like a brother to me. I knew he would be running his mouth to Austin and Lucas as soon as we stepped out of the Jeep. I had known these guys since birth; our parents had been best friends since before we were born. They took any opportunity to fuck with me, as I did with them.
And this gave them the perfect ammunition.
I hoped Half-Pint would be around to stop them before I had to do it with my fists. Half-Pint was Alexandra, Alex for short. She was the glue that held all us good ol’ boys together since we were kids. She was younger than us by two years, but you'd never know that. She was much wiser than all of us put together. She was a true lady, the only on
e besides my mama I had ever met.
That chick from the parking lot was right about one thing…
I was an asshole, I owned it, and made no excuses for it.
There was no reason to try to deny it. I accepted that title a long time ago. I spoke my mind, I didn’t sugar-coat shit. Whether it hurt someone’s feelings or not, that was their goddamn problem, not mine. Life was too damn short to pretend to be something I wasn’t.
Now, did I use girls?
Fuck no.
They knew what they were getting themselves into. My reputation followed me everywhere. I got more pussy thrown at me because of it. See, girls loved the bad boys. The ones they thought they could change, the challenge, the rule breaker, the game changer. The ones that fairytales were made of, the happily-ever-after’s where Prince Charming swept you off your feet and you rode off into the sunset looking deeply into each other’s eyes or some shit like that.
Bullshit.
Every last bit of it.
I was sixteen years old. My parents just got me a brand new Jeep Wrangler. I came from a home with a loving mom and dad who went above and beyond for me. I had a group of boys that were like brothers to me. I didn't need a girl to love me. I didn’t need a girl expecting things from me. I just needed my cock played with because the best part of being me was that I was hung like a goddamn horse.
Now if you were in my shoes, would you settle for one girl?
Yeah, that's what I thought.
I did what any normal teenage guy would do. The only difference was that I wasn’t subtle about it at all. Why hide it? That’s what got you in trouble.
End of story.
But having a stranger, a hot-as-fuck stranger, call me out on it was completely new territory for me. Yet there I was, lost in thought about her. Except, I wasn’t thinking about her ridiculously, curvy figure that would usually have my cock standing at attention. It was the way she came at me with no fear that had my interest piqued. She had the damn balls to call me out on my shit. What people I’ve known all my life said behind my back, she had the backbone to say it right to my face.
Honesty.
A guy like me could appreciate that, yet I was labeled an asshole for it.
Not that I didn’t enjoy watching her pouty pink lips pucker every time she tried to hide the fact that I had an effect on her. I would even go as far to say she had an effect on me as well. Too many adolescent years spent stroking my dick to images of women that were shaped just like her in Playboy magazines. Her blonde hair lay perfectly against her huge tits. She tried to hide them with a modest-cut shirt that did nothing but the opposite. She stood her ground and glared right fucking at me, making me take in her bright green eyes that had a hint of brown in them. Not once did she cower or lower her intense stare from mine.
She smelled good enough to fucking devour. Honey and vanilla mixed together. My favorite.
The girl was a paradox of contradictions. Her demeanor screamed she hated me, but her body, her body liked me just fine. Which only made me want to get to know her that much more. I loved a challenge as much as the next guy.
“She got to you, didn’t she?” Jacob asked, pulling me away from my thoughts. “Well, I’ll be damned. I never thought I’d see the day. Someone got through to your icy prick—”
“Jacob, stop watching all those Disney movies with Lily or I'm going to have to start buying you tampons. I'd really hate to have to punch a girl in the face,” I mocked.
I may have hit a sore spot there, bringing up Lily. She was Lucas’s baby sister and seven years younger than us. I swear the girl was a spitfire. She was a kid, a youngin’, only nine years old, who was desperately in love with Jacob. Had been her entire life. Jacob though, was oblivious to it. It was his subconscious way of protecting himself from the little girl in pigtails in front of him. The same little girl, that would one day turn into a woman right before our very own eyes and eventually carry Jacob’s balls in a jar.
In the years to come, it would be like Lucas and Alex all over again, history repeating itself, and karma knocking Jacob right in the fucking mouth.
“Her name’s Aubrey,” he announced out of nowhere.
“What?” I glanced at him, pulling into Alex’s parents’ restaurant to meet up with the rest of the boys and Half-Pint.
“You heard me.” He grinned like a goddamn fool. “Aubrey Owens to be exact, according to Kayla.” He showed me his text message. “Oh, she’s a freshman, fresh meat just the way you like them, asshole. She moved here from California with her mom or some shit. Do you want me to get her address too? Maybe you guys could braid each other’s hair.”
