Collide Series Box Set

by J. C. Hannigan

  "You need to come!" Jenna begged, pleading me with her wide blue eyes. "I don't want to go alone."

  "You won't be alone; Lucas will be there," I pointed out, yawning.

  "You know what I mean..." Jenna trailed off. "Please come? You could always ask that Jax guy you've been crushing on to come," Jenna suggested, raising a dainty eyebrow. I snorted, getting up off the couch to head to my bedroom without replying.

  I spent the weekend catching up on the homework I'd neglected over the week. On Sunday evening, I sat on the couch, my laptop opened and the Word Document staring blankly at me for hours. My last assignment was writing a paper on death, only I couldn't focus. It should have been easy—I was no stranger to saying goodbye to loved ones. I'd seen death and touched its cold stiff hand.

  I felt myself panicking whenever I tried to think of how to start my paper. I wanted to sound detached from the subject, but it was hard.

  Needing a distraction, I clicked over to Facebook.

  I hadn't stayed in touch with many of my high school classmates over the years. I tended to purge my list every so often, getting rid of the people that didn't do anything but bump up my "friends" number. Some people used Facebook to collect friends; I used it to stay connected to people I wanted to stay connected to. Which explained why I rarely used it and why it was so boring. Jenna and Jake were the only ones I spoke to outside of high school.

  The only person I kept on my list from my life in Toronto was Lauren, and she was dead. I kept her on because I could still message her, even if she would never read the messages. I could still see the photos we took together and the ones she took without me.

  I went to her wall, scrolling through some of the things our classmates had written recently. People she didn't even like claiming to miss her daily and think about her always. Lauren would have laughed at it.

  I stopped scrolling when I saw a familiar name, Alex, proclaiming an undying love for her. I clicked his profile. He was still tattooing, by the looks of things. He now sported a tragically beautiful portrait of Lauren on his chest.

  I shook my head, bewildered. When Lauren was dating Alex, he never told her that he loved her. I knew he'd been crazy about her, unable to keep his hands off of her at any given time...but I didn't think it was portrait-over-your-heart serious.

  Just as I was about to close down Facebook, I received a friend request. I clicked on the notification, unable to hide the smile that lifted the corner of my lips as I saw that it was from a Jax Walker.

  I clicked accept then went over to his profile. He looked extremely hot in his profile picture, his long hair pulled back. He was wearing a leather riding jacket and holding a helmet, posing beside his black Harley.

  "Oh my god, he has a Harley?"

  I jumped, caught off guard by Jenna's sudden appearance behind the couch. She was looking over my shoulder at Jax's Facebook profile.

  "I guess so." I shrugged. "I didn't know. He just added me."

  "You're right. He's totally Jason Momoa from Conan the Barbarian hot. Are you nuts?" Jenna shoved the back of my shoulder. "Why haven't you climbed that delicious body like a spider monkey?"

  I snorted, amused by that image. "I don't know, maybe because I'm not ready to."

  "Damn." Jenna shook her head, resuming her quest to the kitchen for a drink. "I don't know how you've resisted so far, but you are one strong-ass woman. I would lick that manly chest."

  I rolled my eyes, amused at Jenna's commentary.

  Shutting down Facebook, I decided to focus all of my attention on my paper. I wrote about death and social media, and how people now used social media to cope with their grief. I didn't finish editing until nearly two o'clock in the morning.

  * * *

  Despite the late hour I got to bed and a restless night of sleep, I found myself waking before my alarm even went off. I felt nervous and excited, and I knew it had everything to do with the dream I had just woken up from...a dream involving Jax, a dream that left me breathless and very awake.

  I kicked off my blankets and wandered down the hall to the bathroom. Jenna was still sleeping, so I grabbed a quick shower and went about my morning routine as quietly as I could. I dressed in my new outfit: the black stretch slim leg jeans, and the checkered chiffon blouse. I glanced at the time on my cell phone's clock as I slipped into my jacket and boots.

  I would be early, but if I didn’t walk too fast, I wouldn't be too early.

