Chapter 6
College
Hunter’s phone vibrated next to his head, startling him awake and making him roll right into Devon who mumbled a “What the fuck?” and flipped over.
Hunter blinked his eyes open, the sunlight streaming in from the windows like an ice pick to his sleep-deprived brain, and pawed around for the phone. When he wrapped his fingers around it, he put it to his ear. “What?”
“Hey, dude,” said a half-whispered voice. “It’s Ahmed. You’ve got a visitor.”
“Huh?”
“Your father was at the door when I got back a little while ago. He said he’d tried to call you and had been waiting a while. I tried to stall him by making him some coffee and telling him you were up late studying, but he’s about to head your way. If you’ve got a girl up there, hide her in the closet.”
“Shit.” Hunter’s heart jumped into his throat. His dad was here? He glanced at Devon’s sleeping form next to him. He didn’t have a girl in his bed. He had much worse. At least in his father’s eyes. “On it, thanks.”
“No problem.”
Hunter tossed his phone and shoved Devon’s shoulder. “Wake up.”
“Hmm?”
“Get the fuck up. My father’s here. Like here. Now.”
Devon rolled over, eyes wide. “What?”
Hunter hopped out of bed, frantically searching for his T-shirt, but when he picked up the one he’d worn last night it was in a ball and sticky with the remnants of last night’s lapse in sanity. Devon’s come was all over his shirt. God. This was bad. “Shit. Shit.”
Devon hurried to his feet, holding up his hands. “Calm down. We’ve got this.”
He opened a drawer and tossed a sweatshirt Hunter’s way and then yanked the blanket off the bed and threw it onto his wet mattress, making it look like both beds had been slept in.
“Put yourself together,” Devon said. “It’s going to be fine.”
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Hunter tugged on the sweatshirt, but as he stared at his sleep-mussed roommate, purple and brown hair sticking up every which way, he couldn’t see how this was going to be fine. His father couldn’t know that Devon was his roommate. If he got even a hint about Devon’s sexuality, he’d yank Hunter out of the frat house in one hot second.
Devon disappeared into the closet¸ and heavy footsteps thumped on the stairs outside. Hunter quickly gathered the baby-powdered clothes from the floor and shoved them in his laundry basket. Then he grabbed his backpack and dumped textbooks onto his desk, but one book slid sideways and knocked the bottle of lotion on the bedside table onto the floor. “Dammit.”
He swept it up and ditched it into the drawer. The knock hit the door only a few seconds later. Hunter peered nervously toward the closet where Devon was. Was he going to hide in there? Maybe that was the best move.
“Be right there.”
He adjusted his sweats higher on his hips and did one last visual sweep of the room. It was a disaster. Baby powder, a wet bed, stuff everywhere. But no telltale signs of what had happened last night. It would have to do.
He swung open the door, finding his father looming in the hall and frowning. His gaze coasted over Hunter’s disheveled state, and his lip curled in disgust. “It’s past ten in the morning and you look like a homeless person.” He leaned forward and sniffed. “Are you drunk?”
“No, Dad.” He rubbed a hand over his head to smooth his mussed hair. “I pulled an all-nighter studying. What are you doing here?”
“Studying what?”
Anatomy. My roommate. My life and everything I know about it. “Calculus.”
He grunted. “I tried calling you three times. And I’ve been banging on the door.”
“You know I’m a hard sleeper. And if you had told me you were coming . . .”
“I’m here on an unexpected business trip. I thought I’d take my son whom I haven’t seen in months out to lunch. And I pay for this school and this room that you’re in and those clothes on your back, so don’t act like I need to send a formal invitation to your secretary to see you.”