LACHLAN TOOK THE SEAT BESIDE ME, giving me a chin tip. I tipped right back.
He went about his business, like he did at the start of every class, setting up his laptop, stretching out his long-ass legs, ignoring me and everyone else while he waited for Professor Davis to commence his lecture.
“You know, you could have stayed with me on Monday, but you just left me with him.”
His head swiveled my way. “You get hurt?”
“No.”
“He say something you didn’t like?”
“No.” Yes. Always.
His big shoulder lifted. “You’re all right, girl.”
“He could’ve said something I didn’t like.”
His eyes held mine. “Didn’t, though. I think you can take care of yourself against that guy anyway.”
“Not all of us are seven feet tall, Lock.”
“You don’t need to be. That guy could hurt you, but I get the impression he’d saw off his arms before hurting a woman.”
“I don’t know about that,” I mumbled.
He chuckled, low and velvety. “Yeah, you do.”
Lachlan had taken the title of my seat neighbor for one hour, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. At first, I liked him because he was silent. Then because he occupied the chair Theo might have otherwise taken. And last, because he’d stuck by my side on the way out of class both Friday and Monday. Until he’d essentially handed me off to Theo, which was bullshit.
Lock knew less about Theo than I did. He’d used some bro-code instinct to declare him non-threatening. When you were a six foot six, iron teddy bear, I guess not too many people were threatening, so perhaps his impression was slightly skewed.
All that to say, Theo had walked me to my dorm on Monday. And annoyingly, he’d pinned me to yet another wall, as was his way, it seemed.
“Bad start to my day. Why’s it looking better now that I’m seeing you?”
“That sounds like something you should be asking yourself.”
Forget that those words did things to me. I wasn’t interested in the things the words were doing or the man who’d said them.
“I keep thinking about you lunging at me, Tiger.”
My nose crinkled. “I didn’t lunge. Wrong girl, dude.”
He lowered his face, bringing it close to mine. “Don’t call me dude.”
“I’m a skater. Everyone’s dude.”
He slowly shook his head, never looking away from me, not even for a second. “I know why you’re doing it. I don’t like it, and it will not stand.”
My breath came faster as desire and panic swirled in my chest. But my mouth ignored the panic, and as always, got me in trouble when I was trying to avoid it.
“Oh yeah? What will you do if I say it again…dude?”
In a flash, I was whirled around, cheek flattened to the brick wall, Theo, warm and dominant, at my back. One arm braced next to my head, the other moved his palm along my ribs and hip, skating over the outside curve of my ass.
“Why do you drive me crazy, Helen? Why are you in my head?”
His mouth spoke hot, frustrated words against my neck.
“Again, Theodore, that’s a question you really need to ask yourself.” I would have been more convincing without the quiver in my voice.
Or maybe I was convincing enough. One long, wet touch of his lips on my nape, and he backed up, turned me around, nodded, then walked away.
I did not like Theo, and I was still beating myself up for kissing him, because yeah, there was no denying I’d lunged at him. The only excuse I had was I’d been emotionally depleted from school and Luciana and Amir’s visit and stripping and all the stress and bad of the week. I wasn’t in the market for a boyfriend—definitely not one like Theo. No-strings fucking wasn’t my thing anymore either. So, yeah, I shouldn’t have been kissing random rich boys in their luxury cars—especially not ones with bitchy ex-girlfriends who clearly hadn’t retracted their hooks.
Near the end of class, I leaned into Lock. “You’re not going to protect me when we walk out of here today, are you?”
His attention remained on his laptop. “You don’t need it.”
“And if I want it?”
His head moved back and forth. “Not getting tangled in your drama, girl.”
“It’s Helen, not girl.”
“I know.”
“You’re annoying, Lock.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.” I leaned closer so Professor Davis didn’t beam me with his laser eyes for talking during his class. “You know I don’t want his attention.”
“If I knew that, I’d walk with you, keep him away.”
“Annoying,” I muttered.
