9. Sabrina
9
SAbrINA
“ O kay. I’ll see you soon,” I told my parents as they wrapped up the last boxes for the food bank.
We didn’t get to do this together often. It was more like they would volunteer regularly and I would show up when I could. Giving back was in my blood, and I rode the glee of doing something good. I surrendered a long night of reading to come with them to help here tonight, and I refused to cringe at all the lost hours of reading and homework it had cost.
Walking away from the garage where we gave out food donations from the pantry, I sighed and smiled as I replayed the pleasant surprise of spotting one of the candidates for mayor earlier. Patrice Connely had shown up to help tonight, a fellow altruistic soul, and I relished the chance to finally meet her in person. Despite her being one of the people I’d contacted via email for my community outreach project sponsors, she was more important for another reason.
She was an alum, a former law student at the same university I was currently attending. More than that, she was a favorite graduate who’d studied under Professor Gowen’s hawkish rule. Her word would matter, should she decide to contact her.
Elise was right about me. I didn’t want to know the wealthy or celebs like what Lorsen & Spengler represented. I wanted to associate with hardworking people on the front lines like Patrice Connely.
It looks like it paid off to come tonight, then.
I could always stay up late another night to study my ass off.
“Hey, Sabrina?”
I turned at the sound of someone rushing after me, finding a woman hurrying to catch up with me. I recognized her as someone associated with Patrice’s campaign.
But behind her, I saw Nick hanging around near a taco truck.
Dammit!
What is he doing here?
I smiled at the woman, avoiding my newest bully in the background. I didn’t want to know why he was here. No one from campus would venture this far into this neighborhood by chance.
Is he stalking me?
Why?
How?
Just why?
“Hi!” The woman smiled sheepishly. “Sorry to run after you like that. I promise, I’m not stalking you.”
I laughed. That makes one of you.
“I’m Patrice Connely’s assistant. I was out handing out flyers, so you wouldn’t have seen me in the food bank garage earlier.”
“Oh!” Recognition hit now. I had noticed her from a distance. “Yes. I saw you.”
“I wanted to catch you before you left so I could set up a time for you to do a little PR with Patrice. She’s really interested in your pool fundraising efforts.”
“Sure. That would be great!” I smiled right back at her.
“Let me check my…” She frowned, patting her back pocket. “Oh, shoot. I left my phone in the van.” She held up her hands like asking a feral animal to stay put. “I’ll be right back . Do you mind waiting a sec?”
“No, that’s fine. I can wait. The bus won’t be coming right now.” I’d let my parents use the car so they could get home after me.
“Thank you!” The woman dashed off, rushing with that frantic anxiousness people had when they were always on the go, go, go.
Once she was gone, Nick sauntered up close. “You just can’t help it.”
I narrowed my eyes and crossed my arms. I just told that assistant I’d wait here for her. She couldn’t take long, and I didn’t want to risk leaving this spot for the sake of avoiding Nick.
“Help what?” I bit out coolly. He had no business out here. This was common ground. “Are you stalking me?”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” he replied dryly. “You just can’t help but try to look like a good girl. Helping out at a food bank…” He gestured at the building I’d left behind. “Acting like you give a shit.”
“I do.” I furrowed my brow, not understanding why he had to have such an issue with me. For no reason! I’d never provoked him. I didn’t even know him.
“You’re only acting like you give a shit to look good. You’re that kind of a stuck-up law student. I can tell.” He made a show of looking around. “Or is this nothing more than a stunt? Is the news around here so you can brag about being such a good girl, Little Miss Perfect?”
“You can assume whatever you want about me. That’s your prerogative. But I will not allow you to stalk me and harass me—bully me—for no reason at all.”
“Oh, you won’t allow it?” he taunted, stepping closer. “What the hell are you going to do about it? You’re a good girl, remember? That’s what you want everyone to think.”
I stepped back, scowling. “Contrary to your delusions, I don’t care what you think. And I want you to leave me alone.”
Talking back to him was a deviation from my standard reaction of doing nothing. This wasn’t letting his words in one ear and out the other. This wasn’t turning the other cheek. I was defending myself, or trying to, and giving Nick a little bit of hell right back was so… invigorating. I felt alive. Full of fire. And he was merely fanning the flames to make me more excited to push back.
“Now why would I do that?” He lowered his gaze to check me out again, slowly. “Putting you in your place is too entertaining.”
“I—”
He stepped closer again, as if trying to use his height to intimidate me. “Your place as a stuck-up, pompous law student who thinks she’s better than everyone else.”
“I don’t?—”
“When you’re just a nobody. A slut who thinks she’s all that.”
Before I could think it through, I lifted my hand and slapped him.
Hard.
All the fury, all the aggravation. It burst out of me in a swift strike that was so uncharacteristic of me that I bet it stunned me more than him.
So much for avoiding and ignoring.
I’d never hit anyone, not once in my whole life. Slapping him felt justified, but also so wrong somehow. Like it cheapened me to stoop to a baser level of fighting back at all.
His eyes darkened, the deep brown almost black as he furrowed his brow. This intense stare bore through me, piercing me as he breathed harshly through his nose.
He couldn’t have counted on my doing that. I’d surprised us both, but I wondered if I’d just poked the beast and angered him more.
“Oh, um, sorry.” The assistant had returned.
Nick turned, revealing her behind him.
Crap. She had to have seen me slap him, and that was not the cool, professional demeanor I wanted to project. Especially not to someone connected to my project.
“Sorry to interrupt.” The woman grimaced, clearly uncomfortable to be near this drama.
“Hey, no worries.” Nick chuckled, draping his arm around my shoulders as he rubbed his cheek where I’d hit him. “It’s nothing.” He tugged me closer in a quick side hug. “Just a lovers’ spat.”
“What?” I dodged his touch, as if he were infectious with his body heat, tempting me to stay with him. “No. Not a lovers’… He’s not… I’m not…”
She winced, looking aside.
“He’s not my lover, and that was…” I stepped away from Nick again and cleared my throat, focusing on her. “He’s just someone from school. Playing a joke. Nothing more.”
Just an asshole from school who wanted to frame me as a participant in a wet T-shirt contest and then call me a slut. Like that was so original.
Walking this woman further away from Nick, I shot him a glare over my shoulder.
Don’t mess with me.
I wished I could issue that warning out loud.
But maybe my dark glower would be just as effective.
Even if he didn’t get the message, he wouldn’t succeed. So, he’d pushed me to snap and retaliate that one time just now. But that didn’t mean he would get to me a second time.
I vowed, again, to steer clear of him and stay focused. I had to concentrate on my studies, on getting that internship, and on graduating to start the rest of my life.
I had no time to let him play games with me and interfere.
He hadn’t cut back on the bullying and teasing when I consistently ignored him, and I doubted my slapping him would result in anything different. Yet, that was far preferred to hitting him or fighting back at all. Because now that he’d pushed my buttons and made me snap, I had a hard time reining in this need to respond in kind and give as good as I got.
Especially when he glared at me with a challenge in his hot gaze, tempting me to be reckless with him just a little longer.