“Tomorrow. There are four computers set up in a study room in the back. If you have questions, find me before or after school and I’ll answer.”
Duncan walks into his classroom, which sounds on the verge of going Lord of the Flies. He shouts at them to “Quiet down,” and because he can be an intimidating son of a bitch, they do. Then every eye lands on me.
Someone mutters, “Great,” and my eyes hit Kyle Hewitt in the back left corner. There’s no way this moron made it into an advanced class.
“Is there a problem, Hewitt?” Duncan asks.
“Not as long as you sit him far from me.” Kyle assumes he has the upper hand. Poor boy will cry when I nail his coffin shut with him in it still alive.
A knock on the door and two more guys appear.
“Is this the room for AP physics?” one of them asks while cowardly sizing me up.
“You’re late,” Duncan says, ignoring the guy who’s trying to explain why they’re late. “This is Razor, he’ll be taking the class with you. I want partner matchups turned in to me this afternoon. What are you, morons?”
Duncan’s across the room and yelling at some kid who has his hand caught in the blinds.
“Should we wait for the fourth person before we partner out?” one of the guys suggests, but I’m no longer listening as my gaze meets wide hazel eyes.
Breanna blinks when she enters the classroom and I want to kick myself for not thinking ahead that she’d test into this course. She scans the room full of students, spots Kyle fuming, and I decide it’s time to start fucking with the boy.
He demanded that I leave the situation with Breanna alone—threatening to destroy her if I interfere with his plan—but according to his rules, he can’t do shit if I’m hanging with her because of school. Time to inform him he’s not the only one holding some strings.
“Duncan,” I call, and that stops the low murmur of conversation that had started when Duncan went to untangle the idiot in the back.
“Yeah?”
“Miller’s my partner.”
Breanna’s head slowly tilts to the side as if I spoke in another language and she’s trying to translate what I said.
“Works for me.” He gestures to a room in the back. “Get in there and get working.”
The two guys head for the room, and when Breanna stays cemented in her spot, I wave my hand like a gentleman for her to go before me. I follow her as she trudges down the aisle. This time when Kyle looks at us, he doesn’t smirk. This time he’s pissed and I lift my lips in grim satisfaction. Game on.
Breanna
“ARE YOU INSANE?” I whisper-shout. “Have you absolutely lost your mind?”
Razor drops into the corner seat in the long, narrow room built to inventory textbooks. The walls are floor-to-ceiling metal shelves and have become a holding cell for me and the other AP physics students.
He angles his head so he can peer past me, and when I glance over my shoulder, I notice how the other pair reside as far from us as possible an entire classroom length away.
“Most people do think I’m crazy.” Razor kicks out his legs and folds his hands over his stomach. He wraps his booted foot around the leg of a chair and angles it toward me like he’s encouraging me to sit.
I collapse into it, then push back in an effort to create space between us. I prop my elbow on the table that houses our computer and lean my head into my hand as my stomach plummets. This situation is absolutely hopeless.
“Kyle’s mad,” Razor states.
“No kidding,” I mumble. “And he’s going to post that picture because of it. Do you care to explain how this helps me or were you lying to me about the whole protecting me garbage?”
“We do have an agreement.” An unfamiliar tremor runs through me with Razor’s deep voice. “Hewitt thinks he holds the power. I’m letting him know the power works both ways.”
“He’s going to post that picture!”
Razor reclines forward and his blue eyes pierce me. His body is so massive that he fills the windowless, cramped room that has more dust bunnies than square footage.
“Hewitt needs you. Never forget you also have power. I get you don’t want the picture posted, but that bastard is using fear to control you. You hired me and I’m covering your six by showing him we aren’t scared of him.”
My throat tightens. “But I am scared.”
“Don’t be. I’m telling you, that picture won’t go up.”
My temples throb and I slip the spiral-bound, printed-out wannabe textbook off the table in an attempt to pretend these past two days never happened. My eyes scan the page as if I’m interested in the words, but I’m not. I’m mad at Razor. At least I should be, but with each second that passes, the anger recedes.
“I heard what’s going down on Bragger,” Razor finally says. “You deserve better.”
I bite my lip, then summon the courage to look at him. “I’m sorry, too. People have said terrible things about you and that’s not fair, especially when what they’re saying isn’t true.”
“People talk shit. It happens. Don’t worry about me. You okay?”
Not at all. “I’ll be happy when people move on to talking about someone else. Did you also watch Bragger today with agonizing despair?”
“I avoid shit like Bragger, but Chevy showed me some of the feed. I’m not interested in what most people have to say to my face, much less what they have to say when they have the safety of a computer to hide behind.”
“I wish I was more like you.”
“Sorry to break it to you, but only men can join the Terror. But if you’re completely heartbroken, you can try to join the Terror Gypsies. That’s the women’s support group.”
“I wasn’t talking about joining your gang,” I say.
“Club,” he corrects. “Not gang.”
