“I make you nervous.” She had turned to leave, but she hesitated at my question. “Why?”
“You don’t make me nervous,” she answered as she looked over at me. “It’s late, I’m tired.”
“You tell yourself that.” I smirked at her as I resumed my walk.
“You don’t affect me at all,” came her angry hiss, and I smiled wider. I knew I was getting to her, but I didn’t know why. I just knew it pleased me in some way.
“As I said, keep telling yourself that,” I called softly over my shoulder. I laughed when I heard her door slam in response. With a smile and a lighter step, I headed back home.
I had a lot of shit to sort, but now I was ready for sleep.
Chapter 7: Ava
In the morning, I was cranky, and I knew exactly who I was pissed off at. Jett Santo. Every single time I tried to get rid of him from my brain, he turned up, like some form of narcissistic junkie who sensed I wasmoving onfrom Friday, so he popped back into the forefront of my awareness in case Icouldforget him.
He was like a freaking whack-a-mole just waiting to be swatted.
I would quite happily swat the fucker with a baseball bat if I could.
Sleep had not come to visit me last night. I had gotten up and done some coursework, hoping it would help me sleep. Then I had merely lain in bed and watched my alarm clock move ever closer to getting up time. An hour before I was due to wake up, I was using a washcloth to give myself a sink bath since the generator was still out, which meant no shower, and at the stroke of eight thirty, I was arriving at the housing administration building with a vengeance.
Much to my annoyance, there was already a line forming, and I was eyeing the guy in front of me’s coffee with rabid want. Would it be assault if I tackled him to the ground for his coffee? On top of theft? My crazy inner ramblings made me giggle and caused the carrier of the object of my desire to turn and look at me quizzically.
Lame hand wave later, and he had not only turned back, facing front, but also moved a step further away from me. It did not lessen the soft, sultry smell of caffeine, though, and I was almost salivating by the time he was called forward.
My horror as he casually tossed the three-quarter-full cup into the trash was only surmounted when Jett came out of theside office, looking impeccable and well-rested, wearing a white T-shirt and dark blue jeans with ripped out knees.
Hiding behind my hair so he wouldn’t see me, I studied my scuffed white Chucks. Even had I not known he was in the same room as me, I would have felt his presence as he came and stood casually beside me.
“Morning,” he greeted cheerfully.
I hate you.
Looking up and pretending I hadn’t seen him before he was beside me, I forced a carefree smile. When his head tilted slightly to the side and his beautiful blue eyes narrowed infinitesimally, I can only imagine what my face must have looked like.
“What?” I asked him rather forcibly, and my good Southern manners internally balked at me. “Sorry, morning.”
“Are you always this uptight?” Jett asked me with a casual sweep over me, and I remembered that I was practically unwashed, my hair probably looked like I’d been on the back of a hay cart, and I was pretty confident this was yesterday’s T-shirt.
“I’m not uptight, I’m just not a morning person,” I explained patiently.
“You were like this yesterday, and it was the afternoon. You were like this last night, or should I say earlier this morning.” He looked me over again critically. “I think you’re just uptight.”
“Well, thank goodness I don’t really care what you think.” Again, the tight smile, but this time I wasn’t forcing myself to be nice to him.
“I knew I’d regret doing this, but yeah, you can come out of the line. You’re holding everyone up.”
“Huh?”
Jett looked at me with that damn smirk on his face. “Your generator will be fixed this morning.”
“Huh?”
“How quickly you go from hostile to speechless.” His lip curled up in a smile at the corner, and I was torn between wanting to lick it or smack it off his face. “I think I like it.”
“You don’t even know my name.” I looked around as I stepped out of the line. “I was next, so you better not have been fucking with me.”
Again, the cool appraisal, and again I felt like an uncouth bug. “I’m notfuckingwith you. I don’t know your name, but I know the building.”
