Pinkie Promise (Carter Ridge Book 1)

You know what’s even crazier than hosting a car wash on Frat Row?

Hosting a car wash in the fall.

While it’s raining.

“Hmm,” Aisling says, cocking her head to one side as we observe the scene in front of us from the opposite side of the road.

It’s a stormy Sunday afternoon meaning that we were originally going to cancel our fundraiser, but nothing motivates the frat guys like the prospect of unabashedly staring at cheerleaders. They’ve set up a portable gazebo-canopy for each car to drive through, one at a time. It means that the team can wash the cars without getting pneumonia, while the frat boys sit on the sidelines, watching open-mouthed and soaked to the bone.

I tilt my head as I watch one guy snuggle up under a wet Carter U blanket.

Aisling switches the umbrella that she’s holding over us from her hand to mine, and she snaps a picture on her phone to post on the team’s Instagram page. I have to physically restrain her from hitting the post button when I see that she’s captioned it Cum rain or shine!

Technically I should be over there with the rest of the squad right now, but I’m still feeling a little sulky over getting benched.

Although working this wash would kind of be good practice, my brain suggests. For when you go for that job at the–

I quickly shake the thought away, bringing myself back to the present.

“The queue for the wash is like thirty cars long,” I say, staring in disbelief down the block as another vehicle joins the queue. And these are really nice cars because the majority of Carter U’s student population typically doesn’t struggle when it comes to money.

Aisling must sense my vehicular lusting-slash-daily neurotic finance spiral because she starts adjusting my bow and stroking my hair, her usual caretaking methods of choice.

“You know that no-one else knows the situation that you’re in, right? You don’t need to worry about… image, or whatever,” she says to me quietly as the current car leaves the canopy and is immediately replaced by another. These cars are so expensive that I feel like I’m in a Formula 1 fixing pit.

I know that no-one other than Aisling and Connell are aware of my money troubles. Or my grant troubles. Or my at-home troubles. And that’s exactly the way that I need for it to be. Some people say that a problem shared is a problem halved but I know the reality of the situation: people either use your weaknesses against you, or you become a burden that they need to rid themselves of.

This is why I try to never bring them up to Ash, but she always seems to know exactly what I’m thinking damn it!

“Ooh, this one is huge,” she says suddenly, and both of our attentions divert from the row of dazzled frat guys to the large truck currently driving up the wrong side of the road.

I blink at it in confusion as it heads straight towards us.

It isn’t brand new like most of the other ones. It’s big and gnarly and I think that I like it the most.

“Uh, do you think that they’re trying to cut in?” I ask, raising an eyebrow as the truck begins to brake. I glance briefly across the road, grateful to see that the frat guys haven’t noticed yet.

An oestrogen-shimmer radiates out of my roommate. “I hope so,” she purrs, entranced by the prospect of a live scuffle.

I’m about to hair-swish and selflessly say “I’ll deal with it” when the truck parks up right in front of us and I finally see who’s sat in the driver’s seat.

Reading my book.

“Oh my God,” I whisper, as I watch him cock up a leg and flip to the next page. I catch sight of a pink sticky-tab through the rain-washed window and my fingers fly up to smother a gasp. “Ash, please can you go back over to the tent while I get rid of this, um, this…” I gesture vaguely toward the death-trap in front of us, while handing her the umbrella again.

Aisling streaks across the road. My eyes don’t leave the truck.

Sat in the driver’s seat is the guy who almost knocked me unconscious when I was flyering in the sports building at the start of this week. He has dark messy hair and shoulders the size of Colorado. And I know that they’re the size of Colorado because that’s where I’m from.

I attempt to pretend that I’m not impressed, but truthfully he’s the most attractive man that I have ever seen.

I narrow my eyes on him and bang hard on the glass.

He looks up at me and grins. Rolls down the window.

“Hey,” he says in a deep voice, eyeing me up and down. “Great day for a car wash.”

I try not to shiver as his eyes linger on my cheer top. He gives me a smirk and closes the book resting in his lap.

