Scum (Wrong Side of the Tracks 1)

“I guess. I invited the group of exchange students from Norway and they look pretty happy.” He discreetly pointed to the tall, blonde girls dressed as sexy Valkyries and drinking from horns.

Brad smiled like a bear who’d just gotten his fill of honey. “Oh yes, think I can take two of them to bed if I play my cards right?” he asked with a wiggle of his eyebrows. He remained unaware of the Elven prince’s transgression, but that didn’t change the fact that Ros felt as if the whole room was staring at him, already gossiping about him kissing a random older dude.

“Probably. One of them said my accent was hot, so you should try your luck.”

“Hell yes, bro!” Brad patted Ros’s shoulder, his sights already set on the group of exchange students.

It was a relief to not have to continue this conversation. Ros didn’t fit in with the bros, and it was painfully obvious to everyone, even though Brad occasionally made the effort to include him. The only reason he slid through was that he knew how to make himself useful by pulling in girls and assisting with the procurement of drugs.

Ros would have felt way more at ease in the regular dorm, but joining the frat had been his father’s condition if Ros wanted his art degree paid for, so here he was.

Brad patted his shoulder and moved toward the Valkyries, tugging on Ros hard enough to make him face the entrance.

The guy from before, the one whose lips tasted of the forbidden fruit, and whose piercing green eyes promised pleasures Ros couldn’t allow himself, stood under the Halloween banner and watched him with the same self-satisfied smile he’d sported earlier.

How was a shady guy like that even allowed to be so handsome? His face had such beautiful symmetry Ros would gladly use him as a model, and yet a couple of imperfections made him touchably real. His nose was a bit crooked to the side, and a scar slashed through the dark scruff on his pale skin, pointing toward his lips.

But when their eyes met, Ros averted his, because his father’s other condition for helping Ros through college was for him to stay the fuck in the closet. Father had cut the topic short when Ros had attempted to come out to him and had made it clear that “Edward Beck, cannot have a gay son.” Not if he wanted to be seen as someone who upheld traditional values.

So far, Ros had managed to keep his lust on a leash, which was quite a feat, taking into account that he was in his second year already.

But when the handsome stranger moved through the crowd of students in costumes, who parted in front of him like the Red Sea in front of Moses, the collar Ros had put on himself in order to survive until graduation started feeling uncomfortably tight.

Ros had long committed to living in a bubble that involved art, movies, books, and hanging out with the few friends he did have. He didn’t need this clash with reality.

He turned and rushed up the stairs. He couldn’t be flirted with, if he disappeared from the party. Simple. And why was he even thinking about flirting with a guy like that anyway? He was twenty-one, and the shallow crow’s feet on the dealer’s face made him look thirty at least. But logic couldn’t stop the shiver running up Ros’s spine at that thought of being touched by him again.

He bumped into a girl dressed as Batwoman, and she hollered with rage when some of her drink spilled over her manicured fingers, but there was no time for long apologies, because the dealer had placed his foot on the bottom step, following Ros like a predator who knew his prey was already bleeding.

The fake confidence he’d tried to exude when presenting as the fairy prince was evaporating out of Ros like dark magic at the first hint of daylight. He’d put many hours of work into his elaborate mask, because Halloween was his day to let loose, but now he worried that he might have forgotten that he wasn’t really a creature from another world who freely offered teasing kisses and disappeared in a swoosh of shimmer.

He sped up the stairs, hoping it would be enough of an indicator that he wasn’t interested. (Even though he so was.)

He walked straight into a couple engaged in a very heavy make out session but didn’t bother to check who they were and stormed straight down the corridor, toward his sanctuary.

Jumping over a chessboard left in the middle of the corridor for some fucked up reason, he stumbled forward, looking over the shoulder. His stomach tightened when he spotted the familiar figure stalking him—still at a distance yet confident in the success of this hunt.