Page 43 of Revenge

Henry turned around. “What?”

Blake leaned forward. “She’s thinking about you, and her nipples are standing to attention.”

Edward twisted in his seat, glanced down at my chest, smirked, and turned back to his work.

Henry rocked his chair back on two legs, leaning its backrest against my desk. “What do you have in mind?”

I leaned forward and whispered, “Nothing I can say in public.”

“You there,” snapped the substitute teacher. “No talking in class.”

“Yes, sir!” Henry shifted his chair back onto four legs.

Ignoring Blake’s attempts at dirty talk, I dipped my head and scribbled a few lines of verse on my Creative Writing notebook. I might hate Henry with the passion of a thousand suns, but there was no denying how hot he had looked at the party when shuddering and trembling under Blake’s touch.

After class, Henry caged me against the wall with his arms, a shit-eating grin on his face. His blonde hair flopped down over his temples, making him look like the fun kind of guy who wouldn’t frame a girl for kidnapping. “Want to get hot and bothered over me tonight?”

“I don’t know…” I let my gaze flicker from his lips to the hard pecs that strained through the cotton of his white shirt. “What do you have in mind?”

Blake sidled up to us with a smirk. “Come to our room. We have four different types of booze.”

“Next time,” I said.

Blake’s face fell, and he stuffed his hands in his pockets. “See you later, then.”

Henry spared him the barest of glances before turning back to me. “We can go to Edward’s—”

I dipped out of his arm cage and walked around him. A gaggle of fifth-year girls who had been watching the spectacle giggled. “I need time alone with you to talk.”

His brows furrowed. “We can do that. Just tell me what you want.”

“Let’s walk to the village for some of Jean-Paul’s liqueur coffee.”

“Alright.” His shoulders drooped. What had he been expecting? A night at a local bed and breakfast?

“See you later,” I replied in my breeziest tone. Henry walked to his next lesson, while I stayed back to watch him retreat.

He turned around and gave me a half-smile, which I returned with a wide grin. Mom always said that the way to a man’s heart was to let him talk about himself and later paraphrase what he had said to make him think there was a connection. I would replicate that closeness we had in that room, get him to open his heart, and then crush him like he crushed me.

* * *

I wore a close-fitting cashmere sweater with a wool miniskirt and thick tights to our date, with Ugg boots to keep my feet warm during the walk. A long, hooded coat finished off the outfit, and I dabbed on a bit of gloss to attract his attention to my lips.

Rita glanced up from her music scores she had laid out on her desk. “You look nice. Are you going out with one of them?”

“Henry. What are you working on?”

“A composition. My friend, whose brother got into Oxford on a musical scholarship, said that playing something original had made the difference.”

“Can I hear it?”

She glanced at the door. “Won’t you be late?”

“Do I care?”

She placed her fingers over her lips and giggled. “I still can’t believe you came back.”

“Sometimes, neither can I.”