Page 14 of Desert Heat

That backfired. The bets only went higher.

Whenever I see the football team, I flip them the bird and keep going. Two weeks in, I was the baddest bitch on campus and everyone knew it. I just wish I could make a friend or two but even the girls steer clear of me.

I always wanted a man.

Someone to kiss and spoon deep into the night. Someone to wake me up with soft kisses on a bare shoulder, filling me deep to relieve the ache that never seems to go away.

Loneliness.

As much as I front, deep down I’ve never gotten close to another human soul. I attempt to push my guilty thoughts of how I treated Hunter to the side. Maybe I’ll just apologize next time I see him and leave it at that while making it clear I’m not another campus chic trying to fawn all over him.

“You’ve got to be shitting me,” I muttered as None other than Hunter Northport walked into my poly sci class wearing a smirk with three girls giggling in his wake.

It was my last class of the day before I could get the fuck off campus and back to my cozy cabin in the woods. I’d been fantasizing about unwinding with a glass of red, maybe lighting a fire while completing a few assignments.

I turn my head, refusing to make eye contact.

Don’t you fucking dare. Keep going.

The bastard sits down right in front of me, bypassing dozens of empty seats.

“Can you please move?”

No reaction.

“Excuse me, I can’t see the front of the classroom past your shoulders and thick… I mean big head.”

I resort to tapping his shoulder with my pen.

He turns, taking out an ear bud. But by the way his lips try not to curve I can tell the bastard heard me the whole time.

“Can I help you, princess?”

“Yes. By moving. I can’t see around you.”

“But I’m comfortable right where I am.”

My eyes narrowed. I itched to say something snarky. But he clearly had issues besides a learning disability.

I picked up my things, moving a few rows further back and to his left. My eyes strained to read the smart board.

I never realized my vision wasn’t perfect. But then again, wiping down the bar in the clubhouse hardly required perfect eyesight.

I felt his eyes on me, assessing me as I resettled before class started. I turned my head, pretending to glance out the window.

He was watching me.

Intently.

I can’t decipher the look in his eyes. Not quite want. Or hate… it’s something else. Something I can’t place.

I felt as if a target was on my back for the entire sixty minutes. As soon as class was over, I wanted to bolt but got stuck behind ten other students getting out of the same row.

“Mr. Northport, stay a minute.”

I pretended to be preoccupied on my phone while listening to every word…

“…the University is affording you several accomodations. You won’t need to record class as note swill be typed and emailed directly to you. There is also an option to take y9our tests through an audible app.”

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