Fighting Fate (Granton University #1)(67)

He caught a piece of her hair. “I could count the reasons you made me love you, one for each strand of beautiful hair you have. Or…or I could show you.”

He kept his brow pressed to hers as he tilted his face just so until his breath fanned across her lips. Less than an inch away from kissing her, he paused and cupped her face, his fingers trembling against her skin.

“Paige?”

So tender and uncertain, his voice coaxed her into lifting her face to meet his mouth, greedy to taste him.

But at the last second, she pictured him and Kayla locked in this same embrace.

And Trace’s roar of outrage as he discovered them together.

With a sob, she tore her mouth away. “I can’t. I just—I can’t.” Ducking under his arms, she escaped and sprinted away. He didn’t take up the chase this time, and she knew he wouldn’t. But she didn’t slow down until she reached Grammar Hall.

When she shut herself inside her room, she was more than relieved to find Mariah absent. Tess and Bailey might’ve been around, but if they heard her come in, they didn’t pop over.

She sat on her bed, trying to regain her breathing—and her composure.

Logan loved her. Her chest swelled with euphoria. The first guy to ever really hit her radar felt the same intense awareness of her as she did for him.

But logically, she was all kinds of confused. Being with him had to be taboo. Didn’t it?

Then again, if she’d honestly forgiven him, then it shouldn’t matter what had happened three years ago. And in a way, it didn’t.

But what would Trace think of her?

What would Kayla think, or her father?

A small part of her brain said she didn’t care about her dad’s opinion; he could rot in his alcohol for the rest of his life. But she really did care. She loved Paul Zukowski, knew how tormented he was. She didn’t want to lose what little affection her only family left had for her. And she would if she started anything with Logan.

Wouldn’t she?

God, she was so confused.

Maybe she’d been the sole person who’d found Logan culpable for the past three years. Maybe her father had never blamed him. Maybe Kayla didn’t blame him either. Maybe Trace wouldn’t have blamed him.

Except his own family had kicked him out. If his own flesh and blood could do that to him, her family probably wanted much worse.

She winced. She wanted to call her best friend. She needed Kayla’s advice. But she’d never confessed what she knew about Kayla’s involvement that night. Unable to deal with more than one problem as a time, she cradled her head in her hands and came up with no easy solution.





Chapter Twenty-Six


“ARE YOU SURE you can’t come with us this weekend?” Bailey begged.

Beside her, Tess fluttered her lashes. “Please, please, please come, Paige. We already told you we’d both chip in to pay your way.”

Paige chuckled as she sat curled on Bailey’s bed. It was only the second Friday into the semester, and her suitemates had plans to go skiing with both their families over the weekend.

Watching them pack, she shook her head sadly. “I have to work.” When Tess opened her mouth to protest, Paige quickly added, “And I have a test first thing on Monday. A big test. I need to study.”

Bailey wrinkled her nose as she stuffed bras and panties haphazardly into her suitcase. “A test already? But it’s only—”

“World history with Daley,” Paige spoke over her.

Since Bailey had just taken that course with the same professor last semester, she snapped her mouth shut. “Oh.”

“Well, one of these days you have to promise to come home with us. We want you to meet our families.” Neatly folding her undergarments before placing them precisely in her own bag, Tess sent Paige a stern look, waiting for an answer.

Paige nodded. “I promise.”

She stayed with them, chatting until it was time for them to leave. Then she helped carry their luggage to Bailey’s car. “Have fun and be safe,” she warned as she hugged both girls goodbye.

After they left, she returned to her own room, morose and lonely. Without those two around, she always had too much time to think. And thinking was the last thing she wanted to do.

When Mariah blew into the dorm, instantly ripping off her shirt and digging through her closet for something else to wear, Paige welcomed the distraction.

“Going out again?”

“Yep.” Mariah sounded sidetracked as she found a slinky, glittery, backless party top to wiggle into. “I’ve decided the only way to get over one man is to block out his memory with a couple more. And I’ve met this guy named Reggie. He’s so hot. Dreamy hot.”

Paige perked to attention. “Reggie? Reggie Oates?”

“Mmm hmm. Do you know him?”

“Yeah. We had geography together last semester. He’s really nice.” And she could totally see Reggie and Mariah hitting it off.

Wrinkling her nose, Mariah sent Paige a disappointed look over her shoulder. “Nice?”

“I mean—” Back peddling, Paige thought quickly. “Nice in a total player, party-animal, hottie kind of way.”

Mariah thought that through. “Oh.” With a grin, she winked. “Cool.”

With her vertebrae resting against the wall, Paige sat on her bed and hugged her knees to her chest as she watched Mariah get ready for her night out.