Chapter 21 #3
“Try it! I’ll bite your fingers off.”
“Start putting them in your mouth then,” he said with an amused smirk. Then he brought two fingers in front of my face. I raised my hand to slap him, but he swatted it away immediately.
“June, don’t do that,” I heard Will grumble, repositioning me on his lap.
“Is Poppy’s party tonight or tomorrow?” he then asked the bench behind ours. I didn’t even notice that he’d started talking with a guy.
“Try to slap me, and see what happens, White,” snarled James, eyes narrowed.
“I can’t wait to find out. Give me back my book,” I hissed, lunging toward him.
“June, enough flinging yourself around,” Will complained again.
“Sorry, do I weigh too much?” I whispered, composing myself.
“No, it’s not your weight, we’re at school, please,” he murmured, embarrassed.
The guy he was talking with asked if we were going to Poppy’s party, and Will nodded but continued kissing the most sensitive part of my ear near the nape of my neck.
“Are you coming, June?” Will asked me, murmuring.
I felt his warm tongue slide over my earlobe, and I couldn’t control myself any longer. I lowered my eyelids and unintentionally let out a little moan.
“Tramp.”
I immediately opened my eyes again to glare at the idiot next to us, who stood up, looking almost disgusted.
Maybe William didn’t catch that, but I heard it loud and clear.
Overcome with rage, I got up, grabbed the chemistry book, and as heavy as it was, threw it at James.
My usually terrible aim scored this time. I hit him in the head. When he turned, the look on his face wasn’t reassuring. Oops. My self-preservation instinct kicked in. I had to get out of there as soon as possible.
I saw James make a sudden move toward me, so I bolted out of the lab like lightning. I ran through the hallway, but I still knew my days were numbered because I didn’t have his long legs or fit body.
The only plausible option to not get caught was locking myself in the bathroom. I took the first turn I could and went into the girls’ bathroom, but before I could lock the door behind me, James grabbed my arm and pushed me against the wall.
“Do you really think you can run away?” he demanded.
“Say you’re sorry,” I commanded with fragmented breath.
I couldn’t breathe when he pressed his hard chest against mine, making my heart skip a beat.
“Say you’re sorry!” I shouted, out of breath.
“You can go fuck yourself, bitch.”
His eyes drifted lazily to my white shirt.
I tried to remove myself from the situation.
“Careful, you’re getting too close,” I whispered when he trapped me by putting both hands on the cold wall.
“Maybe I can’t resist, did you ever think of that?”
I wasn’t the type to stutter in front of the first pretty boy who came by or get scared of muscular, imposing biceps, but I couldn’t ignore the electric shock that went through me.
“We said we’d stay away from each other.”
My voice lost its strength at the same time that his eyes traced my skin with warm, soft trails.
“We both say so much bullshit. Especially you.”
“Speak for yourself. And apologize,” I insisted.
“I don’t actually think that. I said an idiotic thing. The truth is you drive me nuts.”
Faced with his insistence, a spark of rebellion took hold inside me.
“Are you jealous or just pathetic, Hunter?”
“Nobody talks to me like that,” he snarled, bringing his lips close to mine.
“You don’t scare me.”
I tried to move my leg. He deserved a good knee in the balls, but he ended up being stronger than me, as usual. I felt his knee sneak between my thighs, separating them.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” he asked, lifting his face.
“I already threw a book in your face. I can consider myself satisfied for today.”
“Shut up.”
“Are you worried your friends and girlfriends will catch you letting me go?”
“Shut up,” he repeated heatedly.
James grabbed my chin between his fingers.
His grip wasn’t strong, but it made me shiver.
The cold of his rings rubbed against the boiling skin on my face, and we were so close that I breathed in his mint, coffee, and vape-pen breath as I exhaled mine on his parted lips.
Our lips were an inch away from grazing each other, but before that happened, James pulled away and leaned against the opposite wall.
“Sorry,” he said seriously, looking at me in the eyes.
“Say that again. Louder.”
With a heaving chest, I heard him say: “I said I’m sorry. Do you wanna play a game now?”
A spark of excitement flashed across his cold eyes, and I felt intoxicated and confused. I had to get out of here.
“What game?”
“Yes or no.”
“Do I have to remind you that I’m with Will?”
“And do I have to remind you that it’s just a game between us?”
I froze—my back was stuck in place, and my lips went dry.
“Besides, you’re not with Will,” he said contemptuously. I saw him maneuver something in his pockets.
“Why are you doing this?” I gasped.
He craned his neck. “Because you should be scared of me. If you’re scared of me then maybe you’ll stay away from me.”
And he said that attentively gazing at me like he was studying my reaction.
“It won’t work, because you don’t scare me.”
My facade of conviction wavered when James’s breath grazed my earlobe, making me jump.
“So then why are you shaking? Maybe because you’re getting turned on?”
“It’s because I hate you,” I snarled at him, but I soon froze because James slid his fingertips down from my chin to my throat. He traced my skin delicately, so softly that I just wanted to close my eyes to savor his heavenly touch.
“I hate you, too, princess. You have no idea how much I do.”
James raised the corner of his mouth in a mischievous grin, with a typical sure-of-himself guy look. But I didn’t want to fall into that trap.
“If anyone’s getting turned on here, Hunter, it’s you.” I let out an even more tense breath.
“I don’t think so. Girls like you don’t have any effect on me.”
I begrudgingly accepted that truth, maybe because my insecurities about my body led me to believe him. But at the same time, his eyes kept tracing my lips with their fiery gaze.
“Really?” I egged him on through narrowed eyes.
I must’ve gone too far because James’s mouth brushed against my lower lip for a moment, setting off a series of sparks in my stomach.
“Look at you, all wet—”
“What?” His words startled me.
I didn’t know what he meant right then, but when he moved away from me and turned the crank on the shower to cold, it was suddenly all clear to me.
“You’ll pay for that, asshole!” I shouted at the top of my lungs. He’d just pointed the shower head at me.
James’s amused laughter boomed throughout the bathroom, and while I watched his broad shoulders as he walked out the door, there was only one thing I wanted to do.
Kill him.