“She's not your possession. Now, you’re gonna be a good boy and stay the fuck away from that angel, got it?”
Vince whimpered as he attempted to crawl away.
A flash of my eyes and he froze.
“That wasn’t an answer, Vinnie boy.”
Anger broke through his terror. “Courtney is mine,” he seethed.
I cocked my head. “Maybe I went too easy on you.”
“No, please no!”
A knowing smirk. “That’s what I thought. Now, what are you gonna do?”
“I’ll- stay- away,” he choked out.
“Excellent.” I rose to return to the lecture.To her. As I opened the door, I glanced back. “Oh, one last thing. I took the liberty of toying with the wiring up there and I figured you didn’t deserve the luxury of smelling that perfume of hers you like so much, so now your brain doesn’t process scent at all.”
“Wha-what?”
I’d already walked through the door.
9
Courtney
Myteethclickedonthe pen cap. Mom berated me endlessly about the habit, “You already have enough flaws, don’t ruin your teeth too.”I clamped down harder on the plastic in silent rebellion. From the back of the library, I stared at pages of notes and begged them to imprint on my brain, but it was no use. I was hopelessly distracted. No one bothered to notice my pain before- why would he? That fateful class two weeks ago remained center stage.
When he returned to the seat beside me, trickles of red dripped from the corners of his eyes. Absent-mindedly, he wiped them away with the back of his hand, barely acknowledging the smeared blood on his skin. He reclined in his chair as if he didn’t have a care in the world and said nothing.
After class, Vince wasn’t waiting for me.
No texts. No calls. No knock at my door.
He’ll never touch you again.
The dark promise of those words sparked something dangerous in me that I desperately shoveled dirt over, but like malignant weeds, unwanted desires broke through anyway.
I still felt Vince’s eyes from a distance, but he didn’t approach. Whatever Ollie did worked and against everything I was trained to believe, I wasgrateful. Even if we didn’t speak much, Ollie continued to sit next to me in class. Sometimes he silently walked me to the dance studio. I was confused at first, but after the third time, I accepted his mute company.
A thud jerked me from my thoughts.
On the table sat a British Literature textbook, fingers steepled over its curling cover. My gaze traveled up the hand to a tattooed forearm, higher to muscled shoulders straining against thin white cotton, then to the dusting of blond stubble covering a square jaw and finally landing on an amused smirk.
Fuck, he was gorgeous. It almost hurt to look at him for longer than two seconds. Mom’s warnings about beautiful men threatened to drown out fizzing bubbles of attraction.
Ollie raised a brow. “Care if I join you?”
I ripped the pen cap from my teeth, cheeks burning in embarrassment. Maybe mom had a point about that habit.
“Didn’t think you believed in studying.”
“Some things interest me more than others.”
He eased into the chair across from me, knee bumping mine under the table. I used to cringe at physical contact after years of Vince’s constant fondling, but the slightest touch from Ollie had my skin singing. I bit my lip to avoid chomping the pen to bits.
“Like British Literature?”
