Page 26 of Love JD

“Aw come on,” he said with a wink. “I’m your guy.”

I clenched my teeth hard. Why did that feel so cringy? “I know you are,” I replied mildly.

“As long as you don’t forget it.” He smiled lopsidedly, but it had a strained quality to it. “Sorry I’ve been distracted.”

“It’s fine. Technically, I think it’s family drama. You know that girl my brother has been dating?”

“Yeah,” Robert said, taking a sip of his black coffee. He winced. I knew he liked sugar and creamer, but his buddies had teased him for it, so he drank it black now.

“Well, her brother is the one I ended up in the tabloids with,” I explained. “And it’s just causing unnecessary drama in my life.”

Robert paused with the mug in front of his mouth. “What tabloids?”

I rolled my eyes and pushed away from the beige countertop. “I think Russia could take over the country and you wouldn’t notice if it didn’t creep into your raid.”

Robert looked offended. “That’s not true.”

It wasn’t worth it to point out that gaming had gone from hobby to obsession. He’d failed a class because of it last semester, and since then, he’d been touchy if the subject came up. “Just Google my name. It’ll probably come up. Anyway, I’m going to be late if I don’t run.”

“Okay, but stay safe.” He didn’t know about Guard Dog, and I didn’t intend to tell him, either. “Do you need me to go with you?”

I suddenly felt suffocated, stuffed in a two-by-two metal box of his smothering, misplaced concern. “Nope, I’m good.”

“Okay. You know how you are, Isla. Don’t be a hero.”

“Sure,” I promised tightly.

I practically ran out of the apartment. I knew it would be straight into Tabitha’s watchful gaze, but I would just have to be a woman about it. Especially after the incident three nights before. Apparently, she’d been busy chasing down a phone thief, but it had left my tormentor just enough time to scare me into fainting. They hadn’t hurt me, and the pictures that had surfaced the next morning confirmed what their objective had been.

Humiliation and sensational content. Mission accomplished.

Party Girl Valehart Drunk? Passed Out in Public!

I’d spent the entire weekend huddled up in my bed watching cheesy anime and eating microwave soft pretzels until my sense of reality had been able to settle back into something I could cope with. It hurt. I knew it was a tactic on their part to catch public attention, and their real goal was to make money off the pictures, but the idea that people were commenting on the pictures, making assumptions about me, saying cruel things about me and what my mother had done was enough to drive a sane person crazy.

The text from Zev that had come through the night of the incident had weirdly soothed my fears a little. Knowing that he was aware and even involved had been disturbingly comforting.

It was best not to examine that too closely, though.

As I took a seat in my first class, which was in a large lecture hall with a hundred other students, I glanced at my phone. Speaking of the yeti, he had sent me a message.

Yeti:

Tabitha needed a few days off,

so your new security detail

will be waiting outside your first class.

I frowned. Um, no.

Isla:

Stop doing things without asking.

I didn’t agree to that.

Yeti:

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