Page 99 of Allure

"Nope." She laughs. "I'm not that tech-savvy."

“Me neither, but I might know someone who can help with that.”

“Declan?”

“Why is he always the first person you think of?” I ask lightly. “It’s enough to make me feel like you have a secret crush on him.”

“No. I just… I don’t know. I’ve been bullied before, and the thought that maybe a guy can turn around and not be an ass anymore… Because the thing is, the times when you did let Declan in, you seemed happy. That’s all I want for you.”

“Can a healthy relationship…” I shake my head and roll my eyes. “Not going there. He was eating lunch with Julia today.”

“How did you find that out? Did he bring her to campus? Wait, does she go here?”

“I have no idea. Maybe she is a student here. I don’t know if it was at a restaurant or where it was, but yeah…”

Dawn doesn’t ask for specifics, which makes me grateful because I’m done talking about him.

She starts to gather her books together.

“Do you want me to drive you to the library?” I ask.

“It’s not that far.”

“Those are a lot of books,” I protest.

“My second workout of the day,” she says with a grin. “I’ll be fine. Thanks for the offer. I might be there late. No offense. I love you and Elia and Kaylie, but I get a lot more work done faster at the library.”

“No offense taken at all,” I assure her. “You do you.”

She grins and doesn’t seem to mind at all that I open the door for her.

Time for me to get something to eat, something small, and then karate. Do or die. Not that I’m going to eat a lot. I’m not even sure I’ll be able to keep anything down. My stomach is all twisted into knots.

But I can eat half a sandwich, skip the chips, and eat a cookie because why not? A regular cookie, too. Peanut butterandchocolate chip.

If I die tonight, at least I had dessert.

CHAPTER34

There is an uneven number of students in class. Instead of having me sub in and spar with people, Declan just has me on the bag. I kick and punch it, moving all around, trying to be as light as I can be on my feet, always bouncing. My calves start burning earlier than I would've liked, and my heart is racing, but I feel good, working up a sweat. Not having to worry about being hit or trying to land a hit on someone else frees me up to just mindlessly assault the bag, concentrating on nothing at all, especially not what’s to come after class.

Once class is over, I head to the locker room. Thankfully, Julie isn’t here, but I can’t help but wonder if Declan asked her not to come because of what we have going on tonight.

Whatever. I’m not going to potentially waste my last thoughts on her.

I grab my clothes and pretend to be too tired to get changed here, but instead of leaving, I head to the shower area. Not that I’m showering. Here is where I find out if Declan was able to grab police body armor. If he only managed to grab one…

The plan is for Declan to leave after I do. I'm going to have car trouble and pretend my phone is dead, looking like easy prey.

But even though Declan’s going to leave, he’s going to hide nearby to ensure I have backup.

Thankfully, not only is there a vest, but there are two. It’s warm out, so wearing this underneath my dress is going to look a little awkward, but I tried on my bulkiest shirt under all of my dresses before settling on this one because it can handle bulk a little better than the rest of them.

Declan enters the room, and he helps me put on my vest, and then I return the favor, although he has to tell me what to do because it’s not super evident what to do at first.

“Are you sure about this?” he asks softly. “Because if you want to back out, I wouldn’t blame you.”

“I thought we’ve been over this,” I say, my term as firm as my back is rigid. “I’m not a quitter. I’m doing this. Or are you the one having cold feet?”

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