Chapter 16 – Lena
chapter
sixteen
Lena
The worst part about being over someone? The moment you stop caring is when they show up.
I didn't look up. The library was packed and people grabbed open seats all the time. I'd been camped at this table for two hours waiting for Kimmy to finish her late class, and then we were supposed to grab food after.
Don’t look. Please don’t let it be him.
"So you're dating preppy white boys now?"
My highlighter stopped mid-stroke. I knew that voice, and the fact that it didn't make my stomach drop anymore? Honestly kind of delightful. A month ago, Matt saying my name would've wrecked my whole week. Now it just made me want to put my earbuds in.
My eyes snapped up and collided with those familiar deep green eyes. Same light brown skin, and too-white smile.
"Matt." I went back to my reading. "I'm busy."
"I saw you at the bake sale. You looked real comfortable on Coulter's lap."
"Cool." I turned a page.
"That's all you got? Cool?"
I closed the textbook with my finger holding my place and looked at him. Really looked. Waited for the sting, the squeeze in my chest, the sick-stomach feeling I used to get just seeing his name pop up on my phone.
Nothing. Not even a twinge. Just the vague annoyance of someone standing between me and my work.
Oh wow. I really am over this man. God is real.
"Who I date is none of your business, Matt."
"I'm just saying, Coulter?" He laughed, but it came out tight and forced. "That's a choice."
"What, you got someone else you approve of? You're not my dad."
That landed. His jaw ticked and he didn't answer, which told me everything I needed to know.
I shoved my textbook into my bag and stood up, too fast, the chair screeching against the floor loud enough that two people at nearby tables looked over.
I didn't care. I needed to not be having this conversation.
I slung my bag over my shoulder and walked toward the back stacks without looking at him.
He followed. Obviously.
"My point is, I see you trying to one-up me," he said behind me. "And I'm not bothered."
I turned into the aisle where the business journals were shelved and dropped my bag, then gave him a long once-over. The flushed cheeks. The tight jaw. The fact that he'd literally followed me across an entire library to deliver this speech.
"This is you not bothered?" I gestured at him. "Clearly."
His nostrils flared. He parked himself against the opposite shelf, arms crossed, and the last bit of pretense slid off his face. "You want to know the real reason I ended things? It wasn't about your mom or the stress or any of that."
The back of my neck went cold. "Then what was it about?"
"It was about the rooms I need to walk into, Lena.
" He said it like he was explaining long division to a five-year-old.
"The networking events, the firm dinners, the kind of social capital you need to make partner track?
" He straightened up, and something smug settled into his face.
"Missy will help me get into those rooms. I can build with her. "
Okay. Okay okay okay.
Something hot crawled up the back of my throat. Not sadness. I was past that. More like the feeling right before you laugh at something that isn't funny.
I'd been so stupid. So goddamn stupid.
You wasted a year on someone who saw you as a stepping stone.
Not because I dated him. I couldn't hate myself for that, I was human and he was fine.
"You're pathetic." It came out flat. Bored, almost. Which was worse than angry and we both knew it.
"Am I supposed to believe you just moved on?" he hissed.
I wrinkled my nose and sniffed the air. "What is that smell?" Sniffed again. "Oh wait, that's the hypocrisy." I grabbed my bag.
His face flushed dark and his eyes went flat. "You think he actually cares about you? You're a novelty to him, the exotic flavor of the month."
"Okay, we're done." I slung my bag over my shoulder. "Really illuminating, Matt."
I turned to leave and got two steps before his hand clamped around my wrist and yanked me backward hard enough that my bag hit the floor.
“You think you can disrespect me?” His voice was low and ugly as his fingers dug into the soft skin of my inner wrist. "I'm fucking talking to you."
The adrenaline hit before the pain did. My whole body went tight and I looked down at his hand, then up at his face.
"Let go of me,” I gritted out
"Not until you —"
Suddenly, there was a menacing voice from my left, low and mean. “You have two choices, either you let go of her or I kick your teeth in. Hell, you’re kind of pissing me off so I might kick your teeth in for fun.”
Trace.
He stood at the end of the aisle, his voice sounding like the enforcer he was. Matt should have been terrified. I was too busy noticing how much I liked the edge in Trace’s voice.
He had a paper bag in one hand and I noted the bakery logo from College Ave. His eyes though, were locked on Matt's fingers around my wrist.
When Matt didn’t immediately release me, the bag hit the floor.
Finally Matt's grip loosened and I watched the evolution of his stupidity in real time as he lifted his chin, set his jaw, and smirked as if he was the intimidating one in the room. “I’m having a conversation with my girlfriend.”
"No, you're not." Trace closed the distance in three strides. “You are manhandling my girlfriend.”
I knew the danger. Trace was enormous, but Matt was unpredictable. “Both of you stop right now. Trace, Matt was just letting me go. Weren’t you dumbass?”
But neither moved. With Trace closer, I could smell that woodsy soap scent, and my body leaned toward him before my brain caught up.
He was still in practice sweats, compression shirt stretched across his broad chest, hair damp. He moved the way he moved on the ice right before he put someone into the boards. "Let her go, Hendricks. I'm not asking twice."
As soon as Matt dropped my wrist I knew to get out of the way. Matt didn’t know what was good for him because, he stepped toward Trace. Which, at six inches shorter, forty pounds lighter, seemed crazy as he squared up to the very angry hockey god.
