My lips press together, suppressing a smile. “Understood.” As they get closer, recognition dawns on me. My eyes widen. “That’s Xander in the middle, right?”
Daphne’s head whips toward mine and in a low voice, she whispers, “How do you know Xander?”
Confused by her sudden anxious tone, I whisper back, “I’ve seen him twice while I was out running this past week. I guess he runs, too?”
Max shakes his head, chuckling. “Mm, sort of. He’s the football team’s wide receiver. His buddy Beau, on the left? Running back. And the giant on the right is Micah. One of the tight ends.” He snorts and then says under his breath, “And boy, is the position fitting.” He wriggles his eyebrows at me suggestively.
“Are the two of you …?”
“I wish. He’s as hetero as they come. Doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy the view. Anyway, they are Rosehaven royalty and you’d do well to not get on their bad side. They're the ruling class, Cupcake. The OG Roses. Their families, along with a few others, founded the school three generations ago. Their shit doesn’t stink. Like, at all.”
I give him a disbelieving look and snort. “Whatever.” Is this place for freaking real? I feel like I’ve stepped into some made-for-TV movie, and not the good Netflix Original kind.
We have no choice but to step aside as they pass. When they do, Xander’s gaze connects with mine and holds. None of the warmth, kindness, or humor I’d seen from him when we first met is present. In fact, his stare is cold and unrelenting and sends a shiver down my spine. I tear my gaze from his and look down at the floor, color flooding my cheeks. As they pass by, I can sense that he hasn’t looked away. Not for a second.
“What. The fuck. Was that?” Max looks at me with curious eyes.
A commotion from the other direction has us turning our heads.
Daphne wrinkles her nose and murmurs, “We can discuss it at lunch. No time now. Here comes the HBIC and her cheer bitches.”
I grumble, “You lost me again.”
“The Head Bitch in Charge. Aria Warrington, the head cheerleader. And those are the closest of her minions, Alora Berridge, Danica Seeger, and Farrah Kendrick.”
Max laughs. “Again, steer clear. You’ll have a better experience here if you do.”
Daphne pats my arm. “You’ll catch on soon enough. I’ve got to get to class. See you two later at lunch. Max, you’ll get her to her second class?” At his nod, she gives us a little wave and hurries away.
It takes so long for the hall to clear of the football team and cheerleaders, we’re almost late. When Max and I walk in the door, I look around and see there are only two seats left. The room is set up with rows of tables, two students at each.
A guy calls out to Max from across the room to come sit with him, leaving just one seat open. My breath hitches as I watch Max leave my side and turn my gaze in the direction of the only open seat. Of course. Because this is my lucky day.
It’s the one right in front of Xander.
It would seem half the football team has taken up residence in the back two rows of the classroom, with the exception of that one empty chair.
I walk slowly toward it. All eyes are on me.
“How’s it going, Red? Saved you a seat.” Xander pats the top of the chair in front of his, and winks lazily at me as his face twists into a devastatingly brutal smirk. The deep, gravelly tone of his voice hits me low in my stomach, and my eyes flare wide at the uncomfortable sensation. How can someone look so cruel, but somehow be so damned appealing at the same time? And what did I do to deserve his sudden hostility, anyway?
My. Palms. Sweat. Everyone’s watching to see how I’ll react to his daunting brand of attention. Or am I imagining that? One swift look around tells me I’m not. They’re totally all watching—and delighting in—my discomfort.
I don’t know what happened to the guy who stopped in the middle of his run to ask if I needed help. Or even the guy who tracked me down the next day to apologize and find out who I was. But this person is neither of those guys. This one’s stare is ice-cold and calculating.
Menacing.
Savage.
And his friends aren’t much better. The shorter one, who I remember is named Beau, looks smugly at me. Looks like I’ll be sharing a table with him. The tight end is on my other side, across the aisle, and he has such a manspread going on, I have to step over his foot to get to my seat.
All I’d wanted when I came here was to have a fresh start. Away from the people at my old school, the ones who knew my mother and felt sorry for the newly coined orphan. Away from the hospital Mom had been sick in and the home she’d passed away in.
Is it really too much to ask that my new beginning wouldn’t be jeopardized by some jerk who has flipped his shit for some unknown reason? Why me?
I put my bag down on the floor next to my seat, then pull out a notebook and a pen.
A low whistle sounds from somewhere behind me. “Who the hell takes notes on the first day of class?”
“Totally a Thorn thing to do.” Everyone around us laughs. Fingers of dread creep up my spine. I glance over my shoulder. Yep. It’s him, staring at me like a psycho. I wonder if I can ask the teacher to move my seat.
Thankfully, Mrs. Harden walks in and calls us to attention. She talks so much that the dickheads don’t have a chance to say or do much else for the rest of the class.
Throughout the entire period, the disturbing feeling of Xander’s eyes boring into my back never stops.
Chapter 5
After my second class, which, thank goodness, was not full of obnoxious football players, I stop by my locker. It turns into a huge ordeal just to open it—it’s a complete bitch to unlock. Once I finally manage to break into it, I pull out the books I won’t need today and place them on the top shelf, then squat down to cram my bag inside. With that accomplished, I stand and look around and realize the hall has pretty much cleared. I’d told Max to go on ahead because I wanted to get my locker situated. Taking a deep breath, I head in what I hope is the direction of the cafeteria. Up ahead of me is one last large group of students, all ambling slowly down the hall. I assume they are going to lunch, too, so I follow.
One awesome thing about a private academy is that the school makes its own schedule; it’s not bound in any way by what the state school system does. So, while the poor kids over at River Rock High have a measly twenty-five minutes for lunch, we have a full hour. We’re even allowed to leave campus if we want to, which would never have been allowed at my old school. In that sense, things are looking up.
It’s all good until I hit the lunchroom. Holy shit, this place is huge. I have no idea where my new friends are. Jeez, I don’t even know if they are really my friends or if they were just decent enough to help the wretched new girl because I’d looked like a deer in headlights back in the office this morning.
Scanning the huge crowd, I notice a table dead center in the cafeteria where the whole group of football players I’d been in class with earlier are sitting alongside the girls Daphne pointed out as cheerleaders. Everyone else watches them, like they’re something special. In reality, they’re loud and boisterous, joking and having a good time, not giving two shits that they’re being studied like they’re in a fishbowl.