Page 17 of Burn Bright (Cobalt Empire #1)

HARRIET FISHER

W ith Xander’s gaze firmly on me, recognition shoots through his expression, and then immediate relief pours over his emotive eyes. Flashes of all the parties I’ve been to hit me.

Parties where I was alone beside a wall.

Parties where I wished I knew a single person to at least fill the awkward tension in my bones.

I relate to the feeling I see wash through him. I just never thought I’d be the friendly face in the crowd. We barely know each other. We’re acquaintances through his sister—who I don’t even talk to anymore now that we’re no longer lab partners.

He takes a step toward me, entering our row.

One foot in, he stops. His gaze passes over my shoulder to see Ben. The color drains from Xander’s face.

“Hey,” Ben acknowledges in a friendly up-nod. “We saved you a seat.” He motions to the open one beside me.

Xander looks from Ben to me and back to Ben. “It’s all right.” His voice is a low husk. “I’d rather sit in the back.” He backsteps out of the row and hightails it up the rest of the stairs.

My stomach twists and twists. It feels like I rejected Xander now, and I hate how he’s on an island alone when he was so clearly searching for a life raft. Did he think there wasn’t room for him on the inner tube? That Ben occupied the lone spot?

My neck aches as I strain to watch Xander reach the back row and slump into an open chair, Donnelly claiming the one to his left.

All of Xander’s muscles tense when he notices a bold blonde powerwalking to make her claim on the vacant seat to his right.

I could cut her off.

I have a major brain-freeze on the words: help Xander . My body reacts as I spring to my feet, snatch my backpack, and climb the stairs.

Being casual enough, I make it to the seat quickly and sink into the chair beside Xander. I feel the blonde screech to a halt, then choose a random place several rows away.

Xander releases a breath. His entire body slackens. “Thanks,” he whispers with such depth that I should feel great about my choice.

I nod back, my stomach not unwinding from a vicious pretzel shape.

As I face forward, I realize what I just did.

I abandoned Ben.

My heart drops out of my body and rolls away from me. Fuck, fuck, fuck. See, this is why friendships are too complicated. This is why I might not be built to maintain them.

What’s worse is knowing I left Ben for his cousin that apparently hates him. Ughhh. I want to bring my legs to my chest and hide in my kneecaps.

“Are you all right?” Xander murmurs.

I shrug and swallow the ball in my throat.

Xander searches his backpack. “I’d give you some water, but…I don’t think I have any in here.”

“I’ll survive,” I whisper, finally able to speak. “Will you?”

“Age old question.” He presses the back of his head to the wall while looking down at me. “This is the only course I don’t have with my best friend.”

“Who’s that?”

“Easton Mulligan.”

“Never heard of him.”

“Not famous. We grew up in the same neighborhood.” Xander unwraps the headphones from around his neck. “Knowing someone beforehand just makes situations like this infinitely easier.”

I had the same thought earlier today.

I don’t point out the obvious though. How he should know Ben the best. “What about the bodyguard backup?”

Donnelly acknowledges me with a rock on hand gesture.

I give him a stiff wave as a friendly hello.

“I wouldn’t have gone to college without Donnelly,” Xander admits, then lets out a weak laugh. “Which, I know, probably seems stupid.”

I meet his eyes. “Why would that be stupid?”

“Maybe because I can’t exist without backup.”

“Dude, did you hear the audible intake of oxygen when you appeared? I’m shocked you didn’t get mauled. No one should knock you for wanting to be safe.”

He must hear the ball still partially stuck in my throat. Or maybe I look sickly. “You sure you’re all right, Harriet?”

I find a Jolly Rancher in my backpack, hoping it’ll make my stomach feel better.

“This class isn’t really my jam,” I admit in a whisper, trying to get over the Ben thing.

Let it go, Harriet. It’s not like I can rewind time or return to him.

I just need to believe I did the right thing, but I can’t stop staring at the back of Ben’s head several rows below me.

Is he upset? Devastated? Am I overstating my importance in his life? What if he doesn’t even give a shit? What if he’s hardly batting an eye? And why does that hurt more?

“Classical Mythology?” Xander asks.

“Yep.” I pop the green candy in my mouth, then point to myself. “Science nerd.”

