Loser: A Dark College Bully Romance (Hillcrest University Book 1) Page 14

“All good things come to those who wait,” I said, feeling like a fortune cookie. Good things would eventually come to me in the form of a miserable Declan and Ash; I was prepared to wait and work hard for them. “Don’t worry,” I spoke to her pouting face, “I’ll keep it safe for you.” I gave her a half smile before walking away. Being the first one to leave the conversation, after I’d had to run after her twice, was a bit of an ego-booster.

  I was sure she watched me leave, too.

  Now I just had to figure out where we’d be going for our date.

  Chapter Eighteen – Ash

  A mistake. A terrible, terrible mistake. My mind would not stop nagging me the rest of the week. When Declan asked what was wrong, I shrugged and told him never mind. I would wait until the last possible second to tell him about the date with Sawyer on Friday. A part of me hoped I’d be able to find a skateboard on some kind of online marketplace nearby, but as it turned out, the area around Hillcrest was not one made for skaters. I think I was the only student on campus who owned one.

  Long story short: buying another one was currently out of the picture, so I had to go on a date with Sawyer.

  But you know what? That was fine. It was totally fine, because I was prepared for anything and everything Sawyer would throw at me. He thought he’d fly right under my radar? He’d have to try again. I didn’t trust the rich kid, and I highly doubted I ever would. His need for revenge ran too deep—plus, when he talked, it was painfully obvious he was calculating, always thinking about the next step in the equation.

  How the hell did I wind up in the middle of all of this? Just by circumstance, being the first girl at Hillcrest, and rooming with Declan Briggs, the dean’s son. I’d thought rooming with the dean’s son would mean less drama, not more. I mean, who wanted Declan to run to his daddy anytime something bad happened?

  That was the thing, though: Declan never ran to Dean Briggs. I hadn’t seen Declan talk to his dad once, actually. Maybe that was why Dean Briggs had told me to keep an eye on him; Declan kept to himself, refusing to open up to his dad. I was another pair of eyes on him, and given everything the other students did to him, there couldn’t be enough eyes on him.

  I still wondered why Dean Briggs didn’t do something, though. Send out a memo, a campus-wide email that said something along the lines of bullying isn’t tolerated…but maybe the etiquette for things like this was different among the rich. Maybe all the rich people just pretended bullying didn’t exist once you hit a certain income threshold.

  It was late Thursday night, and Declan and I were both knee-deep in studying for some upcoming tests, when I heard myself sigh. I couldn’t keep the date with Sawyer a secret from him much longer. He’d find out, and if he found out from someone other than me, he’d probably get upset with me, which made total sense. I’d get mad at me too, if I was him.

  I turned on my desk chair, studying the back of his head. He’d just gotten his hair cut; its brown lengths were much shorter now than they were before, almost too short to run fingers through while…

  Hah. No, no. Don’t think of that.

  “Declan,” I said, breaking the silence that was only full of us flipping notebook pages, “I have to tell you something, but I don’t want you to get mad.” It was probably a useless want; he’d get mad at me either way about the date with Sawyer. Why would he not? I could still remember how he acted at that party, and that was from a picture of Sawyer and me together. I couldn’t imagine how he’d freak out when he learned we were going on an actual date.

  On dates people held hands, hugged, kissed, all that good stuff. Now of course I planned on not doing a single thing like that with Sawyer, but Declan didn’t know that. I’m sure he thought I would throw myself at Sawyer like a sex-crazed fanatic who hadn’t had sex in years. I mean, it’s been a while for me, but not that long.

  Declan’s back straightened, and he was slow to turn to me, his dark eyes cloudy. “What is it?” he asked, his voice low, as if he anticipated something really, really bad. A date with Sawyer would probably fall under that category.

  “I, uh…” God, why was it so hard for me to come out and say it? I was never one to beat around the bush. I went straight to the bush and tackled the damn thing usually, but this was…this was a lot more difficult, mostly because I didn’t want Declan upset with me. I also didn’t want him to spiral. He’d been doing pretty well lately, but I knew that when depression was in the picture, you had good periods and you had bad periods. It was a roller coaster.

