Flash (Penmore #2)

by Malorie Verdant

  I was actually already a little proud of myself.

  I didn’t even look that long at him when he threw his legs over the glistening black machine—ten seconds was a vast improvement from five minutes.

  And I was sure I wouldn’t even remember the way his eyes burned into the back of my truck when I climbed inside, as if he could strip each part away with a flick of his wrist if he needed to get to me.

  I definitely didn’t look more than once in my rearview mirror to see him patiently waiting for me to turn onto the well-lit street.

  I was clearly ready to have nothing to do with him.

  He completely repulsed me now.

  Nothing was attractive about a motorcycle-riding, overprotective fallen angel with deep green eyes and a chiseled jaw.

  Crap, I’m screwed.

  MILLIE

  AFTER I GOT OUT OF my car, I slumped down on our rickety porch swing, carefully leaning back and gazing out at the empty street, the gravel pavement glistening in the night. The neighbor’s tabby cat glared at me from the wire fence that separated our two yards.

  It was peaceful in the early hours of the morning. This seat and Jessie's perfectly painted bedroom were the only spots in this ramshackle house that didn’t cause me to sigh in exasperation. I felt the stress of the day drift away as I slowly rocked back and forth on the swing.

  I needed more than a moment to collect my thoughts and calm my feelings before I went inside the house. When I walked through the doors, I needed to be in mom mode. I needed to put away the groceries I’d picked up from the store. I needed to do a load of laundry. I needed to check on Jessie before also checking on all the mess she’d made today. I knew I shouldn’t spend long out on the porch.

  I still didn’t move.

  Every activity would take twice as long if I was still thinking of green eyes and a motorbike. Sleep also scared me. Like many early mornings, I contemplated staying awake, planning and plotting my future. I figured with enough time I could devise ways to avoid Simon Says.

  I had just worked out my first idea when I heard him.

  You shouldn't have skipped your afternoon classes. It’s too much.

  “I need the money," I choked out, still staring at the empty street.

  I tried not to cry. At times like these, when I imagined Nate talking and sitting beside me, I always cried. If I kept staring at the neighbor’s cat or the empty street, I was usually able to keep the tears at bay. It was when I looked at him, with his brown hair falling over his forehead and his playboy smile wide as if nothing ever happened to him, that something inside of me broke. Letting my exhaustion and loneliness toy with my sensibility eventually caused more pain than pleasure.

  It was worse than the dreams.

  The first time it happened was right after Jessie was born. I figured it was a teenage girl’s reaction to feeling completely alone. Abandoned by her parents. Living with basically a polite stranger. Not to mention the fear. Jessie was so tiny that I was afraid to pick her up. I was worried about bathing her, certain I might break the best thing in my life. What I felt was the only thing in my life. It also wasn’t meant to be like that. We were meant to have a future together. A damn dog. Two kids. I wasn’t meant to be doing it all on my own.

  I pictured what it would’ve been like if I had gotten the future I was meant to have. It was supposed to be a careless daydream.

  "If you were here, I'd make you do this shit," I said out loud to the Nate of my past, imaging him squatting beside me in that small bathroom.

  I nearly had a heart attack when I felt his hand rest against my shoulder and heard, Pamela, no way would I be helping you right now. Nope. No way. I’m leaving you in here while I try and haunt my mom enough to change the channel on the TV. It’s like she doesn’t know it’s game night.

  I wish I could say it was a fleeting moment of weakness, but when Jessie would learn something magical, like wave goodbye, wink at Andy, or yell at the top of her voice if Gray left the room, I imagined Nate beside me. I talked to him so often in those first few months that after a while, all I had to do was walk into the house and I’d see him sitting on the couch, as if he were just waiting for me to come home. And now I didn’t know how to stop it from happening.

  I had opened the door, he strutted in, and I couldn’t push him out.

  I no longer needed to fear taking care of Jessie. Tahnee had grown into the quietly caring mother I never had. I didn’t need his company. I didn’t want his company. But just like my dreams, I couldn’t escape my fucked-up ghosts.

  You don't need to work there anymore. With everything else going on, school and Jessie, you need a break.

  I thought about not replying, wondered if that would stop it all. But I made a mistake and turned to look at him. Nate’s challenging glare was so clear that I couldn’t help but reply, “We’ve talked about this. I promised just this year. Then I'll have enough saved—”

  I don't want you girls to move out. You study, Mom can watch Jessie, and you can always pay to have the cracks fixed.

  "I love that you want us to never move away, but you know as well as I do that it's a waste of money fixing this place up. In this neighborhood, this place is never going to be a gold mine. Not to mention if I start fixing things, I'll just find more things that need to be repaired."

  I don't want you to leave.

  “We won't go far. We’ll still need your mom," I explained.

  But you don't need to work there.

  "I'd live here forever if I thought it was best for Jessie," I whispered, thinking of that future we were meant to share.

  I know, Pamela. But I just don't want you working yourself into a breakdown trying to get a house you don’t need.

  "If it was too much—" I started to explain.

  You'd still do it. For her. I just need to remind you that you don't have to.

