Kissing Princeton Charming (The Princeton Charming Series Book 1) Read online

  My boss Janice walks by, snapping her fingers. “Charlotte,” she hisses. “I pay you to work the room, not fraternize with the guests.”

  Spencer stands up straighter, turning his grin to Janice, who immediately falls under his spell. “You’re Janice Walker, right?”

  Obviously frazzled, she lets him take her hand and stutters out a yes.

  “I wanted to compliment you. The event is flawless.” The smile he gives her is different than the one he turned on me. More plastic, like he’s playing a role. “My parents will be pleased.”

  “Wonderful to hear, Mr. Beckett. I—”

  “You wouldn’t mind giving me and...” He grins at me when he says my name. “Charlotte, a few minutes alone.”

  “Oh, of course not. Anything else you need, Mr. Beckett, just let me know.” Her smile is tight, but she quickly leaves us.

  Damn. I know I’m in trouble when he even has my boss scurrying away to do his bidding. I turn back to my tray, wishing at the same time that he would both go away and come closer. It’s been so long since I’ve had undivided attention from a man. Mostly because I don’t have time in my life for guys. For parties. For fun.

  Maybe it’s pathetic, but it feels good to be under his gaze. And even if all he wants is to get in my pants, it gives me a thrill to have the campus hottie’s interest for a moment.

  “So, Charlie,” he says, using a nickname that only my closest friends and parents are allowed to call me. “When do you get off?”

  I turn back to him and muster up all my self-preservation. His proximity has my skin prickling with heat. But I lead with my mind, rarely my heart, and I don’t intend on changing that for Spencer Beckett of all people.

  “Why are you doing this?” I ask him, genuinely curious and honestly confused. He could take home any woman here.

  “Doing what?” His words are slurred. Yeah, he’s drunk. Is that why he’s all over me? It’s not like he’s ever noticed me before. Not that I’ve really given him a chance, I prefer the shadows...and this man lives in the sun.

  I sigh. “Being so insistent.”

  “Because I like you.” His grin is infectious.

  He’s playing you, Charlie.

  “You don’t know me.”

  “But I want to? You’re...” He leans in, and I can smell his cologne, rich and woody, and reminding me of why the man is dangerous. He’s just another trust fund brat who’s been handed everything to him on a silver platter. “Gorgeous.”

  “You said that already.” I set a hand on my hip, not interested in his objectification of me, even though I am doing the exact same thing. He is so much sexier up close. I’ve only ever seen him at a distance. Now though, he is right here, close enough to kiss.

  Do not think about kissing Spencer Beckett, my brain warns, even though my body is already humming with the possibilities.

  And when he reaches out and traces my jaw with the pad of his thumb, I can’t help the shiver of need that races through me -- and he sees it.

  Shit.

  He smiles with a kind of arrogance only money can buy, but the promise of pleasure in his eyes makes me fall a little farther under his spell.

  Damn you, Spencer Beckett.

  “You want me, Charlie,” he practically purrs, his voice smooth and velvety, making my core clench with need.

  “My name’s Charlotte.”

  “Charlie seems more appropriate. It suits you. Strong. Stubborn.” He holds my chin between his fingers and leans closer. “Yeah, you’re definitely a Charlie.” The nickname rolls off his lips. Lips that are way too close to mine now. “Put that tray down, Charlie, and come with me.”

  “I-I’m working.” I hate that I stutter, that even I can hear the give in my words. Hate that I’m even considering it.

  “What do they pay you here? I’ll double it. Shit, I’ll triple it. Just leave with me now.”

  Did he really just say that? Proposition me like he can pay me for sex.

  When I reach for the glass, I know I’m going to regret it, but the normal, rational part of my brain that has gotten me this far in life, seems to have shut down around him.

  I tell myself that it’s his proposition that has me flinging the full glass for champagne in his face -- but that’s a lie. It’s because I’m infuriated with myself. Everything about him should have me stepping away, but my body is begging me to step closer. Practically demanding I lean to his offer.