I take a big swallow. “That’s… that’s my book,” I say thickly, the rain beginning to make my cheeks pinch pink.

He gestures over his big shoulder with his thumb and I notice that his hair is dripping wet, like he’s just had a shower. “Is this what you do? You’re a cheerleader?”

“Please tell me that you didn’t read it,” I continue, my eyes boring a hole through the front cover.

Realising that my attention isn’t on him he tosses the book onto his passenger seat. I make an alarmed sound, fearing that he might crease the pages.

“Why’re you standing over here in a pair of jeans instead of getting suddy with your friends? Is your bit done now? Get in the truck. I’ll take you home.”

My eyes practically roll out of my head. “Absolutely not, stalker. Give me back my book.”

“If I pass it to you now it’ll get ruined in the rain.”

Damn it he’s right. And doesn’t he know it.

He leans back in his seat, pleased, and I try not to stare at his wide abdomen. Then he shifts his belt buckle and I go a little cross-eyed.

“Look,” he says, pulling his car keys out from the slot before holding them through the window like an offering.

I pretend to look down at them but really I’m looking at his hands.

Very, very big.

“Hold onto these for the next three minutes so that you know that I can’t drive off with you. You can get yourself dried in my passenger seat and I’ll give you something to use so that you can wrap up your… uh, porn book.”

I gasp, “That is so inappropriate.” And completely accurate.

Then I scowl, grab the keys from his hand, and round the hood of his truck at a fast clip.

He reaches for the door handle from the inside but I manage to grip it first and pull it open.

I slide inside the truck as he leans back to his side and I shiver dramatically from the sudden surge of heat.

“Did you have the heating on?” I ask absently as I lovingly pick up my book and look around for something to wrap it in. I drop his keys onto the dash as I consider what I could protect my paperback with.

“Here,” he grunts, pulling his jumper off in one fluid rip. “And no. Didn’t have the heating on.”

I stare blankly at the jumper that he’s holding out to me, a little scared by how much warmth seems to be radiating out of it.

“Er, what do you want me to do with that?” I ask.

He pushes it onto my lap and my mind goes blank.

“It’s for your book,” he says, as if giving me his jumper is perfectly normal.

I look up at him and my cheeks begin to burn. Partially because he’s secreting heat like an animal, and partially because he’s so big that he can barely fit in his seat. His biceps are bulging out from the short sleeves of his shirt and his chest is swollen, rising heavily up and down in the confined cabin of his car.

“Nice bow,” he says gruffly, jerking his chin at my hair. Today the cheer squad is wearing last year’s competition ribbons, which are in Carter U’s red and blue colours. “Name’s Hunter, by the way. It’s written there, on the jumper.”

He jabs a thick blunt finger at the embroidery that I’ve just uncovered. Underneath his name are the words Hockey Team Captain.

“You ever been to a hockey game?” he asks, his eyes burning into my skin.

My mind flicks back to him smashing a door into my forehead. “I think that I got a live preview on Monday.”

He immediately winces. “Fuck, I’m so sorry,” he says, shifting in his seat so that he’s fully facing me. “I had no idea that you were behind that door. How’s your forehead?” he asks, looking anguished. When I don’t respond he continues with, “When I saw that you’d left your book, bringing it back to you was the least that I could do.”

I’m actually amazed that he didn’t burn it. Throwing it at him was not only out of order but it was also completely reckless, a clear indication that my brain has been all over the place recently.

This is why you need to focus harder on getting the arts grant, I remind myself. If I start making headway towards securing another year at Carter U then I won’t have to stress about moving back home. I’ll be able to focus on refining my dream manuscript and giving myself the life that I’ve always wanted.

That’s why I quietly admit, “I… shouldn’t have thrown it at you. Playing karma like that was really dumb.”

When I feel him tense up beside me I give him a fleeting glance. He’s frowning slightly, like I said something that resonates. But then he recomposes his expression and pulls a flyer out of his back pocket, dropping back down to his seat with a low grunt.

