SNAPPED (The Slate Brothers 1)

“Nah, he’s just getting us in. We’re here for this,” he says, motioning at the law library.

My lips curve into a smile— I’m still not entirely sure what’s happening, but Sebastian is so pleased with himself and I’m so pleased to be here with him that I can’t stop a bloom of happiness from expanding in my chest. “Keep talking,” I say, leaning into him. I like that I can fall against him, like this, and know he’s not going to stumble; he’s too strong for that.

“You said last night that justice is a huge part of who you are. And given the fact that I had to literally show up at your house and take you away to get you to stop studying…I thought you might like this place. They say it’s the most beautiful college library in the country. And it’s only accessible to Coastal State law students, you know. And also only open between the hours of eight and eight.”

“But you’ve got a way to get us in, don’t you?”

“You know it,” he says, and sweeps me against him to kiss me, his face shadowed and elegant under the streetlights. He releases me, then says, “I wanted to have sex with you the moment I saw you, Ashlynn, but I also want you to know that it’s not just about that. I’m not always going to take you back to my bedroom.”

I flush, flattered and excited and overwhelmed by everything. Sebastian seems to do everything big— football, personality, kissing, sex, gestures like this one. Every time I find myself hesitating or questioning, he’s storming forward fearlessly. I don’t understand how he does it— how can he be so sure about me, when we’ve only just met? He doesn’t even know who I really am.

I swallow. Will he change, when he finds out? He doesn’t appear to be keeping any secrets from me, be they of his past or his heart, and here I am passing up each and every opportunity to tell him the truth.

“Sebastian,” I say, voice a little unsteady. I need to tell him, now, before it becomes a lie rather than a secret.

But Sebastian checks his phone and then starts to walk toward the law library. “Hurry, she’s here,” he says cryptically, and I follow behind him, up a few steps and to the library’s massive doors. Even with the doors shut, a peppery, dry scent wafts from the building— the scent of old books, a scent I know well from my own time spent in libraries. I smile and lean harder into Sebastian, touched and astounded and happy in a way that’s hardly recognizable as those emotions— I just feel bright, like I’m glowing.

It isn’t long before a girl appears. She looks to be a touch older than me, and is holding a keyring with an impossible number of keys on it.

“Hurry up, before someone sees,” she calls frantic.

She inserts a key into the door and pushes it open, then darts inside before us; I hear beeping as she turns an alarm off, then she waves us in.

Sebastian looks around. “Cool place,” he says.

“Alright, here are the rules,” she says sternly to Sebastian. “Don’t mess anything up, be out by seven-thirty, and know the door locks behind you. Got it?”

“Got it. And thanks, again,” Sebastian says sincerely.

The girl exhales. “You can tell Parker he owes me bigtime for waking me up at three o’clock in the morning.”

“He knows,” Sebastian says. “And thanks.”

“Just don’t make me regret it,” she replies, and then quickly exits.

I shake my head in disbelief at him, and step into the library.

The girl must have turned on a few lights— there are sconces here and there glowing dimly, though the place is still largely dark and mysterious, a building of tucked away corners and eaves. There are three stories of books and shelves at the edges of the room, but they look more like circular balconies of books, complete with wooden railings. The ceiling is domed, and there’s a large study area at the library’s center; the shelves branch off from it at the sides of the room, like rays of sunshine. Each study table— all antique-looking— has a little green and gold lamp attached. As we make our way inside, past a vacant attendant’s desk, the sound of my feet on the hardwood floor sound like thunderclaps. My heart is pounding— sneaking into buildings after hours is very much not in the Ashlynn Sawyer playbook, and while I’m not exactly scared, I do feel alive and electric at my rebellion.

Sebastian walks up to one of the lamps at the study tables, then pulls the cord to flick it on. It shines like a candle in the dim, making the muscles on Sebastian’s arms looks all that much bigger for the shadows they cast.