  Shit. Might as well just throw it out there like word vomit.

  “I have a date with Sawyer tomorrow.”

  Declan’s stare turned hard, his lips thinning. He was shaving more often now, which let me memorize the smooth planes of his jaw, the way the corners of his mouth ticked when he was trying not to say something. I’d been around him long enough to know he wasn’t happy with me. I couldn’t blame him. Sawyer was, for lack of another explanation, his worst enemy, his ex-best friend, the vengeful brother of his dead girlfriend.

  Sawyer was everything Declan didn’t want to be reminded of, and here I was, telling him I was going on a date with the man.

  It felt like an hour passed when in reality it was only a minute. “Say something,” I practically begged.

  “Why would you go on a date with him?” His fingers curled around the wooden back of his seat, his other hand tightening around the pen he held onto, nearly cracking the plastic. It was a question that deserved an answer, but I was too caught in the judgmental look he was giving me. Not disappointed, not mad exactly…almost resigned, like he knew all along this would happen.

  And you know what? I took offense to it.

  “He took my skateboard and refused to give it back unless I went on a date with him,” I said in a rush, feeling my own emotions swell inside of me, a sea of prickling, cool annoyance and irritation. Who was Declan to get upset? I was my own person, my own woman. There was no bro code between us. I could date who I damn well pleased.

  Still, a good friend would know without saying that Sawyer was off-limits. And he was off-limits to me…I literally just wanted my skateboard back. Was that so wrong?

  “I looked for a replacement, but I can’t find one,” I added. Not one I could afford, not one that was the same. I’d spent the last two years with that skateboard. We’d bonded. It was mine. I wasn’t going to rest until I had it back in my hands.

  “I’ll buy you a new one,” Declan said, not an offer. More like a demand. He would rather spend money and buy me one than have me go anywhere with Sawyer.

  “No,” I told him, and he glared sharply at me. I wasn’t going to let him spend any of his or his parents’ money on me. I wasn’t a charity case; I didn’t need his money to get out of this. All I had to do was make nice a little bit with Sawyer. Easy-peasy. “I’m going, and I’ll get my skateboard back—”

  Declan was frowning, the creases around his eyes only adding to the resigned and devastated look he gave me. “And then what? You think it’ll end there? You think he’ll give it back to you? No, it’s only the beginning. He will lord that skateboard over you for as long as he can. He will use it to use you, Ash. Don’t you see that?”

  I supposed he did have more experience with Sawyer than I did. He knew how his ex-best friend operated. But I could handle him, just like I could handle anything this college threw at me. I wouldn’t be broken or used by any of the guys here, unless I wanted to be.

  That…that almost sounded like I wanted to go on a date with Sawyer. I didn’t. Did I? I mean, yeah, he was nice-looking, in a preppy rich boy kind of way. Not really my type of guy, however I’d be lying if I said my body didn’t react to his at all. In that bedroom, I’d wanted nothing more than to give in and let him show me just how good he was with his body…

  No. This date would not be like that. I wouldn’t let him come that close, and if my body started to crave his, I’d excuse myself to go to the restroom and yell at my horny vagina. At the rate she was
going, she would need her own name soon.

  “I will get it back tomorrow night,” I stated, meeting Declan’s dark eyes. “Nothing will happen on the date. It isn’t like I want to spend time with him. I just want my skateboard back—”

  “But spending time with him is the first step,” Declan muttered. “If you spend enough time with someone, you’re bound to start to like him.”

  I let out a laugh. “Guys and girls can spend time together without falling in love. They can be friends, acquaintances, enemies.” The list could go on and on, but when I noted how Declan’s expression had changed, my voice stopped. The way he stared at me, it was like he was right next to me, not ten feet away at his own desk. It was like I could feel his breath on the back of my neck, and I felt my thighs clench together.

  The way he looked at me right then, it was like no one else in the world existed, nothing outside of our room. The only thing that mattered was this, right here and right now. A part of me hated the way he stared at me, but most of me liked it. The selfish part of me liked it.

