Page 503 of Filthy Elites

“No you can’t, I have a bralette on.”

“Starling, change the shirt. Now.”

With a scowl, I turn and head back into the closet, stripping the tank over my head and replacing it with one of the things he got me. It’s a cropped shirt, with armholes that are wide enough you can see all of my white lace bralette from the sides.

“No,” he snarls.

Smirking, I spread my arms wide. “You picked this shirt.”

“I didn’t know it’d be that sexy.”

“That’s sounds like a you problem, not a me problem,” I shrug. “Now I need to go, or I’ll be late for class. Did you say Clay’s my prison guard today?”

“Little bird, you’re fucking pushing it with that attitude. Now your ass isn’t leaving this room wearing that shirt, go change to something that covers what’s mine.”

“You’ve had a problem with the last two shirts, why don’t you just go pick something so I can leave.”

Lips pressed together into a hard line, he climbs up off the bed, tucks his still semihard dick into his boxer briefs and storms past me and into the closet. The sound of his muttering filters into the bedroom and I cross my arms over my chest and wait impatiently, tapping my foot against the wooden flooring.

“Here, put this on,” he says, stomping out of the closet and holding out one of his T-shirts for me to wear.

“Fine, whatever,” I say, pulling the tank over my head and replacing it with his shirt. It’s huge on my much smaller frame, so I quickly roll the hem up and tie it in a knot at my hip, then fold the sleeves over so they fit a little better.

Perhaps another girl would be bothered that they’re wearing a huge guy’s shirt, but I really don’t care what I wear. Instead of fighting with him, which would mean exchanging more words than I want to, I just grab my backpack, cell phone, AirPods and Chucks and leave the room without a single glance back in his direction.

I find the other guys all in the kitchen. Hunter is flipping pancakes on a griddle, while Evan is sitting at the dining table and Clay is leaning against the counter.

“Inmate Kennedy, reporting, sir,” I drawl sarcastically to Clay.

“You need to eat, I made you breakfast,” Hunter says, flashing me a soft smile.

“No, thanks.”

“You need to eat, you ran miles this morning,” Evan agrees.

“The asshole upstairs already made me change my shirt three times, I’m late, I’m ready to leave.”

“Starling, can we please just call a truce?” Evan begs.

“I’ll wait outside, if I’m late you can explain the reason why,” I say, ignoring Evan and speaking directly to Clay. Turning my back on all of them, I march out the front door, inhaling deeply and trying to find that elusive, full breath that’s eluded me since I came back to Florida.

“Here,” Clay says, appearing beside me, holding out a banana and a bottle of water.

The moment the gates slide open wide enough for me to fit through, I stride away, trying to figure out a way to escape without him realizing. Pushing my AirPods into my ears, I drown out the sound of him with some old-school ’90s angry-girl music. The dulcet tones of Alanis Morrisette fill my ears and I manage to block out all thoughts of Elite, Collinwood House and anything else that’s related to Sebastian Lockwood. Instead, I focus on the crescendo that the music is building inside of me. I try not to think about the fact that my mom calls this album the sound of her puberty, or that it was her who told me to listen to it one day when I was filled with teenage hormone-induced rage. By the time I reach the building my very first college class is being held in, I’m angry and empowered. I am woman hear me roar.

“I’ll be here when your class finishes,” Clay tells me.

“Fantastic, I can hardly wait,” I deadpan, flashing him my middle finger as I open the door to my classroom and walk inside. Intro to economics is quite possibly the most boring class I’ve ever taken, but as I have no idea what I want to major in, I figure I might as well get as many of my required general ed classes out of the way in my first semester.

After two years of avoiding people and friendships, I’ve got becoming invisible down to a fine art. Most people think that sitting at the back of a class makes you unapproachable, but that’s where they have it wrong, you actually need to be a row or two away from the front. No one likes the people who sit on the front row, but they never notice the mediocre middle people, so that’s who I’ve become. Two rows from the front, two-thirds of the way along the row, I’m in the perfect position to be completely unremarkable. Or at least that’s what I’d be if the beautiful Clay Jansen wasn’t waiting right outside the classroom doors for me the moment the bell rings to signal the end of class.

He's the type of attractive that it’s impossible to ignore, so all my hard work to blend into the crowd is destroyed when everyone watches him smile widely at me. Ignoring him, I pass him as if he’s a complete stranger, but he races to catch up with me and slings his arm over my shoulders. “Your next class isn’t for an hour, I thought we could go grab a coffee and maybe something to eat.”

“No thanks.”

“Okay, so what do you want to do for the next hour?”

“I don’t really care what you do, but I plan to go sit my ass down under that tree over there and read,” I say tersely, walking to a tree and sliding down the trunk until my ass is rested against the roots in the grass.

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