Page 70 of Ink & Ambition

Danika levels him with a stern look. “Keep your girls in check, Prescott.” She leans over to kiss me on the cheek before walking to her class.

“What is she talking about?”

I refuse to look him in the eye as I continue my walk toward the media building, Alex trailing behind. A firm hand on my shoulder stops me in my tracks.

“Margot, what happened?”

I sigh. “Nothing happened. Just some girl asking me about you, not exactly in a nice way.” I keep going and Alex walks beside me, uncharacteristically quiet. We stay that way until we reach the door of the media building. I know Alex doesn’t have any classes here and is just walking me to be nice.

As I open the door, I look back to see Alex standing behind me, his phone at my eye level, which he quickly shoves into his pocket.

“Did you just take a picture of me?”

Alex squints his eyes and looks at me like I’ve suddenly grown ten heads. “Uh paranoid, much?”

“What?”

“Huh?” Alex answers quickly. “Have a good class, bye.” And he’s gone, leaving me with more questions than I started with.

Halfway through class, a text from Dani comes through with a screenshot of an instagram story.

Oh, he's good

The picture wasn’t clear, no identification of the person. A blurry brunette braid with a green bow. Clearly a picture of the back of my head but only if you knew. Near the bottom, it’s written, “going feral for this bow.”

Still entirely confused, I text Danika back.

I don't get it

Check the name

Looking at the photo again, I see the username at the top left corner.@AlexPrescott. This is Alex’s story. Alex posted a picture of the back of my head?Why?

This, my friend, is called a soft launch

Still completely confused, I ignore the picture and concentrate on the lecture but within the next ten minutes, that seems to be a fruitless effort as DMs start rolling in from people I barely even talk to or don’t know at all. All the messages follow the same theme: “You and Alex are dating??????”

As I leave the building, I feel all wandering eyes on me yet again. The whispers have increased in size and volume. I truly underestimated the status this man has on campus if within one hour everyone has seen and talked about his instagram story.

Now that my classes are over for the day, my mission now is to get off this campus as fast as I can.

“Sunshine!”Not fast enough.Alex comes up from behind me and grabs me by the elbow, pulling me immediately toward his car. “Let’s go.”

The fact that he knows my schedule and knows I’m done with classes today should startle me but it fills me with a warm feeling in my stomach instead.

Without hesitation, I get into the passenger seat as he walks around to the driver’s side. After starting the car, he pulls swiftly out of the parking lot, both of us sitting in comfortable silence.

“So, how was your day?”

I look over at him. “Confusing,” I admit, and Alex cracks a grin.

“Interesting assessment,” he comments but does not elaborate. Before I know it, he’s pulling up in front of my apartment. The whole instagram post left me with more questions than answers and as I open my mouth to ask Alex those questions, I’m immediately cut off.

“Go to dinner with me tonight.”

I close my mouth. Then open it again. “Are you asking or telling?”

Alex hits me with that megawatt smile. “Whichever is going to make you say yes.”

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