After (The After Series)

where is the snarky, rude Hardin? I look up to meet his green eyes and his pupils
dilate.
“I hadn’t noticed how gray your eyes are,” he says, so low that I lean closer to
hear him. His hand is still on my face, and my mind is racing. Pulling half of his
bottom lip in his mouth, he takes his lip ring between his teeth. Our eyes meet,
and I look down, unsure of what’s going on. But when he removes his hand, I
look at his lips once more, and I can feel my conscience and my hormones
battling.
But my conscience loses, and I crash my lips against his, catching him totally
off guard.

---

chapter nineteen
I
have no idea what I’m doing, but I can’t stop. As my lips touch Hardin’s I feel
his sharp intake of breath. Hardin’s mouth tastes just like I had imagined. I can
taste the faint hint of mint on his tongue as he opens his mouth and kisses me.
Really kisses me. His warm tongue runs along mine and I can feel the cold metal
of his lip ring on the corner of my mouth. My entire body feels like it’s been
ignited; I have never felt like this before. He brings his hand to my face, cupping
my flushed cheeks, before both of his hands go to my hips. He pulls back a little
and plants a small kiss on my lips.
“Tess,” he breathes out, then quickly brings his mouth back to mine, his
tongue sliding in once more. My mind is no longer in charge; the sensation has
taken over every inch of me. Hardin pulls me by my hips closer to him as he lies
back on the bed, never breaking our kiss. Unsure of what to do with my hands, I
put them against his chest, and then climb onto his torso. His skin is hot and his
chest is moving up and down with his rapid breaths. He pulls his mouth away
from mine and I whimper at the loss of contact, but before I can complain he’s at
my neck. I feel every swipe and lick his tongue makes. His breath moves across
me. He grabs hold of my hair to keep my head just above his as he continues to
kiss my neck. His teeth graze my collarbone and I moan, the feeling shooting
down my whole body when he begins gently sucking on my skin. I would be
embarrassed if I wasn’t so intoxicated, by Hardin and the alcohol. I have never
kissed anyone like this, not even Noah.
Noah!

---

I say, “Hardin . . . stop,” but I don’t recognize my voice. It’s low and husky,
and my mouth is dehydrated.
He doesn’t stop.
“Hardin!” I say again, my voice clear and sharp, and he lets go of my hair.
When I look into his eyes, they are darker, yet softer, and his lips are a deeper
pink and swollen from kissing me. “We can’t,” I say. Even though I really want
to keep kissing him, I know I can’t.
The softness in his eyes disappears and he pulls himself up, knocking me onto
the other side of the bed. What just happened?
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I say, and they are the only words I can think of. My
heart feels like it will explode any second.
“Sorry for what?” he says and walks over to his dresser. He pulls out a black
T-shirt and pulls it over his head. My eyes go down to his boxers again and they
are noticeably tighter in the front.
I flush and look away. “For kissing you . . .” I say, though something in me
really doesn’t want to apologize for that. “I don’t know why I did it.”
“It was just a kiss; people kiss all the time,” I hear him say.
His words hurt my feelings for some reason. Not that I care if he didn’t feel
what I did . . . What did I feel? I know I don’t actually like him. I am just drunk
and he is attractive. It has been a long night and the alcohol made me kiss him.
Somewhere in the back of my mind I fight down the thoughts of how much I
wanted it to happen again. He was just being so nice, that’s why.
“Can we not make a big deal of it, then?” I ask. I would be humiliated if he
told anyone. This isn’t me. I don’t get drunk, and I don’t cheat on my boyfriend
at parties.
“Trust me, I don’t want anyone to know about this, either. Now, stop talking
about it,” he snaps.
And there’s his arrogance again. “So now you’re back to your old self, I see?”
“I never was anyone else—don’t think because you kissed me, basically
against my will, we have some sort of bond now.”
Ouch. Against his will? I can still feel the way his hand gripped my hair, the
way he pulled me on top of him, and the way his lips mouthed “Tess” before
kissing me again.
I shoot up off the bed. “You could have stopped me.”
“Hardly,” he scoffs and I feel like crying again. He makes me too emotional.
It’s too humiliating, too painful how he’s basically saying I forced him to kiss
me. I bury my head in my hands for a moment and head for the door.
“You can stay in here tonight since you have nowhere else to go,” he says
quietly, but I shake my head. I don’t want to be anywhere near him. This is all