His lips curved into a smirk as he shut down his laptop and clicked the lid shut. This was why my best friends growing up had been boys. They were easy to get, emotions didn’t run high, and yeah, they’d protect me if I picked a fight with someone I shouldn’t have. Or if one of my mom’s boyfriends got a little too handsy. Not that I couldn’t hold my own when shit went down, but my size put serious limitations on the pack of my punch.
I shouldn’t have worried anyway. At the end of class, Theo tore out of the room without a backward glance. Which was good. It was what I wanted. The game we’d been playing was getting old. It was high time it was over.
That was why I did my studying in my room on Thursday. Shakespeare didn’t have the same feeling when it was inside my head and not read aloud while cradled in the lap of a guy who smelled delicious and felt even better. But it was safer for everyone. I was at Savage U for a purpose—and it didn’t include wasting time and energy on things and people that didn’t matter.
By Friday, I was dragging. I’d worked three nights in an attempt to recoup the money I’d lost from trusting asshole Deacon, not to mention the boost of income I got through selling for Amir. I’d never been a big dealer or anything, but that extra couple hundred every week or two had sometimes meant whether I had food on the table, especially back in high school.
Since I was dragging, my patience was thin, which meant when I saw Theo lurking around the door at the end of Davis’s class, he took the brunt when I snapped.
“I’m not sucking your dick, Theodore. Why won’t you take a hint?” My voice…wasn’t quiet. Classmates behind me released a collective gasp. Beside me, Lock clucked his tongue. But I was done, you know? Ignoring their judgment, Lock’s “not cool, girl,” and Theo’s expression of pure shock, I strode from the building, needing my bed more than anything.
Theo fell into step beside me. Hands tucked in his pockets, fury emanated from his taut muscles. Any second, I expected to be shoved into a brick wall and shown that yeah, I was going to be sucking his dick.
“I don’t know what the fuck happened to you that led you to believe a guy paying you some attention and kindness is only out for getting his cock sucked, but that’s not me.”
His hard, furious tone had me stumbling more than his words. And when I stumbled, he reached out and caught me, steadying me. Theo stepped backward, off the path cutting through a courtyard between buildings, pulling me into the grass and under the shade of an ancient tree.
“Life happened,” I said simply, even though it was anything but simple. “Don’t pretend you wouldn’t take it if I offered. Or take it if you thought you could get away with it.”
The tendons at the side of his neck swelled. His face flushed. “Tell me you don’t believe that about me, Hells. Tell me you don’t believe I’d take something from you you didn’t freely give me. Tell me you know I wouldn’t do that.”
I met his eyes. His angry, sparking with rage, blue eyes. “Any man is capable of getting to the place where he’ll take what he isn’t given.”
He released me to drag his fingers through the sides of his black hair. “Helen…no.”
I lifted a shoulder. My guts were a writhing mess, but I didn’t let it play out on the surface.
“Was there a reason you were waiting for me?”
Exhaling heavily, Theo paced like a caged lion right in front of me. I waited him out when I could have been escaping because maybe guilt was seeping in a little. I didn’t know Theo, but from what he’d shown me, he wasn’t deserving of my wrath. Not yet, at least.
“Theo—”
He stopped abruptly, swinging his fury onto me. Even then, barely more than strangers, I could read him, and I knew that fury wasn’t mine. If the men who’d shaped me, turned me wary and skittish, were standing here with us, Theo would’ve unleashed on them. It was only us, though. There was nowhere for it to go. So he paced, tugged his hair, grunted for me to go on.
“I shouldn’t have said that.” I dragged my teeth along my lip. “I don’t know if it makes you feel better, but I think what I said reflects more poorly on me than you. I made myself look like a crazy bitch, and you, my poor, hapless victim.”
“Is that an apology?” he groused.
“Yeah.” I wasn’t much for saying sorry, but right was right, and I wasn’t that. “Sorry, Theodore.”
Theo stopped pacing and stared at me. He did it for so long, he made me twitchy. My fingers brushed over my hair, under my bottom lip, smoothed my shirt, and finally tucked away in my pockets when I couldn’t keep still.
