“You were running like someone was after you,” Rafe says quietly, his amber eyes watching me carefully. “Something happen?”
I turn my face away, uncomfortable and starting to get pissed. “Nothing happened. Run back along now and tell Zane I don’t need a babysitter.”
Rafe snorts, but when I glance at him he really seems amused, and that pisses me off even more.
“What?” I grind out. “What’s so funny?”
“Oh, come on, man, drop the tough act. I’m the bearer of good news.” Unfazed by my glare, Rafe grins and jerks a thumb over his shoulder. “Get over to Damage. There’s something Zane wants to talk to you about. I think he wants to offer you a job.”
Chapter Four
Erin
My plans of talking to Tyler… well, let’s just say life doesn’t care much for plans. Jax is sick
and I cancel the Spanish lessons I give in the afternoons, so I can drive over to be with him.
Two days later he’s much better and I’m back in town with Zane’s words about Tyler ringing in my head. ‘He wants to see you, trust me. I think something happened to him.’
But why did he never contact me—or anyone—in all these years? Why let me worry and cry late into the night and fear for him? Why let me wallow in guilt?
My anger was my armor all this time, my buffer against the sorrow and the fear. My heart hardened—or so I thought until I saw him again. Those dark chocolate eyes… they seemed full of joy to see me—and shock and pain. What does it all mean?
Back to square one.
Meanwhile, I have to play catch up with college. I’ve already missed quite a few classes in this past month, what with the flu and Jax, and now, after sitting for an hour in economics class, the numbers the professor is writing on the board are blurring. I can’t follow. I’ll need to borrow someone’s notes and study them.
I also need more sleep and to stop thinking about Tyler.
Rubbing my fists over my eyes, I try to erase his image; his handsome face, his square jaw dark with stubble, his soft lips, his broad shoulders, stretching his wet T-shirt tight over his hard chest.
Gah. Useless. I avoided looking at pictures of him as much as possible in my struggle to forget him and bury the pain, but seeing him again has ruined all my efforts. Both the pain and the desire, and all those feelings for him I’ve done my best to kill, are back with a vengeance.
Noise rises around me like water, engulfing me. Voices and rustling. I lower my hands. Class dismissed. Crap, I spaced out and missed the end of the lesson. Shooting to my feet, I grab the hand of a girl I’ve talked to a couple of times. Tattoos peek over her neckline.
“Dakota?” I say breathlessly.
She lifts a dark brow. “Yeah?”
“Can I borrow your notes? I’ll just make a copy and give them back real quick. Please?”
Hefting her black backpack on one shoulder, she bites into her bottom lip and glances toward the classroom exit. “Right… Aren’t you Zane’s friend? The one living with him?”
I nod, at a loss. “Yeah.”
“The one who kicked Asher out to the curb.”
Holy crapola. Is this how I will be known from now on? The bitch who kicked Asher while he was down? Not that it’s totally unfair, though. I take a step back. “Never mind. I’ll ask someone else.”
That brow lifts again, and this time her lips tip into a smile. “No, it’s fine. Take them. I’ll walk with you.”
“Thanks.” I try not to get whiplash from her mood changes. I grab my stuff, and we stroll out of class together, heading to the photocopy center of the campus. “I thought you were pissed with me,” I say before I can control my damn mouth. “Because of the Asher business.”
Dakota takes her time to reply. She takes a pack of chewing gum out of her bag and pops one into her mouth. She gestures for me to help myself to one, but I shake my head.
Blowing and popping bubbles, she says nothing until we enter the copy center, and I get a machine. She hands me her notes, written in a tight, barely legible script, and leans back against another machine, watching me.
“I’m not pissed with you,” she finally declares.