  I don’t trust myself.

  So instead I throw the liquid gold in his face.

  “Oh my God,” Janice is back, shocked and horrified.

  Honestly, I’m a little horrified too. I’m not the type to act reckless and let my emotions get the best of me.

  I’m easy going. I’m practical. The girl with a library card, who rides a bicycle around campus because cars are expensive, and who basically lives in my roommate Daphne’s wardrobe because she likes to share and I hate to shop.

  This. Is. Not. Me.

  Throwing drinks in the face of The Spencer Beckett when I’m on the clock at a job that is essential to my survival at an Ivy League school, is not the way my father raised me.

  “Charlotte Hayes,” Janice seethes. “Come with me. Now.” She grabs me by the arm and I barely have time to set my unsteady tray of champagne flutes down on the table before she’s dragging me to the kitchen.

  I look over my shoulder, my gaze meeting Spencer’s. To my shock, he doesn’t look angry.

  He looks turned on.

  And that pisses me off even more.

  Apparently the easy going girl who rolls with the punches has left the building for the night. My face is streaked in tears and my tote bag rests heavy on my shoulders as I leave through the back door of the gala.

  Janice fired me. Deserving? Maybe. Devastating? Absolutely.

  But what was I supposed to do? Let that...that arrogant, privileged jerk suggest that he could pay for a night with me. Not in a thousand years. No matter how desperate I am. Which after tonight’s little fiasco is pretty desperate.

  It’s late November, I’ve only been back to school for a few days since returning from Thanksgiving break. I wanted to go home even though the trip was going to be short. I missed Mom so badly and wanted to make her and Dad a Thanksgiving meal, knowing she wasn’t well enough to do it herself.

  I’m glad I flew home to Michigan. Mom was sicker than she let on over the phone, and I needed to see it for myself so I could know how to support her. But now, as the icy winter air sweeps over me, I feel numb and doubt my choice. The plane ticket home was the last of my savings, and now that I’m out of a job I’m not sure how I’m going to manage to get back home for Christmas.

  I push down the knit hat on my head and dig in my tote for my gloves. My bicycle is across the street, and I shove my hands in the mittens as I step off the curb.

  “Charlie!” a voice slices through the dark, icy night, and I’m pulled back to the sidewalk just as an SUV with an Uber sticker in the windshield barrels past me.

  “Oh,” I cry out, my gloves swept into the wind as I’m pulled back, and I sink against the body of the man who saved me. Startled, I cling to him for a second. “Tha-thank you!”

  I turn, his arms wrapping around me, and I look up, needing to see who my knight in shining armor is.

  The man staring down at me is no knight.

  It’s Princeton Charming.

  Of course it is.

  “It’s not midnight, Charlie. You don’t need to run away from me so fast.”

  “You have the worst lines,” I say, trying to still my heart. The rush of the near collision has me gasping, and I’m still in his arms.

  “You like it though,” he says with a chuckle. He holds onto me without any intention of letting go. I don’t mind. In this exact moment, I want to be held.

  Just not by Spencer Beckett.

  “What I like is being treated like a human being, not a piece of meat you think you can buy.” I step back, my resolve strengthening
as I remember his earlier comment.

  “What?” He looks completely confused.

  “You offered to pay me...for sex,” I remind him.

  “Shit. No.” He winces and rubs the back of his neck. “That’s not what I meant. Charlie, I—”

  “Look, you’ve already done enough tonight.” Stupid tears gather in my eyes because I needed that damn paycheck.

  I’m about to turn, but he grabs my elbow. His arrogance is gone when I meet his concerned gaze, and my head spins again with his touch. He smells like leather and scotch and spice. It’s not a smell I know well, but it’s one I like. A lot. Even though I know, I shouldn’t.

  He’s right, I do have a chip on my shoulder. A big one. Because I know people like him. They take, make demands, think every good thing is their privilege, never caring about who they hurt to climb to the top of whatever social ladder they’re climbing.

