“I think he is. I mean, you don’t become rich overnight, right? It’s not like he won the Ohio lottery. He was born wealthy. How wealthy? One can only assume, given that the car and the house are on the same street as one of the older sons, from what I heard. The question is, why didn’t everyone know before? Something like that around here isn’t overlooked. Garret is connected, but he’s not one of them like Saint is, yet everyone kisses his ass like he is.”
I know the answer to that, but I don’t think I should share that part with her yet. For some reason, I feel like that is something I shouldn’t say aloud. It’s obvious they kept him locked up for a reason, but why let him out now? I’m sure whatever the reason, the people who run this place have plenty of resources to handle it.
“Who knows. All I know is that he can’t be trusted.”
“I wouldn’t blame you for saying that with the way he looks at you.”
I lean back in the chair and pause. “What do you mean?”
She leans over the edge of the table and lowers her voice. “You haven’t noticed the times he’s passed by the quad when we’ve sat there for lunch?”
I shake my head. For the life of me, I didn’t even notice. “No.”
“He goes to the gym all the time and works out like he’s trying to exorcise a demon with how much weight he lifts. All the guys from the swim team talk about it. It’s probably why the whole locker thing with that brunette in one of his classes isn’t a lie. She works out around the same time he does.”
My stomach sinks, my heart starts hammering inside my chest, replaced by a pressure when I think about him fucking someone else in the shower, but I push it away.
It’s real.
It happened, and I have to accept that I’m not special to him or anyone.
Before the note under the door. Before the back row in this library. Before him telling me about his past on the roof, and after, when I think of his hand over mine in the dark, and the word yes said quietly, giving myself to him completely.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t notice.”
“He stares at you like you are the only one eating your lunch at the table.”
I didn’t notice because I was too busy thinking about him. My future and what becomes of it by being here. And I now hate knowing that I gave myself to him so freely.
I scan the library like Saint is going to materialize between the bookshelves before my eyes land on her again. “Does he?”
“You like him?”
“Who?” I play dumb.
She laughs through her nose. “Saint?”
I look around nervously. “What makes you think that? You know what guys like Saint are like, and we both know what we are in a place like this.”
“Everything has a price.”
“That’s right.”
She nods in agreement. “I wish I could say you’re wrong, but it’s not.”
“Isn’t it the same with you and Garret?”
She rolls her eyes. “It’s complicated.”
I don’t press her for more because it’s complicated for me too. Everything is.
My life.
This place.
Saint.
“So you want to go to Babylon on Friday?” I offer, like I planned on going.
