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Only to find Nick Merrick standing in the doorway.
Quinn stopped short and yanked the earbuds free, feeling heat crawl up her neck. She wasn’t shy about boys, but her rage-inspired dancing felt like it should be private.
No, indulging her own insecurities felt like it should be private.
“How long have you been there?” she demanded.
“A minute or so,” he said equably. “I wasn’t exactly timing myself.”
Nick was quite possibly the only guy she’d ever met who seemed completely unaffected by her attitude.
Years of putting up with his twin probably had something to do with it.
But it was enough to make her want to be nicer. She coiled up the headphones in her palm and turned for her bag. “Sorry. You took me by surprise.”
“You seemed into it. I didn’t want to interrupt.” He paused, then came closer. “I was wishing I could hear the music.”
Quinn straightened and found him right in front of her. She sucked in her stomach and shook her ponytail back over her shoulder.
Nick and his twin brother were two of the hottest guys in school, and at first she’d been sure Nick was only interested because she had a bit of a reputation for being easy—not that she did anything to erase that viewpoint. She liked boys, and she knew how to get their attention, heavy thighs and all.
But Nick had surprised her by being a gentleman. They’d kissed, a few times—and he had one hell of a mouth—but they hadn’t done much more than that. And even at his house, in his room, where there wasn’t anyone to stop him from doing anything, Nick proved to be a pretty good sounding board for her problems instead of trying to shut her up and get in her pants.
Then again, Nick’s twin brother made no secrets of how he felt about her. She hated Gabriel Merrick almost as much as she hated Jake. Maybe Nick wasn’t doing anything with her because he figured he could do better.
ER 1
Nick Merrick sat on his bed and ran his thumb along the edge of the sealed envelope.
He didn’t want to open it.
He probably didn’t need to. It was thin, and thin letters from universities typically meant one thing: rejection.
It wasn’t his first-choice school anyway. He’d applied at University of Maryland because they had a solid physics program and it was an in-state school. If they rejected him, he didn’t really care.
Much.
He’d thought applying early at a few local schools would be a safe bet, just to get himself into the rhythm of it, seeing what kind of feedback he’d get.
Apparently it meant he’d get used to rejection right off the bat.
The worst part was the twinge of guilt in his stomach.
Not because he might have to go out of state.
The guilt was because he wanted to. Sort of.
A new town would mean anonymity. No one would know about his powers.
No one would know him as Gabriel Merrick’s twin brother, half of a unit.
A new town meant he could just be Nick.
Whatever that meant. Sometimes he worried that he’d get his wish, that he’d end up in some strange town, surrounded by new people, and he’d realize that there was nothing there, that his entire being was based on his brothers’ expectations of him.
Well, it wasn’t like he didn’t have options. A local school would have meant he could still stay home and help Michael with the business. If he couldn’t go to Maryland, he could go to the community college down the road. Nothing wrong with that.
Except . . . he didn’t want to go to the community college.
