What am I doing?
This is Trey Bloomberg. We’re not supposed to be kissing. I shouldn’t be consoling him because his dad’s a bastard. I should be gloating over my revenge.
But instead, my body melted into Trey, flame on flame, heart on heart. The more we kissed, the higher the fire raged inside me, the more of Trey I understood, the more I knew exactly why he had hated me – because when he looked at me, he saw a wildness that he longed to embrace. Trey Bloomberg was just as trapped, just as caged, as I was. The only difference was that his cage was made of gold.
Trey’s hands skimmed my body, dragging me closer, tugging me so that I straddled him awkwardly on the bench. His finger snaked beneath the hem of my shirt, untucking it from my skirt so his thumbs grazed my skin. Just that touch made my body flare like a star gone supernova, and I moaned against his lips. Trey’s fingers trailed higher, pushing up my shirt, grazing the underside of my bra—
“Trey? You back here?”
Trey jerked away from me, his eyes wide, just as Ayaz came around the corner. I yanked my shirt down, my face hot.
If Ayaz saw what we were doing, he had the fortitude not to mention it, or even to acknowledge my presence with more than a flicker of his dark eyes. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere. Come on, man. Quinn’s asking for us.”
“Yeah?” Trey stood up and followed Ayaz. The door swung shut behind them, leaving me sitting in an empty boys’ locker room with the taste of Trey Bloomberg on my lips, wondering what the hell just happened.
Chapter Nineteen
“What’s wrong?” Greg said as I slumped down at the breakfast table. “We should be celebrating, but you’ve got your glum face on.”
He was right. Our plan had gone off without a hitch. Quinn was recovering in the infirmary (his blindness was only temporary, but his eyes were scratched and swollen from irritants in the powder, not to mention his mysterious black eye), and Trey and Ayaz were laughingstocks. One of the yearbook photographers had snapped some pictures of them scratching themselves on the field, and someone copied them and plastered them on all the notice-boards in the dormitory. All the parents saw them as they left the school after their all-night alumni party. When I’d glanced at Andre across the table, he’d flashed me a silent, knowing smile.
I shoved my bacon around my plate, checking around and underneath it for any maggots. My lips still tingled from Trey’s kiss. The whole thing was insane.Why did he kiss me? Why did I kiss him back? Why couldn’t I stop thinking about it, and about what might have happened if Ayaz hadn’t come in?
I pushed my food under Andre’s nose and shoved my chair out. “I’ve got to meet Ayaz in the library. We’re working on our project.”
Greg’s eyes widened. “Wait, Hazel—”
But I was already halfway to the exit. As I walked past the monarch’s table, Trey’s eyes followed me, burning into my flesh. My lips ached with the shadow of his kiss. The trails his fingers laid over my skin sizzled with fresh desire.
Beside him, Tillie Fairchild glared at me. If her eyes were daggers, I’d be skewered on the wall.Does she know? Fuck, I hope not.
She can’t know. If she knew, I’d be lying dead in a pile of my own eviscerated organs.
Who am I? Who is this girl who wastes her time lusting after someone else’s boyfriend, after the guy who tried to kill her? I’m sick. I need help.
It can’t ever happen again. If Trey Bloomberg thought he was going to slum it with me while dating Tillie, he had another thing coming. I wasn’t some guy’s pity fuck or mistress.If he wanted me the way he’d made me believe he wanted me during that kiss, then he can break up with her. He won’t, so it’s over.
If only…My whole body shuddered with heat at the memory of his fingers trailing the edge of my bra. I rubbed my lips as I jogged across the quad toward the library. There was no use hoping or wishing. I must’ve imagined the connection between us. What happened in the locker room was an accident, a strange side-effect of Trey’s vulnerability over the prank I’d pulled. We weren’t attracted to each other. We didn’t evenlikeeach other.
Right?
Right?
* * *
I tapped my pen against my paper and checked the clock on the library wall. Ayaz was supposed to meet me twenty minutes ago. He’d never been late before.
He’s probably got his tongue down some girl’s throat,I thought to myself, remembering Ayaz sitting in the grotto with the two girls. I’d found out from Greg that they were juniors, and that apparently they’d both been in Ayaz’s bed that night.
“Hey, Meat.” A muscled frame dropped into the seat across from me. But it wasn’t Ayaz. It was Quinn.
“Shouldn’t you be in the infirmary?”
Quinn looked awful. Both his eyes were swollen and puffy, the skin on his face red with irritation. The bruising around his black eye had darkened into splotches of color, and it looked even worse when combined with his other injuries. I was surprised he could even see enough to find his way here.
“Yes. I should.” Quinn placed his chin in his hands and stared at me across the table, like he was trying to unpick my mind. “What are you doing in the library on a Sunday? This is the day of rest.”
“Yes, and you should be resting. I’m studying so that I can get into a good college. Unlike some people, I’m not relying on my daddy’s purse-strings to open doors for me.”
