Shark Out of Water (Grab Your Pole, #3) (11 page)

“Look, you need to stop feeling guilty about that…you made a mistake and if he won’t even let you apologize, then that’s on him. Besides, I don’t see him apologizing to you for the shitty way he broke up with you, you know?”

“Yeah, I know all that and I agree…but even though I have it back, it wasn’t right to do and I still feel really horrible knowing I sank to that level even for a little bit.” Yeah, I bet. Jillian saved Camie’s ass on that one by retrieving the present from the trash sometime after lunch and from what I gather, Jillian really laid into Camie about the whole thing. And thinking about that only brought me back to wondering what the hell is really going on.

From the steady stream of tears falling down Camie’s cheeks, I figured they’d be a while so I gave Katy a kiss on the side of her head, inhaling the scent of apple pie and home from her hair, and then I left the two of them in the hall. I also decided to not hit the snooze button on my mental alarm clock again. I don’t know why, but that opening scene between Tristan and Camie really got under my skin and kept playing in my head, so looking around with open eyes, I realized there are some things that just aren’t adding up anymore.

Yeah, I know. I
really
don’t want to, but…I need to talk to a master mathematician. I halfheartedly looked for her at lunch and by the time the bell rang for class to start, I figured it was just as well I hadn’t spotted her and decided to give it up until I’d thought it through a little more. However, once school was over, I didn’t have a choice.

I was standing with Katy, Camie and Melissa by the locker room as usual and we were speculating on the reason for the massive dropout rate of the cheerleader potentials. It’s hi-larious! They’ve gone from like twenty-something down to six. My take on it is that they all recognize they don’t have a fuckin’ solitary chance against Camie because she’s obviously got it in the bag, not to mention she’s in pretty good with almost all the judges. Anyhow, my interest in what the deal with them is went into overdrive when Tristan walked up, ignoring everyone save Camie, and said, “Text me when you’re on your way.”

She shifted her weight on her feet and I would say she had to force herself to look him in the face when she answered, “Oh, um, okay…are you taking them with you?”

“Yep,” he answered and turned to leave.

“Wait, um…I haven’t been able to find that catnip sock they like so much so you might wanna make another one.” Ah, I get it…the shared custody thing.

That must’ve been what they were talking about earlier but I don’t see where Auntie Jillian fits in and why either of them would have to be blackmailed. However, here’s what I found
really
strange; when Tristan heard that,
he
shifted
his
weight and actually broke eye contact for a moment before saying, “Yeah, alright.” If I didn’t know better, I’d swear on my soul that he wasn’t expecting her to bring that up and he knows something about the stupid sock that she doesn’t and he doesn’t want her to know. It was fuckin’ weird. What the hell does a fuckin’ sock filled with catnip have to do with
anything
?

“Okay, and just so you know…they’ve been kinda bonkers the last couple of days and they’re sorta loud.” She said it as sort of an offhanded warning about his children misbehaving, but Tristan’s response made her literally and visibly shiver, and I fucking swear to God, I think I was blushing just as much as she was.

It wasn’t so much what he said or how he said it, in fact, I really didn’t get what the big deal was, but it was the smirk and the
profoundly
intimate look he had on his face when he said, “So I’ve heard.”

It was like for that single moment, Tristan simply forgot or didn’t give a shit that Katy, Melissa and I were there watching and listening, thereby turning the three of us into peeping toms by sharing with us something
intensely
private and personal that was strictly meant for him and Camie alone, and then on that fundamentally erotic note, he walked away, leaving us
all
shifting our weight uncomfortably.

I watched the girls silently wander off to the gym where cheer practice was being held and all I could think about was having just unwittingly participated in voyeurism when I turned around and fucking screamed like a little girl.

“You wanted to talk to me?” Jillian asked with one eyebrow raised superciliously.

So much for thinking things through…

Yep, I’m a rule breaker ~ Pete

I am
not
a jealous person.

