A Whole New Crowd(5)

I had a thing for tattoos, and the sight of his tribal one had me squirming. It’d been a while since I had been with Brian. Shit. Brian. Tray Evans was the rich and blessed version of my ex-boyfriend. The difference was that the Brian Lansers of the world never got away with anything. They got in trouble just because they existed. The Tray Evans of the world pulled the same shit and were worshiped.
Dangerous. He was just dangerous in every way.
“Like what you see.”
I laughed softly. It hadn’t been a question. “You got the package. We both know that, but I doubt you have the quality.”
“You think so?”
“I’ve dealt with boys like you. You’re all the same.”
“Boys?” He flashed me a grin. “I’m all man. There’s no part of me that’s a boy anymore.” He leaned forward so his face was close to mine. He came in slow and his breath teased my skin. Then he tilted his head to the side and his cheek grazed against mine.
I held firm. I had to. He was testing me, seeing if I would flinch or melt. I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t give him any reaction because if I did, he’d win. I would be the weaker one. Heat spread through my body and I gritted my teeth. My body was betraying me. No one had gotten that kind of reaction from me, not even Brian when we first kissed, and that knowledge made me hate this guy.
I smirked at him, he was so close to me. “Good for you.”
His eyes were laughing and the hazel color darkened to an amber color.
“But I’m not interested.”
A low chuckle slipped from him, and he moved back. “Listen, business only, okay?” He paused, an eyebrow lifted. “Next week is homecoming and we play the Panthers from Pedlam. They stole our game book last year, and we got screwed. We lost the game, and we lost going to the championships because of it. Some of my friends didn’t get football scholarships.”
“You want me to steal their game book?”
“Mandy says you used to do this stuff. I respect that you don’t want to do it anymore, but we know that they’ve already been sniffing around campus. We caught a few of ‘em Friday night. They were trying to take our state championship flag from two years ago.”
“You don’t even play football. Why do you care?”
“Because this is my school. Those guys are my friends, and I take care of what’s mine.”
I frowned. “I know people from Pedlam.”
“You went to school there?”
“More than any others. I don’t know if I want to help you screw with a school that I used to consider mine.”
Tray sighed, rolling his eyes. “You’re Mandy’s sister. This is your school now, Taryn.”
That was the first time I’d heard him say my name, and I hated hearing it from him. I hated him. A whole host of emotions were unlocked. Memories seared through me and Brian’s voice, saying my name, was on repeat inside of my head.
I wanted it gone. I wanted him gone. “I’m not helping you.”
Tray Evans was in my car, but memories of Brian were overwhelming me. I didn’t want to remember him.
“What?”
“Get out.” My voice was rougher than it needed to be. I couldn’t help it.
“Fine.” He got out and shut the door. As he walked away, I tried to calm the storm he had unknowingly unleashed.
I missed him. I missed both of them.
*

I let myself inside the mansion, dropping my keys in the bowl beside the coat-rack. The place was just massive. I already knew no one was home. My parents—it was hard to think of them as parents; I had to keep reminding myself not to call them Shelly and Kevin in my mind—were gone to a medical conference. It wasn’t long until I learned that Kevin was rarely home. He was either on-call at the hospital or he was moon-lighting at a different hospital. When he wasn’t, he took Shelly with him for weekend conferences. When they both left, it was Mandy, Austin, and myself. A neighbor came over to check on us in the evenings. There’d been a few times when the neighbor slept over, but she always watched television in her room so we had the house to ourselves most of the time.
Grabbing a soda, I headed to the media room. It wasn’t long until I heard voices coming from the kitchen, and I groaned. Mandy’s friends’ voices. The gods of the gods.
I muttered, “Kill me now.”
“She’s down here.” Mandy bounced down the stairs and plopped next to me. Devon came in behind her and stood at the end of our couch, frowning at her. She beamed at me. “Hey!”
“Hey.” I frowned.
“Tray said you said no. A big fat no actually.”