by Mae Doyle
I’m an artist. I’ve always been able to see the good in things and to create things from nothing, but Teague? He’s the opposite. He consumes and destroys everything in his path, and if I’m not careful, I’m going to be directly in his line of vision. In the line of fire.
“Oh, but I do. I hate you more than you know.” There’s a burning feeling in my stomach, but I’m pretty sure that it’s not hate. Pulling away from him, I force myself to remove all contact with him. Our arms can’t touch. The way his knee is lightly resting against mine has got to stop. If I’m going to be able to pass calculus and not stupidly fall for the bull that he’s trying to feed me, I can’t let him touch me. “Teach me calculus, Teague, and then let’s move on from this.”
“I’ll tutor you, but under one condition.” He picks up his pencil and raps it against the desk like he’s trying to make a point. Even though I try to keep from rolling my eyes, I fail, and he waits until I’m done being dramatic to continue. “You do everything I ask you to do and you don’t make me look stupid by screwing up.”
Heat rises in me. “I’m not doing everything you ask me to do, you asshole.”
“Chill, Nora, I’m talking about in calculus. Don’t worry, I’m not trying to get into your pants.” He leans forward, his voice a whisper. “Again.”
“Fine.” Grabbing my water bottle, I take a long swig, trying to cool off. “As long as you don’t totally suck as a tutor, I’ll make sure that you look good. Deal.”
He grins and takes my water bottle from me, draining it before he hands it back. I squeeze it so hard that I hear the plastic crackle as the sides collapse. “Deal, Nora. Oh, but just so you know, I do offer in-home tutoring sessions. Since you had to get rid of your easel, I’m sure that we have enough space in your room for some one-on-one.” Reaching over, he gently rests his hand on my thigh. My skin comes to life and I have to reach down and slide his hand off of me. Even touching his skin gives me a thrill and I can’t help but remember our time together in the woods.
My body is dead set on betraying me. The look he has on his face is near enough to light my panties on fire. Squeezing my legs together, I do my best to ignore the throbbing and aching between my legs. Clamping my mouth shut is the only way that I can make sure I don’t say something stupid. Instead, I lean down and dig in my backpack to find my calculus book, slamming it down on the desk to make a point.
“Just teach me, Teague.”
He rolls his eyes, but flips open the book, turning it so that he can see the problems. Even though we’re not touching, I feel the energy between our bodies. Biting my lower lip, I try to focus on what he’s saying as he points and taps in the book.
His voice is so soothing. Who knew that Teague was so smart? If I weren’t as strong as I am and as pissed off, I’d easily fall under his spell.
But I can’t. There’s no way that I can trust Teague Ward again.
Teague
“Teague, honey, aren’t you going to spend the evening in the house tonight?” My mom calls to me from the living room and I pause, leaning against the doorframe. The last thing that I want to do is spend any more time under the same roof as Nora if I don’t have to. We just finished dinner and she went upstairs to shower, but knowing that I’m only a few doors away from her naked wet body isn’t helping me focus.
“I’m just going to go for a run.” I’ve got my running shoes on and have changed into shorts, but left my t-shirt behind.
She eyeballs me. “Don’t you think that you’re working out enough? It would be nice to have some time with you here instead of you running off every night. Maybe the three of us could watch a movie.”
I raise an eyebrow at her, hardly believing what she’s saying. A movie? With Nora? My mom hates her ever since we ruined the floor in her bedroom and Nora did a shit job fixing it. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think that she felt bad for Nora and wanted her to feel at home here.
But Blacksburg isn’t her home. Whenever Nora starts feeling like it may be, I’m determined to fix that for her. Don’t want her getting too cocky or comfortable.
“No, I’m good, mom. Don’t wait up.” The doorknob is cool under my hand as I turn it and walk out onto the porch. Rather than driving to the park or school for a run, I’m going to stick around here tonight. From the back of the house, I can see Nora’s window and can keep an eye on her. Not that I think she’s going to go anywhere, of course, because where would she go?
But I still want to make sure that she doesn’t try anything stupid.
***
All of my muscles are screaming by the time I run back to the house and make one more loop around the back to make sure that Nora’s still around. What I see damn near stops my heart. Not only is her light on in the room, but the window is open.
I pause, standing in the shadow of an old maple tree and look up at her. She’s backlit by the light in the room, but it’s obvious that she’s getting ready to do something stupid. “Oh, Nora, what are you doing?” My voice is barely a whisper, so I’m not worried about it carrying, but I still stiffen when I see her turn her head in my direction.
Slowly, almost like she’s scared, she swings one leg out over the windowsill, then the other, resting on it for a moment. Her window, like mine, is on the second floor, and the roof of the first floor juts out under her window. If she lowers herself carefully she’ll be able to stand on the roof and then slide down to the edge. There’s a trellis growing along the side of the house, and I bet that Nora’s looking to use it to climb down.
I wait, barely aware that I’m holding my breath, as she slides out of the window and slips down the roof of the first floor. Her foot catches on something and she pauses, listening to see if my mom hears her.