I’m honestly not. I just don’t have that gene of insecurity. Everyone who knows him would say that Tristan is a prime example of someone who is inflicted with jealousy. Everyone except me that is. Yeah okay, he was a little jealous in the very beginning before he really knew Camie and they got together, and yeah, I’d say he has a touch of insecurity, too, but it doesn’t really make him jealous. It makes him cautious. Sometimes so cautious it’s detrimental, but what Tristan does real battle with, is guardianship. It’s as simple as that. He takes care of what’s his, whether it’s material or human, and he does it with unsurpassed zeal. And because he’s so militant about protecting Camie, it comes off as jealousy, which is what I’m afraid my concern for her sister is gonna look like. Especially since I’m throwing caution to the wind and calling Jillian when she’s not alone, which is kind of a no-no. Well, not kind of but whatever. I’m calling
because
she’s not alone.

I’ll admit I get cranky when I’m unusually tired or don’t feel good, and when I saw her walk off campus with Jeff, it pretty much pissed me off, so, I was dialing before I even realized what I was doing. I know she’s more than capable of taking care of herself and most of the time, I actually enjoy watching her do just that, plus she would probably prefer I not protect her from anything, but the fact is, she’s just gonna have to deal with me doing it sometimes. Like right now; she’s tired and vulnerable and I’m still fired up about Jeff’s idiocy of late so I just wanna make sure he isn’t verbally abusing her to her face because if he is, I swear to God, I’ll use his nuts for pitching practice. That is, if I can castrate him before she does…

Knowing full well I’d just broken the rules, I rolled my eyes and shook my head in contrition when she turned with her phone in her hand and actually found me with her eyes. But when she got snotty and intentionally shunned me by hitting ignore on her phone and then continued on with Jeff as her voicemail picked up, I had to bite my tongue on the words, “You’re going with
Jeff?!
Really, what the fuck?!”

Shit.

Do you think she’d let me off the hook if I pleaded exhaustion? Yeah, I know…that’s why I didn’t even bother leaving a message.

Beelzebub’s bride dwells in a forest of cryptic trees ~ Jeff

Jesus Christ!

I swear the chick does this shit on purpose! She’s almost worse than that fuckin’ Ferb, who I seriously fucking think files her own goddamned nails down so they don’t make any clicking noises while she hunts me. I’m predicting it now; I’m gonna have a fuckin’ heart attack one of these days and it’ll be because of Jillian or Ferb. Maybe both, because I could just see the two of them in cahoots against me.

Once I regained my manly composure that Jillian’s unnerving appearance effectively swiped from me, I decided it’s now or never.

“Yeah, I do. Come on, I’ll drive you home,” I said and started walking towards the steps to the back lot.

She walked with me but halted at the foot of the stairs and then formally—I would’ve said politely if it wasn’t for the content of her statement which I think was an insult aimed at me—she said, “Thank you, but no. I prefer to walk. The people at this school are easily confused and have an unfortunate propensity for jumping to the wrong conclusion…I’d really rather not be responsible for taxing their feeble minds further, which I’m afraid would cause a collective mental breakdown and the school counselors are underpaid as it is.”

I was about to retort when the phone in her hand started to vibrate and she froze like a blonde ice sculpture. Then when the ringtone kicked on, I watched in fascination as she visibly thawed to AC/DC’s “Hell’s Bells.” All the jokes swirling in my head about her response to Satan’s mating call must’ve been readily visible on my face, but in addition to my humor, she apparently wasn’t in the mood for her demonic lover either because her eyes caught fire like a switch had been thrown on her internal incinerator. I held my tongue as she took an extremely deep breath, and I’m pretty sure I saw fire in her nostrils so I was hoping she wasn’t about to breathe out her anger in my direction, which was why I was most grateful when she turned her head to let her breath out. Looking away back towards campus, she held her phone up and almost vindictively clicked it off, and then just as cool as she was before it rang she said, “On second thought, I’d be happy to accept your offer if it still stands.”

“Uhh, sure…” So that was how I found myself alone in an enclosed space driving Beelzebub’s bride home from school…

“Look, Jeff, I know you don’t particularly care for me because I make you nervous, and I’ll be honest here, your behavior lately hasn’t exactly endeared me to being your biggest fan, but in light of what I believe you to be struggling with, I’m prepared to overlook your recent thick headedness and complete lack of faith.”

All I could think was, “Oh holy fuck, what the hell have I gotten myself into?” Of course I didn’t actually say that. Come on, I know better…had I spoken that out loud, you know she would’ve fuckin’ told me and I doubt I wanna hear the answer. So what I said instead was, “I think something is goin’ on behind the scenes with Camie and Tristan and I think you know what it is…I need you to level with me and tell me why you sided with him and not your own sister.”
 
