Loser: A Dark College Bully Romance (Hillcrest University Book 1)

by Candace Wondrak

  “He’s your friend,” I said, shooting him a frown. My frown only solidified when Travis took a step toward me. He smelled of smoke, and since I’d been around smokers before, it wasn’t a bad smell. I’d grown used to it. I liked it, as twisted and unhealthy as it was.

  “Sometimes you have to keep the monsters close,” Travis whispered. The blueness of his eyes sat behind long, dark eyelashes. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say he was wearing a hint of eyeliner. Or maybe his eyes were really just that pretty.

  When he took another step closer to me, less than a foot between us now, I felt my heart speed up. “Are you calling Sawyer a monster?” Granted, he’d flipped when Declan arrived at his house, but if he really thought he killed Sabrina, who could blame him? The kiss, that was crossing the line a bit, but I wouldn’t call it monstrous.

  Travis’s lips smiled a slow, sluggish smile. My eyes fell to his mouth in spite of myself. “We’re all monsters at Hillcrest,” he said, deadly serious. “The only thing that’s different is the type of monster you are.” He was calling everyone a monster. Me, Sawyer, Declan…himself.

  “That means you’re a monster,” I told him, unable to pull myself away.

  He reached a hand to my face, lightly caressing my cheek, tracing my jawline. My skin tingled everywhere he touched, a low fire erupting in my belly. I wanted those hands somewhere else, somewhere lower.

  Someone wearing a hoodie with its hood up walked by us, but neither of us pulled away. I was too lost in him, in his carefully-wound web, and he was too good at playing his own game. Because that’s what this was, right? A game. Travis wasn’t touching me right now because he wanted to.

  “Ash,” he murmured my name, “I just might be the worst monster of them all.” As his words sunk in, Travis pulled himself away from me, his arm falling to his side. My face immediately felt his loss. He gave me a smile, a self-assured grin that made my inner core warm. “A word of advice? Don’t trust any of us, especially me.” He said nothing more, turning on his heel and walking away, leaving me with way more questions than I’d started this conversation with.

  I watched him go, feeling uneasy in more than one way. Crazily turned on by just a small touch to the face, and also crazily apprehensive and anxious. People these days didn’t talk like that. No one called himself a monster. The only time the word monster was brought into daily conversations was when Halloween was right around the corner or the news was talking about someone who’d shot up a school or a movie theater. The nightly news in America was full of monsters.

  What did Travis mean? Was he just like them? Was he a monster like those in prison? Or, I realized in horror, watching as his figure disappeared down a sidewalk, between two tall buildings, did he just admit to me that he did it? That Travis was the one who killed Sabrina?

  I had to be reading too much into this. This was…driving me insane, all of it.

  I went into the union and got the food, skating slowly back to the dorm with a plastic bag in hand. Travis…I didn’t know what to make of him. I was drawn to him, just like I was drawn to all of them, but there was something different about him, something I couldn’t name. A darkness hiding behind his blue eyes, something tucked neatly in the back of his demeanor.

  A monster. The worst monster of them all. Did he mean he was a worse person than Sawyer and Declan? Was he warning me away from him? Way to be cryptic. Way to only make me think about him even more than I already was.

  Shit.

  I was so screwed here, and not in the good way. It was like I stepped out of my life the moment I walked on campus and entered one of those mystery, drama-filled TV shows where everyone was a suspect. I loved those shows, but being in one? Not knowing who to trust, who to lean on, who to watch extra carefully? I didn’t love that.

  Once I was back in the room, I set the bag on my bed and slid my skateboard beneath the frame, tucking it safely away. Declan was in the bathroom, but he came out a moment later, having changed into his pajamas. And by pajamas, I meant athletic shorts and a loose t-shirt. I tried not to look at him too hard, mostly because I was still thinking back to what Travis had said. I had my back to him, getting out the food from the bag.

  Was Declan a monster? I would never have thought so, but after that party…it was hard not to lump him in with rest.

  “Smells good,” Declan said, suddenly so close to me. Too close. So close I could smell his aftershave. So close I could glance at him and see the smooth lines of his square jaw. He was practically suffocating me on my bed.

