“Thanks,” I said, glancing around the crowded hallway for her Parking Lot BFFs. “Um, I should get to my next class.”
“My friends can be bitches, but I don’t care what anyone thinks, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Emery said.
I managed a smile. That was the thing about privilege. You could afford not to care. Some of us didn’t have that luxury.
“My class is all the way in the back in the STEM Wing,” I said.“Don’t want to be late. But we’ll talk later?”
“I’d like that,” Emery said sincerely.
“Great!”
“Oh,ha-ha.”
I started down the hall and she called after me, “Hey, Harper.”
“Yeah?”
“Fuck!” she shouted, then clapped her hands over her mouth.
I laughed. “Thattagirl.”
Okay, Dash. That’s two.
***
In chem, half my attention was on Dr. Langford’s lecture about oxidation and ionization, and the other half was on Orion. I hated howawareI was of him. As if my senses were trapped in his gravitational pull against my will.
He’s friends with assholes. How’s that?
The thought wouldn’t take.
It was an exercise in self-restraint to keep my eyes on my notebook when his left hand was inches from mine. Then I noticed he had his phone out, recording the lecture. A strange look was on his face, almost as if he were half asleep. Not bored or lazy, but something I couldn’t quite place.
He shot me a cocky smile. A mask-smile. I was starting to tell the difference.
“What am I doing wrong now?” he whispered.
I nodded at his phone. “Didn’t know that was allowed.”
“You don’t approve?”
“No, just seems…easy.”
“Easy. Right,” he said, his smile tightening. “It listens better than I do. And I told you, my handwriting is like a secret code, except not even I can crack it.”
“I don’t care,” I whispered. “You do you.”
“You don’t care?TheHarper Bennett doesn’t care about somethingschool related? Bollocks.”
“Okay, so I walked into that one,” I whispered back. “But no, as your lab partner, as long as you get the material down, I don’t care.”
He narrowed his eyes playfully. “I don’t believe you.”
I started to retort then shut my mouth. Damn, this boy. Everything about him was maddening. Impossible to ignore. Impossible to dislike. Impossible to miss he had something intangible behind his eyes that his charming smile couldn’t conceal.
“It doesn’t matter what you believe,” I said. “It’s the truth.”
Watching me squirm, Orion’s amused smile deepened, and I felt my cheeks heat. I started to retort again when he leaned close, rested his cheek in his fist, his beautiful dark eyes boring into mine. Dammit if my heart didn’t skip ten beats.
