Chapter Sixty-Three Aurora
Chapter Sixty-Three
Aurora
A little over a week went by, and everything was going amazingly. I’d been staying with Joshua. I hadn’t slept at my own place since we got together. And I didn’t mind that; I liked sleeping next to him.
I was sitting with the girls on the grass near the fountain. Jennie was scrolling through her phone, Aly was sipping her iced coffee, and Layla was half-asleep with her head on Jennie’s shoulder.
I was on my phone, looking at photos Emily sent me of Brownie and Honey. They were so cute, and they were cuddling up with each other on the corner of the couch.
“Texting your boyfriend?” Aly teased, making me look up.
“No,” I blushed, lowering my phone onto my lap. “I’m texting Emily; she’s taking care of our kittens.”
Jennie and Layla looked up at me as if they couldn’t believe their ears, which was fair because even Alex didn’t believe that the Joshua Lockhart would have a kitten, let alone two.
Aly blinked once, twice, and then whispered, “Kittens? Our? You and him have kids already?”
“Yeah,” I said, giggling a little. “They’re strays, and I couldn’t handle seeing them like that, so he… he took them in for me.”
Jennie sighed dramatically, falling back onto the grass. “When Joshua Lockhart decides to be sweet, it’s unfairly attractive.”
Aly covered her face with both hands. “Like—ugh. He was always brooding and an asshole, but now? He’s suddenly so perfect. Aurora. I actually get it.”
Layla smiled. “Two kittens, and gave you your voice back, so perfect. He’s pretty cool.”
I laughed, cheeks warming. “He’s… really not that bad, you know.”
Jennie shot up, pointing her straw at me. “Oh, don’t you start. You’ve already won the lottery. The rest of us are just trying to survive men who can’t even text back.”
I felt my heart stutter just a little. Yeah, they were right. When Joshua was sweet when he dropped the walls, when his eyes softened, when he looked at me like I was something fragile he wanted to protect, he wasn’t just attractive.
He was everything.
We were still laughing about Joshua and the kittens when a shadow fell over us. A pair of clean white trainers stopped right beside Jennie’s stretched-out legs. She tilted her head up, squinting against the sun, and there he was. Alex Grayson.
He nudged Jennie’s foot lightly with his own. “Gee, thanks for ditching me,” he said flatly, voice laced with irritation. “I waited at the art room for thirty fucking minutes, Blondie.”
Jennie froze for a second before her lips curled into that guilty, sheepish smile of hers. “Oh… yeah.” She stood up, brushing grass off her skirt. “I forgot.”
Alex sighed through his nose, jaw tightening. Aly, never one to resist poking the bear, smirked from behind her straw. “Joshua might be sweet these days, but his best friend clearly hasn’t changed one bit.”
That got Alex’s attention. He turned his head sharply, eyes narrowing into a glare so sharp it could’ve sliced glass.
Aly just grinned wider, unbothered.
But Alex didn’t waste his breath. He exhaled slowly, turned his gaze back to Jennie, and said coolly, “Your friends need to learn that speaking isn’t always required when seeing someone, especially someone who doesn’t want to hear it.”
And then he just walked off. No goodbyes, no look back. Just classic Alex. Aly let out a low whistle as Jennie jogged after Alex, calling something out that made him glance back over his shoulder with that same blank, unimpressed expression he always wore.
“How the hell is she even friends with him?” Aly muttered, eyes following them until they disappeared around the corner of the path. “He’s allergic to joy.”
Layla chuckled, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
“They’ve known each other since their first year,” she explained, turning to me.
“Jennie is the oldest among all of us. It was her, Alex and Joshua in the first year, just them three, but she said she approached Alex because she thought he was hot.”
Aly rolled her eyes at that, making me giggle a bit as Layla continued. “But they ended up being just cute best friends who fight like siblings.”
I blinked, surprised. “They were a trio?”
Layla nodded. “Pretty much. But Jennie is closer to Alex than Joshua. She calls him Joshy sometimes, because Alex is her Lexi.”
Aly chuckled into her straw, “Lexi and Joshy, sickening.”
I smiled faintly, watching the direction they’d gone. The way Jennie could tease him and still make him show up made sense now.
Then Layla turned to me, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. “Wait. You’re December my year, right?” I nodded. “You said you joined last year… which is impossible because I joined last year, and with your birthday, this would be your first year.”
Aly tilted her head, eyebrow cocked. “We never saw you around last year, either.”
I nodded.
I know, I came at seventeen. Still in college in England and would be considered a high schooler here.
