CHAPTER 5
K.C.
The air in the high school sat like a layer of wet clothes on my skin, dense and moist. It almost took effort to move through it on my way to the front office.
But I liked it.
Adding to the dimly lit hallways and the sound of rain threatening harder and harder against the roof, the atmosphere drowned out the evidence that anyone else lived in the world but me. And I needed that feeling right now.
More than just Jax’s kiss had hit a nerve the other day, and I kept swirling his words around in my head. How was it that he knew me so well? He anticipated every argument that came out of my mouth and calculated my reactions, knowing the outcome beforehand, and I couldn’t keep up. Now, a week later, he was still on my mind as much as food and breathing.
I really wanted to hit him, and I wasn’t sure why.
Christ. I tucked my hair behind my ear as I continued down the hall.
It had started storming an hour ago. Since they kept most of the lights off in the school during the summer days—except for the ones in the classroom—to conserve electricity, the only reminder that it was late morning was the reflections of rain bouncing off the windows and their shadows dancing on the walls. We’d just finished both sessions, but you wouldn’t know it. Already the school was nearly empty. Cheerleading and lacrosse never showed up, because of the weather, and at least a third of the tutoring students were absent as well.
Tutoring. I let out a sigh, moving down the steps.
Our progress had been slow during the past few days, the kids having mentally checked out because of summer break, I was sure. Although I had a few students I enjoyed—Ana was actually cooperative and apt with her skills—the lot of them were a struggle, and I knew I was doing something wrong. They wouldn’t volunteer, they wouldn’t answer questions, and they weren’t happy. I sucked.
But when I looked around at the other tutors and their groups, I saw the same pattern. Disinterest and flat-out boredom. Of course, who would want to spend their summer break cooped up in a hot classroom when their friends were at Swansea Lake swimming, drinking, and making out? And why should I worry if they succeeded in school? If they didn’t care, then neither should I.
But that was a shit response, and I knew it. I did care.
“Those kids don’t need an attitude adjustment. You do.”
Damn Jax.
Jax, whom I had barely seen since the kiss last Monday.
Jax, who had me stealing looks out the window as he ran, laughed, and sweated on the field.
Jax, who literally dumped me on my ass after kissing me breathless in the weight room.
Jax, who used to watch me in high school, and now I was the one watching him.
I dug in my heels, pulled open the main office door, and stepped through, looking around for a sign of anyone. The room was spooky, void of any light, life, or noise aside from the echoes of rain coming from every direction. The reflection of the storm created bubbles of light on all the countertops, and the sound of waterfalls surrounded me, hitting all four walls.
The storm was picking up, and I wondered how I was getting home, as I usually walked. I had to remember to call Shane.
“This isn’t up for discussion.” I twisted my head at the bark coming from the nurse’s office.
Who …?
But the voice continued. “As I said …”
Forgetting the reams of paper I was supposed to be collecting from under the counter, I inched toward the open door of the nurse’s office a couple of doors down the hallway.
My short, layered black skirt wafted silently over my thighs, and I rubbed the chill from my arms, bare in their turquoise tank top.
“Yeah, Jared. I know who our father is.”
I stopped, my stomach doing a somersault. It was Jax. And he was talking to his brother.
“I took a hell of a lot more beatings than you did,” he growled. “So stop trying to protect me.”
Beatings?
Stepping up to the open door, I tilted my head to peek inside, and instantly felt the butterflies take flight in my stomach.
Jax was a bloody mess. Literally.
He was dressed in long black mesh shorts with black running shoes. His hair was still pulled back tight to his scalp, but it stuck to his wet back, and I wasn’t sure if it was sweat from working out in the weight room or rain from being outside. He held his cell phone between his ear and his shoulder as he stalked around the room, apparently looking for something. Clearly having a hard time, because he was holding a hand up to a scrape on his stomach even though the one on his elbow was dripping crimson blood on the tiled floor.
I could hear Jared’s voice on the other end, but it was too faint to make out what he was saying.
Jax was swinging open cabinet doors and slamming them shut again, and while he appeared to be battered up, I got the feeling his irritation wasn’t about the scrapes.
“If he gets out early, then he gets out!” he shouted, and I winced as he kicked a cabinet shut. “You get your fucking restraining order, and leave me out of it,” he commanded. “If he comes near me, I’m putting a knife in his throat.”
And I heard Jared’s voice loud and clear this time. “Don’t give me something else to worry about!”
Jax didn’t respond. He yanked the phone away from his ear, pushed a button, and threw it on one of the cots.
“Son of a bitch,” he grunted, bowing his head into the arm that he had propped against the cabinet.
His chest rose and fell quickly, his breathing labored, but I knew it wasn’t from his injuries. I stood there, chewing the inside of my lip, knowing that I should just back away and get out of there. He’d been a total ass to me ever since I got back into town.