My Bully, My Forbidden Mate

Josie's POV "Look who decided to eat in the cafeteria today." I froze with my tray halfway to the table. Grant Callahan stood in my way, tall and smirking, with half the lacrosse team lined up behind him like an audience. "Grant, please. I just want to sit down." "Did I say you could?" He tilted the tray with one finger, and my pasta slid off the edge and splattered across my shoes. Laughter rippled through the room. It always did. "That table's for people who matter, Josie. You can eat on the floor. That's where trash belongs." I knelt to clean up the mess with a napkin, because arguing only made it last longer. His shadow fell over me. "Say it," he murmured, low enough that only I could hear. "Say what you are." My throat burned. "Nothing." "Good girl." He stepped over me and walked away like I was a puddle. I woke up gasping, tangled in an unfamiliar blanket, my heart slamming against my ribs. Pale light slid through the blinds of a room that smelled like new carpet and somebody else's vanilla candle. My dorm room. Not Westfield High. Not the cafeteria. Just a dream. "You okay over there?" My roommate, Brooke, was sitting up in bed, her dark curls a mess. She was awake. I couldn't figure out how, because I hadn't made a sound. "Bad dream. Sorry." "Don't be. Breathe. It's the first day of classes. Nerves are normal." She studied me a second longer than was comfortable, then flopped back onto her pillow. "Wake me if the building's on fire. Otherwise, I'm gone till ten." I almost laughed. Two days of living with Brooke Sullivan had taught me three things: she was kind, she was nocturnal, and she guarded her sleep like a dragon guarding gold. I slipped out of bed and stood in front of the mirror on the back of our door. I had a mantra for mornings like this one. I am not nothing. I am not nothing. I am not nothing. I'd started saying it in tenth grade, whispered into my pillow in the dark, and by senior year it was the only thing holding my spine straight. The girl in the mirror didn't look like the one in my nightmares. Over the summer, my body had finally caught up with the rest of me, and I'd chopped my limp, mousy hair into a chin-length bob that actually moved when I turned my head. There was one thing I couldn't change, though: the thin white scar on the inside of my left forearm. It was from the night Grant shoved me into a glass display case at the homecoming dance. Three stitches. He'd told the nurse I tripped. I tugged my sleeve down. Then, deliberately, I pushed it back up. Let it show. I wasn't hiding anymore. New school, new life, new me. Nobody here knew what Grant had done. Nobody here could tell me what I was. Daisy's Grind sat on the corner where the sidewalk met campus, all chalkboard signs and mismatched mugs, and it smelled like heaven. The line stretched to the door, but it moved fast. The woman at the register had silver streaks in her blond hair and a name tag that said DOLLY. "Morning, hon. What'll it be?" "Caramel latte, large, and a cinnamon scone, please." She squinted at me while she rang me up. "You been in before? You look so familiar." "First time. I'm a freshman." "Well, welcome. I'm Dolly. Come back and see me." She handed me my receipt. "I mean it." I was still smiling when I stepped outside. Then a cold finger of air slid down the back of my neck. I stopped and turned in a slow circle. Parked cars. Students in flip-flops. A squirrel on a trash can. Nothing. But my body, which had spent four years learning to feel danger before it arrived, didn't believe that. I kept walking, and two minutes later I smacked into what felt like a brick wall. It turned out to be a man's chest. My latte sloshed against the lid, and a steadying hand caught my elbow. "Whoa, easy. Sorry, I wasn't watching." His voice had an accent I couldn't place, something soft around the edges, as if he'd grown up very far from here. I looked up. And up. He had broad shoulders, sandy hair pulled back at his neck, and eyes the color of deep water. "My fault," I managed. "Doubtful." One corner of his mouth lifted. "Maybe I'll run into you again, little one." He was gone before I could think of a single word to say. I stood there with my mouth slightly open, like an i***t, and then I laughed at myself. Welcome to college, Josie. Behind me, a bell chimed over the shop door, and the smell of coffee and cinnamon followed me down the sidewalk. For the first time in years, nobody was watching me, and I decided I could get used to that. English Literature met in Hawthorne Hall, and by the time I got there, I understood the gossip I'd overheard at orientation. Professor Dalton looked about thirty-five. He had rolled-up sleeves, kind brown eyes, and a smile that could've sold toothpaste, and he was apparently the reason half the room had worn mascara to a nine o'clock class. I picked an empty seat on the left side, pulled out my notebook, and uncapped my pen. The hair on my arms stood up. There was a presence behind me. I knew it before I knew how I knew it, the way you know a storm is coming before the first drop falls. "Well, well," a voice said, low and rough. "Must be my lucky day." I knew that voice. I'd heard it in my sleep for four years. It had called me names in hallways and whispered nothing into my ear until I believed it. I shut my eyes, counted to three, and turned around. Grant Callahan was grinning at me.