  My life at Hillcrest couldn’t be easy, could it? It just couldn’t be simple. Go to class, do my homework, take my exams, rinse and repeat until I finally nabbed a good job from one of the recruiters. Nope. Not me. I had to be stuck in this weird, twisted revenge scheme, smackdab in the middle of three different but equally handsome guys that all made my body go haywire.

  “Don’t go,” Declan whispered, his voice so soft I barely heard it. A desperate plea to me, one last try to make me feel…guilty? To make me not want to do it? To draw me to him instead of Sawyer?

  This was too much, too confusing, and the area between my legs was a bit too warm just from a fucking look.

  I wasn’t a virgin. I shouldn’t have wet panties from a heavy-lidded look.

  I opened my mouth to say “I have to.” The words hurt coming out, and the expression Declan gave me right then only made me feel worse. My heart nearly broke looking at him, almost shattering as if I was watching myself break his heart.

  Ridiculous, because regardless of whatever look he gave me, Declan did not care about me. He called me Sabrina in his sleep not too long ago. That pleading, desperate look was meant for a dead girl, not me, just like the feelings inside of him. He was projecting, but I wasn’t the correct target…which was why I couldn’t listen to him. I couldn’t let it be.

  I was going on a date with Sawyer, and that was that.

  Declan didn’t talk to me for the rest of the night. In fact, he barely even looked at me. He purposefully did his best to avoid me in my entirety, his eyes downcast every time he went to the bathroom or into the small kitchenette area. When I had the TV on before bed, he didn’t pretend to watch the sitcom about the nerdy roommates with me; he just went to bed, burying himself in the mound of sheets.

  I hated doing this to him. It made me feel horrible, like I was the worst person alive. A total lie, because there were a lot of worse people out there; I’d even met some of them, but those were memories I didn’t want to recall. I had to put my blinders on, so to speak, focus on Hillcrest, on getting my skateboard back.

  As I lay in bed watching TV, I texted Kelsey about my date. I’d kept myself from telling her, mostly because I didn’t view it as a real date, but I needed someone to make me feel better about the whole situation. Declan was being a sourpuss, so I clearly couldn’t count on him.

  Kelsey’s next text made me stifle a laugh. Wear nice panties. I was ready to respond with a firm but playful text that I wasn’t going to do anything with Sawyer—yuck—but she then sent me: or none at all with a winky face at the end.

  Well, at least Kelsey had given up on asking me for pictures of my roommate. I’d described him to her, but no way in hell was I going to snap a picture of him and send it to her. Also no way in hell I’d get him to pose naked with a pillow covering his crotch like she asked me to. Kelsey had moved on to Sawyer and Travis, both of which I’d also described in painful detail. She wanted me to choose one to go after, and then if it failed or he wasn’t so good in the sack, I could drop him and move onto the next.

  But…that was the thing. I wasn’t ready to sleep with any of them, mostly because I didn’t trust them. But beyond that? Beyond that I didn’t want to choose. My inner slut wanted them all. If I could just erase their feud and bring them all together…

  A dream that would never happen. Each of these boys wanted to use me for their own benefit. I was not a willing player, a helpful pawn to be moved across the board whenever these guys wanted. Declan wanted me only because I reminded him of Sabrina. Sawyer wanted me to get back at Declan, and probably for payback for what I did at his party. Travis…I wasn’t sure what Travis wanted, which made me nervous. He was the one who sent the picture of Sawyer and me together, because he didn’t want me to fall for Sawyer’s shit.

  What did Travis want, then? What was his game? The scary thing was I didn’t know, and I knew from past experience it was always the ones you weren’t sure about that broke you the most.

  Chapter Nineteen – Ash

  The closer the time got to five, the more anxious I felt. My last class let out at two, and I promptly returned to the dorm to shower and change—although now I wondered whether I should’ve kept the day’s dirt on me. Maybe the sweat and dirt from today would keep Sawyer from trying anything with me, but that was probably a useless hope.

  Declan was nowhere in sight. This morning I’d told him that Sawyer was supposed to bring a list of where we’d be going, a schedule of sorts, and if I didn’t come home by midnight to…do something. Call the cops, call me, call someone. I didn’t think Sawyer would try to kidnap me or anything, but you never knew. These rich people thought they owned anything and everything, even other people.