Audacity must have been on sale in the student center today.
"What are you going to do about it?"
The crack of Trace's fist meeting Matt's nose was a gunshot in the quiet of the library.
Matt crumpled backward into the shelving with such force the metal groaned.
Books rained down on him, paperbacks and hardcovers hitting the floor.
His hands flew to his face, already streaming blood, and the sound he made was this wet, animal noise, somewhere between a gasp and a whimper. Not pain. Terror.
Trace bent over him with an easy going smile and very calmly muttered, “You ever so much as look at Lena, I will break every bone in your body.” His smile never wavered. “I promise to enjoy it.”
Matt slumped against the shelf, blinking, blood dripping onto the industrial carpet. He opened his mouth like he had something to say, but Trace stepped toward him and whatever was left of Matt's spine dissolved. He shoved off the shelf and stumbled down the aisle without looking back.
Trace didn't watch him leave. Instead, he turned to me with a completely changed demeanor. The hard edges melted. Gently, he reached for my face.
His palms were warm and gentle, tilting my head to check one side then the other. His eyes moved over me, assessing me for any injuries.
"Are you hurt?" He asked, his voice barely a whisper.
"I'm fine —"
"Hold on." His hands coasted down my arms, and when he reached my wrist he cradled it like something precious and breakable, his thumb finding the red marks blooming under my skin.
His jaw clenched so hard I heard his teeth click together. Then he lifted my wrist and pressed his mouth to the inside of it, right over the marks, and the gentleness of it after everything that just happened made my throat close up.
He just risked everything for you. Everything.
"Your hand," I said, reaching for his knuckles.
He pulled back. "Don't worry about my hand."
"Trace.” The weight of what he’d done suddenly hit me. “The draft. If Matt reports —"
"He'd have to prove it, and he won't. Not against my family name.
" His thumb kept moving on my wrist in slow circles. “I’m sorry if I scared you. I don’t usually let my temper get the best of me.
But I don't regret it. I saw him grabbing you and I just —" He exhaled hard through his nose.
"I fucking hate that he was touching you. "
My skin was suddenly too tight, too hot. The intensity of his gaze as it bored into mine made my breath hitch.
“Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”
“N-no. I’m okay.”
We were completely alone in the stacks, the tension swirling around us. His thumb continued tracing patterns over the inside of my wrist like something he was afraid of breaking.
The nerves got the better of me and I had to look away. "What's in the bag?" I asked, because I was about three seconds from crying and that was not happening today.
He blinked. Looked at the paper bag on the floor. The corner of his mouth pulled up as he bent to grab it and held it open. A cinnamon roll, still warm, icing half-melted, from the bakery on College Ave.
"Saw they had a fresh batch." He said it like it was nothing. Like he hadn't walked four blocks after practice to bring me my favorite thing in the world. "You always forget to eat when you're studying. And I know you love the cinnamon rolls. Figured I’d bring you some. No big deal.”
Well shit.
He wasn’t supposed to be this sweet.
My eyes burned and I had to look at the ceiling for a second.
He noticed. He always notices.
I set the bag on the shelf and when I turned back he was right there.
Way too close.
His eyes dropped to my mouth and stayed.
"Lena." Barely a whisper. His hand came up and his thumb traced my bottom lip, so light I almost didn't feel it. "Can I kiss you?"
He wanted to kiss me?
Not for our deal. Not for an audience. He was asking for real, and the fact that he asked made my stupid heart flip.
"Yeah," I whispered, my voice came out embarrassingly small. "You can kiss me."
He cupped my face in both hands and brought his mouth down to mine and it was nothing like the bake sale. That had been performance. This was just us, soft and slow, his lips warm and careful like he was afraid of spooking me.
I grabbed the front of his shirt because my knees were doing something unreliable, and he made this sound, low, quiet, almost pained, and the kiss changed. He took it deeper, his tongue sliding against mine.
Wood shelving dug into my spine and I didn't care about that either because his hands were moving from my face to my waist, pulling me closer, and I could feel him through his sweats, all of him, and my brain just went offline.
His mouth dragged down to the spot below my ear and I grabbed his shoulders to stay upright.
His hand slid under my hoodie, palm flat on my stomach, warm on bare skin, and he paused, waiting, giving me time.
When I arched into him instead of pulling away, he exhaled against my neck and his hand moved up, thumb brushing the underside of my bra, and my head dropped back against the books.
As a parting shot, he nipped my bottom lip which sent a shiver through my body. I rocked my hip over his thigh, chasing the high.
But then a door banged open somewhere down the hall and we jumped apart, breaths coming out jagged and shredded.
His forehead pressed to mine, both of us stood there with his hand still warm on my skin. He pulled away slowly and smoothed the fabric down before tucking a braid behind my ear. Then he used a thumb and traced my cheekbone.
He looked…wrecked. Which did not bode well for how I looked. We had just crossed a line. An invisible line. But a tangible one none the less.
His eyes had gone dark, and his chest heaved like he'd just played a period. But his mouth was tilting up at the corner, that dangerous smile spreading. “Holy Fuck, Lena.”
Same.
He grabbed my bag and slung it over his shoulder, then handed me the bakery bag from the shelf.
"Come on." He laced his fingers through mine, his uninjured hand, because of course he was still thinking about what I'd worry about. "Let me take you home.”
You're in trouble, Lena. Real trouble.
And the worst part? I didn't want out.