Then he burst out laughing and grabbed me by the nape, pulling me into him. “I didn’t expect that, Little Tiger. Not in a million years.”
My hands were trapped in my pockets, otherwise, I definitely would have pushed him away. “Don’t kiss me.”
His head lowered. “Why do you think I’m going to kiss you?”
My eyes narrowed. “You’re getting closer and your eyes are twinkling at me.”
He chuckled, his warm breath ghosting over my lips. “You were just a complete dick to me. What makes you think I’d even want to kiss you?”
“Because you’re obviously obsessed with—”
His mouth came down hard on mine, his playful mood vanishing. Wet, deep, he kissed me like we were naked in bed, not the middle of campus where anyone and everyone could see. And I participated, because along with his playful mood, my brain function ceased. My hands magically came untucked from my pockets and wound up beneath the back of his T-shirt, exploring the smooth, hard planes of his back and hips.
We were so close, pressed together so tight, when Theo’s phone vibrated in his front pocket, I felt it too. It might as well have been a strike with a Taser zapping me back to reality. Except Theo didn’t let me jump back from him when I tore my mouth away. He kept his hand buried in my hair, the other claiming the small of my back.
“Don’t run,” he warned.
“You’re a liar. You said you didn’t want to kiss me.”
“Never said that.”
Maybe he hadn’t. I couldn’t think straight—and that was a problem. I needed my wits around this man.
His phone vibrated again.
“Someone wants to talk to you.”
He lowered his chin. “I’m talking to the only person I want to talk to right now. Whoever is texting can wait.”
I couldn’t handle the underlying sweetness of that. Not in a million years could I take that in and make it mine.
“So talk, Theodore.”
His kiss-swollen lips twitched. “I need your phone number.”
“Why?”
“So I can text when I’m out front of your dorm tomorrow.”
My forehead fell into his chin. “Oh. I forgot.”
He chuckled. “Yeah.”
“I’m an asshole.”
“You are an asshole, no argument.”
I raised my face, laughing in spite of myself. “Give me your phone.”
He let me go to dig his phone from his pocket, swiped his thumb on the screen to turn it on, then handed it over. At the top was a notification for a text.
Abby: It was so good to see you on Wed.
Okay. That didn’t feel great to see, but it wasn’t my business. I went to his contacts and typed in my name. Another text came in.
Abby: I miss you too, you know.
Too? Mmhmm. She probably wouldn’t miss him if she knew where his tongue had just been.
Abby: Come over tonight. We should talk. Or not. We don’t have to talk. My bed is cold, baby.
I tossed his phone at him, making him scramble to catch it. “My number’s in there. You should check your texts, dude. Your girlfriend’s all kinds of thirsty.”
He caught my arm before I could leave, holding me while he read his texts. I tapped my foot impatiently in the grass, wishing I was the size of my attitude. I would have busted free with just my little pinkie as a weapon.
Tucking his phone away, he slipped his hand around mine and began walking. Since I was attached to him, I had to go with him.
“Um—”
“I’m taking you to the dorm,” he gritted out.
“I know where it is.”
“Stop fighting me. I had you soft for a minute, Helen. You were kissing me back, wanting it like I did. Then it was gone. All that soft covered by spikes and metal.”
I tried to pull my hand away, even though it was futile. “You have a girlfriend.”
“I don’t.”
“Then you have a complication I’m not interested in being part of. I’ll take a ride from you if it’s still on the table, but I’m not going any deeper than that. If the ride’s off the table, tell me now so I can look up the bus schedule.”
His hand tightened around mine. “You know I wouldn’t do that.”
He didn’t deny he had a complication. But honestly, it was there in black and white. What was there to deny?
“Fine. I’ll accept the ride and be grateful for it. But I don’t want to walk through campus holding hands, I don’t want to be pressed up against buildings, and most importantly, I don’t want to be kissed. I made the mistake of opening that door last weekend. Now, I’m rectifying it. I’ve got way too much going on in my life to deal with your complications too. Way too much, Theodore.”
