Chapter 6
Reece
The moment she steps through the school gates, I’m already tuned in.
She’s wearing that red skirt again. The one that flares when she walks, the one that should be harmless but isn’t. My fists clench because I know she doesn’t mean to fuck with me, which only makes it worse. But, fuck, it does something to me.
I watch her, books hugged tight to her chest, held there ready to raise if anyone gets too close.
Her red hair pulled back in a ponytail, soft as sin.
I know it fucking is, because I touched it yesterday.
I couldn’t help myself. Those red locks were a temptation I didn’t try to fight.
I just had to touch them. I can still feel them sliding through my fingers, still remember how my chest tightened when she froze under my hand.
Sam Carter is sunshine and sweet-girl energy with teeth.
All control, hiding beneath flawless skin.
Every glare she throws my way sinks into me and stays there.
My blood runs hotter when she’s near. My heart kicks into overdrive.
My dick gets harder too, no matter how much I tell myself to rein it in.
Fuck, what I would do to her if she ever gave me the chance.
Never has a girl had my head this twisted. Never have my thoughts been this locked on to one chick. I’m supposed to be wired for chaos, for easy distractions, for moving on. Instead, I’m stuck walking around half feral, dick hard, ready to rub one out the second she crosses my line of sight.
She hates me. I can see that every time she looks through me instead of at me.
She’s the one thing I shouldn’t want and can’t stop fucking wanting, anyway.
She pretends she didn’t feel what happened yesterday in my room. The way she burned under my hands. The way she melted and then ran.
Her pulse fluttered under my touch. Her breath hitched when my thigh brushed hers. She wanted to pull away but didn’t. Not right away.
And it’s been fucking with me ever since.
She disappears into the building, and I don’t even hesitate.
I pass Jace the blunt we’re sharing, fingers brushing his as I shove it into his hand, already pushing off the wall. He calls after me, some smart-ass comment I don’t bother catching, because my focus is already locked in one direction.
Her.
I have her schedule memorized. Better than I should. English. Bottom floor. Same room every Wednesday morning. No one hangs around down there this early before first period.
But I know Sam.
She always goes early. She gets there before the noise, before the chaos, before anyone can distract her. She sits, opens her bag, lines her shit up neatly, and gets organized as if the world won’t fall apart if she’s prepared enough.
Her head is down. She has no idea I am behind her.
I slow my steps and let my eyes do what they want. They wander freely. Those long, fucking legs built to wrap around me if she ever stopped pretending she didn’t want to. I imagine it without asking. Her ankles crossed behind my back. My hands sliding over the skin she keeps hidden.
She pauses, thumb flicking over her phone screen to check something. It gives me the chance to close the gap.
There’s no one else down here yet. Just the hum of the lights and the quiet she always seeks.
I move up slowly, hands shoved deep in my pockets so I don’t give in to the urge to touch her—to grab her waist and see how real this pull is up close.
I stop right behind her. Close enough, but not touching.
“Morning, Saint,” I murmur in her ear.
She stiffens immediately.
But her breathing shifts. I notice it in how her back rises and falls, sharper now, less controlled.
She turns slowly, as if she’s forcing herself to do it, like she thinks it’s a bad idea and can’t help herself anyway.
Her eyes flash. “Don’t call me that.”
“Why not?” I lean in just enough to feel her heat, my gaze dropping to her mouth because I can’t help myself. Because I want it turned on by me instead of against me. “It suits you.”
I move closer to her, allowing her to sense it before she realizes she’s running out of space.
She unintentionally backs up.
One step.
Then another.
Her shoulder hits metal.
Her books slip from her hands and scatter across the floor, pages splaying open as if they’re as shocked as she is. She gasps sharply, and I move with her, shifting just enough so my palm rests against the locker beside her head.
She’s pinned now, caged in by steel and my body, close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off her. See the pulse throbbing in her neck.
“Move,” she hisses.
I don’t.
One step closer, and I’d be pressed against her. She’s aware of it too. I see it in her eyes, that storm brewing behind her perfect lashes.
