What am I doing? This wasn’t the plan.

This isn’t what I’d intended to do when I came out the back door of the bar to look for Sydney. I never expected to find Jarett here—though I’d be a liar if I said I didn’t hope to catch a glimpse of him—and I had no desire to talk to him again, let alone ask him for help.

Why should I want to catch a glimpse of him after the way he behaved?

No idea. How should I know? I mean, he’s hot.

And we have history. I guess somewhere deep inside I can’t accept that he brushed me off like that, like I’m nothing to him.

I wanted a second shot, a second chance to see if I misunderstood him. If he’s different without his friends around, like Sydney suggested.

Sydney. God. I don’t know what’s going on with her, and Jarett…

Jarett is way too close. He’s moving toward me, and I have nowhere left to go, the fire escape digging into my back.

My breath leaves my lungs in a rush. What’s going on here? He’s stalking me in the half-dark, powerful muscles shifting in his thighs, his faded jeans molding to them like second skin, his jacket stretching over his wide shoulders, and his eyes…

His eyes are dark as he comes to a stop, dark and hot. His chest is a wall in front of me. He leans in, bracing a hand on the fire escape, and his gaze dips to my mouth.

Am I imagining this? Is it a dream?

I’ve been thinking about him, about the boy I knew, the man he is now. About how little I know about him. I can’t stop myself from wanting to find out more, but a quick search online came up with nothing.

And now he’s right here.

“Jarett.” I put a hand on his chest, as if to stop him, but it’s a mistake. Even through the jacket I can feel how hard his abs are, all ridges and hollows, like sculpted rock under my palm.

A tremor goes through him. His chest rises and falls beneath my hand.

“Gigi,” he whispers, his voice rough. He’s wound up so tightly, his jaw clenched, his lashes dipping low. He lifts a hand to my face, and I flinch when he cups my cheek, but that’s all he does, his fingers warm on my cold skin. “Fuck, Gigi.”

Now he seems to remember who I am, I think, a tiny bit of resentment trying to make its way through the confusion and excitement and desire.

But my body is arching toward him on its own, not waiting for any instructions from my conscious brain. He smells of tobacco and sexy man.

He’s going to kiss me, I think.

He’s going to press his powerful body to mine.

After all this time, all these years imagining how it could be, I’m going to feel it. Taste his mouth. Get crushed under his body. Feel the stubble on his face under my hands.

Know what it’s like to be wanted by Jarett Lowe.

But he doesn’t.

Kiss me, that is. His mouth stays inches from mine, his lips slightly parted, his breaths rasping in the cold night air, but he’s still.

“You should really go now,” he says. “Run away before I take a bite out of you.”

“I’m not a cupcake, or a… a cookie for you to bite,” I breathe, my brain sluggish. My heartbeat is beating a maddening rhythm between my legs.

“But you fucking smell like one,” he growls, “and I’ll just bet you taste like one, too. You just…”

“Just what?” I whisper.

He pushes off me and swallows hard. “Fuck. Nothing. Leave me the hell alone, dammit.”

I blink at him, still caught in his spell. “But…”

“Go back to your druggie friend, Gigi.”

That clears the cobwebs. Gathering my wits about me, I lift my chin. “No. Not until you say you’ll help me.”

“With what?”

I tug on the hem of my skirt. “I want you to keep an eye out for Sydney.”

“No fucking way in hell.”

I glance up, surprised at the vehemence in his tone. “Why not?”

“I’m not capable of taking care of more people, Gigi, okay? I just can’t.”

Something in his voice stops me, a crack that resonates inside me. “What other people are you taking care of?”

He kicks at a piece of trash on the filthy alley floor. “Forget it, Gigi. Look, you really shouldn’t be near me, got it? Scram.”

Frustrated, I glance at the bar’s back exit, then back at him. His gorgeous eyes. His mouth. His bad-boy attitude. The tension radiating off his body.

All the conflicting signals are hurting my brain, but I can’t let Sydney go down without a fight, and right now, Jarett seems like my only chance. He hangs around the same places she does, he knows people and things.

Always has.

