6. Chapter Six
Chapter Six
I made it halfway across campus before I heard the footsteps.
Heavy. Measured. Tracking me. Closing in.
Then a heavy arm, slung casually over my shoulders, like we were a happy couple bumping into each other on the way to class. The warm scent of cider wrapped around me.
“Hello, lover,” Kade said.
I shook him off.
“We are not lovers, so keep your goddamn hands off me,” I spat and kept power walking.
His long strides kept him by my side, matching my every three steps with one of his own.
“Oh, but sweetheart,” he said. “We are, aren’t we? And I have to say…you’re better with your cunt than you are with your hands.”
My heart stuttered, but I kept moving.
Had he just admitted to being the one who assaulted me in the library?
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him curl his fingers into a loose fist and pump his hand once, twice—obscene, mocking. I swore the whole goddamn mask smirked, along with his visible lips, as he jerked off the fucking air.
Guess I wasn’t the only one who decided they had nothing left to lose.
Swallowing hard, I forced myself to look over at him. The hollow, soulless eyes of that damn Ghostface mask bore into mine.
He titled his head.
“Eat my entire ass, Kade.”
“Huh. Should I do that in your first class or your second… Let’s see…” He pulled a piece of paper out of his back pocket and unfolded it. “Yeah, let’s save the ass-eating for Econ. Don’t want to spoil my lunch.”
“Is that my fucking schedule?”
“It is, because I’m under strict orders to be your fucking shadow today.”
Well. I guess the good thing about Kade escorting me to all my classes was he couldn’t sneak up on me when I least expected it and pin me against another wall.
When we got to the lecture hall, he followed me inside.
“I think I can make it to my seat without an escort,” I told him with a pointed look.
“Maybe, but I’m not supposed to leave your side if you’re outside the apartment unless…”
I whirled around to face him. Enough was enough. No way could I learn anything with him breathing down my neck.
“Oh,” he said. “Never mind. Bennett’s here. You can be his problem now.”
Dean Bennett was here? Had he changed his mind and decided to be my personal bodyguard, after all? Not likely, but…
I glanced over my shoulder, and a cursory scan of the faces told me Kade was full of shit. What the hell kind of game was he playing?
“What the…” I began.
No, I didn’t see Xander, but I did see another familiar face framed by red ringlets.
Lena.
She sat a few rows back and was looking around, too, as if she were searching for…
Her wide blue eyes lit up when they landed on me, and she grinned and waved.
Almost as if she’d been expecting me…?
I turned back to Kade, but he was gone.
Or was he?
It wasn’t like I was expecting a hug goodbye, but bro might as well have just vanished into thin air.
He must’ve just hightailed it, trying to be on time for his own class, but I roamed my gaze over my other classmates, stalling on all the guys wearing black hoodies and jeans, like Kade had been.
There was something seriously unnerving and nauseating about the realization that if he ditched the mask, he could hide in plain sight. I had no idea what his actual face looked like. He could be anywhere at any time.
He could sit beside me in a lab. Walk past me on the way to the cafeteria. I could brush shoulders with him in the hallway and never fucking know.
He could still be in here right now.
As surreptitiously and quickly as possible and keeping my expression neutral—I didn’t want him to know how freaked out I was if he were still here, watching—I took another glance around at everyone I could from the neck down, checking for any guys built like Kade.
“Tuesday!” Lena called.
She gestured—quite enthusiastically—for me to come over.
It was good to see her again. I honestly wasn’t sure if I ever would. But Mom’s words—trust no one—were like a tattoo on the back of my eyelids.
I shrugged and pointed across the room to where I usually sat. Because this professor treated us like high school students and had assigned seating. Which Lena would know if she’d been in this class before…but she hadn’t been.
So why was she here now?
Certainly, it was too late in the semester to be adding and dropping classes.
Professor Ellis strolled in and had already launched into her lecture before she closed the door behind her.
I’d never had trouble understanding her before, but today I gave up taking notes after the first couple of minutes because I couldn’t make sense of anything she said.
I couldn’t focus on anything other than the heebie-jeebie skin-crawly sensation of being watched.
