Page 20 of My Return to the Walter Boys (My Life with the Walter Boys #2)

My phone vibrated against the bathroom counter just as I turned off the shower. After wrapping a towel around myself, I checked my messages.

Skylar

Scored drinks at Starbucks. Be there in fifteen.

I frowned. Why would he be—oh shit!

Somehow, I completely forgot about the student council meeting Erin scheduled for before class.

Knowing that the Walters would never willingly leave for school early, Skylar had offered to pick me up so we could attend together, but there was no way I’d be ready in time.

Still dripping wet, I grabbed my tote and rushed up the stairs toward my room.

Maybe I should braid my hair instead of drying it? I thought as I threw open the door. I stepped inside and—

My mind short-circuited, and I couldn’t process what I was seeing: Cole lying on his back in my old bed, bare-skinned and cheeks flushed, the sheet riding dangerously low on his waist and his hand moving beneath the thin material.

Our eyes met, and his widened in shock as he scrambled to pull up the sheets. “What the—”

“Oh shit, I’m so sorry,” I exclaimed, slapping a hand over my eyes.

“Morning, Jackie,” Cole said, his tone shifting to light and casual, like I hadn’t just walked in on him jerking off.

“This is all Erin’s fault!” I blurted. “She scheduled a student council meeting before homeroom, but I forgot to change my alarm, so now I’m running behind—”

“Jackie.”

“—and I still need to pick out something to wear and dry my hair and pack my bag, so I wasn’t thinking, and I rushed in here on autopilot, and now—”

“ Jackie! ”

I stopped word vomiting and peeked at Cole. His lips were clamped together as he tried not to laugh.

“It’s all good, okay?”

“I—what?”

“Don’t give yourself a conniption. It’s… not that big of a deal,” Cole told me. “But, um, if you could close the door on the way out, that would be appreciated.”

I blinked at him, his words not registering.

“Unless you’d rather stay and…” He trailed off, and his hand resumed moving underneath the sheet.

The involuntary noise that escaped the back of my throat was so embarrassing, I knew I’d agonize over it for hours to come. Cole snickered, and without another word, I shot out of the room and slammed the door behind me.

I moved through the rest of my morning in a mortified daze.

Not even the latte Skylar handed me when I climbed into his Jeep helped.

The agenda at the meeting revolved around homecoming, but I was too distracted to pay much attention.

As I walked to homeroom, the only thing I remembered was that Chase Kennedy asked about the plan for music—apparently the DJ who performed at last year’s spring fling sucked—and Erin mentioned hiring the block party battle of the bands winner.

I didn’t care either way. All I could think about was how I would never be able to face Cole again.

***

I spent my lunch period hiding in the library.

My essay for AP English Lit was due at the end of the week, and I figured I could avoid thinking about the incident if I buried myself in work.

After taking a seat at my favorite study nook, I turned on my laptop, took out my copy of Jane Eyre , and opened my notes.

I was finishing up my opening paragraph when I heard his name.

“Cole still works there? I thought he got into CU?”

I froze midword, fingers hovering over my keyboard.

“Yeah, on a football scholarship ,” a second person replied. “I bet he couldn’t afford to go after losing it.”

The reason I loved this particular nook?

It was tucked behind the reference section nobody ever used, which meant hardly anyone knew it was here.

As quietly as possible, I slid off my chair and crept to the end of the row.

When I peeked around the shelf, I spotted two girls from my U.S.

history class—a blond built like she played volleyball and a curly-haired brunette with vintage rhinestone glasses whose name I was fairly confident was Savannah.

They were sitting at one of the study tables, their heads bent together as they gossiped.

“That makes sense,” said Savannah as she slowly tore a piece of notebook paper into tiny pieces. “The Walters have a million kids. I bet they can’t afford to send any of them to college.”

“Didn’t they take in that Jackie girl, though?” her friend replied. “I heard she’s loaded.”

Ha! As if Cole, let alone Katherine and George, would let me pay for anything. No matter how desperately they needed the money, the Walters would never take a single penny from me. They were too proud.

“I think so, but she used to date Alex, and you know how much he and Cole loathe each other.”

The blond sniffed. “She probably didn’t want to help him.”

I clamped a hand over my mouth to muffle my snort of laughter. If the implication wasn’t so ridiculous, I would have been offended.

