Page 12 of The Arrangement

I kept my eyes down and ahead as I practically jogged when the sound of a window rolling down had my heart in my throat.

"Clark? What the fuck are you doing out here?"

I nearly tripped on the crack in the sidewalk at the sound of Sebastian Quinn's deep voice coming from a black sports car. Of course he would have a fucking sports car.

"Walking, Quinn, did the pepper spray cause long-term blindness?" I shot back as I straightened with as much dignity as I could muster.

"Jesus Christ, get in the car,” he retorted. “I'll take you home." I could hear the eye roll that accompanied his words.

I shook my head, readjusting my bag on my shoulder. "Nope, I'm good. The night air is good for my health." I winced at the stupid words that just kept flowing from my mouth.

"Clark, for Christ's sake, just get in. You still have almost ten minutes left if you walk it. This wind is insane." He wasn’t lying, even though it was early fall, tonight felt especially chilly for the season and the wind was biting.

I finally stopped next to the car that had been tailing me for what felt like the last mile and peeked inside at its very warm-looking interior, complete with black leather seats.

For a moment, I considered it, but I shook my head. "Thanks for the offer, but I'm good, I promise."

Sebastian's face looked incredulously at me before shrugging and rolling up the window, leaving me on my "healthy walk" in the now forty-eight-degree temperature.

On the way back, I scoured my brain trying to remember why he hadn’t gotten along in school, besides that he was ridiculously wealthy and on the lacrosse team. I hated remembering my time in high school while I made my way past a quiet stretch of houses and businesses deep into the coastal city I called home. Small towns and their people usually weren't super welcoming to outsiders. So when I enrolled at the beginning of my high school career, freshly plucked from New York and the rat’s nest my dad called an apartment, quiet as a mouse andwith only a handful of hand-me-down uniforms from the local charity shop, I wasn't exactly vying for prom queen. I was taller than some of the girls but shit at sports, so it just made my gangly long legs and arms useless and out of sorts with the petite, beautiful girls that seemed to populate Perrington Prep solely. Sebastian always had a beautiful girl on his arm and was the rare combination of class clown and jock that just seemed to make friends with everyone. His sister was barely in middle school, but I always saw him driving her around at the time in some flashy car.

It was he and I who were neck and neck in our academics. The way he looked at me, like he couldn't figure out how a neglected orphan from Long Island was beating him for valedictorian at his prestigious prep school still made my blood boil. It's not like he had knocked my books out of my hands or doused me in pig's blood at prom; it was just the edge of barely concealed resentment that he had whenever he looked at me. The way his dark eyes looked me up and down like I wasn't even worth the cruel barb he could think of. Like he had been studying me. And then not to even remember my name at the end of the school year? That was icing on the cake.

Before I knew it, the welcoming light of my loft building was ahead of me, and none too soon before I couldn't feel my fingers.

"Eleven minutes, Clark," came a deep voice in the parking lot to my left. I jumped, my hand coming to cover my mouth as I barely contained a scream. "And you aren't even paying attention. I could've been a psycho murderer."

I stood incredulous at the 6'4 man dangling his car keys while leaning against the hood of his car. "What the fuck, Quinn? Were you just sitting there waiting for me to get home to scare me out of my wits?" My heart was still beating wildly in my chest as I finally found my voice and stomped towards the stairs.

"I mean, at least you weren't naked!" he yelled, to my mortification. I looked around, but of course there was no one out at 10:30 p.m. on a Tuesday. His crooked smile beamed as he walked past me and opened the door to the loft building, the warmer air hitting me.

I all but growled as I walked past him, turning my body so my armdidn't so much as graze his. Shaking my head as I went to unlock my front door with fumbling cold hands, I paused when I realized he was still behind me.

"What, Quinn?" I snapped as I dropped my keys, my frozen fingers uncooperative in their task of simply getting me inside. My trick of ignoring my next-door neighbor was failing horribly.

When I looked up I realized he wasn't smiling this time but looking serious as he glanced up the stairwell to see if anyone else was listening.

"Listen, I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone about it. About the Wolfe thing?" He scratched the back of his neck awkwardly. "All jokes aside, I would really rather it not be public knowledge."

I relaxed a bit but rolled my eyes. "I figured with the whole mask thing," I whisper-hissed as I finally unlocked my front door with a satisfying click. "Secret’s safe with me. Trust me, I don't want anyone to know that I know if you catch my drift."

I barely caught a glimpse of his relieved face when I shut the door behind me, hoping that would be the last time I had to deal with Sebastian Quinn.

Chapter 7

Sebastian

My eyes were still burning when Georgia rushed out of my apartment, the whole place still reeking of expired pepper spray and my floors slick with milk. Organic milk, I might add. I pried open the painted-over window frame to let the cold night air in because nothing was better than the smell that had affixed itself to my once-spotless apartment.

It was then that I realized I was still holding a blanket over my bottom half, too scared to touch anything below my belly button with my hands until I had scrubbed them at least three more times. Who needed those extra layers of skin anyway?

Once I was absolutely sure no pepper spray residue remained on my hands, I pulled on a pair of boxers and grabbed the mop from the closet. While mopping, I found the discarded hot pink object and, using a pair of tongs, gently placed it into the trash receptacle, along with said tongs. I wasn't taking any chances. My stomach still pitched as the sting of pepper that had permeated my nostrils while I resisted the urge to rub my eyes again.

Walking into my bedroom was a nightmare. The red mood lights were still on, casting an eerie glow on the bedroom, which, when filming, looked mysterious and sexy but now just looked like a horrormovie gone wrong. My camera was lying discarded on the floor, red light still beeping as it recorded the carpet, so thankfully, it wasn't broken in all the hysterics.

The spray seemed localized to the hallway, but the room still reeked, and being on the first floor of this apartment complex, I made the decision just to open the other window, too. At this point, the murderers could just have me. What a fucking nightmare this was. Thankfully I always had a backup in case of an emergency where I couldn't film or push out content in a timely manner, but only having two in the vault meant I needed to get my shit together. During the colder months, my subscribers seemed to increase and I chalked it up to being indoors more as the cold came in. But to be honest, I couldn’t get hard right now if I tried.

I was already stressed as it was; Natalie, my closest friend and only collaborator, was moving to Europe with her long-time girlfriend turned fiancé. I was happy for her, ecstatic even—she had been working her ass off for years for her doctorate, and she was going to help a lot of people. But we had a great partnership with no strings attached and made each other a shit ton of money.

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