Xander points to his chest. “History nerd. I could help you out.”

Plenty of people have more than one friend, but I’m not sure a friendship with Ben and one with Xander can co-exist. I swish the candy from one side of my cheek to the other as I contemplate accepting the offer.

Then the professor walks in. Our attention veers forward as the lecture hall falls hushed.

He looks like he might have lived among the likes of Athena and Achilles. He’s that old. Professor Wellington’s hair is white and fluffy like a cluster of clouds, and he hobbles to the podium so slowly we’re all holding our breath like we’re each on red alert to call 9-1-1 in case of a fall.

He passes the podium and shakily hands a stack of papers to a student in the first row. “Welcome to Classical Mythology,” he says in a soft, buttery voice. I need to strain my ears to catch everything even though he’s speaking into a microphone. Okay, sitting in the front row was the move.

As students begin passing the papers and the stack reaches Ben, I see him take one, then he stands to hand over the stack to a guy in the neighboring aisle. Once Ben has delivered the goods, I expect him to return to his seat.

Instead, he climbs the stairs with his backpack over his shoulder. Beneath the brim of his hat, he’s smiling at me.

My pulse skips, and confusion melts into blissful relief when I realize he’s headed straight for me. He claims the vacant seat at my side.

“You forgot this, Fisher.” He places my pen pouch on my desk.

“My hero,” I tease. “You going back to the middle row with the cool kids?” Please say no.

He folds out the retractable desk and sets his water bottle on it. “Nah, I think I’ll stick with the cooler backrow kids.”

Xander slouches more, his cheekbones sharpening as if he’s clenching his jaw.

Ben can see. “That okay with you, man?”

“Yeah, do whatever you want.” He stares unblinkingly at the blank projector screen.

When the papers come to our row, Xander slips one off the top and passes me the stack.

My pretzeled stomach plummets when I see the handwritten scrawl.

The professor handwrote the syllabus and scanned it.

Does he not own a computer? My confidence swirls down a drainpipe when I skim the course curriculum.

Four exams.

Two essays.

And a group fucking presentation.

My ears ring from the hysteria pulsing inside of me.

“The tests will be given orally,” Professor Wellington says. “I will read aloud the questions and you will write your answer on a sheet of paper.”

Murmurs echo in the room, and I let out a soft, “What the fuck.”

Ben skims my body in a slow onceover. “Are the hives starting?”

“I might be contracting something worse.” I pull at the collar of my shirt, feeling suffocated suddenly.

He hands me his water bottle, and I side-eye him like, are you sure?

A smile crawls over his face. “Cooties don’t exist.”

“Herpes does.”

“I don’t have herpes,” he assures while I take a grateful swig of water. Xander catches my eyes while I cap the bottle, and I tense, thinking back to him wishing he had water to offer me.

“Thank God for Cobalts, right?” Xander says quietly, with a hint of bitterness. “We’d never survive without them.” It sounds like a personal shot at Ben, but guilt instantly twists Xander’s face for even saying it. He mutters a soft, “Fuck.”

Ben heard. “Thank Cobalts for Cobalts, actually.” He says it pretty jokingly.

“Thanks for the correction, man. I forgot you’re gods among us mortal humans.” The sarcasm drips from Xander. He smears a hand down his face, then eyes the exit.

“We’re ceasing fire.” I reread the syllabus, panicking on too many accounts. “I really don’t need to take any stray bullets.”

Xander lets out a laugh. “My aim is terrible, so your worry is valid.” He glues the back of his skull to the wall again, staring straight ahead with reddening eyes.

Ben looks down to me, then back up to his cousin.

He seems worried about him. I try to concentrate on the potential presentation that we’ll need to deliver to over a hundred students and not how I’m sitting between two insanely hot guys, notably a Hale and a Cobalt, and a potential feud I didn’t even know existed until ten minutes ago.

“Hey, on the positive,” Ben whispers to me, “if the professor doesn’t own a computer, which seems likely, you can probably just get all your information from Wikipedia for the essays.”

I raise my brows. “You’re already plotting to cheat?”

Xander also makes a face like Ben has morphed into an unknown creature. I am getting the sense Ben has never advertised his duplicitous academic habits.