  I threw my messenger bag over my shoulder, pausing only to lock our apartment door behind me. I flew down the stairs and pushed open the doors to the crisp September morning. It was a little chilly, but the fresh air felt good on my face.

  At first, I tried to walk slowly, but I felt like someone was following me. I looked behind me, seeing a person walking with a backpack. I couldn't make out their face, as they had a hood pulled up over their head...but there was something about them that unsettled me. The sensation of being followed wouldn't go away, so I picked up my speed. I would rather be early for class than feel that prickly anxious feeling.

  I kept looking behind me, checking that the hooded person didn't get any closer. I was so preoccupied that I walked into what I thought was a wall until two large hands gently steadied me.

  "Easy." Jax chuckled, quickly releasing his gentle hold on my arms. He looked at me curiously, tilting his head slightly. "What's the rush? Excited about our coffee date after class?"

  I looked behind me again and the hooded person was gone. My heart was still racing, my skin still prickled. "Yeah, sure. That's it," I said, my voice laced with sarcasm.

  I didn't want to admit to Jax that I was quite possibly the most paranoid person in the world and thought that someone had been following me. Now that I was away from the situation, it seemed likely that the person was a student at the university, on his or her way to class, and maybe they had their hood pulled up because it was chilly out. I also didn't particularly feel like telling Jax about the other issue clouding my mind—the steamy dream.

  I rolled my shoulders to ease the tension.

  "Shall we go to class then? Get this seminar over with so we can finally have that coffee date you've been agonizing over all weekend?" Jax asked, cocking an eyebrow at me.

  I rolled my eyes, walking away from him and towards the lecture hall. "Sure thing, Fabio."

  "Fabio? Like I haven't heard that before," Jax scoffed, keeping pace with me. I resisted the urge to smile.

  I pushed open the doors to the lecture hall, finding it nearly empty. A few early students had snagged seats, including a bright mass of copper hair. Crimson waved at us frantically, motioning for us to join her.

  Jax and I both stopped at Professor Pedersen's desk to drop off our papers before we walked up the stairs that led to where Crimson was sitting. I sat down next to her and Jax chose the seat beside me.

  "How was your weekend?" Crimson asked, looking at me briefly before she grinned at Jax.

  "Boring. I did homework all weekend," I answered, yawning.

  "Yeah, I played catch up too. What about you, Jax?"

  "I worked and did some homework. Mostly worked though," Jax answered.

  "Where do you work?" Crimson asked.

  I tried not to grit my teeth. Too much talking in the morning before I had my coffee was not ideal.

  "A couple of places," Jax answered, amused. "This weekend I worked at the garage."

  "So, you fix cars?" Crimson asked, needing clarification. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes at her as Jax nodded. "Good! I need a mechanic. My boyfriend is not good at car things. I have a weird tinking sound in my engine and he says it's fine but I'm second guessing him because he doesn't even know how to change the oil!"

  I tuned out, ignoring the conversation of possible things that the tinking in Crimson's engine could mean. Absently, I fingered the necklace on my collarbone.

  I had no difficulty focusing on Professor Pedersen's lecture, but I may have groaned aloud when she told us she would be assigning ou
r first group assignment. We had to write a Psychology thesis together. Each group would be assigned a different topic. She gave us twenty minutes to find a group of five.

  "Looks like we just need two more people," Crimson said, glancing around. She leaned forward, tapping a girl on her shoulder. "Do you and your friend want to join our group?" she asked, gesturing first to herself, then to me and Jax.

  The girl Crimson had tapped on the shoulder turned to look at us. Her eyes widened with approval as she studied Jax. She nudged her friend, smirking and raising her eyebrows in unspoken question. She looked too, her eyes falling to rest on Jax's face before she nodded eagerly.

  "Hell yeah," the first girl said, grinning. I clenched my fists, irritated at Crimson's choice of group members. The first girl had dark hair that reached her shoulders and cold blue eyes, while the other girl had golden hair and brown eyes. They were both pretty, and the fact that they agreed to join our group after seeing Jax pissed me off. I didn't want to have to carry their workload because they were too busy hitting on him to do their part.