“Just help me, please? She’s my best friend. She’s a good girl, and… I’m scared for her.” Hearing myself saying the words out loud sends a shiver through me. “I’m scared she got involved in something she can’t get out of.”

“And what am I supposed to do? Spank her?”

“Don’t be a dick.” God, why did I think he’d be nice? “You’re the one who told me the people she deals with are dangerous. Just keep an eye on her, make sure she doesn’t get hurt. And meanwhile I’ll try again to talk to her, convince her to stop with this… Hey, are you listening to me?”

He huffs, maybe in laughter, digging a pack of smokes out of his back pocket and turning away from me to light up. “Me? You’re the one who didn’t listen to a word I said.”

Come again? “What the hell, Jarett? I’m asking you for a favor.”

He blows out smoke, the cold air bringing the scent of fresh tobacco over to me. “Know what? Sure. For the right price, I’ll watch over your stupid little friend.”

“Syd isn’t stupid.” I think. In any case, only I get to call her that. She’s my bestie. And then… his words sink in. “What sort of price?”

He smirks, makes a show of looking me up and down. It’s not hot like it was before. Now it’s calculating, and cold. “What do you think?” He reaches down, adjusts himself through his jeans, and I find my gaze drawn to his package.

“I don’t understand…”

He’s hard, I realize. Fully hard, I can see the outline of his cock, and it should bother me, make me furious—but instead I feel hot, unable to look away.

His eyes narrow. “You suck me off,” he says, “every time I help your friend. That’s the deal. Take it or leave it.”

Cold shock runs through me. “You serious?”

“As a heart attack.”

God, I can’t… can’t think straight. This is where I give him the finger and go away, just as he told me many times to do, right? Where I never come near him again. He’s not the boy I used to know. How many times do I have to have that reality shoved into my face to believe it?

I want to slap him. Kick him in the nuts.

Undo his jeans and wrap my hand around his hard-on.

Oh God, I’m going crazy. This is stupid, and I’d do anything for Syd, but not this… Not get hot and sweaty with Jarett Lowe, undress him… Touch him, feel him, taste him…

Surely not.

“So what do you say, sweet cheeks?” he drawls, still smoking, like we’re discussing the weather. “You in?”

“God,” I whisper, and lick my dry lips, my heart pounding. I’m hot and bothered, and so frigging pissed I can’t even. “What happened to you? Of course I’m not in. Forget I ever asked.”

Fuming, I turn and march back into the bar. Something I should have done long ago, the moment, in fact, I saw him lurking there, at the end of the alley.

God, if I get my hands on Syd, I’ll strangle her.

I’m so frigging mad—and the worst part is that I’m not sure if I’m more upset with her, or with myself for being so damn naïve and thinking Jarett would help me.

The boy I remember is gone.

* * *

History class is dead boring and so late in the day that my eyes keep closing. It’s warm inside the amphitheater, and Professor Emery is droning on about some medieval torture device and battering rams.

I swear I’m not making that up.

Checking the time on my phone for the thousandth time, I stifle a yawn with my hand. God, the things you have to do for a degree. Who needs to know about battering rams in order to become a nutritionist? If the lecture doesn’t come to an end soon, I’m going to open a vein.

I’ve been doodling in my notebook, with some random bits of info written here and there. I read them over now.

Battering rams were BIG.

Pull back, and then slam into door.

Ram head replaced by that of a WOLF’s—Tolkien lore?

What did I mean by all that? And why is my face getting warm, and my insides clenching? It’s just that… for some reason, reading the words all I can see in my mind is Jarett in that back alley, that smirk on his handsome face and that bulge in his jeans, his hard-on so prominent. Obvious. Big. Like a battering ram.

God. I rub at my flushed cheeks. How can I still want him, after what he said, that sleazy proposal he made me? He knew I’d refuse. But that wasn’t all. He did it on purpose. He made me feel humiliated, cheapened, when he could have just said no.

Though he did say no.

“I’m not capable of taking care of more people.”

He never explained what he meant.

I look down and find that my doodles have looped around a word on the page. His name. I’ve written his name in the center of the page, inside a tangle of thorns and ravens and bloody roses.