  COOPER

  It had been three weeks since I spoke to Flash in the supermarket. I planned on handing over the charm in my pocket and making it to week four. I was done playing bodyguard.

  Shit would get too complicated if I spent any more time with her. It was best I stick to my original plan; then I could go back to the life I wanted—long periods of nothingness.

  I walked into the only class we shared, ignoring the girls who were following way too close behind me. When I felt their tits brush against my back and their breath chase across my neck, I planted my feet to the side of the doorway, forcing them to walk around me or appear like bitches in heat. I looked past the inviting grins they threw over their shoulders while they worked their way toward the back of the hall as I scanned the crowd.

  The giggling I heard fading into the distance reminded me that pretending they didn’t exist was the best response. In my last class, I’d tried to glare at the college chicks trying to seductively smile at me, had sneered at their designer clothes and expensive accessories, but it was like I’d flashed them my cock. Their eyes burned with hunger as they giggled even louder.

  Apparently after a month of seeing me around campus, girls weren’t running scared anymore. Some had seen me with the football team, noticed the seconds I’d graced the field in our away games. They’d heard rumors about the new walk-on that could be the Herons’ very first Burlsworth Trophy recipient if given the chance to play a whole game.

  The more daring girls were now looking at me like a challenge. I had become a meal ticket.

  And yet Flash, the only one who had looked at me with heat in her eyes before anyone started whispering about the infamous walk-on, was clearly coming up with ways to avoid me. It had been amusing watching her tactics.

  The first week after we ran into each other in the supermarket, she didn’t show up to class. The week after that, she arrived seconds before the class started, sat right next to the door, and was gone before the professor had finished his final sentence. Last week, she sat in the front row, surrounded by hippies. She thought she had shielded herself because of their proclivity
for waving their arms and the occasional chant. That was my favorite. From my careful distance, I could see how their tendency not to bathe regularly had not factored into Flash’s plans, much to her horror. I chuckled each time they raised their arms, cheering the professor for mentioning any artist involved in the psychedelic movement.

  I was excited to see what she planned for today.

  I started scanning the crowd for her red hair and smiled when I spotted her in the middle of the hall with the seat to her right empty.

  When an arm slipped across the back of her chair, I processed her new ploy. The anger began to boil.

  I used to have more control over myself. I could rein myself in. Those with control always had the upper hand in a good fight. The ability to surprise an opponent should never be discounted.

  Attacking the dick sitting in the left chair beside Flash, drooling into her cleavage, wouldn't end how I wanted it to. There would be no surprise. No grace.

  I still couldn’t stop myself.

  I glared at the fuckwit sitting like a king on a damn throne as I moved toward them. I didn’t take my eyes off my prey in his fancy threads and black-rimmed glasses, throwing carefree smiles to everyone who walked past. Clearly unaware that with each chuckle and casual stroke of his fingers against her bare shoulder, he was eliciting my primal urge to hear the sound of his bones breaking.

  “That chair’s taken,” I told him forcefully when I stood directly in front of him, with no room for argument. My anger was chained only by the very last tether of my remaining restraint.

  “Sorry, bro, didn’t know it was yours. Maybe you can sit there,” he replied casually, pointing at the empty spot on Flash’s right.

  I didn’t look at the empty chair but deep into Flash’s eyes. I could see her fury, the way her cheeks flushed. Her eyes narrowed, leaving no doubt in my mind that this scene was something she was going to give me shit over. I could see the words she wanted to scream at me in her eyes. You do this, make a scene, there will be hell to pay.

  Babe, you started this.

  I did? You egotistical ass! He just sat there!

  Babe, you let him sit there and didn’t say shit about his arm. You hated it and then decided to use it to avoid me.

  I did no such thing.

  “Maybe I should move?” the idiot asked as he looked back and forth between the conversation Flash and I were having with our eyes.

  “Sounds good to me,” I said firmly, my anger ebbing the longer I watched him twitch and give up.

  When he was long gone, I planted myself in the seat he’d vacated, leaned back against the chair, and made myself comfortable. I rather enjoyed not only the sight of watching him run with his tail between his legs, but the heat radiating from Flash as she looked me up and down.

  “I cannot believe you did that,” she gritted out between clenched teeth.

  “Flash, you should be thanking me,” I replied, turning my head to check out her rigid posture. “He looked sleazy as fuck. You didn’t like his hands on you. I didn’t like how he couldn’t see that you didn’t like his hands on you. Even from across the room, I could tell his arm against you wasn’t something you wanted. You think I didn’t see each time you cringed? You were leaning so fucking far forward to get away that your boobs were practically falling out, and all he could do was stare at them. You talked to him. Smiled once. He doesn’t get to fucking touch you because of it.”

  She didn’t deny it, and I watched the heat in her eyes die down. She exhaled her anger and then, with an eyebrow raised and a smart mouth, asked, “Do I need to start paying you?”

  “Paying me?” I asked, distracted by the sudden shift of light in her eyes. The beauty that seemed to slam into me from every direction.

  “For this fucked-up protection service you think you’re running. Or are you like an undercover cop?”

  I burst out laughing.

  “Why is that funny?”

  “Flash, I just got out of prison,” I told her without hesitation.