  I rolled my eyes at Crimson and shook my head at the girls' giddy attempts at flirting.

  "I'm Brianna, and this is Alissa," the dark haired girl said, speaking mostly to Jax. She smiled appreciatively at him.

  "I'm Crimson," Crimson smiled.

  "I'm Jax," Jax added, an amused smile on his lips. He glanced at me, waiting for me to speak. When I didn't, his grin widened. "This is Harlow."

  Brianna and Alissa eyed me suspiciously, as if sizing me up. Brianna's eyes narrowed as she saw how close Jax was sitting to me.

  "Are you two, like, a couple?" she asked Jax.

  "No," I answered stiffly. Brianna and Alissa exchanged a look, one that I didn't like.

  "If you've chosen your group members, please have one person come up and select a topic from the bowl," Professor Pedersen instructed, her voice ringing out sharply.

  "I'll go," Brianna said, standing up and walking purposefully down to the podium to select a topic, her hips swinging far more than necessary. Professor Pedersen wrote down the topic and our group number. Brianna sauntered back up to her seat, her hips swishing back and forth like she was on a runway. She handed the paper to Crimson.

  "We've got Child Abuse," she said almost coyly as she batted her lashes at Jax. His arm was so close to mine that we were practically touching. I noticed the stiffening of his muscles, although when I looked closer at him, he had purposely relaxed them and was back to being his cool and collected self.

  Since we were the first group to go up and get our topic, we had to wait quite some time for the rest of the groups to grab theirs. Crimson used that time to try and create a schedule for when we could meet up.

  "I'm busy more often than not. I'm on the student board, I have a lot of important events to plan," Brianna said, her aura of self-importance nearly suffocating me.

  "We could always divide into subgroups," Crimson suggested. "Then tackle individual sections and meet up every now and then to see how everything is meshing."

  "That sounds good," Brianna agreed, cutting off my reply. Her eyes drifted to Jax, as if she hoped he would ask her to be in his subgroup. I held my breath, thinking he would, but he didn't. For some reason, this relieved me.

  "Want to be in my subgroup?" I asked him, nudging his shoulder with mine. I'll admit, it was a petty attempt at keeping him close to me. I didn't like the new comers, especially Brianna. There was something about her that rubbed me the wrong way.

  Jax grinned down at me. "Sure," he said, drinking me in with those captivating eyes.

  I could feel Brianna's angry gaze zeroing in. She wasn't pleased that Jax's attentions were on me.

  "Now that all of you have a topic," Professor Pedersen's voice rang out in the lecture hall, silencing any conversations the moment the first word fell from her lips. The class listened in earnest as she continued, very slowly looking from one side of the room to the other. "I will expect you to take this group assignment very seriously. It will be due at the end of the semester and worth thirty percent of your final grade. I will be grading you on how you work together, and your individual work as well."

  Professor Pedersen waved her hand carelessly to dismiss us. Brianna and Alissa lingered, probably hoping that Jax would stop to talk to them more. I stood up, stretching a little. I could feel Jax's eyes on the small portion of skin that showed when my shirt crept up with my movement. I pulled it down, sending him a warning look. He shrugged, unashamed at being caught.

  "Let's go get that coffee," I told him.

  "We'll catch you later," Jax said, peaking around me to say goodbye to Crimson, Brianna and Alissa. I felt all of their eyes on us as we left. Crimson looked delighted, but Brianna was scowling. Alissa seemed indifferent.

  We left the lecture hall, instinctively heading towards The Bean. Jax's arm would occasionally brush against mine, setting my nerves on fire. I found myself enjoying it and craving more than the casual contact. I couldn't help but remember the dream I had woken up from.

  "So, group work," Jax said, making conversation as we walked. He was smiling in a way that could melt panties; not very helpful, given the state of my hormones.

  "I know," I groaned, looking at him in an accusatory way as I tried to bite back my attraction. This coffee date was both a very bad idea and a very good one. I was already having difficulty focusing on conversation. "I was hoping you were joking about the group work."