I have to say, I’m pretty proud of myself. That sounded fuckin’ great!

“Ah. Waking up are we? Well, unfortunately, I’m no longer at liberty to say. I will say this though, regardless of our GPA, we all have times in our lives when we’re not too bright and can’t see the forest for the trees,” she said with a smile. I’m not sure if it was genuine or sarcastic, but it pissed me off because it felt like she was laughing at me.

“This isn’t a goddamned joke, Jillian!”

“I’m not laughing, Jeff, I’m simply being cryptic but you have to understand something about how I work and that is, once I’ve given my word, that’s it and even
if
I was open to intimidation, bribery or blackmail, in this particular situation there isn’t a single thing in this world that would make me go back on the deal I made.”

“Oh shit…you’re saying that you’ll keep your mouth shut as payment for something
you
want.”
That’s
what Tristan’s “not exactly” statement meant.
He’s
doing
her
a favor…

“You catch on quick when you’re awake…but keep in mind, just because I’ve agreed to be silent, doesn’t mean I’m sitting this one out. My advice to you if you want answers is to go to the source,” Jillian told me as I pulled up to a stop sign. Then, before I could ask her anything else or stop her, she slipped out of the Jeep.

“Wait! Jillian!”

She turned around to face me and as she walked away backwards she said, “Oh and by the by, I only make you nervous because you don’t like the exposed feeling that comes with being surprised, and on that, Jeff, we are very much alike.” Then she winked at me, turned back around and disappeared into the trees lining the park, leaving me to check to make sure I wasn’t sitting there naked and exposed.

Honestly, how in the
fuck
does she know this shit about me?

Being the master of your domain is hard—(DAMN IT!)—er than it sounds ~ Tristan

…The Stock Market crash of 1929, Hurricane Katrina, the Challenger explosion, all the Twilight movies, the Exxon Valdez, the BP oil spill…
Yeah, I’m running through a mental list of catastrophic disasters to keep my mind off of what it’s like to give Camie an orgasm. After her sister drew the parallel this morning, I was fuckin’ rock hard the second Camie herself just
had
to mention how loud the girls have been and that’s just not really the kind of shape I should be in to see her parents, know what I mean? …
Hitler
,
Justin Bieber,
San Francisco’s earthquake of 1906, the Northridge earthquake, the Bubonic Plague, Chernobyl, the Titanic…

FUCK!!!!

Well,
that
clearly didn’t fuckin’ work. Now not only am I thinking about what it’s like to give her an orgasm but what it’s like to be
given
one by her too! Maybe I should try singing to myself…
Goddamnit!
The first two songs that came to mind were my current and previous ringtones for Camie. Flo Rida’s “Right Round” was what I made it the morning after she went down on me the first time. And let me be clear here, for a chick who had no clue what she was doing and was exceedingly nervous about doing it, the chorus of that song fits her skills fucking
perfectly
. The next song was Staind’s “It’s Been A While,” which is pretty much my sorry excuse for a life right now set to goddamned music, but the specific part that says I can still remember just the way you taste is what I replaced “Right Round” with as my ringtone for Camie right before I came back to town, so…nope. Singing’s not gonna work either. In fact, I’m obviously gonna have to change that before I step foot in the house because if I don’t, I’m screwed when Camie gives me head—I mean the heads up that she’s cummi—Oh holy fucking hell.

When she tells me she’s on her way home. There.

Jesus Christ, you’d think that I’m like eleven or something. I’m being punished, I just know it. My brain hasn’t been on the same team as my body since I was in fourth grade…this is
so
not fucking cool! What’s next? Can I expect my goddamned voice to start cracking like I’m goin’ through fuckin’ puberty again? I mean seriously, for the love of Pete—oh, wait, Pete. Now that should help. Pete’s a great guy; he’s had my back on this since the very beginning. Well, except that one time when he was running his tongue over Camie’s body that night at Mike’s, the little ass-bandit. At least I was able to get rid of that mental image pretty well in the desert, though, and then New Year’s and the champagne took care of anything else that might’ve been lingering. Plus, Pete was fuckin’
hysterical
on New Year’s.
New Year’s
… Now
that
was a fuckin’ kickass way to start the year off. I still can’t believe how phenomenal she was that first ti—
AW FUCK!!!