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Until then, I organize my binder like I always do for new cases and fill out any available information I have.

I’m halfway through my notes and Lexie’s and my shared playlist playing from my phone when a shadow covers the sunlight pouring over me. I recognize the brand-name shoes and heave a sigh.

“Can I help you?” I ask, then shake my head. “No, I’m already helping you. So, why are you here right now? Didn’t you also get detention today?”

Again in his oversize jean jacket, Theo towers over me. “I’m not allowed to check on your progress? You haven’t spoken to me all week.” He stretches his arms in front of him. “And I got detention for being late to class; what’s the problem with being late for detention too?”

“Must be nice to not be worried about having behavioral marks against you,” I mutter. What’s the worst that’ll happen to Theo? He gets suspended? Kicked out? How easily would it be to just spend money to get to another school, or even bribe his way to remain here?

I could never find myself in another private school; I barely got into this one. He doesn’t know how good he has it, and that carelessness is incredibly irritating.

He holds a hand to his ear. “Speak up, I can barely hear you.”

I drop my pen over the paper I was writing on. “As you said, I’ve never lost a case before, and I can assure you, not a single other person ever needed to check on any progress. And we don’t need to speak, nor have we ever spoken.”

“We’ve spoken. We’re speaking right now.”

When I look up at the sky and mumble, Theo asks, “What was that?”

“I was asking the universe what I did in a past life to deserve you invading my existence this way.”

“Dramatic.” He spreads out a hand, then puts a finger down. “Adding that to the surprising lists of characteristics you have.”

“Why do you have a list of characteristics for me? Are you that bored? Get a hobby.”

“Maybe,” he says, sitting right beside me so the edge of his jacket falls on my lap, “I find you interesting enough to keep track.”

I roll my eyes. “I already agreed to take on your case. You don’t have to try to flirt with me.”

“Oh, this isn’t flirting,” he says, moving so he’s straddling the bench and fully facing me. “When I flirt with you, you’ll know it.”

Something about the warmth in his words makes my throat grow a little dry. That and the quick thought that he might actually just find me interesting. But that can’t be true, because I’m the most uninteresting person on the planet.

I shake my head. Even so, why should I be impressed with Golden Boy’s attention? He gives it out as easily as an army of ants gathers around a crumb of food.

I move on, rubbing the upright hairs on my arm after a cold wind. “Can you take a hint? I’m not in the mood to socialize.”

“Well, I am,” he says, “and I’m much more concerned with my own desires at the moment.”

“Right, silly of me to think you’d care about my desires,” I mumble.

“Very silly of you.” He nods earnestly. “Now give me an update.”

My eye twitches at the commanding tone. I hate that he never says please or thank you and frames questions as demands because he thinks he deserves what he’s asking for immediately and quickly.

But hoping to end this quicker if I give in, I answer, “Right now, I’m getting organized. I don’t have anything too solid to tell you. I’m just building my notes.”

“Let’s take a look.” He pulls my binder from my lap without permission and brings it toward him. He barks out a loud laugh that makes me jump. He turns the binder over and points to where I wrote his name beside Client. “ ‘Theorrorizer Hudson,’ ” he reads my writing. “Like Terrorizer?”

My cheeks grow a little hot. I forgot I scribbled that down when I got a flashback of his ridiculous smirk when he knew he had me, when he asked me to take his case the second time. “Spelling error. English isn’t my first language, you know.”

It earns me a small laugh, and I’m surprised at the tiny burst of pride that swells up in my chest at the sound. Theo pushes himself closer to me and grabs one of my hands in both of his.

“Hey, the whole blackmail thing was unfortunate, sure,” he says, and the lack of a real apology makes anger simmer in my chest, “but that’s all in the past, right?”

Before I can open my mouth and point out that he’s incredibly wrong and that he can’t speak for me, he goes on. “Anyway, the team is counting on me. You’re the best, and I need you by my side for this. I meant what I said before about studying. I know you think I’m some slacker, but I’m just ahead of these lesson plans because my mom has me working with a tutor over the summer, so I’m always ahead. I can help if you ever need anything.”

I know he’s trying to play nice to make sure I do well, keep me on his good side. But if he really wanted to play nice, he would have never gotten me involved in this in the first place. I mean, my workload is insane. I’m barely sleeping as it is; now I have this on my plate.