But they let me in anyway because the interview process went well, because I didn’t give up when they rejected me for being young and for not being able to cover tuition.
I guess I looked like a charity case, but it worked well in my favour.
And I normally ate under the stairs or was tucked away in the library. I guess that was why we never really met. I didn’t remember seeing these girls either.
“I got in at seventeen,” I said, awkwardly smiling
Aly’s jaw dropped as she placed her drink down. “You got in at seventeen and got a full ride. You fucking genius. You’re like—” She lifted her hand up above her head, and the other just below the other one. “You’re just a bit above Miles.”
Ah, yeah, Miles also got in at seventeen. He told me once when he was driving me home way back.
I nodded, smiling. “He mentioned.”
“He’s truly a prodigy just like you,” Aly said, then clicked her finger as if she had just thought of something. She turned to Aly and started muttering something about Miles’s older brother.
Layla turned to me, “Miles has a brother who went to high school at twelve, which is crazy, and graduated from university at nineteen. You might’ve seen him on the news. Mitchell James Miller.”
Oh yeah, I know him. I saw him on the news a couple of times. Top heir of the Miller healthcare system. A family that owns dozens upon dozens of hospitals around almost half of the country.
They were the brain-based empire, and I really looked up to them. A lot of my brain research came from their articles I read online. They were so useful.
No wonder Miles is a genius. It runs in the family.
“The brother who became a surgeon at twenty-seven,” I muttered, almost to myself.
Which was ridiculous, by the way. An average starting surgeon was around thirty, not late twenties. Mitchell Miller was just… ridiculously smart.
“You and Miles have so much in common,” Aly said, winking at me. I blinked before looking around to make sure Joshua wasn’t anywhere near me because I knew Aly wasn’t going to be breathing for long.
He’s not.
Good.
“Calm down, he won’t kill me. I’m your best friend,” she said, showing our matching rings on her middle finger. “You’d definitely dump him; he won’t risk it,” she added, making me chuckle.
Aly is so unserious.
“Has anyone seen Alex?”
I turned around, and there he was, Joshua, hair still a bit messy from practice, jersey half-tucked, backpack slung over one shoulder. He looked a little out of breath, like he’d been walking fast.
Layla tilted her head. “He went to paint with Jennie,” she said. “It’s their thing, remember? Art room.”
Joshua blinked once, then sighed, muttering something under his breath about Grayson being obsessed with paint. He walked closer, and before I could say anything, he dropped down right beside me, heavy and warm. And then, just like that, he rested his head on my shoulder.
My heart fluttered so hard I had to bite my lip.
“Hi, Princess,” he murmured. His voice was low, lazy, but there was that teasing smile hiding in it, the one that always made my chest tighten.
Aly let out the loudest groan. “Ugh, Lockhart,” she said dramatically, throwing her head back. “I’m still not used to you being like this. It’s sickening.”
Joshua didn’t even look up. “Then don’t look,” he said flatly, still resting against me.
Layla snorted into her drink while I tried to hide my face behind my hair, cheeks burning. Joshua kept his head on my shoulder, but I saw something in his eyes: that usual spark of trouble glinting.
I already knew the moment I saw him glancing at Aly as if he were about to cause trouble.
“You know, you and Alex are kind of the same. A match made in hell.”
Aly froze mid-sip of her drink. “Excuse me?”
Joshua just shrugged, pretending to study the sky. “Both loud, stubborn, and love to argue. You’d either kill each other or end up married. I can’t decide which one would be worse.”
Aly blinked once. Then twice.
“Don’t”—she pointed her finger right at him—“you dare say we’re a match, Lockhart.”
Joshua shrugged, lifting his head from my shoulder. “What, being compared to Grayson too much for you to handle?”
“Say I’m the devil, say I belong in hell, I don’t care,” she shot back, voice rising just enough to make Layla snort. “But don’t you ever say I match that arrogant, self-righteous—”
“—artist?” Joshua supplied helpfully.
“—asshole!” Aly finished. “Ambrose and Grayson don’t go together. Not in this world, not in any.”
Joshua smirked. “Sounds like something people say before they fall in love.”
Aly’s jaw dropped. “LOCKHART—”
Layla was already looking down at the grass, trying to hide her grin. I was doing my absolute best not to giggle because Aly looked furious, cheeks flushed, eyes wide, ready to throw her drink at him.
Joshua just leaned back on my shoulder again, satisfied, murmuring low enough for only me to hear, “Told you. Match made in hell.”
I elbowed him lightly, whispering, “You’re going to die one of these days.”
He just grinned, eyes still on Aly. “Worth it.”