Nothing moves, and Nora turns around, searching with her foot for the trellis. I can easily imagine the relief on her face as her foot finds it and she tests it with her weight. If she weren’t so damn skinny she’d easily break the trellis, but she probably weighs 100 pounds soaking wet.
Slowly, she searches for each step down on the trellis, carefully testing it before committing to the step. A soft thud carries across the lawn as she makes the final jump and lands, crouched by the house. I stand up, wanting to call out to her, but she stands and darts off down the driveway, making sure to run in the grass where she’ll be hidden by the shadow.
I’m exhausted, but there’s no way that I’m going to let this fly. Nora has to have a damn good reason for trying to run away from the house, and since I’m the only one who drives her anywhere, she can’t get far. At least, that’s what I tell myself as I follow behind her.
Even tired, I’m faster than she is, and I have to focus to keep my pace slow. My stomach twists and my adrenaline starts to peak as I think about chasing her down and tackling her. Out here, nobody would hear her cry. We’d finally be able to work out whatever the hell is going on between the two of us, and she wouldn’t have a choice but to figure it out with me.
My legs tense as I run and I think about tackling her, but just then headlights sweep across us. I drop down into the grass, pressing myself onto the ground. The blades of grass are sharp points that dig up into my skin, but I do my best to ignore them. Nora doesn’t shy from the lights and instead runs straight to them.
The car stops and she grabs the door, throwing it open and sliding into the car as quickly as possible. As soon as she shuts the door, the light in the car clicks off, but not before I see who’s driving.
Jeremy Gibbons. Of course. I thought that I scared him off at lunch today, but Nora must have said or done something to make him take pity on her. Standing up, I glare after them as they drive off. There’s no point in trying to chase them on foot, and I’m not going to have time to get in my truck and hunt them down.
Nora’s going to have something to answer for, and I’m determined to get the truth from her as quickly as possible. Turning, I start walking back up along the driveway.
I’m halfway to the house when I
realize my good fortune. Nora’s gone, which means that her room is left unguarded. I don’t know that I’ll find anything good in there, but I’m going to go look.
***
Twenty minutes in her room and I have jack shit to show for my efforts. Her space is picked up and clean. Even her homework is neatly stacked in her folder and ready to be taken to school tomorrow.
If it makes it to school. At this rate, I’m half tempted to be waiting for her when she gets back so that we can handle whatever we have going on. I don’t like to let things fester, and things with Nora are definitely coming to a head.
Dammit. I was really hoping to find something here that I could use to bring her down a few notches, but since I took care of her art, there’s nothing here that really seems to be important to her. The best thing would have been to find a diary so that I could get into her mind.
The idea that I may be in her diary – if she had one – admittedly gives me thrills. I’d love to leaf through her thoughts, but the only thing here is her homework. I sigh, grabbing the stack from her desk and perching on the edge of her bed.
There’s nothing exciting in here expect for a history report that’s due tomorrow. Grinning, I pull it from the stack of papers and fold it, sliding it into my pocket. Nora has her own secrets tonight, and while I don’t like it, I can’t really stop her from going out if she’s going to sneak out of her window, but I can fuck with her tomorrow.
I’m about to leave her room when I have a flash of brilliance and turn back, stalking across her space to the window. The lock flips easily and I give the window a little shake to make sure that it’s really locked tight. Let’s see her get back in tonight without a little mercy.
My mom will have to show it to her, because I’m done. Nora has used up all of my mercy.
Chapter 5
Nora
“Long night?” Teague barely looks up from his breakfast when I walk into the kitchen, but his voice cuts through the silence and I immediately feel pinned to the wall. He had to have been the one to come into my room and lock me out last night.
Banging on the door until his mom let me in was nothing short of humiliating, especially when I had no way to explain to her where I was. How in the world was I going to pretend like Teague locked me out of my room when I had no real good reason for being out after dark in the first place?
No, I just had to play dumb and pretend like I’d gone out for a walk and gotten myself locked out of the house. Nevermind that she hadn’t seen me leave the house. Nevermind that if she had given me a key, none of this would have happened. I may be allowed to live under the same roof as her, but that doesn’t mean that I will ever be her equal, and there’s no way that she’s going to let me forget that.
“Nothing out of the ordinary,” I lie, sitting down across from him and pulling the cereal towards me. Teague grunted and pushed the milk closer, watching while I lifted the jug. “What’s wrong the with milk?” I pause, my arm shaking a little as I hold the almost-full gallon.
He shrugs and takes a noisy bite of his cereal, milk dripping back into the bowl. “Nothing, why?”
“Because I don’t like the way you’re looking at me.” It sounds silly to say it out loud. Teague wouldn’t do anything to the milk, would he?
“Well, I don’t like the way you look.” He rolls his eyes and keeps eating. The barb stings, even though I know that it’s not true. I took special care this morning picking out an outfit and I have on skinny jeans and a tight black sweater with gray ankle boots. I look great. I know it and Teague knows it.
