When Sinners Play (Sinners of Hawthorne University 1)

Something like pride colors Gray’s voice, and when I glance over at him, he’s smiling at me with the same softness in his eyes that I noticed when I first woke up.

It cracks my heart open, making an unfamiliar sensation flood my chest. I pull my gaze away from his, but when I look at Declan and Elias, they’re watching me with similar expressions. They’re all gathered around me in a tight knot, and I suddenly feel like I’m at the center of something… big.

Something meaningful.

Something more powerful than I was prepared for, and something I never, ever expected.

A flood of panic washes through me, because I’m not used to people looking at me with soft eyes and taking care of me. Being fucking proud of me.

I’m not used to feeling the same softness back.

My body still aches like hell, but I ignore it as I push the covers off and crawl out of bed, slipping between Elias and Declan. I’m still wearing Declan’s clothes, but I’d rather walk across campus naked than put on anything I was wearing when Cliff assaulted me. I scoop up my shoes from the foot of the bed where someone left them, and Gray narrows his eyes slightly.

“Where are you going?”

“Back to my dorm.” I’m already moving toward the door, even as my body screams an angry protest at me for leaving the comfortable warmth of the bed. “I need a shower. I still have”—I gesture to my body with one hand—“Cliff on me.”

The guys did a good job of cleaning me off last night, but I won’t feel truly clean until I scrub off an entire layer of skin under the hottest water I can handle.

Gray looks conflicted, like he’s thinking about dragging me back and tucking me into bed again himself. But finally, he nods. “Alright. But then rest, you understand?”

“And call us if you need anything,” Elias adds. He picks my cell off Declan’s nightstand and hands it to me, then rattles off three phone numbers.

I type them into my meager collection of contacts, wondering how it is that these three men became so deeply entrenched in my life. When did that happen? Somewhere between the hate and the lust and the battles and the games, a connection was forged between us, whether we meant for it to be or not.

Slipping my phone into the pocket of Declan’s sweats, I glance at the three men again. For just a second, I let my own mask fall, laying down my armor as I meet each of their gazes.

“Thank you. You didn’t have to do any of this.”

Declan shakes his head, rising and crossing the room to open the bedroom door for me. “Yes, we did.”

He rests a hand on my lower back as he walks me to the entrance of his little apartment unit and opens that door too. Dozens of unspoken words hover between us, but neither of us say anything else as he presses a kiss to my hair and watches me walk down the hall.

I almost turn back around twice, and that scares me more than anything.

24

Secrets aren’t a thing at Hawthorne.

Everything ugly always comes to the light. There’s no such thing as privacy in a school that thrives on gossip and intrigue. That became apparent when my medical records were leaked at the assembly—and even before that, when Gray told the entire school that he’d fucked me. Secrets are currency, exchanged and bartered for like precious gems.

So my assumption that Cliff’s attack on me would stay under the radar was very, very wrong.

He and the other Saints all come from powerful families just like the Sinners do—wealthier and more connected than the rest of the Hawthorne University students, which is saying a lot.

Me, on the other hand?

I have no fucking connections, and most of the money I have to my name is cash I won from Gray when I shut down his stupid competition.

So I’m a little shocked when Max texts me on Sunday morning and tells me stories about the incident are already flying around campus. I called her as soon as I left Declan’s dorm on Saturday, and she came over to watch stupid movies with me while I iced my face and my knuckles. The bruises are still there, but the swelling has gone down a lot, and my fingers only ache a little as I type out a quick reply on my phone.

ME: What kind of stories?

I’ve never exactly been popular at this fucking school, so I’m fully prepared for everyone to turn against me after this. Cliff will probably try to label me as some crazy, desperate chick who tried to get him to fuck me, then snapped when he rejected me. Seems like the kind of thing someone like him would say just to save his own pathetic skin and bandage up his reputation.

MAX: The truth. That he tried to assault you and you fought back.

MAX: I think he tried to sell the rumor that he got mugged, but nobody’s buying it.