Page 4 of Study Buddies

I nodded, a little glumly. The campus bookstore likely had dozens of different kinds of journals. “Yeah, that’s probably for the best.”

“He meant don’t go there alone,” Lucas clarified. “We’ll go with you.”

“Really?” The word had come out quicker than the assurance that it didn’t matter.

“Really,” Lucas said, and his eyes met those of Jayden and Roger. They both nodded. “Let’s go.”

2

LUCAS

Jayden drove,and Roger sat up front with him. Tori and I were in the back of the SUV, just a foot and a half separating us. The occasional streetlight lit up her face, but other than that, I couldn’t see much of her.

But I saw enough to catch the tightness in her jaw, the way her fingers gripped the hems of her sleeve like she was bracing for something.I’d spent a lot of time in our study group last year studying her instead of my books, and I knew she was uneasy.

The question was why. She’d let slip that her last roommate was male. That wasn’t that uncommon these days, but had he just been her friend? Or boyfriend?

Or maybe he wasstillher boyfriend. That thought didn’t sit very well, but it was possible. Maybe she’d decided that they’d moved in together too fast or something.

Tori hadn’t mentioned a boyfriend before—not like Amanda who seemed to have a different guy every week—but that didn’t mean that Tori didn’t have one. My priority was my schoolwork, yes, but I’d have to have been blind to not realize how gorgeous she was.

Last year she was the only woman I truly noticed. The first woman I noticed since Natalie.

“How long did you live at this place?” I asked.

She’d given us directions, and her former residence was on the far side of campus behind the foreign language building.

“Not long. A couple of weeks.”

I frowned. “So where did you live before that?”

“It’s kind of a long story.”

“We’ve got time,” I said, although it wasn’t true. We couldn’t have been more than a few minutes away from our destination.

Jayden slowed down and made a right at the next stop sign. I caught his eye in the rearview mirror and exchanged a look. If I wasn’t mistaken, he was taking a longer route. He knew as well as I did that something was up with Tori.

“What happened to those women you were living with last year?” I continued.

She grimaced. “That was okay at first. We weren't best friends, but we got along until one got a boyfriend and then the next one did too, and before I knew it, they were over all the time. There was always somebody sleeping on the couch or in the kitchen. And it was so loud. I couldn't study, and someone broke my tablet, and… it just got pretty bad.”

I wanted to reach over and take her hand, but we were just friends. “When did you move out?”

“Halfway through the summer.”

She told us that she moved during the summer, but it seemed more likely she’d had a series of moves. I wondered where she was living now.

“Todd and I didn't part on the best of terms.” Todd, that was his name. But I still didn't know the nature of their relationship.

Then she elaborated. “He was in one of my pre-ed classes. He was my friend, and I told me about my roommate situation.He had a spare room, and he said the house felt too big for one person.”

Light from an oncoming car splashed across her, and I saw her shrug. “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

“I'm sorry it didn't work out.”

She glanced at me, and I caught a quick glimpse of her before darkness returned. She had pale skin like porcelain, and those dark eyes and lashes. Then there was that hair—long, glossy, and frequently up in a ponytail. Jayden couldn't keep his eyes off it. He was like a cat watching a mouse, like he wanted to paw at it and bat it around. I couldn’t blame him. Long hair on women had never really been my thing until I met Tori.

Jayden pulled into the driveway of a small house. It looked to be two bedrooms like mine. Though mine was a little bigger, from the look of it. Tori made no move to get out until Roger opened her door. Then she took a deep breath and climbed out of the SUV.

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