  Just like the men at the banks who refused to give my dad a loan to help pay for my mom’s medical expenses.

  Just like the insurance company that decided to cancel their plan when they found out she was sick.

  Just like all the people on this damn campus who have no idea what it’s like to hold two part-time jobs while trying to keep up their academic performance so they don’t lose their scholarship.

  Despite my attempt to blink them back, big, hot tears stream down my cheeks.

  “Hey,” Spencer says.

  Suddenly my face is being held by the most sought-after man on campus, and he uses his thumbs to wipe away my tears. God, those blue eyes, they stare down at me with compassion and lust, and the promise of a night filled with more pleasure than I’ve ever experienced.

  “Jobs come and go, right?” he says easily. “It’s not the end of the world. I bet you hated it anyway.”

  The words cut through the magic of the moment, and I step back. “Actually, in the real world that isn’t how jobs work. I needed that job.”

  “Let me fix things—”

  “By what? Propositioning me again?” I laugh, but there’s no humor in it. I just need to get away from him. A bike isn’t fast enough. But there’s a cab coming down the street, and I wave for it to stop, but when I step off the curb as the car approaches, my heel sinks into a drain grate, and when I lift my foot it comes away shoeless. “Damn it.”

  “Here, let me help…” He leans down the same time I do to retrieve the shoe and our foreheads collide.

  “I don’t...” I try to yank the shoe out, but it won’t budge. “...need...your...” The shoe flies free and I fly backward with it, once again straight into oncoming traffic, and I cry out, “Help.”

  “Got you.” I’m pulled back into his arms, icy water spraying us from the cab that squeals its tires to a stop a couple feet away.

  “Jesus, lady,” the cab driver yells through the half-open window. “You trying to get yourself killed?”

  On shaky legs, I manage to stand. I reach for the door handle of the taxi, practically throwing myself in the car.

  “Charlie,” he calls out as I slam the door.

  Humiliated, frustrated, and an emotional wreck, I don’t turn to meet his gaze, not until the cab starts to take off. And when I do, I see Spencer Beckett’s perfect frame disappearing behind me, and I groan when I see what he’s holding in his right hand.

  My damn shoe.

  3

  Spencer

  Despite how hard I try, I can’t get the girl out of my head. Maybe it’s because I’ve had her shoe sitting on my nightstand for the past week, begging me to find its owner, like a freaking Cinderella story.

  But this is no fairy tale. And even though I’ve cashed in on my nickname, I’m sure as hell no Prince Charming. I’m the antithesis of a hero. The guy who fucks everything up. The deadbeat who’ll never be able to fill his older brother’s shoes.

  At least according to my dad.

  The man likes to remind me whenever he’s had too many bourbons that it should have been me who drove that car over the cliff and not Ethan.

  Fucked up? Yeah. But hearing shit like that screws with a person’s mind. Which is why when my phone vibrates and I see my mom’s number pop up on the screen, I groan inwardly.

  But ignoring the woman isn’t an option. She’ll just keep calling, or worse, hop in her private jet and fly to see me.

  “Hey, Mom.” I lean against my dresser and pick up the shoe -- Charlie’s shoe. I can’t help but smile thinking that I still have a piece of her. Even if that piece can be replicated at any big box store for less than ten dollars.

  My mother’s voice is raised an octave and I can hear the outrage seething through her words. “Janice just called me—”

  “Janice?”

  “The event organizer for last weekend's Gala. She was apologizing profusely, said one of her waitresses attacked you—”

  “Charlie didn’t attack me.”

  There’s a short pause. “You know the girl?”

  No. But I want to. More than I care to admit. “Everything is fine.”

  “Everything is not fine if one of the staff humiliated you.”

  “She didn’t—”

  “I’ve made sure she’s fired, and she won’t be getting a job anywhere—”

  “Mom.” Frustration seeps into my words. “It was me who was out of line.”

  Her words come out slow, filled with suspicion when she asks, “Out of line how?”