  Declan might be avoiding the room on purpose, I realized as the clock hit four in the afternoon. Sawyer was picking me up here, and since I hadn’t given the bastard my number, it wasn’t like he could pull up to the turnaround in front of the dorm building and call me. He’d have to come up here, with his damned schedule, but I wouldn’t let him in the room. I wasn’t that stupid.

  Though of course I did consider my stupidity when I pulled out jean shorts and remembered what Kelsey had said about the panties.

  Eventually I pulled out a notebook and started writing Declan a note. I figured I’d leave it on his desk, where he’d see it, and drop the schedule of the date right on top. You could never be too careful these days.

  While I debated on wearing a beanie—because I highly doubted someone like Sawyer found a girl who wore beanies attractive—I heard a knock on the door. I dropped my favorite grey beanie and headed toward the door, opening it to see Sawyer’s half-smirking face.

  Would it kill him to give a full, real smile for once?

  Eh, considering this wasn’t a real date, I could handle the half smirk.

  Sawyer’s wide frame wore a light coat, a dark shirt underneath it. His jeans were clean, a darker blue, complete with a belt. His blonde hair was styled to the side, with just the smallest amount of smooth hair putty. He looked good, of course, but he looked just like I imagined he would: a rich boy cleaned up.

  I really had to stop calling him a boy. He wasn’t a boy. He was a man, and he was at least a year older than me.

  I opened my mouth to ask him about the detailed date list, but he stopped me by reaching into his coat’s pocket and pulling out an envelope. He handed it to me, flashing his pearly whites as he said, “Your date schedule. I’d prefer it if you don’t look at it, but…” He watched me tear into it. I wasn’t going to give anything to Declan from Sawyer without looking at it first. “I figured you would.”

  When I saw where he was taking me, I was taken aback. My eyes flicked upward, and I was about to ask him about it, but he silenced me by glancing at his wrist, where a shiny new watch sat. A watch that probably cost a semester's tuition.

  “We should hurry. It is a bit of a drive from here,” he said.

  “And
my skateboard?” I asked.

  For a moment, I was sure he was going to give me a real, full smile, but only one end of his mouth quirked upward. “After the date, Ash. After.” I resisted my urge to say anything else as I set the envelope on Declan’s desk. The door hung open, and Sawyer peered in, noticing Declan’s absence. “Not here, huh? Weird. I figured he’d need to see you off, try to intimidate me again, like he tried to at my party.”

  With my phone in one pocket and my keys in the other, I shut the door behind me, jiggling the knob to make sure it was locked. It was. “I think Declan knows he can leave the intimidation to me,” I spoke, smiling up at Sawyer, giving him my best fuck you smile. I hoped he remembered the party as well as I did: me kneeing him in the groin. Yeah, not going to lie, that felt so good.

  Sawyer let out a chuckle as we headed down the hallway to the elevators, but it sounded pretty fake. “Yes, you’re very spirited, aren’t you?” His green eyes flicked downward to me, looking more like cloudy jade than clear emerald.

  “I’ve been known to have some bite with my bark.” We got on the elevator. Since it was just the two of us, I moved to the opposite side of the square space, leaning on the railing as I studied him.

  Why did he have to be born so pretty? Things would be a lot less difficult if he was uglier, if he had a boil or two, a nose too big for his face or something. But that was the thing about Sawyer Salvatore—there was nothing off about him. Nothing I would change. He was preppy and rich, but he was attractive all the same, dashing in an undeniable way.

  Sawyer had his car, a low-sitting, bright red sports car whose brand I couldn’t even pronounce, parked in the turnaround. I went for the passenger’s side, but he moved quicker than me, or maybe his legs were just that much longer than mine, darting around me to hold open the door, acting like some gentleman.

  Hah. Worth a laugh or two, but okay. If he wanted to play nice, we could do this all night. Being nice to me was not going to get me to change my mind about him. He was a rich, entitled asshole, and I had no idea why he wasn’t spending tonight, a prime partying night, balls deep in some other girl. Nope, tonight I was the lucky one, though he wasn’t going to get balls deep in me, mark my words.