“Why did you do it?” he asked, eyeing me again. He frowned. “Stand up for
my sister. I mean, we know you used her. To get to D?”
I had used her and was well aware of it. I’d messed up, done her dirty, and I was woman enough to admit that. I shook my head. “I didn’t mean to use her,” I said, opening my hands. “I fucked up, and she didn’t deserve that.”
The words tasted sour coming out of my mouth, but not because I didn’t feel that way. I had messed up. I didn’t mean to do such a thing to Bow. She’d always been nice to me. A little all over the place, but always nice.
It was saying all this shit in front of the enemy I didn’t like. That I was bowing down to the force that ran this place.
“So you felt guilty?” Thatcher cocked his head at me, really trying to figure me out. I shook my head, and his eyes twitched wide.
I shrugged. “I may have fucked up when it came to your sister, but I’m not an asshole.” My eyes narrowed. “I stepped in because it was the right thing to do. It wasn’t guilt. It was just the right thing. She was in trouble, and I wanted to help her out.”
Thatcher leaned back, his beefy arm on his chair. “Surely, you knew you couldn’t have done much with those guys.” He leaned in. “Even with that little bat of yours.”
That didn’t matter. It was the right thing to do. Call me stupid, but I stood up for the little guy. Maybe because I knew what it was like to be the little guy. I hugged my arms. “I don’t like bullies.”
Thatcher’s eyes returned into slits, this boy seriously serpent-like. He was as lethal as he was pretty, deadly. Wetting his lips, he kicked his chair from underneath him, rising to the sky. He waved a hand. “Come on. You’re coming with me.”
I shot up. “Uh, no.” How about a hell no?
He shook his head, then pointed at my food. “Your food is garbage, and I’m not going to be an asshole and let you eat it.” He popped a big shoulder. “Come. I’m going to get you a decent burger and fries. It’s the least I can do for you helping Bow.”
I tilted my head. “Like… off campus?” I said, but he was already leaving. We weren’t allowed to leave school for lunch, one of the academy’s rules. I read that in the handbook the first week. I sat up. “Like we’re leaving?”
He turned around, his arms open. “You coming or not, Pretty, Pretty Princess? Where I come from, we take care of those who take care of us. I owe you a burger. Let me do that for you.”
He put a hand to his chest, and though he appeared genuine, I wasn’t so sure. I stood. “I didn’t help your sister for a favor or anything.”
He was backing away. “I know,” he said, then paused to flash a cheeky grin. “That’s exactly why you’re about to get one.”
*
How I ended up in Thatcher’s Audi was beyond me, and I’d gotten more than a few looks before we drove off school property. Ironically enough, attention we hadn’t gotten had been that of the school security.
“They don’t care what the fuck we do,” Thatcher said, his thick arm hanging out the window. “Our parents own this school. This town.”
Apparently, they really did. He went on to say how much their parents donated to the school and the influence all their parents had on the school board because of it. Actually, once Thatcher got talking, he couldn’t stop, and I was surprised he relayed this much information about his family. Well, Legacy’s families. I supposedly was the enemy.
I guessed I wasn’t today.
This “favor” Thatcher seemed obligated to fulfill, and he chatted my ear off all the way to the closest Jax’s Burger franchise. As it seemed, the Legacy boys owned this too.
“Wells’s dad is Jax,” he stated, his tongue out in a gleeful fashion as he unstrapped himself. “We basically get all the free shit we want. Come on.”
Eh, big spender, huh?
I rolled my eyes, unstrapping myself. I wasn’t surprised to see more than one academy jacket donning both guys and girls in the lot. This must have been a hot place to sneak off to during lunch, and it was close, so I’d give them all that.
Still, this was awkward as fuck flanking behind Windsor Prep elite. Thatcher threw out his large wing span to anyone who gave him attention, the life of the party and vain as complete fuck. The amount of kisses he demanded on his cheek on the way inside alone told me what he thought of himself. And some of the chicks he passed were with guys.
This guy really was something else, but he made me laugh surprisingly enough. His arrogance alone I found laughable.
I wasn’t laughing when we got inside.
One booth specifically held all his friends, Dorian and Ares eating from their Jax’s haul. Wells sat on their opposite side. Dorian and Ares specifically had Bow tucked between them, and she was the one to spot me.
“Sloane!” She waved in my direction like the spirited little rabbit I’d come to miss. This action completely got the attention of her “brothers,” and each one of them whirled their heads in my direction. Wells arched his neck, Dorian sat up, and Ares…