He held the stairway door open for me, grinning down at me. “Thanks. That would be cool of you.”
I doubted he’d still think so if he ever found out how many times I had stared at him through a set of binoculars this summer, but I wasn’t silly enough to confess and ruin a good thing. Surprised by how comfortable I felt talking to him, I pointed out which classes we’d have together as I showed him the rooms for the rest of his schedule. We were back downstairs, standing in front of the office when the first bell went off and students started streaming into the building. “I guess that’s your cue to head off to American lit.”
“Can I walk you to your first class?” He tilted his head to the side and grinned. “Or will I get all turned around and forget how to get to mine?”
For the first time since I’d set my schedule for the year, I regretted starting my day as the office aide. Jerking my thumb over my shoulder, I replied, “You kind of already did.”
“Ah, gotcha.” He took a couple of steps backward. “Thanks for showing me around.”
“My pleasure.” The words were automatic since my mother had drilled them into my skull, but they were also one-hundred-percent true.
The big smile on my face was wiped away when I stepped into the office and found two of the school’s queen bees peering through the glass door at Corby’s retreating form while they gossiped. “He’s so hot,” Staci sighed.
Traci nudged her in the side with her elbow. “Yeah, we should totally suggest that we perform at some of the hockey games this year.”
I snorted at the idea of the cheerleading team freezing their butts off in an ice rink, and the two skinny blondes both turned to glare at me. “What do you think is so funny?”
“You didn’t think that just because he was stuck with you walking him around before class that he’d actually notice a little nobody like you, did you?” Traci scoffed before they burst into a fit of giggles at my expense.
I ducked my head and hurried past them into the back of the office. I might not like Staci and Traci, but their mean girl act was the reminder I needed that I didn’t stand a chance of catching Corby’s attention. When he’d invited me to his game, I’d wondered if something could happen between us. For a moment, I’d forgotten the way things worked for me at Black Mountain Academy. I couldn’t let that happen again.
4
Corby
My first few weeks at Black Mountain Academy flew by without any major issues. My teachers were mostly cool, the homework wasn’t too bad yet, and practices were going well. The only problem I had was that my attention kept drifting to the cute girl who’d shown me around the first morning, but she seemed to be avoiding me even though we had two periods and lunch together. I’d caught her looking at me more than a few times, but she’d quickly glanced away without returning my smile.
I rarely saw her talking to any students other than the two girls she hung out with, so I wasn’t sure if she was just shy or if she wasn’t as into me as I’d thought that morning. Whatever the reason, the distance she’d put between us had only made me more curious about her. The longer she pretended to ignore me, the more it killed me to sit on the other side of the cafeteria during lunch without going over to ask her what was going on.
I must not have been hiding my frustration with the situation as well as I’d thought I was because Chuck elbowed me in the side and asked, “You’re into Emmeline Cushing?”
Dragging my gaze away from her, I nodded.
He let out a long whistle. “You’d have to be hella brave to try something with her, man.”
My gaze slid back to the pretty brunette sitting at a table all by herself. Her two friends had been with her when I’d walked into the cafeteria, but they’d left a few minutes ago. Nobody else had approached the table, and none of the hockey guys had so much as glanced over there until Chuck had noticed me looking at her. It was almost as though the three girls were invisible to anyone but me, which seemed impossible with how hot Emmeline was.
“Dude, I wouldn’t go there if I were you.” He clapped me on the back and shook his head. “Nobody else at Black Mountain Academy has, and I haven’t heard any rumors about her dating anyone off campus, either.”
“Why in the hell hasn’t some guy locked her down already?” It was the last thing I wanted to ask since the thought of some douche dating Emmeline made me want to punch the wall, which was crazy as fuck since I barely knew the girl.
He set his half-eaten slice of pizza on the plate in front of him and shrugged. “I think it depends on who you ask. For some of the guys, it’s because she’s the kind of girl you’ll find yourself wifing up before you realize it’s happened. For others, they’re just into girls who’re willing to put out since you’d have to work hard to get in there with Emmeline. She’s pretty and sweet but also super fucking shy. It’d probably take a lot of effort just to get her to agree to a date. And then there are guys like Atticus Caswell who don’t have the balls to go after what they want when their mommy tells them to stay away from a girl, no matter how much he likes her.”
I looked over my shoulder at a guy who looked as though he wouldn’t have a problem with tossing stacks of cash into a fireplace if he was cold. I could practically smell the wealth radiating off him from over here—which was saying a lot, considering I was surrounded by guys who’d grown up with silver spoons in their mouths. He was seated a few tables down, and now that Chuck had pointed him out to me, I realized he was sneaking looks at Emmeline.
Ignoring the other shit he’d said, I focused on the one thing that had the potential to get in my way. “He likes Emmeline?”
“Yeah, but you don’t need to worry about him asking her out or anything,” he assured me.
I slid another look at Atticus. “Just because his mom doesn’t approve?”
“Yeah, he can’t access his trust until he turns twenty-one, and his mom controls the purse strings until then,” he explained.
“I don’t get it.” I shook my head, my brow wrinkling. “Emmeline comes from money. From what I can tell, she’s pretty, smart, and kind. Isn’t she exactly the kind of girl a trust fund kid’s mom would want him to date?”
“Normally, yes,” Chuck agreed. I was even more confused until he added, “But his mom doesn’t want to run the risk of Emmeline’s mother getting her claws into their family.”
“What’s up with her mom?” I asked, sending another glance Emmeline’s way and grinning when I caught her looking right at me again.
“She takes social climbing to the extreme.” He lifted his hand and rubbed his fingers against the pad of his thumb. “If Emmeline started dating a guy who came from one of the big families in Black Mountain like the Caswells, I wouldn’t put it past Mrs. Cushing to give Emmeline a box of condoms with holes poked in them. The woman is a world-class user. All she sees in people is what they can do for her or even her daughter. Being the baby daddy for her grandchild would fucking suck.”
The thought of one of the rich pricks I went to school with having sex with Emmeline, let alone knocking her up, made my blood boil. Chuck’s explanation sounded lame as fuck to me, but I wasn’t going to try to explain to him how ridiculous their logic was. The last thing I wanted was to give one of the guys a reason to make a move on the only girl at BMA who I was interested in. The idea of some dude named Atticus swooping in and claiming her lit a fire in my veins.