Page 12 of The Torment of Two

Numero Uno.

Prime choice for a prime couple.

The golden child.

Of all the luck.

Gemma, perfection personified, continues to gape at me like a goldfish gasping for air. Her long, dark hair is sleek and silky, not a strand out of place. The lips that remain parted are glossed in a pinky hue that reminds me of strawberry Starburst. Freakishly long and thick eyelashes continue to blink at me.

I think I broke Homewrecker Barbie.

Turning my gaze away from her, I spear my hand into the air to get Mr. Pederson’s attention. He frowns before ambling our way.

“What’s up?”

I jut my thumb in her direction. “Can’t.”

Gemma scoffs. “Unbelievable.”

“Can’t what, Mr. Sheridan?”

“I can’t do this with her.”

The older man tugs at his scraggly beard, eyes narrowed as he studies me. “Too bad.”

Too bad?

Is he for real?

“Unless you can give me a perfectly logical reason for not partnering with this nice young lady, I don’t want to hear another word on the subject.”

Oh, yeah. He’s fucking serious.

It’s not like I can tell him the real reason I don’t like her besides her brattiness over our parking lot debacle that was clearly her fault. I can’t tell anyone. Not Dr. Wynn, not Dad or Pops, hell, not even Dax.

I’m alone in my misery.

Fucking wonderful.

“Whatever,” I grunt, waving off our professor. “I’ll deal.”

“Please do.” Mr. Pederson walks off, shaking his head in frustration.

Makes two of us, man.

Gemma pushes her syllabus across the desk until the paper is in my line of sight. Her fingernails are long, pointy, and matte black with shimmery rhinestones on the middle nails. How can anyone function with nails that long? How does she wipe her ass?

She probably has people for that.

Gemma looks rich as fuck.

“This,” Gemma says icily, tapping on the semester project, “is a huge part of our grade. I don’t exactly understand what your problem is with me, but I wish you could squash it for five seconds and focus on this.”

I snatch her paper up and glower at the ink. Seventy-five percent is a lot.

“Fine,” I grunt. “I’ll do the project. You can sign your name at the top. We can avoid each other until then. Problem solved.”

She scoffs again. “Problem solved? You’re an arrogant piece of work, Two.”

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