Page 139 of They Break Beauty

28

~Brianna~

“What’s wrong with it?” I demanded with a noticeable edge.

Levi smirked as he pushed my laptop back to me, then started pulling up his own code on his. “Aww, baby, don’t get worked up—at least not in that way. I said I’d teach you a few things, so here it is.” He pulled up what he needed to, then pointed at a section of his code. “You see the difference? Yours left a backdoor entry point accessible. Most wouldn’t be able to work with that, so it’s why it’s not taught to go the extra mile with this. Well, also the fact that the way I’m doing that isn’t exactly on the up-and-up. But you and me, the world we walk in, we need to concern ourselves with the threat of the best trying to access our data and private information.”

“I see it,” I said, taking in his code and all its complexities. “I’m definitely better with software and programming apps than this side of things. I thought I could at least hold my own, but looking at this now, the holes you found in my code… it’s clear I can’t.”

“No, you can definitely hold your own. But, like I said, in our world, things need to be another level to protect ourselves.”

I looked out at him, very aware of him sitting so close to me, so much that I could feel his body heat and smell his sexy sandalwood scent.

He was in a gray pair of his go-to cargo pants today, with a white muscle tee that served to highlight his boxer’s physique beneath, all that hard muscle and incredibly toned abs. A gray hooded denim jacket completed his more relaxed look today.

I was dressed down too in just a pair of gray lounge pants and an off-the-shoulder pastel-pink top.

Levi might have appeared relaxed, but he wasn’t. Because it was Sunday and my last night here, because I’d only be here in the morning tomorrow, spending most of the long-weekend Monday at my apartment studying and making sure I was up to date on the remote learning I’d been doing for a few days after those leaked pictures had caused such a hoopla on campus for me.

Honestly, I was a little tense about it too.

It had been a really nice experience surrounded by the three of them in this house, not being alone with my thoughts, actually having people in my corner—in spite of the fucked-up way it had all started. Since Chloe had been called home by her extremely overbearing mother, I’d been without a close friend, the only friend I’d felt comfortable making because of how difficult it normally was for me to hide all the trauma behind a façade of normalcy, to pretend it didn’t exist. She’d even messaged me telling me she wouldn’t actually be coming back now like she’d thought, that her return was being delayed, and she didn’t even know for how long.

Because of Levi, he’d set things up for me with him and the guys where I actually didn’t need to hide any of my trauma. More than not concealing it, they understood it because Levi had suffered from episodes just like me. Colton and Mason were used to dealing with it through him. And they didn’t look at me differently because of it. They didn’t treat me like broken glass, like I was damaged. I’d never had that before once someone had discovered my issues. Not even with my ex, Tommy. In fact, when Levi had posited that I hadn’t experienced the rough, raw, and mind-numbing intensity of sex before because Tommy had treated me so gently, he’d been right on.

As much as I liked being around the guys, the flipside was that things had moved fast since that night I’d come here to talk with Mason and end his Hex campaign against me. I needed some space to take stock of it all away from them so I could see things in a more clear and objective way. Also, having the guys around would be majorly distracting to my studies, and I couldn’t afford to screw up and fail out.

“Let’s take a break,” Levi said, pulling me from my thoughts.

“No, I’m good now. We can keep going.”

“We’ll come back to it. I’ve got something to show you, something for you to take home with you tomorrow.”

I cocked an eyebrow. “What’s that? Colt already gave me a going-home present. The recording of our duet, Until You.”

He chuckled. “Of course he did.” He laid his hand over the back of mine on the coffee table. “It was more than even a song to him—and that already means a fuck of a lot for him. It was him connecting with you, bonding.”

I smiled. “It was for me too. That’s what it’ll represent whenever I play it.”

“Good. He’ll be a happy little cupcake.”

It was my turn to laugh then. I slid my fingers into his hair, stroking softly and making him groan. “You’re so sweet with him.”

“Well, he makes it impossible not to be.”

“I can see that, yeah. But I like it, how you are with him.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. You’re like that with me too. Sweet and attentive.”

He gave my hand on the table a squeeze. “Well, you deserve to be treated like a princess. And not a club princess, because we’re equals, and I don’t want to push you to the sidelines like what was done to you with your dad’s motorcycle club. A whole lot of misogyny masquerading as intense overprotectiveness.”

“I couldn’t have said it better myself.”

He eased away from me then, and I saw him tense up. “Speaking of that, and in the name of being equal partners and transparency between us, there’s something I need to—”

“Lev.”

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