“Okay then.” Unscrewing the lid of the milk, I pour a huge splash of it into my bowl, but it doesn’t flow out like normal milk does. Instead, large chunks plop down into my bowl, splashing me with drops. The hole of the jug clogs for a moment while thick milk and curds fight their way out, then they all come flowing out of the hole at the same time. “Eww!” I shout, standing up and pushing my chair back as it splashes all over me. “You curdled the milk?” My chest is heaving as I look from Teague to my milky sweater.
He grins and my stomach flops. If only he wasn’t so evil, I could fall for him. I love seeing that grin trained on me and I could get used to it, but then he speaks. “Probably just had to look at your face and it curdled.” His voice is dry and bored, and I push the bowl across the table to him.
“I’m changing.” My chair scrapes on the floor as I shove myself back from the table, but I don’t stop to see if I gouged the wood.
“You should.” His voice carries after me as I stomp from the kitchen and head for the stairs. “While you’re at it, see if you can do something about your face. Who knows what effect you’ll have on the kids at school?”
***
The drive to school was silent and everyone ignored me when we walked into the building. Fine. That was fine. But now that I have some time before class to think, it’s giving me a little break from Teague, from Robby, from all of the stupid students here.
All except Jeremy. He had given me a halfwave when Teague and I walked in, and at first I thought that Teague saw him, but he just kept his pace next to me, carefully escorting me to my first class. Now that he’s gone and Jeremy’s not in the same class as me, I feel the key I stole from his room digging sharply into my thigh.
My trip last night wasn’t just a joyride, although it felt really good to get out of the Ward house for a little while without Teague following me around. Even now I remember how nice it felt to be in a car with the windows down, driving with someone who doesn’t hate me. Absentmindedly, I rub the outside of my jean pocket, feeling the outline of the key.
It had taken some serious research to be able to find out what the key was for. A first, I had assumed that it was for a lockbox at a bank, which meant that I would never be able to get to see what was inside without Teague finding out. Some time on my phone late the other night had clued me in that it’s actually a storage unit key.
Next, I had to find out where the storage units are in town and think about which one would be the one that Teague would mostly visit. I knew that he wouldn’t automatically opt for the one closest to his house. That’s too easy and too obvious, and besides, the storage unit closest to his house is a bit of a dump, which I find amusing.
No, it makes sense that Teague would want to be sure that all of his stuff would be as safe as possible, which meant that I had to narrow down the storage unit to three different ones across Blacksburg. Calling them in between classes to get information about rentals and to pretend like I was Teague’s wife wasn’t fun, but I got my answers.
Although I wouldn’t admit it to anyone but myself, pretending to be his wife gave me a bit of a thrill. I swear, my body is out to betray me whenever possible, especially when it comes to Teague.
Only when it comes to Teague.
Jeremy had been thrilled to drive me to Blacksburg’s finest self-storage unit last night – the Safe and Secure on 9th Ave. It’s only thanks to our visit last night that I can sit here right now and I know that I finally have something over Teague that may be able to get him to back off, but before I can spend any longer thinking about my plan, the bell rings, my stomach growls, and it’s time for class.
The rest of my classes fly by, and so far I’ve managed to avoid Teague simply by trying to be where I know he won’t. He’s still buttsore about getting kicked off of the football team, so whenever I hear his old teammates in the halls, I stick close. They shoot me dirty looks, but so far, nobody has tried to rape me in the woods or destroyed my art, so I kinda feel like I’m coming out on top.
None of them have ruined my breakfast, either. My stomach growls again and I make a beeline for my locker to drop off my books and grab my lunch. I’m not the type of person to skip any meal, and it’s been hard for me to concentrate all morning with my stomach rumbling so much.
Before I even make it to my locker, I can see that something’s wrong. There’s a group of people standing around it – a clump of bodies that easi
ly sticks out in the hall. Slowing my steps, I walk up to them, my ears pricked.
“Well, of course she’s still a virgin. Can you imagine anyone sticking their dick in that? It would probably shrivel up and fall off.” A boy I don’t know is talking loud enough for his voice to carry down the hall, and everyone laughs at his comment. My ears burn and I consider turning around and making a run for it, but I have to eat something.
I’m starving.
“I just want to know why it’s taken this long for people to see who she really is.” The voice cuts through the laughter and I freeze in my spot.
Bethany. She’s had it out for me ever since the vomit incident. I have no idea what I did to piss her off so badly, but she’s an absolute nightmare and works hard to make my life a living hell. Because I still can’t see what’s going on at my locker, I inch closer, my eyes glued to it, trying to see what’s going on.
From here, it looks normal. I can’t see the entire thing thanks to all of the students standing in front of it, but I can’t tell what’s amiss. A few more steps, though, and someone sees me. The boy who made the comment about me being a virgin points, his finger leveled accusatorily at my face. “Hey, there she is.”
Like one, the whole group of students turns and looks at me. Bethany steps to the front, grinning so widely that her teeth are bared. “Oh, if it’s not our favorite virgin,” she calls, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “You do know what happens if you don’t use your bits, right? They’ll get old and rancid. Do you have a rancid vagina, Nora?”
I freeze, my blood running cold in my veins. What in the world is she talking about?