“Okay.” He didn’t let go of my hand.
“Okay what?” I wiggled my fingers, but it was a no go.
“Okay. I heard what you said. We’ll see.”
“What will we see?”
“We’ll see where this goes. Right now, I don’t agree. You can close the door all you want, but I have the fucking key, so expect me to open it right back up.”
I sighed, long and ragged. “Oh my fuck, you’re demented. You are, aren’t you? Did a screw get knocked loose when you were performing homoerotic acts disguised as a sport or have you always been this way?”
That made him snort. “You’re calling wrestling homoerotic?”
Turning my head to look at him, I raised my brows. “Come on, dude. I saw the video where the guy had his face right in the other guy’s boner. It was hot, and if you try to convince me, that’s not the point of wrestling, I’ll laugh. Plus, the outfits? Spandex, two young, fit guys grabbing each other? I’m not buying it.”
Any other guy would have been pissed, but Theo laughed harder, letting go of my hand to wrap his arm around my shoulders and pull me deep into his side. And I liked it. Jesus, I liked hearing him laugh and having his arm around me like that.
Which meant I had to push him away. I couldn’t like it. I had no room for twinkly eyes or kissing under ancient trees or complications. Theo was all those and more—and I. Just. Could. Not. Do. It.
Even though a small, sparkly heart-shaped part of me wished I could.
I slipped from beneath his arm. He let me do it, probably because we were at my dorm. Most likely also because he knew he’d have me for hours tomorrow, and I’d have to be nice to him or he could leave me in L.A.
“Bye, Tiger,” he called after me.
Scrambling up the steps, I waved over my shoulder. I could still hear his low, lovely chuckle as I swiped my card to enter the dorm.
The faint buzz my interaction with Theo had given me evaporated when I entered my suite to find Elena lounging on the couch. Zadie was there too, a book in her lap in the armchair.
Elena’s eagle eyes landed on me immediately. “My, my, our little Helen is blushing. Were you having a rendezvous with your criminal boyfriend in the bushes again?”
I scoffed and tossed my skateboard next to the door. “Hi, Zadie. There’s no way you’re doing homework on a Friday.”
She was chewing on the corner of her lip. “I am. But only because if I get it all done tonight, I won’t have to think about school until Monday.”
“Genius,” Elena supplied. “If I didn’t have plans in an hour, I’d join you. Maybe next weekend.”
“Really?” Zadie asked.
“Mmhmm.” Elena nodded. “Lazy Sundays are my favorite, but I can get on board with lazy Saturdays too.”
“Well, I do other things, so—”
Elena sliced her perfectly manicured nails through the air. “Shhh…shhh. I know you probably volunteer to sew blankets for orphans or plant trees or something, but that’s not me. And you know, they say laziness is next to godliness.”
Zadie’s mouth fell open, but I shook my head. If Elena wanted to believe that was the saying, we should let her have it.
I went to the kitchenette, grabbed a soda from the mini-fridge, cracked it open, then started for my room. As much as I liked Zadie, I needed a nap before I faced another night at Savage Beauties. Plus…well, Elena.
“I’m taking a nap.” I hit the frame of my door.
“Getting ready for a long night at the strip club?” Elena asked.
I stopped, froze, my eyes darting to Zadie. Her cheeks bloomed with color. She had told our third, unwanted roommate where I worked. I was none too pleased. And disappointed. She’d always given me the impression of being real and loyal.
“Wow, Z.”
Zadie’s eyes went round, her pretty face the picture of innocence.
Elena untucked her legs and rose from the couch. “Oh, come off it. Zadie didn’t say shit. I used context clues to figure you out, girl. Skanky outfit, stack of one-dollar bills on your nightstand. You smell like perfume and desperation when you leave, and you come back with the scent of blue balls and old-man sweat clinging to you like a cloud. That reads strip club to me. You just confirmed it.”
“I waitress,” I said flatly. “But I think it’s interesting you so closely study me. Consider discussing that with your therapist.”
