After a surprisingly pain-free removal of the stitches, Dawson says, “You did good. Let’s go celebrate.”

“We’re going to celebrate getting my stitches out?”

He holds up the passes the nurse gave us. “Did you notice how I distracted her with questions when she was filling these out?”

“You were asking a bunch of dumb questions.”

“Yeah, she’s not a good multi-tasker. See this line where she’s supposed to write what time we left? She didn’t fill it out. That means we can go have some fun. And we need to have fun this week. When you start play practice next week, you won’t have any time for me.

“I like fun,” I say. “And I’ll make time.”

“You know what today is, right?”

“Tuesday?”

“Yeah, what else?”

“Pajama day?”

“Try again.”

“Uh, Taco Tuesday?”

“It’s our anniversary.”

“We have an anniversary? We haven’t even been going out for a full week yet.”

He grins. He’s got his school blazer off and the sleeves of his oxford rolled up. He looks so damn sexy.

“Yep.” He pulls my waist into his. “It’s been a month since our first time.”

“Our first time. As in when we had sex in the Hamptons?”

“That’s a night worth remembering, don’t you think?”

“Is it bad that we’re celebrating our sexual anniversary?”

“I don’t think so. It’s when we got together.”

“True.”

“So I have plans for you after Taco Tuesday, but since we have some extra time now, we might as well take advantage of it.”

“How are we going to celebrate this anniversary?”

“Exactly the way it started.”

He pulls me inside his dorm and pushes me against the door, kissing me. He drops his jacket and backpack on the common room sofa then pushes me against the wall in the hallway. He’s kissing me with that same intensity he did that first night. That night I knew there was no way I could resist him.

We work our way down the long hall. His hands are feeling their way across what’s underneath my sweater.

After seriously making out down the hall, we finally make it to his room.

He pulls my sweater off and takes in my little pink knit camisole set.

“Very cute,” he says.

“Take it off me. There might be something underneath that shouldn’t be categorized as cute.”

He gets a naughty grin on his face and slowly pulls up my cami, revealing a sexy black lace Agent Provocateur push-up bra.

He licks his lips, kisses my cleavage, then slowly pulls down my shorts to reveal the teeny matching briefs.

He stands back and looks at me. Then he literally leaps on top of me, pinning me to the bed.

“You always ruin my plans,” he says, as he strips his own clothes off.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

As he pulls off my panties, he says, “I always think I’m going to be able to go slow. I can’t go slow with you.” He covers my mouth with his and quickly proves his point.

A short while later, we’re dressed and heading to class.

“We’ll go to Taco Tuesday tonight, but we’re leaving early. Gonna do some more celebrating.”

“Where are we going?”

“Back to our lake.”

As in the lake where we parked and did it standing up against his car.

Dawson is like a sexual buffet. I never know what to expect, what’s going to be next in line. But I definitely want to keep going back for more.

Looking like a slut.

Lunch

Dawson and I are in line getting lunch. Whitney and Peyton are ahead of us and Peyton is getting chewed out.

“What is your problem lately? You go on one trip with Dawson’s little plaything and come back looking like a slut. Did she help you pick out those furry heels?” Whitney asks, scowling at Peyton.

I give Dawson a look. Like, what a bitch.

Dawson winks at me, walks past me, and smacks Peyton on the butt. “Looking pretty sexy there, Arrington.”

Peyton jumps slightly from the smack, but her face breaks out in a wide grin. A smirk, really, directed at Whitney.

Whitney doesn’t bite though. “My point, exactly.”

“Whitney, I don’t tell you how to dress. Why would you think you could tell me?”

“Because the five of us have dressed alike for every spirit day for the past three years, maybe?”

Peyton shrugs. “Well, if you were on the dance team, you’d understand. Sometimes you get tired of dressing like everyone else.”

Oh. Damn. She just slammed Whitney for not making the dance team.

Peyton’s bitch is totally coming out.

But I’m worried about her because I know what happens when you go up against a Queen.

You become just as big of a bitch as she is.

I want to tell Peyton it’s not worth the fight. Just do your own thing.

Then Damian’s song starts playing in my head. Just do your own thing, do it up big, rocket to the moon, now everybody sing.

I think maybe I need to get Peyton to listen to that song.

I get my food then go to our table.

“That was sweet of you,” I whisper to Dawson as I set my tray down.

“So you have to help me win Mr. Eastbrooke,” he replies.

“What’s that?”

“It's a contest we have every year. The competition is held during the pep rally on Friday. Each boys’ sport chooses a junior or senior to represent their team. I got picked to represent the football team. It’s a big deal.”

“What do you have to do?”

“Dress up like a girl.”

I laugh. “Seriously? And you want to do that?”

“Of course. It's awesome. So you have to make me look pretty. I’ll need makeup, a wig, heels, and an outfit. We all walk out in heels and wave at the crowd. Then we have to do either a dance or a cheer.”

Bryce adds, “Everyone votes by clapping for their favorite.”

“Hmmm. I just can't picture you as a girl.”

He runs his finger down my arm. “Just think. You can grind all up against me and pretend I’m a girl. Only when you take me home, I’ll have a little surprise for you under my skirt.”

“I can handle the clothes. Do you want me to help you with a dance too?”

“No. Honestly, even though it’s always an option, no one ever dances. A cheer is a lot easier to learn. Riley said Ariela could teach me one.”

I finish up my lunch quickly, then tell Dawson I have some stuff I need to do. What I need to do is work my way around the freshman tables and start suggesting they vote for Peyton.

He’s sweet?

5:30pm

I’m just finishing up tutoring Aiden in the library when Dawson texts me.

Dawson: I’m STARVING and ready to start celebrating ;)

Me: I’m about done. Be there soon. Heart you.

