Page 14 of Knight
CHAPTER SIX
Gwen
The first week at my new college was a little rough. It was a new campus, a new environment, so I knew there would be a bit of adjusting. I was outgoing enough I knew I would make friends easily, but my head was a mess and I hadn’t really taken the time to even notice who was around me in each class, let alone introduce myself.
I was sitting in a coffee shop near the campus trying my best to take it easy on my extra shot mocha. I had a tendency to drink them fast then I would have caffeine overload and get twitchy. But since I’d had trouble sleeping, all I wanted to do was get jacked up enough so I could focus on the words in front of me.
Knight. What could I say about him? Too much to go into right now. He was the root of every thought. The star of my stupid dreams—and some of those were very much naked ones. It was pretty sad when a sex dream was better than anything I’d had in reality. No, it was downright pathetic.
I shook my head and snatched up my highlighter with all intentions of doing some actual work.
“Hi,” a meek voice said from the opposite side of the table. I looked up to see a small, brown-haired chick around my age. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt you. I just, well we are taking the same class and I wanted to see if you wanted to study together.”
I looked down at the book clenched to her chest.
“Oh, yeah. I’m sorry.” I hoped that I didn’t seem like a bitch. “Sure, I could use all the help I can get.” I let out a short, harsh laugh.
“I’m Tara,” she said as she pulled the chair out and cringed at the sound it made as it scraped along the cheap floor.
“Gwen,” I said with a smile.
“I know. I mean, I just pay attention when the professor calls on people.”
Yeah, that was something I didn’t do. Maybe it was a good idea to start from now on. I needed to zone out less.
We ended up talking more than studying, but that was alright with me. It was nice to have someone other than the brothers to chat with. That wasn’t to say that I didn’t love the time I spent with them. But this was different. She wasn’t here because in some small sense she felt she had to be. I wasn’t stupid or blind. I knew there was always one of the Paragons lurking around, watching over me like I was some sort of prized possession or princess. To be fair, I was kind of a princess to my dad.
I didn’t love it and I didn’t hate it. At this point, I was more or less used to it. Even when I was states away from him I still had that security, mostly because he hired real security for me. He didn’t think I knew, but I did. There were two of them and they stuck out like sore thumbs on the California campus. I chose not to let my dad know I was onto him simply because it was just easier to let him have his safety net. I looked at it the only way I should have, he loved me so much he couldn’t handle it if something happened to me.
So, to have someone who didn’t know about me or my connection to the club actually want to sit down and talk to me was something I wasn’t going to take for granted. I wanted to prove to myself, and others, that I could handle life on my own. Nothing like being able to function like a normal person and make friends to start that journey.
Then I started to wonder why it hadn’t been this easy in Cali. What was it about now and this situation that I felt more comfortable? The answer was simple and complicated at the same time. I had my safety net of the club even if I kept it hidden a little.
I shook myself out of such heavy thoughts and realized how late it had gotten. I said my goodbyes to Tara saying I’d see her the next class. She suggested we should exchange numbers and I thought why not. After that was done, I headed out. There was one more thing I wanted to do today before I headed home.
The bar was dead. One guy was cleaning down the bar top and there were three guys I hadn’t met yet playing pool in the far left corner. I bounced my way up to the bar and asked the guy if the prez was around anywhere. He pointed and told me to check the shop, or I could wait and he might be back soon. Since I hadn’t seen the garage setup yet, I decided to make my way next door.
The whole thing they had going here was pretty cool. I’d yet to see the compound, but I knew the dirt road that cut through the thick forest in the back of the bar led to it. It was an old motel or something that they, from what I had gathered, were still working on fixing up.
The garage was a small parking lot away from the bar and they shared what seemed to be a fairly newly paved lot. I would have said they got lucky that they found this all together like it was, but my dad’s words popped up in the back of my head. He had told me they weren’t lucky, it took long hours and hard searching to find what they did. Maybe it was just meant to be.
Outside the air was hot and sticky. I knew the river was just on the other side of the thick forest of trees and today it wasn’t smelling so great. I scrunched up my nose and wondered how all the guys stood living so close to that. I wouldn’t have wanted to smell that all the time, that was for sure.
“Hey, princess,” Ky called out to me the moment he popped his head out from under the car he was working on and laid eyes on me. “Whatcha doing here?”
He stood tall, rolled his shoulders, then walked over to me.
I had learned that Ky was the go-to guy for classics. He rebuilt and restored them and from the pictures he’d shown me, they came out looking like new.
“What’re ya working on?” I asked eyeing the pile of rust that looked like it may have been cherry red at one point. The thing was stripped out, the doors and hood completely gone and sitting off to the side. There weren’t even covers for where all the external lights went.
He looked at the car and a wide smile spread across his face. He was envisioning the finished product I would have guessed.
“This here,” he said as he slung his arm over my shoulders. I didn’t care that he was dirty and possibly making a mess of my clothes. “Is a—”
“Nineteen seventy-three Chevy Nova,” someone called out from behind us just on the outside of the bay. We both whipped around to see who had interrupted.
“Seriously, man. You just gonna come into my garage and steal my thunder like that. Asshole.” Ky said with a smile on his face and I knew he was just messing with the guy.