  “Charlie...” I catch my reflection in the mirror and wince at the man who stares back at me. A man who falls into all the categories the girl tagged me in. Privileged. Arrogant. Selfish. Asshole. “She thought I propositioned her.”

  My mom sucks in an outraged breath. “My God, Spencer. How could you?”

  “I didn’t. It was a misunderstanding.”

  “You can’t afford those kinds of misunderstandings. If the girl knows who you are, and she brings this forward, she could ruin your reputation.”

  “You mean Dad’s reputation. That’s what you’re really worried about.”

  “Spencer Thomason Beckett, how dare you speak to me like that?”

  “Sorry.” I rub my forehead. “I’ll deal with it. The girl won’t be a problem.”

  There’s a short pause before my mother sighs, and her voice returns to its normal sweet cadence which she’s perfected over the years being a politician’s wife. “Don’t you think it’s time you settled down? I was talking with the Harringtons yesterday and they told me that Winslow—”

  “Mom.”

  “You care about her, I know you do.”

  Of course I do. We’ve known each other since we were still in diapers, she’s like family. But I have no intention of making the woman my wife, no matter how happy it would make my mom.

  “At some point, you’re going to have to settle down.”

  Not likely.

  “If I ever do, Mom. It’ll be my choice.”

  “You were always such a stubborn child. Why can’t you be more like...”

  I hear her unspoken word - Ethan.

  There are moments when I know she forgets he’s gone. And I hear it now. The small gasp on the other line as his loss hits her. Grief infuses the silence between us.

  “Mom?”

  She sniffs, and says softly, “Yes?”

  “I love you.”

  More silence, and when she speaks again, her tone is cold, callous. “Just remember who you are, Spencer. You’re a Beckett. Act like one.”

  She ends the call, and I shove my phone back in my pocket, wishing that my name didn’t feel like a noose around my neck or a damn curse.

  I know she’s right though. I am a Beckett. Even if my family is dysfunctional, they’re still my family. And after everything we’ve gone through in losing Ethan, I refuse to give my parents another reason to mourn.

  Besides being reminded of my familial duty, talking to my mom gave me an idea. I call Janice, the event coordinator, and after several minutes of smooth talking, I’m able to convince her to op
en Charlie’s file for me. Phone number, address, and even a last name, completely confidential and illegal, but I guess there are some benefits to being a Beckett.

  One thing I’m not able to do is get her her job back.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Beckett, but your mother insisted—”

  “Yeah, I get it.” I may have the name, but it’s my parents who have the power.

  Even over me.

  They still have power over my finances, and while I have some of my own money that my grandfather left me, it’s barely a drop in the ocean of the Beckett fortune.

  “Thank you for your help, Janice,” I say. “And I’d appreciate if you’d keep this call between us.”

  “Of course.” I can hear the nerves in her voice before she hangs up. My mother must have laid into her good.

  I’ve been on the receiving end of the woman’s lectures enough times that I know how intimidating she can be.

  Both my parents thrive on control. Especially over their children. Ethan and Ava were always better at accepting it. Me? There’s always been an itch inside me wanting to rebel.

  I shouldn’t complain. What my mother and father lacked in parental love, they made up for in things.

  Gifts. Toys. Anything I want, I always got.

  Even this place.

  I live in a townhouse in Palmer Square. After living on campus for my freshman year, my needs required more than the typical college experience. I needed a proper bedroom to bring home my conquests.

  A bedroom that to my aching cock’s dismay hasn’t seen any action lately. Even before I couldn’t get Charlie out of my head. The whole one-night stand, meaningless sex thing has just gotten old. Not that I’m looking for anything serious.

  Shit, I don’t even know what I’m looking for. I just know I’m tired of feeling numb. And the only thing that’s made me feel alive in a long time is the girl with the eyes too big for her head, and a tongue sharper than an obsidian blade.

  Charlie lives on campus, so that’s exactly where I head after tucking her shoe in my messenger bag.

  After parking my Mercedes-AMG, I turn toward the senior dorms, more than ready to find the girl I’ve been thinking about for days.