  “Who are you, Allen Iverson? The administration isn’t worried in the slightest about letting you study here?”

  “What can I say? The dean loves me. I’ve also been on my best behavior.” I smirked at the shock plastered on her face.

  “Damn, if this is your best—”

  Before she could finish her sentence, the noise in the lecture hall amplified. We realized everyone was chatting excitedly with the person sitting beside them.

  I looked at the girl sitting above Flash, “Yo, what’s everyone talking about?”

  “Didn’t you hear? The professor just announced that our major assignment could be done with a partner. He’s also sick of marking incomplete assignments, so he’s giving us the rest of the lecture time to research together. I guess everyone’s excited about having free time. That or they’re finding a partner before they get stuck with the spare hippie,” she said before turning to the person sitting beside her and smiling.

  I took a quick look at the five hippies in the front row, saw the fifth smile widely at the room. Yeah, that wouldn’t be happening. Although it would be funny watching Flash try to work with her.

  I slowly twisted my head to make the suggestion only to find Flash’s narrowed eyes on me. Before I got the chance to suggest she join the hippie in the front row with a shit-eating grin, she gave me a sharp look, flicked her hair behind her shoulder and, like a queen dismissing a peasant, simply said, “No.”

  Now, I was pretty sure after suggesting she work with the hippie, I would’ve gotten up and walked out. I hated working with others. I also kept meaning to stay away from her. Couldn’t do that shit if I was expected to study with her. Fuck, I wasn’t even going to talk to her that day. I was just going to give her that damn charm and walk away. But she had to get on her high horse.

  Lizzie used to tell me that whenever she wanted me to do something, all she had to do was tell me I couldn’t. Apparently she always thought I had issues with authority and staying out of trouble.

  I always thought that was bullshit, but fuck if I wasn't about to show Flash that I didn’t take kindly to being dismissed.

  And now that she’d made such a big deal about it, I fully intended to introduce her to her new partner.

  MILLIE

  I MADE IT INTO THE quad. Then heavy footsteps fell beside me.

  “No,” I repeated without looking at him. I refused to even use my peripheral vision while I made my way toward the campus library.

  I didn’t need to see his face to know he was the one beside me. Didn’t need to run my eyes over his imposing body or rebellious gaze. As soon as I left the hall, I knew he would follow me. I wasn’t stupid—though flatly refusing a convicted felon probably wasn’t my smartest move. After I worked out how to get him to leave me alone, I’d be having a very serious conversation with myself.

  Especially seeing as I was already angry at myself for getting turned on as I watched him intimidate the guy who had sat beside me earlier. Sure, I was pissed when Simon Says yet again started treating me like I couldn’t take care of myself, but my body hummed. He took two steps toward that stupid guy, his strong arms clearly tensing beneath his jacket, and sweet baby Jesus, I was fidgeting in my chair because every part of me had started tingling. I was a hot mess.

  Thankfully I was angry enough about his continued rescue efforts to mask any signs that revealed the real cause of my flushed cheeks and unsteady breathing. Because it didn’t matter how hot he looked trying to protect me, I’d finally started taking care of myself this year. I was no longer in need of anyone’s help. His gestures weren’t wanted or necessary.

  Furthermore, I didn’t want to help others, and the longer he did things for me, the more I’d feel like I was duty bound to help him.

  But I wasn’t going to be his partner. Or anyone’s, for that matter. I didn’t have the time in my day to put up with anyone’s issues. I had more than enough of my own.

  I figured if I kept walking away, pretended
he didn’t exist, he’d disappear. I hadn’t exactly met a lot of guys with a hero complex, but I was laying my money on it being an attention thing—just like when Jessie helped me put away her toys, always anxiously waiting for the pat on the back. The moment she was lavished with attention, her enthusiasm always diminished.

  Simon wasn’t getting jack. No smile. No undying gratitude. I was sure he’d go look for another helpless damsel in distress when he realized the most he was getting from me was the cold shoulder.

  I walked in silence all the way to the big timber doors of the library entrance. As I reached for the handle, he stepped forward and held the door open. I walked through, my head held higher than I’d ever held it before, yet I still caught the hint of a smile coupled with bemused eyes.

  “You know, Flash, I don’t think I’ve ever had a girl tell me no before I’ve even asked her a question. Maybe I don’t want to be your partner. Maybe you're not smart enough to work with me.” He laughed before pausing in the entryway. It was the first time I’d heard him laugh. Deep. Infectious. Potent. I really wanted to turn toward that noise, take his ridiculous bait and argue with him just to see how his face changed with each chuckle. Did his forehead crease? Did that sinful mouth stretch or stay the same? Did he have dimples?

  But I couldn’t. I had to stay strong.

  I reminded myself he was arrogant.

  He was bossy.

  He was a damn felon!

  No girl in her right mind should be turned on by his dangerous, domineering crap. And while I couldn’t always be considered in my right mind, today was different—today I was sane.

  I was also done with men. Stupid men with their stupid pretty faces and nice-sounding laughs that turned me into a fool. No sir, I was not responding to his lunacy. I was just going to keep trekking toward the art section at the back of the library.