“So I have to get going. A bunch of us are going out for Taco Tuesday.”

“I’m going to Taco Tuesday,” Aiden says. “Riley invited me, but he said it was a guy thing.”

“I’m the only girl that goes, usually. Well, so far, anyway. Dawson and I won’t stay all that long though. He wants to go celebrate.”

Shit. I shouldn’t have said that. Now he’s going to ask what we are celebrating. How we’re going to celebrate.

“I heard him say something about a special day this morning. What are you celebrating?”

“Um, just our anniversary.”

“Yeah, but anniversary of what? You haven’t even been going out a week.”

“It’s been a month since I stayed with him in the Hamptons. That was when we got together. Like, I was done with the Keats guy, and then I sorta started seeing Dawson.”

“And this anniversary of when you sort of started seeing each other, was this your idea or Dawson’s?”

“He remembered it, if that’s what you mean.”

“That doesn’t sound like something a guy would remember.”

“He’s sweet?”

“Lots of people said you had sex with him that weekend.”

“People speculate lots of things, doesn’t mean they’re true.”

“That would be the kind of anniversary a guy would remember.”

“Or, he’s just adorably sweet?”

“I can’t believe you had sex so soon.”

“I never said I did.”

“I know you did though. It makes so much more sense now.”

“What makes sense?”

He just shakes his head at me.

“Okay, whatever. I have to go. I guess I’ll see you at dinner.”

We’re definitely not.

6:30pm

I stop at my dorm and quickly freshen up. I don’t want to wear my pajama shorts to dinner, so I grab a skirt, throw it on, and then run down to meet Dawson at his car.

“There you are,” he says, eyeing my skirt then pulling me in for a kiss. “Damn, Keatie, you looked sexy today, but tonight you just look hot. Does this zipper work?” he asks, referring to the one that runs down the front of my black Valentino biker mini.

At Taco Tuesday, the boys are all talking about the Homecoming game. How they have to win. About how it sucks having their parents here. About how they have to help Aiden move the keg to the basement tonight because the dorm advisors are doing room checks tomorrow to make sure they look presentable for Homecoming.

Then they start talking about sex. One of the guys brags about doing it with one of the cheerleaders, and I’m slightly horrified at the intimate details he shares.

I’m so glad Dawson isn’t like that.

I’m also listening closely to what Aiden talks about. To see if he’s the type to kiss and tell.

Dallas tells everyone about the big ring gummy lifesavers Dawson brought to the party.

“That’s a dance team girl trick,” Logan says, grinning straight at me.

“Yeah, I remember hearing that,” I say in a noncommittal way. Mostly I say it that way because Aiden is staring at me.

Nick pats Aiden on the back and says, “And last year the cheerleaders were on a fruit rollup kick, remember that, Aiden?”

Aiden gives him a little smile back and repeats my words. “Yeah, I remember hearing that.”

“Hearing that? More like lived that,” Nick says with a mischievous grin.

So cheerleaders are Aiden’s thing.

Jake says, “What about mints? Altoids. Red hots.”

“All this blow job talk is making me incredibly horny,” Dawson whispers, snuggling up to me.

“You’re always incredibly horny,” I tease.

He runs his hand down my thigh. Then up my thigh and inching closer to going under my leather skirt.

I grab his hand. Hold it firmly in a respectable spot. He looks at me, grins, and laughs.

“What’s so funny?” Riley asks him.

“Nothing, we just need to go study, so we’re gonna head out . . . ”

Riley interrupts. “You don’t need to make up a lame ass excuse. I think we all know.”

“Oh, well, okay.”

I just wave.

I’m feeling a bit sleazy leaving with Dawson early, knowing they all know what we’re going to do.

But in my head, I tell myself we’ll just talk, kiss some.

Yes, it’s our anniversary, of sorts, but that doesn’t mean we have to.

We already did it earlier today.

We’re not.

We’re definitely not.

When we get to his car, he pushes me up against the door and gives me a hot kiss.

“I’ll never forget how excited I was when you showed up at the Hamptons, in that bikini. I felt so lucky and happy. And that night. God, that night was amazing. Really. Of course that was probably pretty obvious. Like, how much I wanted you. And then it was so good. Every time is so good. It’s been the best month of my life.”

I slink away from him and get in the car, so he doesn’t attack me right here.

But what he said totally makes me melt, so I lean over, unzip his pants, and slide my hand inside while he drives to the lake.

Wednesday, October 5th

The people that you love.

Lunch

I offered to go help Dawson work on his cheer, but he doesn’t want me to see it until Friday. So I sit down between Riley and Ace, who has stopped sitting at Whitney’s table and started sitting here with Annie.

Annie shoves a tabloid magazine in front of my face. “Look at this! Abby is having an affair with her bodyguard. The hot one that was with her on Saturday.”

I read the headline.

Abby and the Hot Bodyguard’s Secret Affair.

Underneath that is a large photo of Mom and Ryan. Mom’s head is down and Ryan’s hand is on her back, guiding her. It’s not unusual for Ryan to do that when there are a lot of people around. He’s trained to keep her close. To shield her if necessary. Off to the side is a photo of Tommy. He’s wearing a ball cap and sunglasses and his head is down. The photo is not a new one. He’s wearing a shirt that I know he gave to charity over a year ago. The little headline above it says, Friends Say Tommy Distraught Over Affair.

“You shouldn’t believe everything you read in these kinds of magazines,” I tell Annie.

But even though I know it’s not true, I’m worried.

I leave lunch, get to French early, and text Mom.

Me: Saw what the tabloids are saying. Are you doing okay?

Mom: Of course, we are. Our publicist was going to release a statement that it’s false, but sometimes when you do that people assume you’re trying to cover it up.