“I know it isn’t Halloween yet but there’s this thing that me and the guys are going to next weekend. There’s like a corn maze and stuff.” He breathes out a laugh and his cheeks begin to turn a little ruddy. He swallows hard as he passes me the flyer and says, “I never do this, but I was wondering if… if you’d wanna come. You don’t have to come with me or anything, but it’d be cool to see you there.” He scratches at the back of his head and adds with a growing grin, “Maybe we’d even get around to you telling me your name.”

I stare at him, speechless, and he gives me a kind of smug eyebrow raise. It reads, how about it, baby?

Did taking the door to the forehead leave me with serious brain damage? Is this an extensively prolonged hallucination? Is this actually happening?

The captain of the Carter Ridge Rangers is asking me out?

“Unless you were already going… which you probably were,” he adds, looking at me a little deeper like he’s trying to push his way into my head.

There’s a whole host of new sensations tingling in my body, and I’m not sure that I want to give any of them the time of day. Behind us outside I can hear the window-muffled sounds of low frat-boy voices and the spray of multiple hoses. The rain isn’t torrential but it’s pattering steadily on the roof and washing the common sense straight out of my head.

Why am I enjoying this guy’s attention? Why am I feeling it deep down in my belly? Now is not a good time for me to get myself a distraction. I should be thinking about research and staff endorsement letters and finding somewhere else to live if Aisling’s parents kick me out of the condo.

“Is this a guilt thing, because of the head injury?” I ask. “Because if it is, don’t worry about it. It happens more often than you’d think.”

If I thought that that would give him the relieved get-out that he needed, I couldn’t have been any further from the truth.

“What does that mean?” he asks, his irises aflame.

I clutch my now-jumper-wrapped book against my stomach, successfully ignoring how warm and soft it feels, and I shake my head at his aghast expression. No time to explain the disastrous end to my show-stopping cheer career.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“But–”

I pass the flyer quickly back over to him and scooch on my seat. “My roommate told me about the Halloween night and I would… kinda like to go. I’m not sure if I’ll have the time though.” I hug my jumper-book a little tighter against my body and Hunter’s eyes flick down to it, his forearms flexing. “I just have a lot on my plate right now.”

I turn to face the passenger door and I’m a little horrified to see that I’ve completely steamed up the window.

“Hey,” he says, his voice low as I turn back to face him. He jerks his chin at me and for some reason it makes me blush. “I understand. I usually work the whole weekend too. But the guys and I have to throw in occasional social sessions so that we have off-rink team-building opportunities. I have to be there.” He holds my gaze for one long, heated moment and then he leans across my body to click open the door. When he notices that I’ve stopped breathing he flashes me his grin again, warm humour returning to his sparkling eyes. “I’ll be looking out for you.”

“Uh…” I stare at him even as he pulls back to his side, studying me so unabashedly that I simply stay still. “I…”

His phone suddenly buzzes on the dashboard and his eyes flick lazily over to it, tipping the screen so that he can deem its worthiness. He checks it for a beat and then throws the device into his glove compartment. I try so hard to not care that dozens of Carter U girls will be hitting Hunter up all day, every day.

But it’s exactly the kind of grounding that I needed.

“Thanks for returning my book,” I say, “even though this is kind of grounds for stalking.”

He flashes me a grin, eyes on my hips as I slip out onto the blacktop.

As I’m about to unceremoniously slam his door shut we both hear a shout of “Yo Hunter!” from behind me, meaning that the frat guys have finally clocked him and are now vying for his attention.

Great. This is exactly what his two-hundred-and-twenty pound ego needed.

Hunter laughs at whatever he reads in my expression and I thump his door closed extra hard.

He winks at me through the window and mouths see you Saturday.

Letting out a shaky breath I turn on my heels and run across the road, heading for cover from the rain under the car wash canopy. I don’t give Hunter the satisfaction of watching him drive away but when the wash is over and I’m shot-gunning in Ash’s car I do unravel my paperback and flick to where I’d last left off.

Something warm and tingling stirs in my belly when I notice the fact that I now have two bookmarks.

One is the receipt from when I purchased the book.

And the other is a scrap of paper with Hunter’s number on it.