Awesome.

I’m sick. I keep finding excuses for him. So he said no, and some cryptic comment. But instead of discussing it like a normal person, he propositioned me. Help Syd in exchange for sucking his dick. Who does that?

An answering throb starts between my legs.

I drop my head on the desk. Unbelievable. Just goes to show that lust has nothing to do with intelligence. I’m not stupid. But my body is.

They say love is blind. Well, if love is blind, then lust is stupid. A total slut.

Makes me crave a guy I shouldn’t want.

And my memory keeps replaying the times he was nice to me, so that I can’t stop myself from wanting to find out more about him, find out what happened in the time I lost track of him—and before that. Before I met him.

All those rumors that were circulating about him, were any of them true?

Funny how my throat closes at the thought. Those rumors were pretty hardcore. Over the top.

Nah, I bet his childhood was nothing like that. This isn’t a movie.

Still, it makes me all the more curious to know. To understand him, understand what put that core of steel in him, that hardness in his eyes, in his words. What planted that metal seed that’s been growing branches, covering him in impenetrable armor. A cruel seed that’s been changing him from the inside out.

I shouldn’t have left the bar to talk to him.

I shouldn’t have asked for his help.

I shouldn’t have considered his words for a second.

No matter how hot he is.

Oh God, the professor is still talking. Turning my notepad sideways, I doodle a cocktail glass and a bottle.

That’s it. The bar. Merc said Jarett works at this bar nearby. I could drop by and ask a few questions.

What was the name of the place again? Something to do with ass. Ass end?

Tight End. That’s the one. I’ve passed in front of it a few times, never paid it much attention. Sydney usually chooses the bars and clubs when we go out—and now I guess I know why, if she chooses them according to their drug selection and not how hot the guys hanging out there are. Like the frat party she wants us to attend tomorrow.

And although I want to refuse to go with her, I know I can’t. Especially not now that I know why she’s going.

God, Syd… She’s in this mess, and Jarett is not who I thought he was, either. I never saw any of it coming.

Thing is, I never see anything coming. What happened in Destiny, then finding Jarett only to lose him. Lose him and find him again, on the night I saw Sydney in that alley with a drug dealer.

Just goes to show. I drop my pen on the desk and pull my hair out of my face, knotting it quickly on top of my head. I mean, what do I know, in the end?

Something? Nothing?

Much less than I thought I did, that’s for sure.

* * *

The bar is quiet and dim as I step inside and let the door close at my back. I take a deep breath. Wipe my hands on my skirt.

I stood outside for ages, ridden by doubt, before I mustered my courage and entered. This isn’t like me, to be so nervous, scared of something as trivial as checking out a bar and asking a few questions.

Then again, it was always different where Jarett was concerned. My bravado always deserted me when it came to him. Everything around him felt… important.

More important than anything else in my silly little life, and I won’t start thinking about how empty it felt after we moved and I lost contact with him.

Because that’ll only serve to scare me more.

I’m only here to satisfy my curiosity, I tell myself, find out anything I can about Jarett, because… because…

I just want to know. Could be because he was such an ass to me last time, I decide as I advance toward the back where the bar is, a dark, polished affair with dim Christmas strings of lights hanging behind, over the shelves with the drinks. He changed.

Right? He totally did. He was a quiet loner when I met him, not an arrogant jerk. I mean, I would have noticed. I would have known. I wouldn’t have handed my heart—

“What will you have?” The man has dark hair and wide shoulders, and for a moment my heart actually frigging stops.

Oh God.

But then I realize it’s not Jarett. Finding him here was a very real possibility, which I somehow failed to consider. Of all the brilliant, thought-out plans…

“A beer?”

“Are you asking me?” He gives me an easy grin.

I lick my dry lips. “A Bud.”

“You got it.”

He’s handsome, I notice as I settle on a stool, stashing my backpack at my feet and placing my purse on the bar. Attractive in an older, darker sort of way.

Older and darker than Jarett, and I really have to stop doing this. Comparing every guy I see to Jarett.

It’s not healthy.