---

part of his little game. He will offer to let me stay in his room so I’ll think he is a
decent person, then he will probably draw some vulgar design on my forehead.
“No, thanks,” I say and walk out. When I reach the stairs, I think I hear him
call my name but I keep going. Outside, the cool breeze feels wonderful against
my skin, I sit on the familiar stone wall and turn my phone back on. It’s almost 4
a.m. I should be waking up in an hour to get an early shower and start studying.
Instead I’m sitting on this broken stone wall, alone and in the dark.
With a few stragglers milling about, and unsure what to do, I pull out my
phone and scroll through the text messages from Noah and my mother. Of course
he told her. It’s what he would do . . .
But I can’t even be upset with him. I just cheated on him. What would give
me the right?

---

chapter twenty
A
block away from the frat house, the streets are dark and quiet. The other frat
houses aren’t as big as Hardin’s. After an hour and a half of walking and GPS-
obsessing, I finally reach the campus. Fully sober and figuring that I might as
well stay awake, I stop at the 7-Eleven and grab a cup.
As the caffeine hits me, I realize that there are so many things I don’t
understand about Hardin. Like: why is he in a fraternity with a bunch of preppy
rich kids if he is punk, and why does he go from hot to cold so quickly? It’s all
academic musing, though, since I don’t know why I even bother to waste my
time thinking about him, and after tonight I am beyond done trying to be friendly
with him. I can’t believe I kissed him. That was the biggest possible mistake I
could have made, and the second I let my guard down he attacked, worse than
ever. I’m not stupid enough to trust that he won’t tell anyone, but I hope his
embarrassment over kissing “the virgin” will keep him quiet. I will deny it until
the grave if anyone asks.
I need to come up with a good explanation for my mother and Noah for my
behavior tonight. Not the kissing—they will never know about that—but that I
was at a party. Again. But I also really need to have a talk with Noah about
telling my mother things; if I’m an adult now, she doesn’t need to know what I
am doing all the time.
By the time I reach my dorm, my legs and feet hurt and I actually sigh in relief
as I turn the knob.
But then I nearly have a heart attack at the sight of Hardin sitting on my bed.

---

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I half scream when I finally regain my
composure.
“Where were you?” he asks calmly. “I drove around trying to find you for
almost two hours.”
What? “What? Why?” As in, if he was going to do that, why didn’t he just
offer to take me home earlier? More importantly, why didn’t I ask him to as soon
as I found out he hadn’t been drinking?
“I just don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be walking around at night,
alone.”
And because I can no longer read his expressions, and because Steph is who-
knows-where and I’m alone here with him, the person who seems to be the real
danger to me, all I can do is laugh. It’s a wild laugh, ragged and not really me.
And it’s definitely not because I find this funny, but because I’m too drained to
do anything else.
Hardin furrows his brows, frowning at me, which only makes me laugh
harder.
“Get out, Hardin—just get out!”
Hardin looks at me and runs his hands through his hair. Which is at least
something; in the little time that I have known this frustrating man that is Hardin
Scott, I have learned that he does that when he is either stressed or
uncomfortable. Right now I hope it’s both.
“Theresa, I’m—” he begins, but his words are cut off by a terrible pounding
on the door, and screaming: “Theresa! Theresa Young, you open this door!”
My mother. It’s my mother. At 6 a.m., when a boy is in my room.
Immediately I spring into action, as I always do when faced with her anger.
“Oh my God, Hardin, get in the closet,” I whisper-hiss and grab his arm, yanking
him up off the bed and surprising us both with my strength.
He looks down at me, amused. “I am not hiding in the closet. You’re