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He doesn’t seem a single bit perturbed by my blunt answer. In fact, his smile widens. “I didn’t think you did. But it was still entertaining as hell. Honestly, I’m impressed. Most scholarship girls are timid little things.” He shakes his head, chuckling. “You, my dear, are not timid at all.”
“I’m also not your dear,” I say. “And you’re interrupting me and Max. Bye.”
Maybe it’s stupid to be rude to another potential ally on campus, but I’m not interested in being this guy’s little performing monkey—the sassy poor girl who entertains him with her antics.
Whatever Cliff thought he was going to get out of that interaction, he’s just left watching Max and me as we head off down the hall. I feel his gaze on my back, keen and a little too interested.
“Well, so much for those fucking free lunches.” Max shakes her head, irritation clear in her voice. “Want to cut out and grab something to eat off campus?”
I tilt my head. “You got a ride?”
“Yeah.” She shrugs. “My parents saved up since I was like, born, basically. It’s not an Aston Martin, but it gets me from point A to point B. I just need to run up to my dorm and grab my keys if you want to come up? Or stay down here and wait?”
My veins are still buzzing with leftover adrenaline. I need to walk it off. “I’ll meet you outside, by the quad.”
Max smiles and nods. “Cool. I won’t be too long.”
She slips out a side door, and I start making my way toward the front of the building. I’m still not super familiar with the campus, but I think if I go out that door and turn left, I’ll reach the quad eventually.
But I never get a chance to find out if I’m right.
Before I reach the building’s entrance, a hand clamps down over my mouth and a large body presses to my back.
Fuck.
Those assholes from the cafeteria weren’t done with us after all.
A fresh spike of adrenaline surges through me, and I drop my weight, trying to break the iron hold on me. But whoever’s got me is strong, and he barely even flinches as I dig my elbow into his ribs.
I’m shoved into a nearby room, the thick arms around me caging my own until I hear the door close behind us. A second later, I’m let go, my bag slipping from my shoulder as I stumble forward a step. Immediately, I whirl around to face the cafeteria bully—realizing only as I round on him that it’s not, in fact, one of the assholes who went after Max.
It’s Gray, with Elias and Declan standing close behind him.
I freeze with my fist half-cocked, my gaze flicking over the three of them. When I thought I knew who grabbed me, my body knew exactly how to respond. But this new turn of events has thrown me off-balance.
What the fuck do these three want with me?
“Not so ballsy now, are you, Sparrow?” Gray taunts, his voice a casual drawl.
Fury burns inside me like fire.
“The fuck is wrong with you?” I snap. “You didn’t have your balls handed to you hard enough the last time you accosted me for no reason?”
He shrugs. “Hard to say my balls were handed to me when everyone on campus knows now that you’re an easy slut for rich dick.”
“Kinda makes you a slut too, fucking some poor-ass rando in a bar bathroom,” I sneer.
Gray’s face hardens, and he pushes into my space. The room we’re in seems to be a barely used storage closet. It’s small, and my back presses against a bit of shelving as Gray cages me there.
“You’re not very bright, are you? Even if you’re mouthy as hell.” He grips my chin, forcing me to look at him. “The hell was that in the dining hall?”
I jerk my chin out of his hand, glaring at him. “What I do is none of your fucking business, you prick.”
“Sparrow, I’m Gray Motherfucking Eastwood. Everything here is my goddamn business.”
The venom in his tone bleeds out like an overflow of poison from an open wound. It makes my heart slam harder against my ribs, and I hate that he affects me at all. That the black hole in my chest, the comfortable, numbing emptiness, seems to disappear anytime he steps into my orbit, replaced by something chaotic and turbulent.
His eyes burn with the same venom that coats his words, and goose bumps scatter across my skin. Gray ‘Motherfucking’ Eastwood hates me, and I have no idea why.
