Page 23 of Study Games

“Yes…sir.” Kash touched my other cheek, his strange smile the one of a kind benefactor, not of the man who could ruin my non-existent future on an evening’s whim when everyone else pretended to hide away and see nothing.

I closed my eyes to block them out. My hands fisted in my pockets, fingers closing my key. What would happen if I sliced the blunted metal at one of them? But I knew what they would do, and more. An echo of an unforgettable error of my youth.

A whole semester ago. It seemed like an age.

“Open up, Waverly.”

A whimper escaped my lips. I remembered those words from a very different scene. “Yes–” I opened my mouth to parrot my puppetmaster, but the words that tumbled forth weren’t mine, and they weren’t spoken by me.

“Can’t you two find someone worthwhile to pick on? It’s not like she’s a challenge, for fuck’s sake.” Jax’s voice dripped with derision.

Heat flared over my cheeks as miraculously, the twins’ dual, and unwelcome, touch dropped away. I closed my eyes again and refused to open them again. Brilliant. Both my tormentors in one place.

“My lucky night,” I muttered as their presence retreated and I managed part of a breath before I choked on a vacuum inside my own lungs. Squeezing my eyes tight I tried not to wince, and failed.

Key in my pocket.

My door three buildings up.

Twelve steps or less.

I’ll never make it.

All three of them were ridiculously fit, and built up with their own private home gyms for all I knew. Rippton U students were their own breed of wealthy, the twins–and Jax–no exception.

I risked a peek through squinting eyes, waiting for the next metaphorical blow. Or maybe not so metaphorical. I’d heard rumors the Twins were into some seriously shady stuff, and from their manner tonight, I didn’t doubt the grapevine got it right for once.

“Tonight,” Key and Kash crooned together, their words a far too intimate response.

My stomach lifted, flipping over on itself. It wasn't until they turned and were a few dozen steps away that I managed to squish my hands over my stomach and expel a breath tinged with the bitter seeds of bile.

“The fuck was that about?” Jax stood right next to me, sharing the same damn air I breathed, and I hadn’t seen him move.

His leather and smoke scent wafted possessively around me, sucking away the next breath I secured for myself.

“I can’t deal with you tonight on top of them. Get out of my way,” I snapped with the last remnants of my fading bravado. Adrenaline rush depleted, my energy zapped. The few feet to my apartment building seemed an impossible distance to conquer alone.

“What just happened, Waverly?”

“Glad you can use my name,” I sniped pettily. I tried to push back at him with my words alone, still frozen to the spot though the Twins were long gone, melted into the shadows they preferred, but my snark deserted me.

“Bee girl, I’ll bully you any other time, but right now I'm worried about you.” Jax’s brow dipped as I turned to face him.

His lime highlights stood out in the dim light the neighboring building afforded, leaving us in a halo of haze. He stood close enough that if I tried to raise my hands, I’d touch the black shirt he wore beneath the leather jacket he once draped around my shoulders. It appeared blue in the odd light, and I stupidly drifted my fingers along one sleeve as he sucked in a sharp breath. Yeah, a lot of things were stupid about me tonight.

“I’m fine.” My airway constricted, barely letting the lie escape. “I need to get work done.” My feet finally opted to obey my command and propelled me forward. A hand wrapped around my arm stopped me. Tonight, at some point tonight I would actually get my work done, despite all evidence to the contrary. “Jax–” I started, but one look at his face stalled my breath.

Coal dark eyes, the color of the graphites he preferred to use when he made weird art that suited him just fine, pinned me like prey he wanted to devour.

“Tell me, Waverly.” His voice remained soft, but the command did me in.

I ripped my arm from his grasp and swirled on him. “You don’t own me, have anything to do with me or give me fucking orders, Jax! This,” I waved my hand at the vacant street where Key and Kash disappeared into thin air like the pair of specters they were, “is an utter shitfight and I can’t possibly get anything done out here. I lost my phone. and all my videos—cue more bee jokes from you, I’m sure—and all my personal photos. Family, not sex tapes,” I added in a scathing voice. “Though there’s those too, if you want to pry. Surprised I have a sex life, art boy? Hell, I even have some kinks. I’ve got more work to do than I have hours, and I've barely slept in a week. Now please, fuck off and let me get some goddam work done.” I stamped my foot, the clomp echoing along the bitumen. My chest heaved as I yelled right in his face.

Blood rushed across my cheeks a second time, and the unshed tears rose to the occasion with the timing of a boxer who walked into his opponent’s fist.

He watched me without reaction or taunt, just watched me.

Jax was beyond unnerving and I had no idea what to do with that.

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