“I-I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t know.”
“Now you do so you won’t make the same mistake twice…will you?” Soren asks, taking another step toward him so he’s right in his face.
“No, sir.”
My classmate drops to a knee, scoops up his things, and takes off in the other direction, exactly where Soren had pointed to.
My bodyguard cups his hands around his mouth and shouts after him. “And tell your friends. She’s not available. Anybody that tries has to deal with me.”
The boy runs and runs until he’s a spec, then disappears around the corner of a building. Only then does Soren turn toward me.
“He won’t bother you again,” he says calmly and moves to walk away, back to blending into the terrain from where he came.
But not so fast.
“I’m not available?” I ask. He says nothing, just keeps walking so I repeat myself. “I’m not available?” I say a second time, my voice raised.
“You heard me,” he says over his shoulder.
“If I’m not available that means I’m taken. Taken by who?”
A beat passes as he’s almost back to the oversized bushes. Then finally he says over his shoulder without making eye contact, more of a grumble than a regular sentence. “Your schoolwork. Your education is your priority.”
“I can’t have a little fun?” I yell just as he’s about to disappear.
“Not with any boys. Hell no.”
And just like that…he’s gone.
But I can’t help but smile.
He said no boys, but he didn’t say no men.
And we both know there’s one man and one man only who I’ve got on my mind. Time to turn up the heat.
5
Sadie
Hey Ally. Just curious if you know of any parties tonight?
I stare at the message for a few seconds and hit send before I can talk myself out of it.
Ally was the most social girl in high school and she also stayed local for college. I don’t know her that well, but we do know each other and I have her number…probably from a group project where she took advantage of my kindness. Maybe she’ll remember and do me a favor.
The three dots show next to her name and I hold back a smile, trying to remain cautiously optimistic but not get my hopes up. I’m not really the girl who gets invited to the cool kid parties, or any parties for that matter.
The dots stop and there’s a lull. Shit! She decided to just ignore me. But would she really do that when she knows I saw her start typing?
She starts again and suddenly my screen lights up with a message.
Hey Sad. Football team is having a kegger off-campus. Wanna come?
I look at her choice for my name, wondering if it was by choice because of her true thoughts about me or just an attempt to try and be cool and abbreviate it. But this isn’t about me. At least not directly. This is about my plan.
Sure. Seems fun. Where and when?
11. 7317 E. Lincoln. Oh, and bring that Navy SEAL guy everyone’s talking about.