All Broke Down (Rusk University 2)

“Um . . .” I fish for a suitable explanation. “We met at a thing.”

A thing. Really smooth.

Silas drops his arm from around my shoulder, and I’ve officially screwed this all up. Where is the nearest oven into which I can stick my head?

It’s probably for the best. I’ll let Matt do his thing, and then we can get out of here.

“You done with the third degree, Stell?”

She stands up straighter and shrugs. “No third degree. I’m just wondering how you leave your own party after . . .” She trails off, but not before giving Silas a look. “How you leave your own party and come back home with two strangers and a bruised face.”

His expression has gone hard, but his words are still light. “What can I say? I make friends everywhere I go.”

She rolls her eyes. “Right. And what exactly did your face make friends with?”

Silas drags a hand through his hair. “Jesus. We met at the police station after I got arrested for beating the shit out of Levi. So, if you don’t mind, I’m not really in the mood to rehash my terrible day. Take your gossip and go.”

He grabs my hand and pulls me into the living room.

Stella calls after him, but he ignores her. A younger guy vacates a recliner, and between one breath and the next, Silas has sat down and pulled me straight onto his lap.

Chapter 6

Silas

Spooked. That’s the look in her eye as I curl a hand over her bare knee and turn her sideways on my lap. She already has big eyes, but now they’re two wide blue oceans set in a heart-shaped face.

“Um, I think I’ll find another seat.”

I tighten my grip on her knee and say, “You see one?”

A frown pulls at her lips as she looks around the packed room. “I’ll just . . .” She shifts like she’s going to stand, but I stop her. I’m f**king this all up. Coming on too strong, pushing her too much. I know it’s crazy. This one girl doesn’t define my place here, but I can’t take another moment today where my shortcomings are thrown in my face. I need this. Need her.

“I’ll be good. I promise.”

“I think we probably have very different definitions of good.”

I laugh at having my own words thrown back at me. And I’m a little puzzled at why she’s still hanging in there with me. If she’s actually as uptight and serious as she seems, she probably wouldn’t have even climbed into my truck. The way she smiles at me from beneath her wild hair makes me feel like what I’m seeing is just what she wants me to see. Maybe I’m not the only one pretending.

“What’s your last name?” I say.

She’s worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, her eyes scanning the room uncomfortably as she answers, “Brenner.”

Brenner. The name sounds familiar. Or maybe it’s just that it flows right in my head. Like she’s one of those people that you have to say their full name every time.

I watch her fingers tangling in her lap for a few moments, and I can see her closing herself up. I grip her h*ps and shift her forward until she stands. I do the same, and then push her back down into the recliner alone. Then I balance myself on the edge of the end table next to her.

“Tell me about yourself, Dylan Brenner.”

She gifts me a smile that just might be grateful, and she shrugs. “You’ve already been party to my most mortifying experience—”

“Are we talking your arrest or that weird verbal diarrhea back there?”

“Oh God.” She covers her eyes with her hands so fast, I can actually hear her palms hit her face. Laughing, I reach out to tug on her braid again. I don’t know what the f**k my problem is, but I can’t stop touching her hair. I don’t want to stop.

“I’m kidding. Besides, it gave me some info. You’re a junior, so that makes you what, twenty? Twenty-one?”

I slip my fingers down her braid, the texture smooth and complicated. She lifts her head out of her hands. “Twenty-one. Just turned in June.”

Reluctantly, I let go of her hair.

“And what did the Dylan Brenner do for her twenty-first?”

“The Dylan Brenner?”

I shrug. “I figure people are going to call you that someday. After you’ve changed the world a few times. I’m just getting a head start.”

She says, “I don’t know that it’s really possible to change the world.”

“Then why go through all the trouble?”

She pulls her feet up into the recliner and balances her arms atop her knees. She did that in the jail cell, too, and I swear to God it’s like she wants to torture me. I try not to stare at the gentle curve of her thighs, not while she’s got this far-off, contemplative look on her face. She gazes just above my head as she speaks, like she’s somewhere else entirely. Or like maybe she’s explaining it to herself more than me. “Because once upon a time, someone went through the trouble for me. And I want to be that kind of person. The kind of person who fights for what I believe in even if I’m already beat. I don’t think I can change the world, but I can change one person’s world at a time. And that’s something.”

Her shirt still hangs off her shoulder, revealing the gentle slope up to her neck. She tilts her head to the side and shrugs, brushing off what she’s just said. My gaze gets stuck there, on the sun-kissed skin of her neck and shoulder. She looks so soft. Her whole personality seems too sweet, too good to be real.

Or maybe that’s my history. I only know how to expect the worst of people because it’s all I’ve ever seen.

“I think you’re something.”

Her lips pull into a small smile.

“Something ridiculous?”

“Something special. Where I come from people are more concerned with changing their own worlds than someone else’s.”

“And that’s bad?”

“It is when nothing ever changes. Each new scheme or plan always winds up just how you started. And all you’ve got is some messed-up cycle that does nothing but drain you a little more each time around. I think it would be easier to change the whole damn world than to change some people.”

She lays her head on top of her knees, and those big blue eyes lock on me, studying and sizing me up like I’m her next save-the-world project.

Oh hell no. Enough about me.