Free Go Deep: A Bad Boy Sports Romance by Bella Love-Wins Page A

grabbed her light jacket and a tiny black purse she liked to wear to campus hangouts.
    “I will. Where are you off to?”
    “This Master’s student is hosting a talk on séances at her place off campus. I can’t miss it. Hey, you should come.”
    “Um…I think I’ll pass, hun.”
    “Cool, but don’t think I’ll let you off the hook for the next invite. We haven’t spent nearly enough time together lately. You and I need a good talk session.”
    “Sure, hun.” I nodded and she rushed to open the door.
    “Soon. Talk to you when I get back.”
    Later that night, around midnight, my phone woke me up, buzzing next to my bed. I picked it up and was too groggy to check the number.
    “Hello.”
    “Get dressed.” It was Slade. “I’ll swing by in fifteen to pick you up.”
    I didn’t appreciate having to wait until he was ready to work in order for us to meet up to work on the project, let alone him waking me up like this. “Fine,” I groaned. “I’ll be down by then.”
    He was waiting in front of the dorm by the time I got downstairs, with the passenger side door open.
    “Hop in,” he called from inside.
    The gentleman was long gone. Maybe that meant he was done trying to get in my pants. I took that as a good sign. I slid into his car, and the smell of cigarette smoke and fried food assaulted me immediately.
    “What have you been doing? Hosting parties in the Slaughter-mobile? Or did you have me waiting because you’ve been out drinking at some new smoking club dive bar?”
    “Good one. And no. I’m fine to drive. Haven’t had a drop, and you know I don’t smoke. Just taking care of some personal business.”
    “You’ve been out trying to get a piece of ass, then, haven’t you?”
    He cut his eyes at me. “Why would I do that when I’ve got you right here?” he teased and put a hand on my leg.
    I pushed his hand off and gave him the evil eye. “Don’t even try that tonight.”
    I was only going to put up with as much as I had to for this project. After that, we had no other need to interact.
    “Look, I’m sorry, Cassidy. I’d explain it to you if I could, but it’s really complicated.”
    “You don’t owe me any explanations.” I told him, keeping my eyes facing forward as he drove. I’d heard enough of his bullshit already. I was here to make preparations for the pitch portion of our project and set up the time for the interview with our business owner or investor. Nothing more.
    “What the hell, Slade?” I asked as he pulled up to his frat house and parked. That’s when I looked over at him again. Sure, the student center was a block from here, but my gut feeling was dead on, that he was trying to get me alone with him.
    “I figured we could work on the table in the foyer or the kitchen,” he told me, getting out of the car.
    “Seriously?”
    “I’m tired, all right?” He was getting that short-tempered, badass attitude I’d seen enough times on the football field and back when we were kids. “I don’t feel like those bright lights right now.” He looked pretty run down too. I don’t think I’d ever seen him look lethargic.
    “Okay. Just don’t make a habit of this. Got it? And we’re staying on the main floor.”
    “Fine,” he barked.
    I followed him inside, relieved that we weren’t heading up to his room for another mindless session of stupid almost-life choices. We went straight to the kitchen, where he put on a pot of coffee.
    “It’s a little late for caffeine, don’t you think?”
    “Speak for yourself. I need this. Anyway, what are we going over with this project?”
    “The pitch,” I told him, pulling out my computer tablet with the slide presentation.
    “I think one of the points we need to make is that we can help with the over-saturation of shelters in the area,” he said first off. “When we talked to Gladys, that issue came up a few times. Lots of service providers, no coordination of pet placement activities. Meaning, they’ve all got