Free Big Man on Campus by Jayne Marlowe Page A

red.
    Cass
smirked. From what she could see, most of them had that
buttoned-down, loafer-and-khaki look of frat brats from the private
university down the road. These guys will have all come from money;
not bluebloods, but Republican Reds, the descendants of those who
would have frothed at the mouth and proclaim, “Better dead than
Red,” and yet, today...
    “ Democrat Crips and Republican Bloods,” she said. It made her
laugh because she thought most politicians were thugs
anyway.
    Her
phone vibrated on the table and she looked at the screen. It was a
text from Matt.
    “ Geez, Matt, what the hell?” She picked up the phone and began
typing her reply.
    “ Excuse me, Miss?”
    She
looked up and gasped. Standing next to her booth was a young man
wearing a white button-down shirt, tight black jeans, and black
cowboy boots. If she didn’t know better, she would have mistaken
him for a server. His big, brown eyes looked back from underneath
the dark bangs of his mop-top haircut like that of The
Beatles.
    She
regarded him as “young” not because she considered herself to be
old, but because he looked to be in his early twenties—a decade she
could now see in her rear-view mirror, if only recently—that and
the fact that he had been with those frat brats cloistered at the
bar. Her look turned into a scowl and he continued.
    “ Please don’t take this the wrong way,” he said, “but I need
to talk to you.”
    Now she
looked suspicious. “Usually when someone says that, it’s followed
by something rude.”
    “ I assure you, ma’am, the last thing I’d ever want to be is
rude to you.”
    She
nodded slowly. “OK...what is it you have to tell me?”
    “ I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but I’m here with my
friends.” He threw a look over his shoulder towards the group of
frat brats.
    “ Oh, I’ve noticed alright.” She frowned and didn’t care when
he caught her doing it. “Fraternity boys leave me cold.”
    “ Well, I’d like to rectify that if I can,” he said. He put his
hand over his heart and gave a slight bow that, were it anybody
else, would look patronizing, but when he did it, the gesture
seemed sincere. “Like I said: don’t take this the wrong way, but I
think the best thing for me to do in this situation is to be
honest.”
    Cass
felt the hair rise on the back of her neck. Just what the hell did
this kid have to say to her? Whatever it was, he’d better do it
fast. Her inner alarm system was starting to wake up. He must have
picked up on her agitation because he leaned forward and lowered
his voice.
    “ The guys dared me to go out into the restaurant and pick a
woman to start talking to.” Her blank stare made him continue
quickly. “I hate to intrude, but may I sit down?” He made a move to
slide into the booth opposite her.
    Cass had
half a mind to cuss him out and embarrass the shit out of him in
front of his friends, even if it made her look like a fool too, but
at that moment his expression was pleading, and those big, brown
eyes so full of apprehension, it made him look both endearing and
sexy. Not an easy task, considering her jaded opinion of
men.
    After
letting him hang there, propped against the seat, half standing,
she finally nodded. “I would hate for you to lose face. What’s your
name?”
    “ Adam Pierce.” Sliding into the booth, he held out his hand
and she shook it.
    “ Cass Malloy. Where are you from?”
    “ Athens, Texas.”
    “ Really? What brings you all the way to Big D to go to school
rather than closer to home?”
    “ The full scholarship, for a start. That and how I’d never
been to Dallas apart from driving through it.”
    “ Scholarship, eh? Football?” He didn’t have what she’d call
the typical physique of a football player. He was maybe six feet
tall, if that, with an average build. Perhaps he was a kicker. But
when Adam pressed his lips into a grim line, Cass figured her
assumption was one everyone made—and it was wrong.
    “ No.