Free Tamed V by Anna Page A

Marcus walks up to a group of girls standing at a tall table and whispers to me, “Maybe I can get a threesome going.”
    “Good luck with that,” I laugh. Dirty bastard.
    I smile at a blonde with brilliant blue eyes and a black halter top. Perfect.
    “Hi,” she says, raising some sort of fruity drink to her mouth. I wonder what it tastes like on her lips.
    “I’m Tucker—“ I stop when I feel a cool hand on my arm. I turn and slump back.
    Bird.
    The rest of the room falls away and I stare at her, beautiful as ever.
    “Hey Tucker,” she says, a tiny, guilty smile on her lips.
    I swallow. “What are you doing here?”
    “I’ve been hanging around up here for a while,” she says. She reaches out for an awkward hug and I force myself not to sink into the embrace. “Visiting some friends. John sent me your schedule and I came out to see you.”
    “You saw the game?”
    “Yeah.” She smiles again. “You were great. I’m so proud of you.”
    I’m proud of myself, too, and I know I have her to thank, but she broke my heart into a million pieces and well, ouch.
    “Can we talk?” she asks.
    “Sure,” I say. Marcus looks at me questioningly but I nod to let him know it’s okay.
    We slide into a booth and she sits next to me so we can hear each other over the loud music. She smells like shampoo and flowers and she’s got on a yellow tank top with tiny straps. I can tell she doesn’t have a bra on and that alone makes my heart stutter. There’s no way my body won’t respond to her physically, just looking at her makes me think of sex.
    “So you tried out and made the team?”
    “Yep. I got your message from John. I decided what the hell, you know? There was nothing left for me in Columbus and I didn’t want that coaching job.”
    Her smile wavers when I make the jab about Columbus. “I’m sorry if I hurt you,” she says.
    “If?” I laugh. “Girl, you were my world. Don’t pretend otherwise.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “Don’t be. I wanted you to be something you aren’t. You can’t settle down and turns out I couldn’t either. We should just be happy we had that time together, right?”
    It hurts to say that out loud because I want to make her feel badly, the way I did for months after she left. But she’d never been anything but honest with me and I knew she was wild. All I could offer her was sex and she could get that anywhere. I was a nineteen-year-old kid in a dead-end town with no plans for the future.
    I would run, too.
    I did run.
    “So what have you been doing?” I ask, wanting the focus off myself.
    “Traveling. Visiting friends,” she says. “Most of them are married now. Having babies and stuff or work big time jobs.”
    “Growing up,” I laugh. “It sucks.”
    “I’ve been running for so long, Tucker. Since I was sixteen. I don’t know how much longer I can do it.”
    Her eyes shine emerald green with tears. I don’t like seeing her sad and my hostility slips away. Scooting closer, I wrap my arm around her shoulders. “What’s going on?”
    She looks around the bar. “Can we get out of here?”
    “Yeah, sure.”
    We head out into the spring night. It’s warm enough but not too hot yet. We walk down the sidewalk in front of restaurants and shops. “So what’s this about?” I ask. Hollis unnerved is something I’m not accustomed to.
    “I think I made a mistake leaving you last summer.”
    I stop cold on the sidewalk. “You’re kidding, right?”
    “No.”
    I close my eyes and steady myself, like I’ve just been hit in the gut. “Bird, Columbus was not what you wanted. It wasn’t what I wanted either.”
    “I know, but you’re what I wanted—want.”
    I give her a hard look and shake my head. “Don’t say things like that.”
    “Like what? The truth?”
    “Things that can’t happen.”
    “Why not?”
    I’m not even sure who this girl is in front of me. She’s beautiful—maybe more so than before. Sexy-always sexy. But something in those eyes