“Is it bad that I don’t really care?” Savannah asked. “Cole always thought he was better than everyone else. It’s about time life brought him down a peg or two. Besides, I love having something pretty to look at when I get my oil changed.”

My amusement evaporated. No doubt about it, Cole was cocky.

But he wasn’t the kind of person to maliciously look down on other people.

Sure, he liked to tease, but it was always lighthearted.

Clearly, these girls didn’t know him like I did.

It was a startling thing, suddenly feeling defensive of him, and I considered marching out from behind the bookshelf to give them a piece of my mind.

“Jackie, there you are!” someone said before I did something stupid.

I yelped and jerked my head back. Riley was standing beside me, a broad grin on her face.

“Don’t sneak up on people like that,” I said, swatting her arm. “You scared the crap out of me.”

“Sorry,” she replied, not looking the least bit apologetic as she bounced from foot to foot.

“I’ve been searching everywhere for you!

You’ll never guess what just happened. Alex’s friend Marcus asked me to go to the movies with him tonight.

We’re partners in physics, so I’ve been flirting with him all week, but I didn’t think it would go anywhere. ”

“The guy from his GoG guild?” I’d only met him once before at the Walter end-of-the-school-year party, but Marcus gave me the creeps.

“What? Oh no. You’re thinking of Malcolm. They’re two totally different people. Marcus and Alex are on the baseball team together.”

“I’ve never met him, but if you’re happy, then so am I.” Maybe if she had a boyfriend, Riley would be too distracted to bug me about Cole.

Riley gave a contented sigh. “ Beyond happy. I’m hoping he’ll ask me to homecoming if tonight goes well. Do you think I could raid your closet after school? I need to find the perfect outfit.”

“Well, I have a lot of homework…”

“Pretty please?” She pouted her lips. “My mom gave me a gift card for that new café you like. If you let me come over, I can pay you in frozen caramel goodness.”

“Okay, deal.”

***

“Huh, that’s strange,” I said, my eyes narrowing as Riley pulled up alongside the truck and parked her car.

“What’s strange?”

I pointed out the windshield to where Lee was rocking back and forth on the porch swing, a textbook in hand. “ That. ”

“Um, okay.” Riley gave me a strange look before flipping down the sun visor to access the mirror. “Are you guys not allowed on the swing or something? My mom is weird about stuff like that too. There’s this fancy sofa in our sitting room that we can’t use because it’s imported from Europe.”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “He’s pretending to study.”

“What makes you think he’s pretending?” she asked as she uncapped a tube of lip gloss, then applied a thick coat.

“Because that’s a chemistry textbook.”

“So?”

“Lee’s a junior.” I unclipped my seat belt and grabbed one of the straps on my backpack, which was tucked between my feet. “We all have physics.”

“Oh,” Riley said. “Maybe he’s really into science?”

That was highly unlikely. From what I observed, Lee slacked off in school.

Not to the same extent Alex did, but he preferred to spend his time skating over studying and doing homework.

I couldn’t recall a single instance where I’d seen him touch a book before today.

What I did notice, however, was that Lee kept glancing up from his reading material, and of all the spots to sit on the front porch, the one he had picked had the best view of the driveway.

It looked like he was waiting for something.

“Come on.” I opened the car door and hefted my backpack onto my shoulder as I stepped out. “Let’s go talk to him.”

“Can I help you ladies with something?” Lee asked when I approached him.

“You can tell us what you’re up to,” I replied.

The corner of his mouth quirked. “No can do, Jackie. But if I were you, I’d use the back door.”

“Is there a reason why?”

“Trust me,” he said. “You’ll be sorry if you don’t.”

Well, that was ominous. There was a point in time when I’d have scoffed at Lee’s warning and done the opposite, not trusting a single word he spoke, but now I decided to take his advice.

After giving him a nod of thanks, I directed Riley around the side of the house.

Usually you could find at least one Walter in the backyard at this time of day—playing on the swing set, swimming in the pool, roughhousing on the lawn—but there was nobody in sight, and when I pushed open the sliding glass door and stepped into the kitchen, the room was empty.

The house was entirely too quiet.

“What do you think is going on?” Riley asked, her voice low.

“Definitely some type of shenanigans,” I whispered back. “Why don’t you go upstairs and start looking for an outfit while I investigate.”