“She’s in her room—”

I charge forward, only to be intercepted by the petite brunette. “Hold on a second,” Hannah orders, planting her palm against my chest. “You’re not seeing her until you tell me what the hell is going on.”

“You tell me,” I snap impatiently. “You’re the one who called me at one a.m. and told me to come over because Allie needs me. What happened?”

“Sean showed up,” Garrett says grimly. “Drunk and pounding on the door and demanding to talk to her. I let him in—”

“You let him in?” I roar.

“She told me to,” he mutters. “Said she could handle him.”

Hannah speaks up angrily. “You should’ve heard the way he was shouting her. Calling her a slut and saying she has STDs—”

What the fuck?

Fury sizzles up my spine, ripped from my throat in the form of a menacing growl. “Get out of my way,” I tell Hannah.

“Dean,” she protests as I sprint toward the short hallway. “What are you even doing here—”

The thump of my footsteps drowns out the rest of that sentence. I burst into Allie’s bedroom, then skid to a stop when I find her curled up on the bed. She lifts her head at my entrance, and the desolate look in her big blue eyes shreds my heart to pieces.

“Baby,” I say softly.

A startled gasp sounds from the door. Gritting my teeth, I spin on my heel and proceed to slam the door in Hannah and Garrett’s astonished faces. They don’t exist to me right now. Only Allie does, and I’m on the bed before she can blink, drawing her into my arms and cocooning her in them. She buries her face against my chest, and I can feel her trembling.

“What happened?”

“Sean was here.” The answer is muffled against my hoodie.

“I know, G told me. But why was he here?” A curse slips out when I remember our run-in with Paulson this morning. “His frat brother… Paulson told him he saw us together?”

Her nod bumps her head on my collarbone.

“Asshole,” I mutter. Then I take a breath and smooth my hand over her silky hair. “I take it Sean was pissed?”

“He…” Her voice cracks. “He called me a disease-ridden whore.”

Red-hot fury slams into me like a crosscheck to the chest. It takes every ounce of strength to push it away, to banish it from my body. I want to kill the bastard for saying that to her.

“You…are not…” I take another breath “…a disease-ridden whore. Do you hear me, baby? You are not that. Ever. I don’t know why that son of a bitch would even—”

“Because of you,” she whispers.

My hands clench into fists against her shoulders. “What?”

“He thinks you’re riddled with STDs because you…have an active sex life—”

“I’m clean,” I interrupt. My voice is low, rippling with anxiety. Fuck, I really hope she believes me right now. “I’ve never had unprotected sex in my life, Allie. I got tested before the season started, but I can do it again if you—” I stop. Fuck that. I’ll do it even if she doesn’t ask me to, just to squash any seed of doubt that piece of shit Sean might have planted in her head.

“I trust you, Dean. I know you’re safe, okay? It wasn’t the disease part that upset me. It was the other part. The way he looked at me…” Her small body shudders. “He was so disgusted. It’s like in that moment, he truly saw me as a whore and he hated me for it.”

The fissure in my heart cracks wide open, sending jagged shards to my gut. Sean should be thanking his lucky stars he’s not here right now. I want to wrap my fingers around his throat and squeeze the life out of him.

“Baby…” I swallow my rage. “Baby, look at me.”

She slowly raises her eyes to mine.

“I don’t give a shit what Sean says, or what he thinks—you didn’t do a goddamn thing to deserve his verbal attack, you got it? You’re not a whore. You’re…” Perfect, I almost say, but I don’t get the chance, because she’s trembling again.

“Then why do I feel like one?” She blinks rapidly, as if she’s trying not to cry. “God. I hate this. I told you, I’m not cut out for casual sex.”

My palms grow damp. I don’t want her to continue. I’m too terrified of what she’s going to say.

“I’m not sure I can do this anymore.”

Fuck.

“It’s too confusing…sleeping with you when we’re not actually together—”

“We’re together,” I bite out.

She startles. “What?”

It feels like someone jammed a handful of gravel in my throat. I gulp through it. “We’re together,” I repeat.

She looks baffled. “We…why?”

“Because we are.” A nonsensical response, but it’s all I’ve got. I don’t want this to end. I can’t explain why, but I just know I don’t want this to fucking end.

“You want…” The groove in her forehead deepens. “You want to be with me?”

My heartbeat grows erratic. I haven’t had a conversation like this with a girl in years. Not since Miranda. But Allie isn’t Miranda. Allie is…she’s…fuck, I can’t make sense of my jumbled thoughts. Except for one. The bone-deep certainty that I can’t let this end.

“Dean?”

I tighten my hold on her, burying my face in the crook of her neck. “I want to be with you,” I mumble. “So that means we’re fucking together, okay?”

Shaky laughter tickles my cheek. “You’re freaking me out right now.”

“I’m freaking myself out.” Groaning, I lift my head and cup her delicate chin with both hands. “Why did you ask Wellsy to call me?”

Allie falters. “Because…” She bites her lip. “Because I wanted you to tell me that Sean is wrong. Because I needed…” She stumbles again, as if she’s as freaked out by this as I am. Her uncertainty only makes me more certain.

I rub my thumb along the seam of her lips, soothing the tiny indentation she made with her teeth. “You want it too. To be with me?”

She’s quiet for so long that I’m nervous again. Then she nods.