Elena pursed her lips. “Oooh, joking about mental health is such a sick burn.”
“And putting down sex work when you were born with a silver spoon crammed up your lily-white ass is about as privileged and narrow minded as it comes.”
I closed my door more gently than I thought myself capable and leaned heavy against it, tired down to my bones, and not from lack of sleep. Every day was a fight. It had been that way my whole life. Yeah, I brought some of it on myself. I knew that. I just didn’t know how to lower my fists. I’d give a lot for a peaceful living situation, but simply looking at Elena’s perfect, bitchtastic face made me pissy.
I could try. Maybe.
Throwing myself on my bed, I put my soda on my nightstand and took out my phone. If I was going to do some deep introspection, I needed company for that. I sent a text to my girl Penelope, who happened to be Elena’s much nicer cousin and my best friend Gabe’s girlfriend.
Me: How do I live with Elena without murdering her?
Pen: Hi, babe.
Me: Hey, girlie. Now, advice.
Pen: Elena isn’t so different from you.
Me: What did I do to you to make you hate me this way?
Pen: I’m serious! She’s fiercely loyal, tough as nails, kinda scary, and wicked smart. Like you, Hells.
Me: Ugh.
Pen: Love you, babe, but she’s the other side of your coin.
Me: All right. Done with that line of convo. I need help.
Pen: Anything. BTW, Gabe’s here reading over my shoulder. He’s still dying that you and El are roommates.
Me: Tell Gabe to go fuck himself.
Pen: I would never! (he says to tell you he loves you endlessly)
Me: Ugh, same. Anyway, the help I need is how do I stop fighting?
Pen: Explain.
Me: There’s a guy. Our lips keep touching. And every fucking time, I push him away. I don’t even know if I want to push him away, but I can’t stop doing it.
Pen: This is Gabe. You kissed a boy?!?!?
Me: Give Pen the phone back. Adults are speaking!
Gabe: Nope. You don’t need to be nice, boo. If the dude is a real man, he wants you, he’ll keep coming back. He gets scared by a little bitchy attitude, he’s a pencil dick. My Pen was a bitchy angel to me, but she let me touch her legs, so it didn’t deter me. I liked the abuse.
Laughing, I dropped my phone on my stomach. No one was like Gabriel fucking Fuller. Just then, I was homesick for the days we skinned our knees in the skate park, stole money from our parents to buy popsicles from the ice cream man, and generally wreaked havoc around Savage River together. I was glad he and Pen had gotten out and were living the good life, but I missed the hell out of my boy.
Me: There’s wisdom somewhere in that insanity. I know there is.
Gabe: Damn straight, Hells. Am I gonna meet this boy next weekend?
Me: Next weekend? What?!?
Gabe: Wouldn’t miss my girl’s birthday. Me and Pen, Bash and Grace, Bex and Ash—we’re all coming to SR. Gonna flip the bird to your teen years, boo. Now, I repeat, will I be meeting pencil dick?
Me: Ahhh! What?? I’m so excited. Also, no. No meeting the boy, dick size yet to be determined. I don’t even know how I feel about him. He’s got complications.
Gabe: Aw, you’re no fun.
Pen: I got my phone back. Ignore Gabe. If you think the guy is safe, maybe try to have one conversation without fighting and see how it feels. If he doesn’t make you feel safe, then ditch him, Hells. You’re too rad to waste time with unworthy boys.
Me: K. Sound advice. I’ll try. Thanks for being a real one, Penelope. Kick Gabe’s shins for me.
Pen: Never. Love you, girlie.
Me: Love you too.
I tossed my phone aside and sipped my soda. A whole conversation without fighting? Theo and I hadn’t had one of those. I shouldn’t have been contemplating it. He had a girl who clearly wasn’t over him. A girl who matched his golden-god status.
Complicated.
But I hadn’t kissed anyone in a year and a half. There was something about Theo that had made me break my fast. Something beyond his hotness. It was still up in the air what it was.
Tomorrow, I’d be nice to Theo, then we’d see.
