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FRANCESCA

My nerves are shreddedwhen I get ready for school on Monday morning. The videos for Kincaid had been a fun tease but when I curled in bed last night, I wasn’t laughing. Over the weekend, I phoned and texted Aidan half a dozen times, hoping the brush-off on Friday was my overactive imagination.

He didn’t reply.

The last few messages haven’t even been read.

Our friendship appears to be over, and I’m troubled he hasn’t told me face to face. Aidan is many things, but a coward isn’t one of them. Not that it takes a genius to guess the root cause.

He’s been getting chummy with Ezra and from what I’ve observed, he and his cousin don’t get along. Whichever side it came from, one of the Tana boys has threatened something to keep him away.

I know how much rugby means to Aidan. How he’s pinned his entire future on the sport.

His family might be wealthier than mine—not a hard ask—but he’s not in the same league as the truly wealthy kids. I understand choosing his sport over me, especially since he has a thousand other friends to cushion the loss.

It still makes me sad.

And if it’s Kincaid, the fact he stripped away my only friend is another klaxon, warning me there could be worse in store if I let myself fall deeper under his spell. Each time we’re together, I trust him more,likehim more, laugh with him more, and it’s dangerous.

My growing affection is most likely a normal reaction to sex that would happen with any partner, and I’m just too naive to know. My only other experience was with Ezra, who frightened and revolted me, hardly a good comparison.

It’s insane to like the psychopath who told me he could obliterate my face with a shotgun in the same tone of voice he asks what I’d like for lunch.

I need to learn how to be stronger. To resist himinside,where it counts. To stop thinking about him all the time we’re apart.

But memories place him beside me in the bedroom. He waits in the kitchen, hands touching me everywhere while I make a proper coffee with fresh beans, using the complicated machine he bought me.

The sensation of his tongue on my breasts, of his cum coating my tongue, of his greedy mouth sucking my lip, of his adoring eyes watching as he rubbed me against his massive cock spoils my attempts to make myself breakfast.

Which is probably for the best considering how uneasily the hot drink sits in my stomach.

I’m about to leave when there’s a knock on the door and I stare out the side window at the shiny orange car parked at the curb. There’s only one person that could belong to, and I glare at it with resentful eyes, trying to hate its sleek lines and rich colour. Like I can’t make my own damn way to school?

Kincaid this early on a Monday morning is asking too much from my shattered composure, but there’s no choice but to open the door.

“Morning, Freckles.” He tilts his head, considering me for a long moment, then grins. “Did you wake on the wrong side of your tiny little bed?”

“Funnily enough, I was in a great mood up to a minute ago.”

I shoo him back, turning to lock the door, and he snorts. “Are you protecting burglars from the inside of your house? Because there’s nothing in there worth stealing.”

I stop in place.

“Come on,” he says, patting my behind.

“Oh, we’re going, are we? I thought we were just going to stand here, abusing the poor girl for not having the foresight to be born to a rich family like some arseholes she could name.”

“Rawr.” He claws his fingers.

“Fuck you.” I stomp to my vehicle, ignoring the new car that probably cost his uncle more than the combined total of every house on this street.

“Wrong way, Freckles.”

“I have my own car. I can make my own way to school, thank you very much.”

He leans back against the side door, arms folded as he watches me get into my battered car and turn the key. I’m used to it struggling with the cold, but this time, nothing happens. Just a dull click when I turn the key. Kincaid smirks like he knew it wouldn’t start.

“What have you done?”