I have no idea if he’s telling the truth or not. His poker face has always been eerily immaculate. It’s one of the reasons he’s so dangerous. It’s one of the reasons my nerves are always on edge around him, constantly trying to find my footing, but never quite able.
“Of course,” I say, twisting the band around my hair. “Nothing you do is ever against the rules. There are always special circumstances, always an excuse for your behavior, right?” I level him with a look of utter disgust. “The Devils are always covered.”
His eyes spark once again, but I avoid them by reaching for both my shirt and the flimsy pretense that I don’t sense his absolute hatred of me—hatred simply for failing to be a perfect clone of every other student here. Closing my eyes, I pull my shirt over my head, relieved to be hidden from his glower, however brief it may be.
When my head emerges from the shirt, however, he’s inches from my face.
I jerk back, crashing into my locker.
“Here’s what you don’t get, Adams.” His voice is carefully controlled, but even still, I can detect the barely restrained growl of anger in his words. “There is no room for mistakes, excuses, or bad behavior in my life. I follow strict rules, codes, and procedures. I surround myself with people who adhere to the same values. The same ideals. The same understanding of how life works—what it takes to succeed.”
He’s so close that I can smell the mixture of sweat and deodorant on his skin. I try shifting away from the locker handle stabbing into my back, but I’m pinned by his glare and the solid wall of him.
His eyes narrow at the movement, eyes tightening as he continues, “I know you think I was involved with what happened to your sister, but let me make something perfectly clear.” His jaw flexes as he tilts his head closer, voice pitched low and harsh. “She’s trash. You’re trash. Your whole goddamned family is a bunch of feral, abandoned rejects. Your blood, your saliva? It’s all dirty. There’s no way I’d contaminate my dick or any other part of my body with it. Understand?”
God, he’s so predictable and childish and... well, just so utterly lame. His words don’t even graze me, they’re just that over-the-top ridiculous. A laugh bubbles from my chest and escapes in a snort before I can stop it. Hamilton’s eyes flash even hotter, and then—because god, I just can’t even help it—I reach out and caress his cheek, running my fingertips down his chiseled jaw.
He jolts back as if being burned.
“What the hell are you doing?” he spits.
I smile serenely. “Soothing you like a child. That was a tantrum, right? I’m fresh out of binkies or blankets, else I’d give you one.”
He lunges, completely closing the distance between us, his two palms meeting the metal of the lockers with a resounding bang. His muscular arms pin me there, one on each side, but I hide my shock enough to fight back a flinch.
Instead, I raise my chin.
The dark pupils in his eyes are blown with anger and I’m surrounded by him. Too close, too tall, too big, too Hamilton. In all the years I’ve known him, been forced into classrooms and gyms with him, I’ve never been this close to Hamilton Bates. I’m not sure why, but the first thing I notice about his proximity is the annoying lack of flaws on his face, even this close. You could probably put this guy under a microscope and find the answer to the universe or something.
My eyes track a drop of sweat as it falls from a lock of his inky hair to clutch at his eyelash. “You think baiting me is funny?”
“You want to know what I think?” I hold his gaze, completely calm despite the percussion of something hot and frenetic in my veins. “I think you’re a joke, Bates. I think you’re weak and painfully unoriginal. I think you’re so transparently pathetic that you believe controlling your minions might make you look stronger, even though it really doesn’t. But mostly I think one of them dared to show up with my sister instead of raiding
your Approved Bitches stash, so you showed him what you really thought she was worth.”
He reacts, by grabbing my wrists and slamming my arms up and over my head.
He leans his hard, powerful body against mine, pinning me with all his crazy heat. “Shut up.” His warm breath washes over my face, the sharp scent of old cinnamon gum making my throat bob with a swallow. “Jesus fucking Christ, do you ever just shut the fuck up?”
His grip, damp and slippery against my wrists, flexes once, twice, and for the life of me I just can’t stop myself. “Nope.”
His nostrils flare on a long, sharp inhale, eyes closing as if he’s asking some higher power for the strength to put up with me. It must not work, because when he opens his eyes again, for the first time, I almost feel genuinely afraid of him.
If you asked me if he would have ever gone this far, I’d say no. I’d say that he was all bluster and pedigree, just a chess piece playing the board he was raised to dominate. But now I’m not so sure. His carefully composed poker face is crumbling, I can tell, and behind it is something crazed and red with intent, a sharp edge that trembles down my spine.
No, he’s just trying to intimidate me. He can’t control me like he can the others, this is nothing more than a last-ditch effort. That realization gives me renewed strength.
I fight against him, hiding my wince as the bones in my wrist strain against his grip. “Let go.”
But his grip just tightens. “Come on, Gwen. Admit it. You’d love it if I caved—just once—for a piece of trash like you, wouldn’t you?”
I freeze, not even sure who he’s arguing with right now. Me or himself? Either way, it’s clear that he’s not releasing me. Now it’s just the two of us caught in some battle of impulses, a battle I’m not sure I entirely understand. If he hates me so much, if I repulse him so deeply, why is he holding me like this? Touching me?
The same question is clear in his eyes, eyebrows tightly knitted together as his gaze dips to my parted mouth.
He’s wondering the same thing.
His face tilts and I see the muscle in the back of his jaw twitch. But then his palms finally loosen around my wrists, and it’s like a cord has been cut, because I figure this is the end. He’s about to release me, and then we can both walk away from this whole awkward, strange, bewildering encounter.