Page 51 of The Revenge Plan (Forbidden Descendants 1)

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Haven

Okay, so I might’ve relentlessly paced the floor by the door, waiting for Wick to get home that night because the glare Topher had sent me across campus had haunted me all day.

When he hadn’t charged after me to talk it out, it made me think… I don’t know. But it felt as if things were worse because he’d let me go, so now… Now I wondered what had happened between him and Wick at practice.

I finally sat in a chair in the living room with an open textbook on my lap, pretending to study, but I ended up just staring at the front door and biting my fingernails the entire time until it finally opened at a quarter until seven.

As Wick stepped inside, a huge sports duffle slung over his shoulder and his head bowed as if he were deep in thought, I popped to my feet, instantly nervous. Instantly expectant.

“Hey, um, hi,” I rushed out the greeting and offered him a tense smile as he looked up in surprise, then paused to eye me warily. I tucked a piece of hair behind my ear. “You look like you just got out of practice. Did you just get out of practice?”

Shutting the door behind him, he answered with a brief, stoic, “Yep.”

“You did? Oh. Uh, did you… I mean, did you see him there? Topher, that is.”

He squinted at me. I flushed, feeling like a fool. “Sorry. Of course you saw him. I just…” Laughing uneasily at myself for acting like such a weirdo, I rubbed at the back of my neck and asked. “I’m just… I mean… Did he say anything to you? About me?”

Like the fact that I’d been staring at you across campus today as if I wanted you, even though I was seriously only staring because, well… Looking at you just helps me with my nerves for some reason. The fact that you’re gorgeous is completely coincidental.

“Mm-hmm,” he mumbled, lowering his gaze.

My heart started to pound. “He did?”

Oh God. Had he told Wick I’d been staring? Had Wick told him where to find me? Crap. Did Topher know where I lived now?

“He was still convinced you ran into Izzy’s room last night,” Wick explained. “I told him he was wrong, and then I didn’t tell him anything else.”

“Oh.” I blew out a breath and wavered a little unsteadily from the relief that spiked through m

e. “So, you didn’t tell him where I was? Where I’m living now?”

He shook his head.

I clutched my abdomen, grateful. “Thank you,” I gushed. “Oh my God, thank you.”

He nodded. “I don’t want him showing up on our doorstep any more than you do.”

“Right,” I murmured. “I mean, of course. That makes sense.”

“Yep.”

His short answers were beginning to drive me crazy. I wanted to know more, everything: what he thought about all this, what he thought about me, every detail of what had gone down between him and Topher.

I felt so in-the-dark and uncertain.

When Wick started from the room without another word, I wilted, because obviously, I wasn’t going to get my curiosity appeased.

But then Wick jarred to a halt in the doorway. He lifted his hand to the doorjamb, and with his back to me, he said, “I insulted you.”

Blinking because I was certain I’d misheard him, I said, “I’m sorry, what?”

He glanced back, his pale eyes troubled. “At practice today, when he confronted me. He seemed so certain I had you stashed away somewhere, I just… I wanted to convince him I didn’t know where you were, so I lied and said—”

He broke off abruptly.

Wincing over what he must’ve said about me, I cautiously prodded. “You said what?”

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