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“Delighted,” Seth said.

“Yes,that. I would rather be delighted.”

Owen winked at him. “I delight you.”

“You don’t. You’re wearing a leather jacket in September. Nothing about you delights me. You—”

“Kensington, just who I wanted to see. You look good. You thought about my offer to take you out and show you a good time?”

The tables around them quieted.

Gibby started to get up, but Jazz reached over and touched the back of her hand. Gibby sat back down with a huff, turning to glare at the Heteroh-hell-no standing next to the table in a letterman jacket with a perfect smile on his face. Nick didn’t know his name off the top of his head, but it was most likely something douchebro like Derek or Westley. All the straight jocks looked exactly alike to Nick, and he didn’t care to try to differentiate between them.

“You should probably run,” Seth said to Derek or Westley as Jazz finished drizzling the olive oil over her caprese salad.

Derek or Westley narrowed his eyes as he looked down at Seth and dropped a hand on Jazz’s shoulder, squeezing gently. “Oh, really? And why exactly would I do that, you weirdo?”

Andoh,did that make Nick mad, but he knew better than to intervene. Jazz had this, even if Derek or Westley didn’t know it yet.

Jazz stood from the table slowly, running her hands down the front of her skirt, brushing away the wrinkles. She smiled up at Derek or Westley. He grinned cockily down at her. “Not that it’s not hot,” he said. “Two girls, or whatever, even if one of them is butch. I think you need to explore your options, you know?”

Nick really didn’t understand straight people. They didn’t seem to have any sense of self-preservation.

“Do you?” Jazz asked sweetly. Well, itsoundedsweet, but Nick had seen one too many shows on Animal Planet about how lionesseshunt. And since lionesses hunted in groups, Derek or Westley was up to his neck in shit. “Maybe show me what I’m missing?”

He reached down and grabbed her hand. “It’d be my pleasure. And then if there’s time for it, it could beyourpleasure too. I’m not selfish.”

“Oh, man,” Nick said. “You shouldn’t have said that.”

Derek or Westley glanced at Nick, eyeing him as if he were some kind of bug. “What’d you say?”

It’d been a long time since he’d heard Jazz make a near-grown man scream. Usually, she’d let them off with a warning, but Derek or Westley was grosser than most, so when she turned her hand and snapped it around two of his fingers, twisting them viciously and bringing his arm behind his back, Nick couldn’t find it in himself to feel all that bad. He took another bite of his sandwich.

Derek or Westley cried out in pain as his head fell to the lunch table right next to Jazz’s caprese salad. Gibby pulled the Tupperware away, just to be safe.

“Thank you, baby,” Jazz said. “I appreciate that.”

“You asshole,” Derek or Westley managed to say. “Let me—ow, owow!”

“Now, here’s how this is going to go,” Jazz said, apparently able to ignore the fact that everyone in the cafeteria was staring at her. You didn’t mess with Jasmine Kensington, especially not during lunch. And if you did, you certainly didn’t insult her friends at the same time. “You’re going to apologize. And after you apologize, I will let you go. If any of that sounds too much for you, we’ll see how far your fingers can bend before they snap.”

“You can’t—”

“That wasn’t an apology,” she said, and Nick didn’t know it was possible for fingers to be facing the direction Derek or Westley’s were. He should have paid more attention during anatomy.

“Okay! Okay! I’m sorry!”

“And you will never touch another person without their consent again.”

“Iwon’t.”

“Or call my friends any derogatory names. Because that’s rude.”

“So rude!” Derek or Westley cried.

“Good,” she said cheerfully. “If I find out that you do, we’ll have to see if you can live a normal life without your testicles. Do we have an understanding?”

“Yes,” he groaned.