Fake Summer Boyfriend

Snapping my eyes open, I saw Leif’s huge frame. He had Craig’s arm pinned behind his back, his face pressed against the brick.

“You will never threaten her again,” Leif said quietly, his deep voice surprisingly calm. “You will never speak to her again.”

Craig responded with a slight grunt, as Leif tightened his grip on his arm.

Then Leif’s eyes met mine. “He’s completely bluffing. He hasn’t spoken to his father in years. He lives with his mother. She was the one who pulled a bunch of strings to get him into university. However, there’s one requirement.”

I glanced to see Craig’s eyes widen in absolute shock.

“He already has flags on his transcript for harassing women. With one phone call, you can make sure that he is banned from every notable school in the country.”

“No, wait.” Craig whined. “I didn’t mean anything bad by it.”

Leif brought his mouth closer to Craig’s ear, practically growling. “I’m one of the department heads of a security company, Craig Landers who lives at 427 Roseheath Ave. I could be the one to make the call. I could make an official report, and submit it to both the university and your mother. Both would likely kick you out. Shall I go on?”

Since Craig wasn?

??t able to shake his head, he simply whispered, “No.”

“If you ever happen to see Hayden again, you drive in the opposite direction immediately. If you’re in a movie theatre and she enters, you get up and leave. You don’t speak to her. You don’t look directly at her. She should never be aware of your presence again. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” he whined pitifully.

“I’ll be watching your every move,” Leif snarled. I didn’t even feel bad as Leif ground Craig’s face against the rough brick just a bit before releasing him. “Now run.”

Craig practically tripped over his own feet racing to his car before he squealed away.

I turned to Leif, but he didn’t come any closer toward me.

Even though I was still trembling from Craig practically pinning me against the wall, I still had enough residual stress to be angry at Leif.

“Were you following me, or following Craig?” I asked. “Do I have two stalkers now?”

As mad as I was, I still hated that Leif looked wounded by my jab.

“I knew that he would be irritated seeing us together yesterday,” Leif said in an infuriatingly calm tone. “I had to make sure he didn’t try anything. I’m so sorry, Hayden. If I hadn’t been trying so hard to stay out of sight, I would’ve gotten here sooner.”

Those piercing blue eyes were swimming with concern. “I hate that he got in your space. Are you all right?”

Nodding, I tore my eyes away to stare at the ground. “So you were spying on him.”

“Just enough to know how much of a threat he was. Yes.”

“And I’m guessing you messed with the security system here.”

“I was just checking it. Which is actually a good thing for everyone, since it was outdated and on the verge of malfunctioning. Everything has been updated now.”

I glanced over to him again. “You know this because you checked it again this morning?”

“Of course.” Leif seemed unable to stand still, shifting his weight strangely. “Even if you’re still angry with me, Hayden, I need to know that you’re safe.”

Turning to face him, I leaned against the wall. “Why didn’t you tell me that you were moving?”

He smiled slightly. “I never really wanted to move to Nevada, so I was holding out on making the decision. Then when we clicked so perfectly, there was no way I was going to leave, so there was nothing to tell you about.”

He stepped barely an inch closer. “I also didn’t mention it because I didn’t want you to feel that there was some sort of time restraint. Like there was a deadline on deciding whether or not we were going to be real.”

“But your brother sounded so serious.”