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Colbie came skippingup to the table, dropping her tray down with a clang that jolted me back into reality and pulled me out of the book I’d been reading as she slid into the chair across from me.
“Whatcha reading?”
I flipped the cover of my book closed so she could see the front. She let out a short whistle and waggled her brows at the image of the half-naked Duke clutching the nanny with the heaving bosom to him on the cover. “Another one you stole off your mom’s shelf?” she teased, knowing I was a sucker for my mom’s old-school bodice-ripper romances.
For the nerdy girl who didn’t get much attention from the boys in school, it was nice to read about the lengths a man would go to win over the woman he loved. If I couldn’t have a real relationship, at least I had these books. They were a much-needed escape from reality a lot of the time.
Colbie gave me a look as she peeled the rind off the orange on her tray. “You keep your face buried in those books, you’re going to miss out on everything happening around you.”
The doors to the cafeteria opened just then, almost as if her words had some sort of magical power, and my mood immediately plummeted to the floor. “You say that like it’s a bad thing,” I grumbled as I watched Beau Wade and Larissa Johnston walk into our school’s cafeteria, hand in hand, like they were the king and queen of the freaking senior class or something.
As far as the rest of the kids we went to school with were concerned, they might as well have been. He was the quarterback of the football team and she was the captain of the cheer squad. They were the clichéd popular high school couple who treated everyone they thought was beneath them like crap, and it just so happened I was a favorite target for both of them. Individually and together.
I quickly slammed my book shut and stuffed it into my backpack, knowing if either of them saw what I was reading, there would be no end to the crap they’d give me.
Colbie looked over in the direction I’d been staring and let out a scoff. “God, they’re the worst,” she mumbled as Beau took a seat at the head of the popular table and pulled Larissa into his lap. She let out an over-the-top giggle like the two of them didn’t push the limits of the school’s policy on PDA on a regular basis. If she wasn’t climbing him like a tree in the hallway for everyone to see, they were sucking face against the lockers or grinding all over each other in the parking lot. They had no shame. Anyone else would have gotten into serious trouble, but it was like everyone looked the other way for them, teachers and students alike. Like they were special.
I looked away with a roll of my eyes and picked up my plastic fork to move the food around on my tray without taking a bite.My appetite had disappeared the moment those two had shown up.
“I really can’t wait for graduation,” I mumbled. “Hopefully I’ll never have to see them again.”
Colbie lifted her hands in the air and crossed her fingers with a huge smile on her face. “Here’s hoping they go off to college somewhere far, far away and never come back.”
My head fell back on a deep, genuine laugh. “God, wouldn’t that be amazing?” I asked with no small amount of glee in my voice.
Just then an intense prickling sensation began to crawl up the back of my neck. In a room filled with kids my age who hardly ever noticed me, I suddenly felt like I was being watched. I twisted in my seat, trying to be as discreet as possible as I attempted to find out the cause of that sensation. As soon as I did, my gaze locked on with Beau’s chilly blue eyes.
I needed to look away. I knew that. But there was something about the way he was staring at me that caused a shiver to work its way down my spine. A shiver that should have been my body’s reaction to fear or revulsion, but instead it was a shiver that made me feel things I’d never felt before. Things I couldn’t explain but left me out of sorts.
“Uh, Pres?”
I ripped my eyes off of Beau’s before Larissa could notice. The last thing I needed was to end up on her radar—again. I cleared my throat as heat spread upward from my chest over my neck and pooled in my cheeks. “Yeah?”
She was looking at the popular table with a furrowed brow, confusion painted across her face. “Why is Beau staring at you like that?”
I didn’t have the first clue, but I had no intention of sticking around to find out. After all, having his attention never ended well for me. “Who knows,” I said as I pushed back in my chairand hefted the strap of my backpack over my shoulder. “He’s a weirdo creep.” I grabbed up my tray, my lunch uneaten. “I need to get to the library. See you after school?”
She nodded, popping a slice of her orange into her mouth. “See you,” she returned with puffed cheeks, and with one last wave in her direction, I booked it out of the cafeteria, refusing to look in that jerk’s direction as I passed his table. Even though I felt him staring the entire way.
That feelingof being watched returned the moment I stepped into Spanish later that afternoon, and I knew without having to look that Beau was at his desk near the back of the class, watching me just like he had been in the cafeteria. Usually, I considered the day a win if I managed to get though all my classes without notice, but something about today was different, and I didn’t understand why. I didn’t know why he held such an interest in me today, but I knew the reason couldn’t possibly be good, so I decided the best thing I could do was ignore him.
I refused to turn around, even though it left me feeling like I was ignoring a persistent itch between my shoulder blades or fighting a sneeze. I did my best to focus on what our teacher was saying. Usually I thrived on being studious, but today was proving to be exceptionally hard. I was having trouble focusing as I frantically scribbled notes in my binder, more to give myself something to do than anything else, and when I read over what I’d written, it was clear I’d only picked up every fifth word or so that Ms. Garza said, because what I’d written didn’t make any sense.
I glanced to the clock hanging over the whiteboard at the front of the classroom and let out a sigh of relief. Only five minutes left in class, then I didn’t have to see Beau for the rest of the day, God willing.
I was almost scot-free. At least that was what I’d thought, until Ms. Garza spoke again. “All right class, now for your homework.” Groans filtered through the room from my classmates, but I sat with my pen poised over a clean sheet of paper, ready to go. “Beneath each of your desks you’ll find a card. It’ll either have a picture or a Spanish word. What you’re going to do is partner up with the person whose card has the word or image that corresponds with yours and together you’re going to create a two-page conversation in Spanish that you’ll read in front of the class. You’ll have two days to complete the assignment, so I suggest you find your partners and work out a schedule. And remember,” her voice rose as the kids in the room grew louder while hunting for their partners, “pronunciation counts.”
Group projects were something I dreaded. I would have much rather done the work on my own. Well, except for my science lab, but that was only because I was partnered up with Mike Perry, and I was justwaitingfor the day to come when he’d finally ask me out.
My heart lodged in my throat and anxiety made my chest tighten as I twisted around in my desk, trying to find a card with the word that went with the drawing of a house on mine. As the seconds ticked by, more and more of my classmates partnered up for the assignment. Finally, I spotted a card with the wordcasascrawled across it, and when I looked up to see who it belonged to my stomach bottomed out, plummeting to the floor at my feet.
Beau was kicked back in his seat, long legs stretched out in front of him. His eyes were on me, a smirk that could only bedescribed as evil stretched across his face.Man, it really wasn’t fair that he was so freaking good-looking. It was like a cruel joke that someone so ugly on the inside would be so cute on the outside.
The blood drained from my face and my mouth went dry as the sounds in the classroom dulled beneath the roar of blood rushing in my ears.
“Looks like it’s you and me, Bubbles,” Beau called with a cocky grin that had too many people focusing on us. My eyes narrowed and my hands balled into fists.God, I hated that stupid nickname. Like going out of your way to be nice instead of a raging jerk to everyone was a bad thing.
I wanted to scream. Or at least throw back a biting remark that would even the score between us, but I couldn’t get my mind and mouth to work in sync. Instead, the bell rang and I quickly stuffed my things into my backpack, barely taking the time to zip it up before storming out of the classroom.
