Fitz was walking ahead of us, and one of Matt’s guards was behind us. We had two others covering us, but walking far away so students wouldn’t automatically associate them with us. It didn’t matter anymore. I was past wanting to be invisible. This was how life was going to be. Guards. People would recognize us, but as we were going back to my usual building, I realized that only a few people had paid attention to us. And even those people had just stopped, stared, frowned, and then continued on.
A few were glancing at Fitz and the other guards, but it wasn’t the spectacle of last semester.
As if following my thoughts, Matt said, “We’re old news.”
“What?”
He gestured around us, his hands sliding into his back pockets. “You’re looking around, right? Noticing no one noticing us?”
“Yeah.”
He inclined his head. “We’re old news. You’ve been gone, mourning your mom, and Kash isn’t letting anyone take his picture. There was a spread of him and me at Naveah a while back, but you’ve gone to ground and so has he. People moved on. Some celebrity posted an image of himself and you could see his dick. Everyone was in an uproar about it.”
Well.
That was nice.
Felt nice.
Normal.
And I was almost crying, because it was reminding me of a time before the first kidnapping attempt.
That was making me think of Chrissy, and yeah. No “almost” anymore. Huge tears were rolling down my face.
Matt looked over and cursed under his breath. “Come here.” He put an arm around my shoulders and pulled me into him. We kept walking, but I was half tucked under my brother’s arm, and by the time we got to my building, the size of the tears had shrunk. He patted my arm. “There you go. Look at you, learning the Francis way and getting in control of your robot side.”
I laughed.
The tears were almost gone as Fitz held the doors for us and we stepped through. I used the backs of my hands to wipe my eyes clean.
That’s when we ran into Hoda, my on-and-off nemesis from school.
Who used to work at Naveah, and who was the one to release an image of Kash and me in a compromising position. That Hoda.
Who was friends with our blogger nemesis.
I had a lot of nemeses.
She was coming out of an office, looking down at her phone.
Matt stopped and frowned. “Hey, isn’t that—”
Hoda’s head whipped up, saw us. Her eyes went wide, and she tried to go back into the office she’d just left.
“Hey!” I zipped out from under Matt’s arms.
Hoda was still scrambling for the doorknob.
“Hey!” I grabbed her arm just as she got it open and started to go through.
I pulled her back out.
“What are you doing?” That was me, in her face. I was more confused, though. I thought we’d been okay before.
“Sorry.” She moved aside, but she still seemed agitated. “I don’t know why I did that.”
Matt raised an eyebrow. “Conditioned response?” He flashed a cocky grin. “Makes me feel good that you instantly fear us.” He smoothed a hand down his chest. “We’re doing something right.”