  Okay, total exaggeration there, but still. I nearly leaped out of my skin when I realized how close he was.

  “Yeah,” I muttered, handing him his container and a set of plastic silverware I’d taken from the union. Less for us to wash, right? Declan took it, his hand engulfing mine. Do not notice how big his hands are. Do not notice how warm they are. Do not notice how when he walks, you can see the swaying indent of something in his shorts you definitely shouldn’t see…

  It was hard to stay sane at a place like Hillcrest University. Full of dicks, monsters or not, and still I was the one constantly swooning and daydreaming about the three guys I shouldn’t.

  Why the hell couldn’t I daydream about someone else? Anyone else? My classes were full of guys. There were literally tons of other faces to choose from, and yet my mind had zeroed in on Sawyer, Travis, and Declan.

  Fuck me.

  Declan sat at his desk, plowing into his food with vigor. He’d gained some weight in the past few weeks, not enough to make him look overweight, but enough that he looked healthier now. Less depressed. Which was good, because being around someone who was constantly morose was awful. Made me want to be sad with him.

  “So are you really going to work on your paper after this?” Declan asked, tossing me a quick glance. He watched me sit at my desk. Something was on his mind, but he didn’t bring it up. He said nothing else, actually, as he watched me.

  This was how it was between us: friendly, but not overly so. It was more than clear he didn’t want to get close to me, didn’t want to be my new best friend. Good, because Kelsey would fight him for that honor, if given the chance, but sad because I felt the friction between us.

  “I might just go to bed,” I muttered, picking at the food. It smelled heavenly, yes, but after that encounter with Travis, I wasn’t hungry. Not really. Something about it just wasn’t sitting right with me. I couldn’t…I couldn’t pretend to be happy right now. It felt like way too much work.

  We were all monsters at Hillcrest. I didn’t think of myself a monster, but I knew someone who would think differently, someone who’d called me worse names while claiming he loved me. My last relationship…I’d like to say it was on my mind less and less as time went on, but the opposite was true: I thought about it more and more, probably because this deranged situation between Declan, Sawyer, and Travis reminded me of him.

  I didn’t like to think about him, or our relationship, and I refused to say or think of his name. I wouldn’t. I would focus on Hillcrest, on the guys around me. If they couldn’t sort their problems by themselves, maybe I would help them. Bring the three of them back together somehow. It was more than obvious to me that none of them were whole; each and every one of them had lost something when Sabrina killed herself.

  If she killed herself, but that was a mystery for another time.

  Chapter Sixteen – Ash

  Kelsey and I were walking home. Where we were walking home from, I couldn’t remember. I also couldn’t remember what season it was. Summer? Spring? Fall? The trees’ leaves were green, but the air felt too cold.

  Kelsey’s black hair was drawn back into a ponytail, her brown eyes crinkled in merriment. She was busy laughing at something she’d said, but I couldn’t remember what she’d just said. Everything in my mind was hazier than it should’ve been. I didn’t feel like myself. I felt strange, like an alien in my own body.

  Like…like I wasn’t in control. Like everything that was a
bout to happen was out of my control.

  “Well, this is it,” Kelsey said, her high-pitched voice sounding a bit sad. She turned her body to face me, reaching out and enveloping me in a giant hug. “I’m going to miss you.” The way she whispered it, it was as if we were never going to see each other again.

  “I’ll miss you, too,” I whispered, not sure why I was saying it. When the hug ended and I met my friend’s eyes, suddenly I knew. I knew this was it; this was the end of everything we’d ever known. Nothing would be the same after this.

  Kelsey kept walking on the sidewalk, not a single car driving by. I watched her go, feeling the urge to turn around and see where she’d left me. In front of a giant house, a mansion, a place I’d never seen before. Whoever owned this place had to have money. So much money they probably wiped their asses with it and flushed it straight down the toilet.

  I had no bag, nothing holding me back, so I headed to the front door, walking up the grand steps. The sunlight faded as I went, clouds gracing the sky, which was an eerie gray hue, nearly the same color as my eyes. Before I reached the front door, it swung open of its own accord, inviting me inside.