“You know, if you weren’t such a fucking saint,” I murmur. “I’d have my fingers down your panties right now. Pressed up against your locker while I made you come so hard you’d forget what subject you had next.”
Her breath falters. It hits my chest. Her pupils dilate wide. Her lips part, caught off guard. And fuck. My cock presses against the front of my jeans as if it’s desperate to get closer to her.
I’m hard and drowning in her. The flushed anger on her cheeks, the wild heat in her eyes. She looks like she wants to slap me and kiss me at the same time. And I’d let her. I’d take both.
“You’re disgusting,” she spits, but her voice trembles at the edges, and it comes out more breath than bite.
I lean in, letting my nose brush against her cheek, just enough to see her shiver.
My breath ghosts soft over her skin, and she jerks beneath it, her chest rising fast. I don’t even need to glance down to know her nipples are hard beneath that shirt.
She’s fighting it. Resisting me. But her body’s already made its choice.
God, she’s stunning. The kind that burns you when you get too close. The kind that fucks with your head and ruins every girl who came before.
“You hate me,” I murmur. “But your body doesn’t.”
Her chest rises again, sharp and shallow. One step closer and I’d feel the press of her tits against me. One more filthy word and I bet she’d either melt against my mouth or slap me again. And fuck, I want her mad. I want her feral. I want her so far gone she forgets why she ever wanted to hate me.
She moves before I can react, and her hand snaps up.
Crack.
Her palm strikes my cheek, snapping my head to the side. Heat rushes through my skin, sharp pain. My jaw aches, but my arousal remains firm. I don’t bother hiding the smile curling at my lips.
She glares at me, fury burning across her face. Her chest rises and falls; her lips are parted perfectly. Those eyes flash with something fierce and unspoken.
She looks at me as if she wished it had left a scar.
And, fuck, part of me wishes it did too. Because then maybe I’d stop coming back for more.
“You do that again, I swear to God—”
“You’ll what?” I turn my face back to her with a grin that’s full of defiance. “Slap me harder?”
She doesn’t answer. Just ducks under my arm, quickly gathering her books from the floor with trembling hands. Her face is flushed, mouth pressed into a thin line, fury radiating off her in waves. She doesn’t say another word, simply rushes into the classroom before I can get another breath in.
I stay frozen for a beat, hand braced on the locker, cheek still stinging from the hit. And I grin because she’ll never forget that moment.
And neither will I.
The sting doesn’t fade. It stays on my skin. I touch it, feeling the throb beneath the surface. The kind of pain that reminds you that you’re alive.
Pain has never scared me. Not when it’s wrapped in flushed cheeks and trembling hands. Not when it’s delivered by a girl who looked me in the eye and meant it. The beautiful that burns.
She didn’t slap me because she hated it.
She hit me because she sensed it and was unsure how to handle everything passing between us in a moment. Her breath on my skin, the spark in her spine when I leaned in and said what I said.
She’s fierce under pressure. The girl who’d rather draw blood than admit she wants me.
But I felt it in the shake of her hand after she hit me and the heat still rolling off her skin.
That’s the part that’ll haunt her.
The breath she gave me. It was the look in her eyes that drew attention. The stutter in her chest when I told her what I’d do if she weren’t such a fucking saint.
It’ll keep running through her mind for days.
I hear footsteps and turn my head, seeing Lola and Aubrey walking down the hall. They say nothing to me; they already know who and what I am. What I do when I get bored.
I slide my hands back into my pockets and walk toward them, shoulders relaxed, heart still racing as if it’s caught in her orbit.
I head down the hallway, looking for noise, distraction, something easy. Maybe to find Jace or some girl who will give me that look that says she wants to be fucked and won’t expect more afterward.
Either option works. I’m not picky.
I notice how Aubrey glances at me as I pass. The way Lola nudges her, both of them sharp-eyed, reading me in a way that irritates me.
They know exactly what the fuck I’m doing down here.
It all relates to Sam.
And no matter who I find next, no matter whose lips are on me, whose nails dig into my shoulders, whose moans fill the silence—
I’ll be thinking of Sam’s name when I come.
The face I see when I close my eyes.
The reason I grip harder, fuck deeper, chasing something that only she could ever give me.