Then I’d heard a few guys discussing who would be the one to take Merit’s V-card. And that was enough to push me over the edge. It wasn’t like she went around preaching she was a virgin, but Merit wasn’t the type to really date, either. When she did, it never seemed to last long. Probably because I’d threatened to beat the ass of any guy in our school who dared to touch her or hurt her in anyway.
So when she’d walked up to me, I was already buzzing from drinking and worked up from all the guys’ talking about Merit.
“What’s wrong, Dirk? You look upset. Anything I can help with?” She smiled at me. Her smile always seemed to be my undoing. If she ever needed me to do anything, all she had to do was flash that grin and I was putty in her hands.
For one crazy moment, I let my guard down and took her by the hand and walked her up to the bathroom. I needed to taste her, touch her. Feel what it was like to hold her. For just one night, I didn’t want to think of Merit Eden as my best friend. I wanted to think of her as the woman I secretly wanted more than anything, more than anyone. More than Kaci. I had kissed her and I would have taken her right then like the heartless prick I was, had someone not knocked on the door and pulled me back to my senses.
And now, a week later, she stood in front of me, asking me to make love to her. In her daddy’s barn. “We’re going to be graduating soon, Dirk. You’ll be going on the circuit full time, and I’ll be leaving for college. I don’t trust many of the boys we go to school with, only you, and I don’t want to be a virgin when I get to college.”
I sighed and closed my eyes, attempting to gain some much-needed strength before I looked at her again. Knowing I needed to do the right thing, instead of all the wrong things my body wanted with her. “There’s nothing wrong with saving yourself for the guy you love, Merit.”
She swallowed hard and nodded. The look of defeat nearly had me dropping to my knees. “Were you simply drunk last weekend? Saying things that didn’t matter? Did you not mean what you said, about wanting me?”
I cursed and pushed my fingers through my hair. “Goddammit, Merit. You know I want you. Was it not obvious in the way I was touching you?”
With an innocent smile, she looked down and kicked at nothing on the floor of the barn loft. “Other guys have touched me like that before.”
Rage ran through my entire body, and I had to keep myself from demanding she tell me the name of every guy who’d dared to touch her. They wouldn’t have another chance at her again—or with anyone if I had anything to say about it.
“What?” I asked, not recognizing my own voice.
She glanced up at me. “I mean, I’m not exactly innocent, Dirk.”
My eyes narrowed, and I tried to understand the jealousy that appeared out of nowhere. “I’ll kick the ass of anyone who touches you. You know that, Merit.”
Merit laughed and shook her head. “That’s probably why I’m still a virgin. Or it’s because…it’s because I’ve always wanted it to be you, Dirk. But if last week was some drunken mistake—”
“No!” I said too quickly. “I mean, it wasn’t a mistake. I…I…do want you.”
She smiled, and I felt my chest squeeze. “Does that mean you’ll do it?” she asked.
The idea of giving myself to Merit like that scared the shit out of me. Hell, it was just sex. I’d screwed plenty of girls already, and I was only eighteen.
I thought about Kaci, the one girl I swore I was in love with from the moment I first saw her so many years ago. Brock and I had made a vow not to make any moves on her. She was one of us, after all. The girl who acted like a boy but was far-freaking from it. She fished with us, hunted, knocked back the whiskey, and made us both crazy for her. We were the three musketeers, or so everyone said.
Then Brock broke our vow and asked her to prom, and she said yes. Everything changed after that. Brock and I started fighting over every little thing. My best friend was beginning to be the one guy I couldn’t stand to be around.
At times, I thought maybe Kaci enjoyed toying with us both. Seeing the two of us fight over her. We finally told her she had to pick between us. She picked Brock—even though I would have given up bull riding to stay in Hamilton to be with her. But had my desire for Kaci only been because I knew she was forbidden? A challenge? She had picked Brock over me, and even though it pissed me off, had I been pissed for the right reasons? Wasting so much time on something that was never going to be mine to begin with?