Crave Your Mercy (Mercy Academy, Book 2)

Caroline

“Shit!” Blake startles upright and then glances over his shoulder. He does a double take, his eyes widening before he scrambles up out of his seat to face me. “Caroline? What are you doing here? Is this a dream?” His bottle is still tightly gripped in one hand while the other smooths invisible wrinkles out of his football jersey. The bright red numbers one and five plastered on the front give me pause for a second, although I’m not sure why before I’m distracted by the twelve solid inches that I swear my brother’s best friend has grown since I last saw him in the summer. Or maybe I’ve just been surrounded by nerdy scholars at Hawthorne, which is not known for its athletic programs that are few and far between. “Aren’t you supposed to be at Hawthorne?” he asks, and I inwardly cringe at the verbal reminder of my alma mater where I’m a complete failure. 
“I came home for the weekend,” I reply with a shrug. “And I saw Royal outside earlier. He invited me to come celebrate your birthday and the holiday intended for women to dress in the least amount of clothing possible.” I swipe my palm along the front of my blue and red cheerleading top and pleated skirt, and Blake’s eyes follow it all the way down. 
“Oh. Well, um, good. I, mean, you look good,” he says. 
“You too,” I reply. “You’re taller than I remember.” 
“Ah, thanks I guess?” 
“So, what are you doing up here all alone on your birthday?” I ask him. 
“I’m not really in the mood to celebrate,” he says, shoulders deflating before he turns around and retakes his seat. He drinks a swig from the bottle and adds, “Royal said it was too late to cancel the party, so I’m just avoiding it.” 
“Everything okay?” I ask as I take a seat in the empty chair next to his and set my purse down at my feet. While I think I know what he’s upset about, I don’t want to just blurt out that I know about his parents. 
He looks over at me again for several silent moments before he glances away again. “Not really, no. My parents are getting divorced.” 
“That sucks. I’m so sorry,” I tell him, reaching over to rest my hand on his to give it a squeeze. “Aric didn’t tell me.” 
“It’s sort of old news,” Blake responds. “Anyway, it sucks and all, but today it just hit me a little harder I guess since they’re still not speaking and I’m sort of caught in the middle.” 
“That sounds awful,” I say because I couldn’t imagine my parents splitting up. It would be devastating to see them arguing and ending their marriage, along with blowing up the family I’ve always had. 
“Sorry, the alcohol makes me even more depressed. You don’t have to hang out with me out of pity,” Blake says when he takes another swig. 
“Here, I’ll trade you.” Leaning over, I dig through my purse to find his messily wrapped gift in sparkly silver paper. Taking the bottle from his hands, I exchange it for the package. 
“What’s this?” Blake asks as he spins it around. 
“Your birthday present.” 
“You didn’t have to get me anything,” he says. 
“Of course I did. And I guarantee it will put you in a better mood!” 
“Oh yeah?” he asks with a near smile on his face before he tears into it. While he’s working on ripping the paper off, I take a few big gulps of his tequila to try and wash down my epic failure. 
“Gummy bears?” he says, holding the package up with an arched eyebrow. “So, you do still think of me as a kid.” 
“What? No, I don’t!” I argue. “Those are special gummy bears. Ones that aren’t exactly legal…” 
His blue eyes that look black out on the dark balcony widen. “You’re kidding. They’re cannabis gummies?” 
“Yep! Happy birthday!” 
“Wow. Thanks, Caroline. You’re the best,” he says while tearing open the plastic bag to get to the colorful bears. He puts several in his mouth and then holds the bag out toward me. “Want one?” 
“If you don’t mind sharing?” 
“Help yourself. I’ve already smoked a joint with Royal,” Blake replies, so I scoop out a few and chew on them one at a time. “So, how’s school going?” he asks. 
“Honestly? Not very well,” I admit after swallowing the first bear. 
“Really? Why not?” 
“I’m, ah, flunking out actually,” I say with a wince, hating to admit that aloud to anyone. 
“You’re flunking?” he repeats. 
“Yep. That’s why I came home this weekend, to tell my parents I need to drop four out of five courses.”
“Wow.” 
“Don’t tell anyone, okay? I don’t want Aric to know before my parents.” 
“You don’t have to worry about me talking to him,” Blake mutters while popping a red and yellow bear into his mouth. 
“Thanks,” I reply. “I was just so excited to leave home and go to college that it never occurred to me how much hard work it would be once I got there.” 
“Yeah?” he asks. “I still haven’t decided where I’m going next fall. My dad has been insisting I go to Duke like he did, but I don’t even have any fucking idea what I’m going to major in.” 
“That makes two of us,” I say, holding up the peace sign. “My professor suggested I switch from pre-med to statistics since that’s the only class I’m not failing.” 
“Statistics?” Blake repeats, and then both of us are laughing. 
“How stupid, right? What do statisticians even do?” 
“No clue,” he says, followed by another chuckle. “Guess you could keep track of football stats for the pros.” 
After we laugh for so long I can’t even remember what was so funny to begin with, Blake stands up and shoves the rest of the gummies down into his jean pocket. “I hate it, but I better get my ass downstairs and at least make an appearance since it’s my party before Royal comes to drag me down there.” 
“Yeah,” I agree as I stand up too. I set the tequila bottle down to scoop up my purse from the ground. 
“Thanks for coming up and talking to me,” he says as he leads the way into his bedroom. “You didn’t have to do that.” 
“I wanted to,” I tell him honestly. “I’ve never forgotten that night you were there for me when I was having a shitty time.” 
“Oh yeah?” he asks with a smile. 
“Yeah,” I respond with my own grin. “And, by the way, I’m still searching for my first time having good sex.” 
“You’re kidding?” Blake says as he turns around to face me. 
“Nope,” I tell him with a shake of my head and a giggle. Poking my finger at his chest, I say, “Fourteen. I’ve been with fourteen guys who were so awful that I didn’t go back for seconds. I’ve had fourteen various yet equally awful types of bad sex.” 
“Maybe…maybe fifteen will finally be good for you,” he says. 
“Fifteen?” I ask and then my index finger is tracing the numbers on his jersey unable to ignore the hard stomach underneath the material. “One and five is…fifteen.” 
“Ah, yeah, Caroline. I’m not sure if math is your major either,” Blake tells me with a chuckle. 
“You are number fifteen!” I point out. I swear it’s like some sort of sign from the universe. It’s fate. I’m dressed as a cheerleader and he’s a football player wearing the next number up…
“Uh, yeah. I’ve worn this number since freshman year.” 
“Hmm. I bet you would look even better not wearing number fifteen,” I tell him as I slip my palms up underneath his jersey and undershirt to touch his warm, flat stomach that’s etched into a six pack and smooth other than a light dusting of hair around the waistband of his jeans. 
“Oh god, that feels good,” Blake groans from above me. He’s really tall when I’m standing right in front of him with my hands moving up to his chest and then down his stomach again, the muscles tightening and rippling underneath my palms. I don’t want to just feel his skin; I want to see his hard body too, so I lift the shirts up and off. Well, I try to get them off, but they sort of get stuck around the hat on his head. I don’t even wait for him to get the material untangled before my tongue is licking a path down the center of his chest, eager to taste him.

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