I chuckled. Everyone fucked with me because of my hair that sat just above my shoulders, especially my mom. I’d had long hair ever since I could remember. It was blonde, but turned white over the summer from surfing and constantly being in the sun and salt water.
“I get plenty of pussy on my own, Jacob, which is more than I could say for you.”
“What can I say? I have high standards. I don't go around and fuck everything with a hole. By the way, tell your mom I said hello.”
“Not before you tell your sister Amanda she's the best I've ever had, you sick son of a bitch.”
“Touché, motherfucker. Touché.”
Lucas and Austin were already surfing by the time we walked into the restaurant. Alex sat at a table with her notebooks spread out, writing in her binder. On a Friday afternoon, it was normal to see Half-Pint doing her homework like the good girl she was. She was very bright.
All of us boys were like brothers from different mothers. Alex being no different, but there was no telling her she wasn’t one of us boys. She was like our little sister. We all looked out for each other, even when we didn’t need to. Old habits die hard, that was true when it came to meddling in things that were none of our business to begin with.
Jacob and I were definitely the closest, since we were the oldest and our smart-ass personalities were somewhat the same. Both of us acted like we owned the damn beach and our little town. And in our minds, we did.
Lucas was a few months younger than us, but you’d never know it by looking at him. If you told that boy no he would do it just to spite you. Stubborn, hardheaded, and a temper that would make anyone think twice about ever crossing him. That didn’t stop us from fucking with him though since we were all a bit like that, growing up together made it easy to fall into similar patterns, our personalities rubbed off on each other whether we liked it or not.
Alex was adamant she would be one of the boys from the second she popped out of her mama’s belly. She came out screaming and kicking, a force to be reckoned with. Hell would freeze over before she would act like the girl she was. It was only a year or two ago that she actually started wearing dresses and make-up. Before that she dressed exactly like us, begging her mama to buy her cargo shorts and loose-fitting shirts to blend in with us boys. And like Lucas, we picked on her every chance we got. She hated being called a girl, or being treated like one. Though she was tough. Tough as nails, we made her that way, and you better believe that we were overprotective as hell of her.
Despite her tomboy tendencies, I meant it when I said Alex was a lady through and through. She never cussed, she didn’t hang out at parties with us, and was polite to everyone, even if we didn’t like them or talked shit about them. She never cared to get involved in gossip or school drama like most girls did, keeping to herself or hanging out with us. Except she wasn’t very bright when it came to her choice in guys.
We all realized it before it even happened.
Case and point… Lucas and Alex aka Bo and Half-Pint.
Those two had always shared this special bond between them that didn’t include the rest of us. They were separate, but still a vital part of us. We ignored it for years, blew it off, thinking it was the best thing to do at the time. We all hoped it would magically go away on its own or some shit like that. Until one day we couldn’t overlook it anymore. When shi
t went down it was like a goddamn avalanche occurred, and it impacted all of our lives in ways we never thought possible.
Austin was the youngest among us boys, a year younger than Lucas to be exact. He was trouble with a capital T, in every sense of the word. He was the good ol’ boys wild card. The older he got the worse he became, and there was nothing any of us could ever do
about it. It wasn’t from lack of trying on our parts either. He was out of fucking control.
Jacob headed toward the beach, saying he was meeting up with someone, probably some new pussy he was trying to get a piece of. I walked over to Half-Pint.
“Hey,” she greeted, looking up at me. I pulled a chair over and swung it around to sit on it backwards.
“Whatcha workin’ on?”
“Algebra,” she sighed.
“Ah shit. Your worst subject.”
She peered at me, wide-eyed and confused. “I think I’m going cross-eyed trying to figure out these formulas.”
I nodded at her. “Scoot over, sweet girl.”
She smiled, pushing back her chair to give me some room to sit beside her. I grabbed her algebra book, skimming over the chapters she was working on. Numbers and statistics were always my best subjects in school. It was easy for me to remember formulas and rules. Numbers stayed consistent. I grabbed her binder to help explain an easy way for her to remember the patterns.
“See, here’s your problem, Half-Pint. Your Order of Operations is off. You need to do the parentheses before your exponents or else it’s going to mess you all up.”
“Ugh, I always forget that. It’s so hard to keep them in order and remember which goes first.”
I grabbed her pencil from her. “Remember it like this: Parentheses, exponents, multiplication, division, addition, and subtraction. Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally. You remember that phrase, you’ll always remember the rule, guaranteed.”
She nodded, looking at what I just wrote. Whispering, “Please excuse my dear Aunt Sally.” She glanced over at me. “Good to know. Got it!”
“Knew you would, you’re smart, darlin’.”