He hauls me to my feet and straightens out my skirt and top before he hurriedly zips himself up.
“Dude, what are you doing in there?” one of his drunken frat brothers calls through the door.
“Nothing,” Joey answers quickly as he opens the door and wraps an arm around me to usher me out.
“Oh, I see.” His friend has a shit-eating grin on his face as his eyes jump between us.
“Nothing happened, man,” Joey tells him firmly before he steers me out of the door.
I wince at the sting of Joey’s words. Is he that ashamed to be seen with me? What about everything he said?
A hollow feeling takes root in the pit of my stomach. Were those all just words to get into my pants? Isn’t that what guys do? They’ll say anything to get the instant gratification they want.
My cheeks flame. I fell to my knees at his feet like a whore and sucked him off the first time he spoke to me. How pathetic must he think I am? How stupid can I be? He's never paid any attention to me until I came here dressed like this.
I should have known better. Tears are already blurring my vision as embarrassment engulfs me. God, he’s probably trying to think of a way to get rid of me.
Someone bumps into us, knocking us apart, and I take the opportunity to make it easy on him and melt into the crowd and hurry away.
I hear Joey calling my name after me, but I ignore him. I don’t know what he could possibly want to say to me.
I can't believe what we just did and how stupid I am. Maybe my dad was right to keep me locked away. Maybe this is what he was protecting me from.
Maybe I am just a stupid girl just like my mother.
CHAPTERFIVE
Joey
I don't knowwhat's going on with Penny, but I'm beating myself up over it. I must have moved too quickly and freaked her out. That's the only thing I can think of because she disappeared, and I haven't seen her since.
I’ve been camped outside her dorm room for two days, and there’s still no sign of her. She hasn't emerged from it.
I know she's in there because I've checked her phone on the tracker I have on it. Yeah, I know I'm a psycho about her. Ask me if I give a fuck because I don't. I'll do whatever it takes to make sure my girl is safe. I've even gone so far as letting her know that I got her number without her knowledge because I've texted her and told her it was me and asked her to call me or text me back something—anything—to let me know she's okay.
She's ignored every effort at contact, and I'm going absolutely fucking insane.
I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. I’ve missed practice two days in a row. I’m sure the coach is ready to kick my ass off the team, which means I’ll lose my scholarship here, but none of it fucking matters without Penny.
Finally, when I call her for what must be the two-hundredth time, I see the three bubbles on the screen dancing as she types out a text. My heart jumps into my throat as I impatiently wait to hear from her.
I don't care what she says. Just hearing anything from her will make me feel better.
Penny:I’m not going to be your dirty little secret, so please just leave me alone, Joey. Just forget it ever happened. I already have.
My brow furrows as I reread the text at least three times, my mind scrambling for what could make her think that, and then it's like a light goes off in my head.
When I told my roommate nothing happened…
Thatmust be what she's pissed about.
I let out of breath as I hit the call button to try to call her again. It goes straight to voicemail again. I try to send her a text, but it comes back undeliverable.
She's blocked me.
Panic blooms in my chest. This cannot happen. I finally had her in my arms, and now she's being ripped cruelly from me.
She thinks I'm ashamed to be seen with her. Is she crazy? I want to tell the world she's mine. The only reason I said that was because the dude was drunk, and I didn't want to deal with any comments that would make me want to murder him in front of Penny. If he'd made any deprecating or derogative comments about her or even insinuated that she was just some girl for a one-night stand, I’d have probably gone to jail. I was protective of Penny in high school, but I'm even more so now.