  "Nope." Jax tucked his hair behind his ear. The action carried over the enticing aroma of his shampoo, reminding me just how appealing everything about him was to me.

  "Wish I could have had more of a say in our group members." I sighed, pushing open the doors to the The Bean. There wasn't a line up, and for that, I was thankful. I had already waited long enough for my morning coffee.

  Lucas was working away with a bounce in his step and a grin on his face that said he had just as much fun as Jenna had the night before.

  "Morning, Harlow. Coffee?" Lucas asked, his eyes bright with happiness. It actually almost made me feel hostile. How could people—myself included—get so muddled up over physical attraction? How could we so easily delude ourselves into thinking we connected with someone just because that physical pull was there?

  These are questions I had wondered aloud to my therapist for the last two years. After everything happened the way it did with Iain, I was left with a lot of hostility and resentment, and worst of all...I felt betrayed by myself. My physical feelings had tricked my mind into believing that I was in love; that he loved me. That everything would work out fine in the end.

  Jax nudged me, bringing me back into the present and away from my dark thoughts. "Oh, yeah. Coffee."

  "For me as well, thanks. Large," Jax added, looking at me with intrigue. He waited until we fixed our coffees at the sugar station and found an empty table. He sat down across from me, looking at me with open curiosity, as if I was a perplexing puzzle he wanted to figure out.

  "Why are you looking at me like that?" I demanded, feeling unsettled. The gold that edged his pupils was flickering with interest. I had never felt so exposed by someone's eyes before. I had to physically stop myself from blurting out that his eyes were the most captivating, magical things I had ever seen.

  That damn physical attraction rearing its God-like head of perfection right in my face.

  "You're incredibly difficult to read." Jax laughed lightly, not breaking his gaze as he took a sip of his coffee. I was getting warmer, and I had a feeling it had very little to do with the temperature of my drink.

  "I'm incredibly difficult, period." I sighed, shrugging out of my jacket.

  "I like that." Jax's eyes didn't leave my face. I felt myself coming undone, and it was aggravating. A stare shouldn't be able to do that, not after I had spent a good solid year building back up the wall between me and anyone else.

  I had vowed to not let anyone in, but I knew I was in trouble. If I wasn’t careful, Jax's gaze was enou
gh to destroy the walls I had carefully crafted.

  "Most girls seem so two-dimensional,” he said. “They claim to be complex, but they're really just carbon copies of one another. Take Brittany and Alicia, for example. They're exactly the same, even if they look totally different. Their mannerisms are the same, hell...even the way they talk is the same."

  "Brianna and Alissa," I corrected, trying not to smile at the fact that Jax hadn't remembered their names. It was silly, really, just how good it made me feel. "Besides, how do you know I'm not two-dimensional?"

  "I just know." Jax shrugged, still looking at me. "I've got a good judge of character."

  "Well, I'm fairly good at reading people...and I'd have to agree with your assessment on Brianna and Alissa. They are carbon copies of each other, the stereotypical University girls that are a dime a dozen. Crimson seems different. She's got more personality than the two of them combined. They should be great fun to work with, especially if they keep drooling all over your presence."

  Jax's laughter was rich and it made me feel better. It warmed my blood and made me feel...lighter.

  I didn't like that.

  "You sound jealous," he remarked, the amusement evident on his face.

  "Definitely not," I argued, frowning. "I just hate listening to girls giggle and act dim-witted in front of an attractive guy."

  Jax smiled slowly. "You think I'm attractive?"

  "Don't even." I rolled my eyes, embarrassed that he was focusing on that admission. Jax laughed again, shaking his head as if he was deeply amused by me.

  "Tell me more about yourself," Jax said, that delicious smile still on his lips.

  "What do you want to know?" I asked, arching an eyebrow inquisitively. I was thankful for the change of topic, but I was far from an open book. I didn't know how to respond; a lot of the subject matter in my past was not first coffee conversation. Nor was it first date conversation. I didn't often share bits and pieces of myself with strangers, even those trying to befriend me.