What’s the difference? “Fine—club, but even if I were, I don’t know how to ride a motorcycle.” Like that’s the sole thing stopping me from dancing over the line into crazy.
Razor rests his arms on his thighs, causing his golden-blond hair to fall forward. Through the strands, those beautiful eyes capture me, holding me completely and utterly under a spell. “I’ll teach you if you want.”
My mouth dries out and Razor’s eyes focus on my lips as I lick them.
“Teach me what?” I whisper.
“To ride,” he says in this slow seductive slide as he inches forward in his seat. His knee brushes against mine and a zap of electricity shoots up my leg to very private places.
My temperature spikes and I have to remind myself that inhaling is essential. Razor eases back in his seat but extends his leg so that our calves are touching. A ball of energy zings to life from the small amount of friction between our bodies and it races through my blood. I take a deep breath, gather my hair and pull it off the back of my neck.
“Hot?” There’s a definite tease in his voice.
Sizzling. This entire room is sizzling. From his voice to his eyes to that dimpled half smirk to those ripped muscles in his arms. Razor is so hot the fire alarms should be blaring. I wave my hand toward the ceiling. “There’s no vents in this room—no flowing air. It’s stuffy.”
“Mmm.” That’s his response to my attempt at logically explaining away my attraction to him. I have never felt like this with a guy before—like a moth drawn to the raging inferno. My entire body hums breathing the same air as him.
“Do you want out of our deal?” he asks, and the humming stops.
A mental pause. The real question he’s asking is do I believe he can keep the picture from going up...if I can trust him to help me. “I’ve heard your club kills people and I don’t want that. I’m mad at Kyle, but I don’t want him dead. I want out of the deal if he’s going to get hurt.”
Razor
steals a few seconds of silence as he methodically rubs his hands together. There’s a hard glint in his eyes that causes a spark of fear within me.
“Our club isn’t what you think,” he says as if he honestly believes he means it. “Are you saying you don’t want to work on my code?”
“No, I’m saying I’m not okay with hurting people even if they’ve hurt me.” It’s an honest answer. “I’ve seen the code. Even if I wanted to stop working on it, I can’t. My mind won’t stop turning over the possible solutions.”
I raise my fingers to my head and they flutter about like the movement can help him understand the organized chaos. “I don’t know how to describe it, but when my mind doesn’t have something to work on, I feel like someone’s peeling off my skin. My mom says I never relax, but how do I explain that crossword puzzles and those mind games on my phone are what help me unwind?”
I wish I would learn to shut up around him. I’ve spent too many years trying to keep this part of myself locked tight so no one can use it as ammunition against me and here I am handing it out freely.
“You’re the coolest damn person I’ve met,” he says.
On the inside, I’m smiling like an idiot. I may also be smiling like an idiot on the outside.
“If you’re working on my code,” he says, “then I’m still your bodyguard. Deal’s still in place, and if it makes you feel better, then I won’t involve the club.”
My happy moment withers. “You know the whole bodyguard thing was a sham.”
Razor’s mouth edges up and my breath catches. Good God, he’s gorgeous with a frown, but he’s perfection with a smile. “I thought you were trying to hire me last week.”
“Would you hate me if I told you that you scared the hell out of me last week and I said some stupid things I’m sorry for?”
“I’d like you more than I already do for being truthful. There’s not too many people who can do honesty.”
The way he stares at me, as if he likes who I am, causes me to become shy. I run my fingers through my hair and pretend I’m crazy interested in the ends, because I have no idea what to do with myself now.
Razor doesn’t propel the conversation along, so I do what any other self-respecting seventeen-year-old would do: change the subject. “Mr. Duncan told me about this class yesterday and he let me take the book home, so I read the syllabus and—”
“You memorized it,” Razor cuts me off with a grin.
I bob my head back and forth. “Maybe.” Yes. “Anyhow, there are projects and Mr. Duncan said we can do them together, but I’m not sure you’ll want to work with me, because—”
“I do.”
I blow out a frustrated sigh. “Razor—”
“We’re working together. You’re smart, I’m not.”
“You’re one of four people who tested into AP physics. I’m not buying what you’re selling. But anyhow, you need to remember how I explained I’m not good at math, and there is math in physics, so—”
He slices his hand across his throat, ending the discussion, and I snap my mouth shut. While me and big, bad hot biker guy may be forming some sort of strange friendship, I’m not pushing him into conversations he doesn’t want to have.
“Back to the deal.” There’s a glint to Razor’s eyes that’s a hundred percent mischief and I’m tempted to play along. “You crack my code and I’ll continue to watch your back, and I’ll even sweeten the pot. If you and your friends want to go out dancing, I’ll be DD, mop the floor with any boys that try to cop a second-base feel, then I’ll make sure you get safely home.”
I swallow at the thought of Razor being the guy stealing a second-base feel. I haven’t been that far before. Bet he has. I bet he’s full of all sorts of fun, fascinating moves. “Thank you for the offer, but my clubbing days are officially over.”
“That’s a shame.” His eyes wander the length of my body like he sees beyond my clothes. “I loved the blue dress.”
