I’d known her all of a few weeks, but I’d learned enough to know that she was trouble.
Trouble with a capital T.
“Kye, man, leave it,” Nix said, casting a weary glance my way.
“I’m fine,” I snapped.
“You’re wound tighter than a spring. Maybe you should speak to Bryson about getting in the ring.”
Fat chance of that. Fighting was Nix’s thing, not mine. I didn’t mind sparring and going a few rounds with some of the guys who worked out at Buster’s Gym, but I didn’t get the same rush Nix did.
“Shit.” Nix stared at his cell phone, his lips thinning with annoyance.
“What is it?”
“I’m guessing that.” Kye pointed his finger behind me, and I glanced over my shoulder. “Fuck’s sake,” he said. “I told her to stay away.”
Harleigh, and Kye’s sister Chloe, made a beeline for us.
“The fuck, Clo?” he ground out. “You were supposed to be at the bowling alley.”
“We were, but Miles showed up and he and Celeste got into it, so we bailed.”
“She okay?” Nix asked, dragging Harleigh onto his lap.
“Yeah, Celeste can handle Miles.” She looped her arm around his shoulder, her gaze sliding to mine. But I glanced away.
I didn’t give a shit about Celeste and her on-and-off ex Miles Mulligan.
Even if hearing her name made me bristle.
No one got under my skin.
No one except her.
But Celeste Rowe was everything I hated. Smart. Beautiful…Rich. With the whole world laid out at her feet, she would never want for anything thanks to her parents’ obscene wealth.
She didn’t know what it was like to go hungry or to worry about how the fuck you were going to pay your bills on time. She didn’t know what it was like to drown in medical expenses, wondering how you were going to help your ailing grams.
She didn’t know.
And she never would.
So Celeste Rowe might have gotten under my skin, sure. But she would never worm her way into my heart. Because it was a cold, dead thing in my chest.
And I’d be damned if a rich girl from across the res would ever be the one to thaw it out.
Celeste
I should have gonewith my sister Harleigh and her friend Chloe.
That’s all I could think as I sat in awkward silence with Miles, my best friend turned boyfriend.Ex-boyfriend since I ended things a couple of weeks ago.
It wasn’t him. He was kind and sweet and he made me laugh. But I didn’t feel it. That sparks-flying, toe-curling, heart-racing rush you were supposed to feel around your boyfriend. And life was too short to spend the rest of my junior year trying to convince myself that there was something more between us when there wasn’t.
At least, not for me.
“I know I got a bit overprotective, babe.” Miles finally broke the silence. “But I only care about you. I’ll do better, I swear. If you just give me another chance, I’ll—”