I already told her that and I don’t repeat myself. I cross my arms over my chest and wait for my statement to sink in.
“You’re taking this bodyguard thing seriously, aren’t you?”
I keep to myself that she should be glad I upheld my end of our agreement. “I’ve protected you twice. Now I need something from you, but if you don’t want to help me, I’ll let you out of our deal with no hard feelings.”
Breanna yawns and her eyes grow heavy. She’s the type who gets tired when she drinks instead of annoying or weepy. It’s one more thing I like about her. “What do you need?”
“Your brain.”
Breanna
MY BRAIN. HE NEEDS my brain. Of course he does. Why else would he be talking to me? No guy would choose to be alone to kiss me. I practically threw myself at Razor, confessing I was hoping to be kissed, and he gives me a rain check, which I’m realizing is the equivalent of a gentle letdown. What was I expecting? Him to admit he lured me to the bed of his truck to ra
vish my body?
Yeah, I know. I’m supposed to be this twenty-first-century woman and obsessed with a man desiring me for my massive intellect. I am woman, hear me roar, and all that stuff, but for once, it would have been really freaking awesome to be the girl in the pretty dress left alone with the gorgeous bad boy who wants to kiss me.
I evidently expected too much out of the universe. “I’m not writing your papers.”
Razor goes rock solid and I make myself smaller when those blue eyes ice over again. “Did I ask you to?”
“No,” I croak.
“Do you believe what everyone says? You think I can’t write my own papers?”
I know what he’s referring to. People say he’s stupid because he failed fifth grade, but until he brought it up, that fact had stayed stored away in the dark recesses of my mind. “No.”
“Did I ask you to cheat?”
“No.” Once again, I made a horrible presumption. “I’m sorry, I didn’t think—”
“You didn’t think. Remember that, now let it go.” Razor pulls his phone out of his jeans pocket and flips through icons. A split second later he’s showing me a picture.
I’ll admit, my vision isn’t the best. In fact, everything has a blurry haze on the edges. My eyes are drying out and my contacts are irritating the crap out of me. My goal in life is to find a pillow and my glasses. Give me that combo and I’ll die a happy girl.
A blanket would be like sprinkles on ice cream.
I squint at the lit-up cell and the thoughts in my head disappear. I reach out, grab Razor’s phone and use my thumb and forefinger to enlarge the picture. “What’s this?”
“Some sort of a coded message. Can you decipher it?”
“I’m not a puzzle ATM where you insert the code and I spit out the answer.”
“Do you speak to all bikers this way?”
I choke on a laugh or a hysterical sob. I’m too tired and light-headed to analyze which one. “I was raised to never speak to any of you.”
“Guess that makes you a rebel.”
“Guess so.” But I’m too lost in the numbers and letters to enjoy this easy banter between us. “It’s worked like a crossword puzzle.”
“Yeah.”
“That’ll help. It means some of these words share the same letters.”
“There’s another one.” Razor switches the image. My eyes scan the code, attempting to force a pattern, but my mind is already stuck on the crossword.
“Does it matter which one I try to crack first? Because once I get going on something I have a hard time moving on until I figure out the current problem in front of me.”