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I sat up straighter. “I’m okay. I just didn’t get great sleep last night.”
My mom pursed her lips, looking down at me in that motherly way of hers—like I didn’t know what I was talking about, but she’d let me go on believing I did. “Just promise you’ll tell me if it feels like you can’t handle it anymore, okay?”
I smiled. “I will, mom. I promise.”
I had no intentions of giving in—not to my symptoms or Tristan.
After lunch, I found a shaded spot beneath a tree in the center of the school’s courtyard to sit. I pulled the camera out of my book bag and tried messing with some of the settings we’d learned about today. I trained the camera on a trash can, frequently pulling it away from my eye to tap through menus on the digital screen, then checking the results.
I tried aiming it in a darker spot. I picked a random corridor off the courtyard and squinted down the lens. I almost jerked the camera in another direction when I realized I was aiming it straight at a student. But then I recognized him. It was Cassian Stone, and he was pouring something from a small flask into a clear plastic water bottle.
I pulled the camera down and stared as hard as I could at a tree, then lifted the camera to make a show of the fact that I was just photographing random things—not him.
But a moment later, he was towering over me. He reached down and snatched the camera from my hands so hard that the strap holding it to my neck snapped. I reeled forward, having to grab the wheels of my chair to stop myself from rolling straight into him with the force of it.
I knew what he was going to say. He’d tell me to delete the pictures I took of him, and I’d happily show him that I hadn’t taken any. It was going to be okay. I just—
With a casual toss of his arm, he slammed the camera into the ground, where it crunched expensively into a hundred little pieces.
My stomach lurched up to my throat.
“I signed a paper,” I said weakly. “I’m financially responsible for that.”
Cassian’s eyebrows lowered. He smiled in a way that was objectively charming but felt completely terrifying and unnatural to see after what he’d just done. I flinched back.
“Wheels, right?” he asked. “At least that’s what your boyfriend calls you. Maybe I need to come up with my own name for you. Whore on wheels? Nah… Can’t re-use the whole wheels thing.”
Before Cassian could finish deciding, Tristan flashed in front of me and shoved Cassian.
Despite how big Tristan was, he wasn’t built like Cassian. Tristan had the length and leanness of a quarterback, with defined muscles that didn’t seem to weigh his frame down. Cassian, on the other hand, was thick with muscle and maybe an inch or two shorter than Tristan. He barely moved from the shove.
“Want to do this now?” Cassian asked. “Over her?”
“I’ve been wanting a piece of you since practice yesterday,” Tristan growled. “It has nothing to do with her.”
“Strange.” Cassian flashed a cocky smile. “You had plenty of shots at me today. History class. The lockers. Lunch… Yet you chose to do this when I start messing with the cripple. Very strange.”
A small group of students was gathering. I hadn’t been at Parker long, but I’d quickly learned the reputation Tristan and his friends had. They were kings among kings. Untouchable and elite. The group of Tristan, Cassian, Logan, and Gage was apparently destined to go down in school history as some kind of mega group—like a boy band, except one where the only real talents of each member were playing football, getting girls, and general assholish behavior.
A public fight between Tristan and Cassian would be gossip for months, I didn’t doubt.
The two of them were just staring at each other. Tristan looked tense and ready to swing, but Cassian looked alarmingly casual.
Without any hint of warning on his face, Cassian swung at Tristan. The blow caught Tristan on the lip. Tristan’s head popped backwards from the impact, but he managed to swipe away Cassian’s next punch and throw one of his own. It connected, glancing off Cassian’s cheek.
Before another punch could be thrown, Cassian rammed himself into Tristan, driving his back into the tree beside me. Tristan wrapped his arms around Cassian’s neck and started squeezing while Cassian punched at Tristan’s ribs. A moment later, Gage and Logan pushed through the crowd to pull the two apart.
“Fucker,” Cassian said, smiling with blood on his teeth at Tristan while Logan held both of his arms behind his back.
Tristan spit blood on Cassian’s shoes, then shook Gage’s hold off. “Get off me, I’m done, anyway.”
Logan pulled Cassian back through the crowd, which parted for them.