Um... I’ve lost the ability to speak or to think or to do anything, so I flip through our textbook. Words. Words would be good. Any word. Preferably words that make sense.
“If we’re working together, then you’ll need to read the syllabus today. The first video is tomorrow. Did you know that everything falls at the same rate? Like if someone was to chuck you and me off a building at the same time, we’d both fall at the same rate of motion because of gravity? It’s called acceleration of gravity. If you exclude wind resistance, everything, and I mean everything, falls at the same rate of 9.81 meters per second. You, me, cats, dogs, hedgehogs. We’ll be doing a project on that.”
Yep, words.
“We’re going to toss hedgehogs off a building?” he asks.
I try not to giggle at his bad joke and fail. “An egg.”
“Good on the hedgehog. That could get messy. Speaking of throwing people off buildings, we have two options of how to handle Hewitt.”
And the conversation was going so well... “What do you mean?”
“I can try scaring the hell out of him,” he says, like we’re discussing the weather.
“You already tried that and he said if you get involved in any way someone else will post the picture. I was in the bathroom, remember? Scaring him didn’t work.”
His mouth twists up in a deadly way. “That was me being friendly.”
I shiver despite the heat of the cramped room. “What’s the second option?”
“We get rid of the picture.”
“How?”
“By being smarter than them.”
It’s like he’s set out a puzzle and my mind is desperately trying to sort the pieces. “Only way to get that photo is to know who is in the group associated with the site and then hack into their computers and phones to delete it or destroy the hardware.”
He doesn’t even blink at my words.
“I’m not a computer hacker,” I say. “And I have no clue who he’s working with.”
“You’re not, but I know a few things about computers and you’re smart. Together we can figure this out.”
I fiddle with the corner of the syllabus. “I don’t want to write the papers. If I do it for him, it’s a lie he could hold over me forever—just like the picture.”
I could lose my chance at a scholarship or admission into my colleges of choice for cheating. My skull starts to feel as if it’s collapsing in and I rub my temples as if that could help. I wish this problem would go away. I wish none of this had ever happened.
“Breanna,” he says, then goes quiet. I glance up and he continues, “You won’t write the papers and that picture will be deleted, okay?”
I nod and Razor seems to accept my answer. His eyes dart around my face as if he’s waging an internal war. “It’s going to be hell on you to be seen with me.”
It’s not a question. It’s a statement. A very, very true statement.
“If we’re sharing,” he says, “I’m going to catch hell being around you.”
My eyebrows rise at this. “Because I’m the epitome of trouble?”
He laughs and it’s a glorious sound. One that warms my insides. But then the laugh turns a bit bitter and dies out. “I’ve been warned I could hurt you without meaning to.”
My stomach sinks and my posture deflates along with it. Addison said the Terror have to follow orders or there are consequences. “Have you been told to stay away from me?”
Razor’s expression gives nothing away and in the silence I can hear the whispers of the boys on the other side of the room. I clear my throat and try a different question. “Are you going to get in trouble for hanging out with me?”
“I’m running out of allies. Hanging with you might piss off one of the few I have left.”
It’s not really an answer. A million questions spring to mind about his club and w
ho his allies are and who is warning him away from me and why, but the one single thought that wins out is... “I don’t want you to get in trouble over me.”
Razor offers a crooked smile that I guess is meant to comfort me, but all I see is sadness. “I’ll worry about me so you don’t need to. I hate to ask, but beyond us working together in class, do you have a problem with keeping whatever this is between us a secret?”
He nudges my leg with his own, rekindling the fire that had begun to burn minutes before. “The fewer questions I get from the club about you, the better it will be, and it’ll be easier on you at school the less we’re seen together. Besides, being a secret makes the flirting more fun.”
I should be annoyed at what Razor is saying, at the idea that he doesn’t want to be seen with me in public. Instead, a thrill runs through me, so fast, so strong, that goose bumps form along my arms. A secret. Me and Razor from the Reign of Terror—a secret. There’s something magical in the idea of there being a secret between us. Something exciting about being allowed to explore this newfound friendship without the prying eyes of the rest of the world.
Life just went from awful to incredibly fantastic. “I can absolutely live with that.”
RAZOR
Breanna: Apples. Your turn.
I DON’T KNOW why her answer causes my lips to curve up, but it does. It’s eleven at night. She texted to let me know she wasn’t making much progress on the code. I texted back that she should take a break. Now neither of us seems eager to end the conversation. Our texts took a turn toward random and we’ve been sharing favorite foods. Breanna’s moved us on to fruit.
Me: I don’t eat fruit.
Breanna: Liar.
I laugh. Maybe I am.
It’s been a few weeks since Breanna and I made our deal. She’s been working on my code and, with a few glares from me, Kyle Hewitt has gone mute about me and Breanna, which is what I wanted. He’s scared of me, yet with time passing, he’s relaxing. Tonight I step up my game to nail the bastard.
Breanna: Kyle’s paper is due soon.