I snuck a peek at Lena, but she had her head down, furiously scribbling in her own notebook.
But I could feel someone’s eyes on me, as weighty as a touch. Chill bumps rose up and down my arms.
Was Kade still in here?
I was used to feeling watched. I’d felt that since my first day on campus. But this was different…stronger, like a weight pressing between my shoulder blades, like an actual touch, and not a gentle one.
I shifted in my chair, twisted around as inconspicuously as I could, and let out a little gasp as my gaze met…Connor’s.
His brown eyes widened. He fumbled the pen he’d been tapping against his bottom lip, dropping it to the floor.
Yes, I, too, was often startled when the person I was staring at busted me.
Though he’d been paying zero attention to Professor Ellis, he leaned forward, giving her all his attention.
What the fuck? Had he been there all along?
The lecture ended in a blur of words I barely absorbed, unable to shake the sensation of being fucking observed. Professor Ellis dismissed us with a casual reminder about some upcoming assignment I had no memory of her giving, and the sound of chairs scraping back filled the air.
I remained seated, watching each student as they filed out.
Kade wasn’t amongst them, unless he could shapeshift.
We sure as fuck weren’t lovers, but I knew his body, mask or no mask.
He might have been able to slip past me before, unnoticed, without the mask on, when it hadn’t occurred to me it was a possibility, but I’d be far more careful now.
Lena had stayed back, too, as had Connor.
She approached me, her red curls bouncing, while he chose to go with a broody, bad-boy lean against the doorjamb in his all-black ensemble.
A long, drawn-out exhale that might or might not have been a sigh of longing slipped from my lips. For all his faults—and there were many—the dude did know how to lean.
I wondered how he would look horizontal, though…
Oh my God! What was wrong with me?
“Girrrrrrrrrl,” Lena greeted me. Her blue eyes flicked to Connor, causing both of their brows to crease, then settled on me. “Professor Ellis is…unusual, right?”
I snorted. Ellis lectured as if she was talking to herself, pacing from one side of the room to another, never actually looking at or addressing anyone in the class.
Nonetheless, occasionally she’d declare, “Yes, yes, excellent!” as if she were responding to someone else’s statement.
And the wardrobe? Yeah, that was unusual.
But Ellis herself? Around here, not so much.
“Well,” I replied to Lena. “If she were completely normal, she probably wouldn’t be teaching this class. So, what brings you to MED 210: Theories in Alternative Resuscitation?”
“I’m going to be pre-med, so it’s a necessary evil for me, I’m afraid,” she said with a slight lift of one shoulder. “Though honestly, after the first class, I considered completely changing majors. Who gives that much homework on day one?”
I studied her.
What?
I’d transferred into Whispering Ivy a week into the semester, so I couldn’t know for sure that she hadn’t been here for the first class. But if she had, she hadn’t been back since.
I was sure of that.
“You okay?” she prompted.
I nodded.
Lowering her voice, she asked, “So are you an undercover movie star doing research for a film or something?”
Before I could respond, she lifted her chin in Connor’s direction.
“Most undergrads don’t have their own security,” she said.
Oh, if you think this is odd, just wait until you meet my second bodyguard and his creepy-ass Scream mask.
I glanced at the doorway. Was Kade lurking in the hallway? And did he really wear that thing all the time without rando final girl-esque screams ringing out all the time?
“Connor is not…” I began, then sighed. “It’s complicated.”
Lena chuckled, the sound light and carefree. “Wanna explain it over coffee?”
Trust no one. Trust no one. Trust no one.
“Explain? No. Coffee? Absolutely—”
“Can’t,” Connor called. “Tuesday’s got somewhere else to be.”
“Excuse the fuck out of me?” I arched an eyebrow that I hoped told him to back all the way off.
Lena glanced from him to me and back again, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth.
“You know the rules,” Connor said, popping a pen into his mouth.
Hopefully not the same one he’d dropped on the floor.
“I don’t know the rules,” Lena replied. “Someone want to explain the rules to me? Tuesday, is this an abusive boyfriend situation because—”
Connor barked out a laugh. “Not that it’s any of your business, uh…Lena, was it? I’m not her boyfriend.”