“Whatever helps the hives, Friend,” Ben says.

“Cheating will probably cause stomach ulcers.”

“We can’t have that. Tell your stomach to stay out of it.”

I almost smile. “My stomach is a nosy bitch.”

I half-expect him to drop his head and speak to my belly button ring, but he seems highly aware Xander is beside me.

We both go quiet when the professor instructs everyone to settle down. The next half hour goes by painstakingly slow as Wellington draws out explaining the topics for the semester.

When class ends, Xander is a rocket. He says a quick, “Bye, Harriet,” then exits before most students are even on their feet.

Ben watches Xander go while we gather up our things. By the tension in his face, I can tell that interaction bothered him. He’s half-focused on returning my pen to me but mostly peering at the door that Xander disappears through.

Leaving the auditorium, we head down the black-and-white checkered marble hallway. The arched ceilings and intricate beam work remind me how some rich architect built MVU back in the day to resemble European cathedrals. Nearly every building has stained glass windows and gargoyle turrets.

We step foot outside together, and the sun beats on the grassy quad where students sprawl out with their textbooks and friends. New York high-rises jut in the background, reminding me we’re actually in the city, but I’m digging the secluded collegiate feel of MVU’s campus.

“Sorry back there,” I say fast, needing to get this off my chest. “I didn’t mean to bail on you for Xander. I just?—”

“You saw a guy who needed an assist, and you came in with the save. Nothing to be sorry about.” He skims me up and down. “You’ll be a great doctor someday, petit oiseau.”

It lifts the weight off my body and goes further by filling my heart. It’s a total head-rush. His confidence really is a thing of beauty. “I know you’re calling me little bird , but the correct nickname based on what happened would be little bird shit .”

“Merde de petit oiseau?” He laughs, then says a much longer phrase in French.

I’m completely stumped, but my cheeks are on fire. “Is this going to be a Google translate situation?” I ask him.

His grin is infectious. “I said there’s nothing shitty about you.” His translation dives deeper into me.

I chew the inside of my cheek, feeling my smile reaching uncharted levels.

“Where are you off to next?” Ben asks after gulping some water.

I pull up my schedule on my phone. “I’m meeting with my honors advisor,” I say, “over on…north campus.”

“We are on north campus,” he says into a smile.

“Lucky me, then.” I hike the strap up to my falling backpack. “Where are you headed?”

He holds up his phone for me to see. Twenty-two missed texts. He must have kept it on silent because I never heard it go off in class. “My brothers,” he explains. “They’re relentless.”

“What do they want?” I ask.

“The usual. For me to hang out with them. I think Beckett must have put them up to it. They’re worried I’ll hate New York.”

“So now they’re on a group mission to make sure you love it?”

“More like to make sure I won’t move out in under two weeks. They want me to stick around.”

I frown. “Are you in threat of leaving?”

He nods, which plummets my stomach. “I can’t live with them all year. Charlie and I might kill each other.”

Okay, so he plans to stay in New York. He just needs to find new sleeping accommodations, which must be hard with his financial situation. I’m still not sure why he’s broke, even after he explained the stipulations behind his trust fund to me.

Maybe it’s an embarrassing story. Like he got duped or hustled out of a large fortune. It makes sense why he wouldn’t want to tell his family.

I figure when he’s ready, he’ll open up. It’s not like he’s taking an axe to my past. He’s been swinging gently. So I do too.

“Are you looking for an apartment?” I ask him.

“Not yet. First, I need to convince my brothers I’ll be fine on my own. It means hanging out with them a lot more than I would.”

I have so many questions. Why don’t his brothers think he’s fine? And why wouldn’t he want to spend time with them? Charlie, I get, but he doesn’t have any vitriol for the other three.

I want to ask but I’m running late.

Ben sees me check the time. “I’ll let you know how it goes with my brothers.” He eyes me. “Let me know how your honors advisor thing pans out too?”

My chest inflates with oxygen so suddenly that I feel like I could float into the sky.

“Yeah, sure,” I say, trying to sound casual.

Cool. I tell my brain, Relax. A hot guy asked you to update him on your day and he’ll update you on his .

He didn’t profess his love and ask you to bear his children. We’re good.

We’re good.