  The house was full of decorations that cost more than my mom’s car, blindingly bright chandeliers and carpets that looked too nice to walk on. I made my way to a dining room, finding three guys sitting at the table, quiet, save for my footsteps.

  Declan, Sawyer, and Travis. Brown eyes, green eyes, blue eyes, all watching me. They each rose an arm, pointing to the side. My gaze followed where they were pointing, and my stomach lurched when I saw a chair resting under the archway between the dining room and a sitting room of sorts.

  Well, not so much the chair itself as from the noose hanging above it.

  I knew in my heart of hearts it was meant for me. Moving to the chair, I paused before climbing up it, glancing back at the group of guys at the table. They’d all gotten to their feet, their handsome faces grim. Declan’s mouth was drawn into a thin line, but it didn’t detract from his cuteness. Travis stared at me with wary eyes, his fingers tensing at his sides. For some reason, his tattoos blurred into one another. I couldn’t tell where one ended and the next began. Sawyer…Sawyer was walking toward me, that lazy half smirk on his face.

  “You knew this would happen,” Sawyer spoke once he stood before me, running a hand along my arm. Goosebumps rose in my flesh, his touch the opposite of tender and warm. More like uncaring and cold. So very cold.

  Near the table, Travis whispered, “We’re all monsters here.” At his side, Declan nodded grimly.

  Sawyer leaned down, pressing his lips against my forehead. That was it; I knew I’d get nothing else from him. I also knew if I didn’t get up on that chair and put that noose around my neck, someone else would do it for me.

  No, thank you. I’d do it myself, and make these three watch. That’s all they ever did anyway. So full of hateful words, and yet when it came down to it, they were nothing but chickens. Nothing but scaredy-cats. They thought they’d seen the worst life had to offer and lived? They were wrong.

  Declan, Travis, and Sawyer—they hadn’t seen what I had. They didn’t know what I knew. They were so innocent compared to me, even if one of them had hung Sabrina. The truth was…the truth was that I was so much worse.

  I got on the chair. I grabbed the rope hanging in front of me. I pushed my neck through the noose, meeting gazes with each of the three men in front of me. Men, that’s what they were. Not boys. None of them had the rounded faces of teenage boys. None of them had acne. They were men, plain and simple, and I’d fallen for their pretty-faced lies.

  Which one of them spoke the truth? Which was a liar? It didn’t matter, not anymore, because I was about to pay the price.

  My eyes roamed to the window on the side of the room. I could’ve sworn I saw someone standing there, a fourth person, but by the time I glanced up, they were gone. It was just me and the three men, my three unrequited crushes…and the noose. If I was honest, and the truth was I very rarely totally honest, I would say this was how I imagined my death all along, except it would’ve been at the hands of one particular man who wasn’t here. A man I refused to think about, for I’d left him in my past.

  This was it.

  I pushed off the chair, feeling the rope snag itself tighter around my throat.

  I woke to a pitch-black room, unable to catch my breath. My lungs wouldn’t work, and my heart was racing. Sweat coated my body, and my arms flew up, touching my neck. Noose free, but that didn’t mean I’d be able to breathe, apparently.

  I tumbled out of bed, landing as quietly as I could so as to not wake Declan. Hard to do, given the fact that I just couldn’t seem to fulfill my body’s need to breathe. My feet stumbled as I went into the bathroom, waiting until I had the door closed before I flipped on the lights. I was over the toilet the next moment, wanting to heave, to throw it all up and never think of it again. Never dream anything like that again.

  I liked to think of myself a sane, normal person…but there were times when I really wondered. Who the hell would ever have a dream like that? Hanging myself? I wasn’t one to glorify suicide. Never thought about doing it once in my life, even when I was at my lowest low, even when I realized what shitstorm I volunteered to walk into.

  Everyone who saw me might think I was well put together, but I wasn’t. Deep down, I was just as fucked up as all the guys around me. Sawyer, Declan, Travis? They had nothing on me. Nothing. These rich boys played a game they weren’t prepared to lose.

  But that was the thing: you don’t play the game if you aren’t willing to lose it all.

