Page 18 of Make Me, Break Me

I got to play nursemaid. What I had accused Nelson of being back on that first day when I brought Dex home from the hospital all filthy and bandaged up. Which meant I was the only one in the room who was kind of useless.

“I’m not really sure why I’m here,” I whispered helplessly, letting Dex take my hand.

He switched it out for his good one when his bandaged hand grew clumsy. “You’re here because I need you.” He drew me back to the sofa, wrapping a log-like arm around my waist.

Warmth from him sank into me, removing some of my discomfort. My period had hit yesterday and the heat of his touch eased some of the pain that assaulted my lower back like I’d been stabbed. I refused to acknowledge the other cramps, preferring to pretend they didn’t exist.

I sat reluctantly, locked in a flesh and material cage of my own making. On the first day I’d refused flat out to let Dex draw me into his bedroom, knowing that we’d just end up tangled in each other’s arms. That door had remained off limits since. And though screwing around seemed like our regular fun activity, it wouldn’t help his ribs or his hand to heal—or my heart. Because that’s who we were. We weren’t this coupledom pigeon pair who he tried to meld us into.

No matter how much it hurt my heart to see him struggle with both the pain and the heartache or whatever ate him inside. Because we all sure as fuck knew that nothing laid out Dex Breaker by choice.

Not even cracked ribs and a fractured finger.

“Stay, Zin,” he murmured again, stroking the back of my hand with his thumb.

I noted the deep circles under his eyes, the redness at the edges as he looked up at me beseechingly. Nelson nodded his encouragement when I glanced his way. Predictably, Falcon said nothing.

Letting out a sigh, I slid beneath Dex’s raised head, and planted my ass. “I’ve got two hours til class.Ifyou let me work here, okay?’ I muttered, extracting my laptop from my bag. “Can I plug in somewhere?” I swung the end of my charge cable in a slow circle.

Nelson’s face lit up, and the tension in the room broke. Even Falcon’s slow growing smile took on an approving glow as he went back to making out with Bella.

“Feeling like a fifth wheel, anyone?” muttered Nelson.

I giggled, and clamped my hand over my mouth at the sound that shattered the silence in the room.

The Lord of Nothingness sent me a knowing look. “It’s okay to be human and feel, Zin. We don’t all have to lock our hearts away.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Maybe you should go for Casanova of the Week. isn’t Opal doing a stack of those for Valentine’s Day this year at the campus paper?” I yawned into the back of my hand.

He shrugged. “Something like that. But who wants a displaced lord with no land, a title and some spare change?” he said lightly.

“If you consider a billion plus in the bank to bespare change,” Falcon snorted.

“A bil—” I gaped at the Lord of Apparently Freaking Everything who crouched before me on his knees like any average pleb, plugging in my laptop charger. “Why aren’t you in the Kingsman frat, and why aren't you being eccentric and getting laid?” I blurted.

Falcon laughed, long and loud. Bella, giggled into his chest.

Nelson perched on the arm of the sofa and patted my head sweetly and pointed to his bow tie. “Eccentric. And because the Kingsman frat is full of assholes. I like pussy, darling. And money isn’t everything.”

“Says the man with a happy nine figures in his bank account,” Dex mumbled into my thigh.

I nodded, absently swiping at a collection of saliva pooling at the corner of his mouth. “My household can’t make it to tenthousand,” I informed Nelson. “You’ve outclassed us all, Lord of Bow Ties.”

He grinned, flicking said bowtie in a strangling motion that apparently still let him breathe. “That’s a good title.”

I grinned, and suddenly, I didn’t feel as uncomfortable as I had when I walked in on my fourteenth day of nurse maiding Dex, stuffed between his mafia prince and billionaire Lordling roommates.

“Group project. What could be more fun.” Nelson plopped into the seat beside me in my third year marketing class and twirled his bowtie.

I stared at him. “I didn’t realize you were in this class.” A class I'd been taking for the better part of a month, and I hadn’t seen him in a single session.

Not once.

“I wasn’t. Watching you talk about marketing and…things…encouraged my love of the art.” Nelson mixed his metaphors, probably threw in an acronym while I wasn't paying attention, and waved his fingers in a completely lord-like motion Ithoughtwas meant to convey the magic of…something.

I snorted. “You’re also full of shit.”

Apparently billionaire lordlings could do what they liked on campus, all his previous declarations to the contrary.

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