Especially since there’s never been anything between us. I thought we were friends once, but even that turned out to be a lie.

The bartender slides the Bud in front of me, and I wipe the mouth before I take a sip. “Is it always so empty in here?”

He chuckles. “Nah. Soon it will fill up. You came just in time to get a good spot at the bar.”

Ah. I take another sip of beer. “This place hasn’t been around long. I know all the bars around the campus.”

“Opened a few months ago.” He wipes the bar down, and leans over it. “I’m David, by the way.”

“Gigi.”

His brows arch. “Interesting name. Short for what?”

I open my mouth to tell him, but find myself oddly reluctant. “Just Gigi,” I mutter.

“Fair enough.” He shrugs and turns away to cut some limes and cucumber slices on a board. “So how did you end up here?”

“Well, I heard an old friend of mine works here, so… I came to see if the rumors are true.”

All the rumors, new and old. But can this guy help me?

“What’s his name?”

“Jarett.”

“You’re friends with J? That’s a first.”

“What do you mean?”

He finishes cutting up the limes and throws them into a bowl, then does the same with the cucumber slices. “I just never met any friends of his.”

My heart sinks. “You don’t know him well.”

“Nobody knows J well, sugar. He keeps mostly to himself.” He turns around, gives me an assessing look. “I take it he’s not expecting you to show up here.”

I shrug. “It’s complicated.”

“Isn’t it always?” He sighs. “So why are you here, then, if not to meet him?”

“Just grabbing a beer.” I take a swig, to demonstrate. “And to see where he works.”

“Ah-huh.” He folds his arms on the bar. “Ask away.”

“Ask what?”

“The questions you came here to ask. I can’t give you his number, just FYI. I should always start with that.”

I realize I’m gaping. “You make it sound like girls come here all the time to ask for Jarett’s number.”

He tsks. “Only every other day.”

Oh crap. My plan officially sucks. I so didn’t need to know that. “So…”

“No, he doesn’t have a girlfriend. No, he’s not gay. Yes, he has an address. No, I can’t give it to you. Yes, he works here.” He stops. I wonder what my face looks like. “Did I cover your questions, or was there something else?”

Wait… Is that pity in his eyes? Jesus. I feel sick.

“Look.” I prepare to jump off the stool and make my escape. “That’s not why I’m here, okay? I knew Jarett years ago, and lost track of him. I just wanted to reconnect.”

“Sure.” David straightens, his gaze raking over me. “Lucky son of a bitch. All the pretty girls are after him.”

Suddenly, I don’t like this David all that much anymore. “Listen, asshole. Forget it, okay? I’ll be on my way.” I fish out my wallet and push some bills on the bar. “Have yourself a good night.”

“Hey.”

I’m already off the stool and heading toward the exit, furious with David, and furious with Jarett. All the girls asking about him, huh? Wanting his number. Wanting to know if he has a girlfriend.

Bitches. How could they…? And even worse, how does he…?

Know what? Never mind. Asking questions. What was I thinking? This is stupid. What would they know about him here, anyway?

And why am I so set on looking into him when he was such a douche last time we met?

“Hey, Gigi.” David is running after me. “Your backpack.”

Shit. “Thanks.” I take it from him, sling it over my shoulder. “Good night.”

“Wait. Sorry, okay? I’m just used to girls plastering themselves all over him every night.”

Oh God, another visual I didn’t need. “Right.”

“If there is any question I could answer for you…?”

I think about it, my hand already on the door. One question. What do I have to lose, right? “Does he sleep with all those girls asking after him?”

He blinks. Snorts. “No. Not all.”

I slap a hand over my mouth. Holy shit, Gigi. What is wrong with you?

David wanders back to the bar, and I step outside, my heart racing. That wasn’t the question I’d meant to ask, dammit. I was going to ask if he’d ever mentioned his mom, or his past.

Standing in the cold, I ask myself what exactly I’m doing. Getting jealous of other girls Jarett has slept with? Playing detective and poking my nose where it doesn’t belong?

Whatever it is, it’s stupid, and it’s getting abundantly clear that it’s time I stopped.