  My fingers curled around the edges of the toilet seat, my breathing slowing, my teeny panic attack almost over. One month into the semester, two months out, and I was here to succeed. I wouldn’t let anything or anyone get in my way, not even myself.

  As I stared at the clear water in the toilet, a soft knock echoed from the door. “Ash,” Declan’s voice was groggy, like he was still half-asleep. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I croaked, wincing at the sound of my own voice. Unconfident and totally shaky. An idiot with ears would know I wasn’t fine, it wouldn’t take a rocket scientist. I wanted him to leave me alone, so I could sort through my mind in peace, but he didn’t.

  Of course he didn’t. Why would he? It would make things too easy if he simply left me alone like I wanted.

  Declan pushed inside the bathroom, squinting as he came in. He slowly knelt beside me, setting a hand on my back, rubbing it in gentle circles. “Sick?” he asked.

  “No,” I muttered, tearing my gaze away from the toilet. When I met his eyes, I was ready to tell him it was nothing—I refused to tell him it all stemmed from a bad dream, because how juvenile it would sound—but the moment I gazed into his dark, chocolatey stare, I couldn’t form whole thoughts. Mostly because he was shirtless.

  Did he always sleep without a shirt on? I never noticed before, mostly because when I got up in the morning, Declan was usually buried under all his blankets, only the top of his head above them.

  It was a nice chest. No, wait. Better than nice. Flat, not too muscled, but defined in all the ways that counted. Faint outlines of squares on his abdomen, a smooth chest that looked so inviting, more welcoming than my pillow. I wanted to touch it, to see if he was as soft and inviting as he looked.

  So I did.

  It was because my brain was frazzled and I was completely out of it—I never made good decisions when I was freaked out—but I did it all the same. I did it while knowing I shouldn’t. I moved a hand to his chest, just above his collarbone, dragging it down to his stomach. So warm. So smooth.

  Declan didn’t pull away from me, but his eyes closed a bit, and his breathing became ragged. “Ash,” he murmured. “What are you…” Even he couldn’t ask the question, because it was more than obvious what I was doing.

  I was touching him, leaning into him, pressing myself into his body much like he had that night after the party. �
�Can I sleep with you?” I whispered. Not once in my life had I ever asked to sleep with someone, and this time I really meant sleep. Not sex. Childish as I was being right now, I felt better with him near me. After everything…I think I had the right to be childish every now and then.

  “Uh” was all he said at first, then after a while, “Sure.”

  Together we stood, heading back into the dark room. I followed him to his bed, climbing inside. Under the covers, the blankets were still warm with his body heat. It was, quite frankly, one of the best things in the world.

  Declan crawled in behind me, pulling the blankets over us. He left a good space between us, as much as he could without falling off the twin-sized bed, but that wasn’t what I wanted. I reached behind me, found his arm, and tugged him closer. He’d spoon me all night even if I had to force him to.

  My heart still thundered in my chest, and I did my best to ignore it. Leftover from the nightmare, or a rapid heartbeat because of Declan’s closeness? I wore a tank top and shorts, so I could feel a lot of his bare skin on mine. It wasn’t the worst thing to feel.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Declan asked, his head right behind mine. Though he whispered it, he was so close to me, it sounded like he’d spoken at full volume. If I moved my head back, I’d give him a nasty headbutt. He held onto me gingerly, as if he was afraid of holding me closer to him. As long as he held me, I didn’t care.

  Sometimes…sometimes things were easier when you were with someone else. Sometimes having someone there for you meant all the difference. I knew this was a night that could never be repeated, but I didn’t care. Sometimes it was best to forget certain things.

  In the darkness, I found myself forcing a smile. “I’m fine,” I said, lying. I was lying an awful lot lately. I’d say Hillcrest was making a monster out of me, but that’d be another lie. I was a monster long before I stepped foot here.

  “If you say so,” Declan whispered.

  I closed my eyes, willing myself to go to sleep. I didn’t need to lay awake here all night; I had classes tomorrow. I found it was easier to get drowsy when I tuned out what just happened. No nightmare, no panic attack. Nothing out of the ordinary. I was just sleeping in Declan’s bed for fun, because we were roomies and this was what roomies sometimes did.