Edwin returned my smile and inclined his head. “I’ll see you after school, Miss Cushing.”
“How many times do I have to tell you to use my first name?” I sighed, shaking my head.
He winked at me, his grin widening. “I can’t run the risk of slipping in front of Mrs. Cushing.”
“Yeah, that’s understandable,” I huffed before shutting the car door and turning to walk inside the school. I ignored the catty whispers from the cliques I passed along the way, internally rolling my eyes at how most of them were done up as though attending a debutante ball—with hair extensions, fake lashes, hundreds of dollars of cosmetics slathered on their faces, and thousands in sparkling jewelry in their ears and on their necks and wrists. There wasn’t much they could do about the uniforms because BMA was pretty strict about what we wore on campus, but they found ways to show as much skin as possible before they walked through the doors of the school.
My best friends would wait until the last minute to head inside, so I didn’t bother searching for them before I went into the front office. “Hey, Ms. Jansen.”
The woman who usually manned the desk and phones looked up from the computer and smiled at me. “Good morning, Emmeline. Are you all ready for the new school year?”
“Yup.” I nodded as I walked to stand in front of her on the other side of the long counter. “My schedule is great, and I’m looking forward to it.”
“Of course, it’s great.” Ms. Jansen pointed at the glass case on the wall to my left, where the school posted the lists for perfect attendance and honor roll. My name was on both and had been every semester I had been a student at BMA. “After all those dual enrollment courses you’ve taken, you only need a couple more classes to graduate.”
Thinking about how light my schedule was this year, I grinned. “Which is why I’m the office aide during first period and have a study hall at the end of the day.”
“Oh, that’s right.” She swiveled in her chair to grab a sheet of paper from the printer. “Your first task of the day is to show one of our new students where each of his classes are. He did a quick tour last month, but you know how difficult it can be to navigate our building when you’re unfamiliar with everything.”
I glanced down at the paper after she handed it to me, and my breath caught in my throat when I recognized the name printed there—Corby King. Holy crap, I was going to spend the next half hour or so guiding my new hot neighbor around the school. My mind was further blown when I scanned down the list of his classes and realized I had two classes and lunch with him. We also had study hall together during last period, but most students used that as an early dismissal instead of staying on campus. I was going to be seeing a lot of him around school—and I wouldn’t even need to bring my binoculars.
“Sorry to interrupt. I was told to come in early for another tour before classes started.”
I whirled around at the sound of the deep voice, and an awkward laugh bubbled up my chest. Corby had no idea what I’d just been thinking, but my cheeks filled with heat as though he did. I went to wave at him in greeting, but I forgot I was holding the printout of his schedule and almost gave myself a paper cut on my nose. Luckily, his gaze was aimed at Ms. Jansen, so he didn’t catch how lame I was right off the bat.
He was even hotter up close than he had been all those times I’d gawked at him as he ran past my house. His blond hair was a little on the longer side, and a lock had dropped onto his forehead. His eyes were crystal blue, and his skin was lightly tanned. The white material of his polo stretched tight across his broad shoulders, and his biceps bulged just below the short sleeves. He had a good eight or nine inches on me, and I kept casting glances up at him out of the corner of my eye, so he didn’t realize I was staring at him.
“You must be Corby?” He nodded, and Ms. Jansen continued, “Emmeline is going to show you to each of your classes.”
His blue eyes focused on me, and butterflies swirled in my belly. He gave me a head nod and said, “Hey.”
“Hi.” Getting that one tiny word out was hard enough. I couldn’t imagine what I was going to say to him while we were walking around. Just the two of us. Dang, I really needed to pull myself together before I started to hyperventilate. “Um, we should go.”
Corby opened the glass door and smiled. “After you.”
“Thanks,” I whispered as I walked past, swooning inside over the chivalrous gesture. Turning to the right, we made it all the way to the door of his first class before I realized I hadn’t said anything else. After clearing my throat, I mumbled, “You ended up with a great teacher for American Lit. Mr. Miller is one of the best in the school. As long as you put in the effort and turn stuff in on time, you’ll probably get an A.”
“That’s good to know.” After looking into the classroom, Corby pulled a map and pencil out of the pocket of his khaki pants and jotted a note on it. “One of my teammates told me which teachers to avoid so I wouldn’t end up with a shit schedule.”
“Teammate?” I echoed softly as we headed to his next class.
“Yeah, I play hockey.”
I didn’t know much about hockey—or really any sport since I tended to avoid activities that made me sweat. But it was impossible to be a student at BMA and miss that we had a great team because they’d made it to the state championship game every year since I’d been here and had won twice. “Are you any good?”
His lips curved up in a cocky grin. “Good enough that I was the MVP when my last team ended the Cougars’ hope of snagging the cup again last year.”
That explained why the Whitneys had taken him into their home—he was the new star of our hockey team. William Whitney had played for BMA’s team when he went to school here, and so had his father. He donated so much money to the team each year that the rink the Cougars played in was named after him. I could totally see him manipulating the foster system to get a hotshot player on our team so they didn’t lose the championship again this year. “I’ve never been to a game, but that sounds pretty impressive.”
“You should come see us play at the start of next month,” he suggested with a grin that made my knees feel weak, which was really bad timing since we needed to head upstairs so I could show him where he needed to go for third period. “It’s our first game, and you’re the first student I’ve met who isn’t on the team. You can be the person there to cheer me on in the stands since I don’t know anyone else here.”
“A month is an awfully long time. I’m sure you’ll have a whole fan club by then.” With his looks, it was practically guaranteed.
A hint of pink tinged his cheeks as he shrugged. “I don’t know about that. Hockey wasn’t a big deal at my old school, and the stands were pretty empty besides the parents of my teammates.”
“Even when you guys were playing for the championship?” I asked, pointing out his third-period classroom.
He jotted another note on his map before answering. “We pulled in a slightly bigger crowd then, but it still wasn’t anything like how they pack them in at football games on Friday nights.”
“Hmm.” I pressed my lips together, thinking about how I would feel about the lack of support if I were him as we walked down the hallway. “I guess I could come to your first game so there’s at least one friendly face rooting you on.”