I glared at him. “Yeah, I’m not his type. I have a soul.”
“Let’s go,” he said.
Where the hell have you even been? I wanted to blurt. You can’t just disappear for…days? …and then show back up to boss me around.
“Do you want to go with him, Tuesday?” Lena asked, her voice carefully level. Like she was fully prepared to throw hands if I so much as hesitated.
Connor rolled his eyes with the drama of a fourteen-year-old girl whose mom had just used the latest slang out of context.
Did I want to go with Connor? Not really. Would this turn into a Ghostface, Take the Wheel situation if I didn’t? Probably.
I held up a finger for Lena to give me a second. “Where is Kade?” I demanded of Connor. “He’s my designated manny today.”
“Well, I relieved him of his duties.”
“Dean Bennett said you have other responsibilities.”
“Guys…?” Lena asked.
“I was attacked in the library,” I told her without preface.
“Christ,” Connor muttered.
Lena’s pretty blue eyes went wide, and her mouth dropped open. “Oh my God. Are you okay?”
She reached out to touch my arm, but Connor swatted her hand away. I grabbed his wrist, which he immediately yanked out of my grasp with a scowl.
“Would you chill?” I demanded, shooting him the world’s dirtiest look.
Lena huffed. “Yeah, Secret Service, I was trying to comfort her, not assassinate her.” She turned to me. “Are you okay?”
I nodded. “I’m fine, but Dean Bennett is taking extra precautions to keep me safe. It was an isolated, targeted thing, so you don’t have to worry. No one else is in any danger.”
Based on her continued concerned expression, my explanation didn’t ease her worries at all.
“And…Connor is one of those precautions?” she asked.
“Unfortunately,” I said with a sigh. “He and my other two roommates have to take turns escorting me to class, and unless one of them is with me, I’m supposed to stay in my apartment. But you can come back there and hang out with me, if you want. We have an espresso machine.”
I glared at Connor, daring him to shut this down. I would not allow myself to be completely isolated.
But it was more than that—Lena was another person who might have answers about the Lifewell.
And unlike Malcolm, she might be willing to give them to me.
Also unlike Malcolm…and Connor…and possibly Kade…and definitely Xander…I was completely uninterested in fucking Lena, and I needed someone I could talk to without inadvertently humping them.
And also Lena actually listened to me without asking for anything in return.
Connor shrugged.
“You had me at espresso,” Lena said with a laugh. “Lead the way.”
As she and I walked to the apartment, with Connor trailing behind us, she kept up a constant stream of easy chatter, as if we were long-lost friends.
After Connor caught up and unlocked the door, gesturing for us to go in first, I shot him a glare over my shoulder, daring him with my eyes to follow us into my room.
Thankfully, he veered off into his own and slammed the door behind him. What a luxury, having a door. It truly was the little things in life.
“Mine is that way, Lena,” I told her, pointing. “Go on in. I’ll set our caffeination in motion.”
A few minutes later, when I went to join her, she was still standing in the doorless doorway. At least I didn’t bust her going through all my earthly possessions, right?
“Is this part of the precautions to keep you safe?” she asked.
“The missing door? No, that’s…”
She shook her head.
Even before she stepped out of the way so I could pass through, my stomach clenched. It was a sunny day. My room should’ve been way brighter, even without the overheads on.
The reason it wasn’t?
The newly installed boards over my window blocked all the natural light. Thick wooden planks bolted into the frames, layered over each other like a barricade against me and the outside world, like I didn’t even deserve a glimpse of it.
I stood there, staring, my pulse hammering in my ears.
I wanted to scream so loud the hairs on Ms. Tissdale’s chin would stand at attention, causing her to send Xander immediately. Connor had been in class with me, so this had to be Kade or Malcolm. Did he really think they were the men—ha!—to keep me safe?
But I put on my best happy face. Like it was no big deal. Like this was just another charming little Whispering Ivy quirk.
Because Lena stood next to me, and murdering your roommates in front of a new acquaintance was not how you built lifelong connections.
Still.
Those fucking assholes.