Page 3 of Between the Blue
I started to scroll back through my email inbox as I reached the bottom of the stairs, double checking to make sure I hadn’t missed an email from anyone at COBO.
When I found nothing, I opened our last thread of communication and hit the button to reply. My feet slowed, my thumbs beginning to tap out my message as I came to a fork in the road before me. I looked up from the screen for just a moment, my brows pulling together.
Across the weight room, down the stairs, take a…
My phone buzzed in my hand and I glanced back down at it to see a text message notification banner at the top of my screen.
Nana: Good luck today, Addie! You deserve it all. Let your light shine, Sunny.
My heart swelled at the message, and I almost clicked on the notification to reply, but shook my head, quickly swiping it away and telling myself I could respond to her while I was on my way to class.
Focus, Addie.
I refocused on the email, taking a right down the hallway and picking up my pace when I caught the time on my phone and realized I was running a few minutes behind schedule now.
Take a right, first door on your…
My eyes flicked up from my phone to see a door just to my left. I deleted the last sentence I typed out, rephrasing it for the third time as I pushed the door open and ducked quickly inside.
And the next thing I knew, I was smacking into a woman with so much force that it felt like I had run straight into a brick wall.
And then it all happened so fast.
My phone flew out of my hand, my gym bag slid straight off my shoulder, and the bag fell roughly to the ground as I stumbled forward.
I muttered an “Oof”at the same time the woman I ran into let out a deep grunt. My phone went skittering across the locker room floor with an awful sound as what must have been the entire contents of my gym bag exploded at my feet.
Getting tripped up on my own belongings, my arm shot out, grabbing onto the only leverage that I had: the arm of the poor woman I just collided with. I wrap my hand around her forearm, attempting to steady myself.
“Ohmygosh,” I blurted, “I’m so sorry.”
I blinked hard, coming to my senses and allowing my rattled brain to settle in my skull. And as my vision came back into focus, I realized the forearm of the woman that I was holding was entirely covered in dark swirling tattoos.
My brows pulled together as I turned her arm over, seeing even more ink. I felt entranced as my gaze traced over the art, my eyes zeroing in on what appeared to be half of a Yin-Yang symbol on her wrist until it suddenly occurred to me how thick and corded with muscle the woman’s arm was.
I blinked again, then felt my stomach dip before I forced my eyes up, knowing what I would find.
The woman was, in fact,nota woman.
Not at all.
I immediately snatched my hand away, feeling the embarrassment tinging my cheeks and confusion swirling in my brain.
“What are you doing in here?” I demanded. I tried to take a single step back but snagged my foot on my jeans that were rumpled in a heap on the floor, stumbling back several steps instead.
I righted myself, huffing out a heavy breath as I waited for a response that didn’t come.
“Why are you in the women’s locker room?” I asked the man.
The longer he didn’t answer me, the longer I had to stare at him, and the longer I was able to take in what I was truly looking at.
I didn’t notice in my initial shock what I had stumbled upon.
And that just might have been, unfortunately, the most beautiful man I’d ever seen.
He was tall. Well over six feet. Definitely a little older than me. Probably late twenties, maybe early thirties. He had a full black and gray tattoo sleeve running the entire length of his right arm and another one I hadn’t initially seen covering most of his right leg. He had hair so dark it was nearly jet-black slicked back under a baseball cap and a trimmed beard covering the lower half of his face. But it’s where my eyes settled last that really stopped me in my tracks.
Those brown eyes.
