Chapter Five

Jace's POV

We lost the fucking game.

Now, Coach was screaming at me, the team captain who’d royally fucked up, and I stood there with my helmet under my arm and took every word with my mouth shut because what the fuck was I going to say.

That I couldn’t see the field, because every time I’d lined up to throw, I kept seeing her face instead, those stupid brown eyes looking at me from across the hallway.

I hit the gym showers, not the locker room, because I was still too full of shame and disappointment over losing that I couldn’t yet face my team and give them the encouragement and morale they needed.

But despite the hot water rushing over my head, I still couldn’t focus.

The thing that was killing me, the thing I couldn’t get my head around, was that it made no fucking sense.

She was nothing. She was a plain, stubborn, broke, socially invisible nerd who had no business being within ten feet of my life, and yet there I was, throwing interceptions, losing games, unable to concentrate because I couldn’t get her face out of my head.

Those big eyes. That soft voice, afraid but firm and brave despite the odds.

I caught myself having those thoughts about her again and groaned with frustration.

I fucking hated her.

Later on, I texted Alison from the parking lot on my way back home.

Woodview hotel tonight. 10 pm.

She responded immediately

Just got new lingerie, can’t wait to show it to you, sweetheart.

I glared down at her message, waiting to feel something, some excitement. But as usual, nothing happened.

I already knew how tonight would go. How it always went every single time I used another girl to try to forget about Lena Hartwell. I’d still end up staring at the ceiling afterwards with the same name going on a loop in my head.

Lena, Lena, Lena.

Lena, smiling only for Coach Ellis, Lena, laughing at me like I was the saddest thing she’d ever seen.

Like she fucking pitied me.

In a rage, I stepped on the gas, accelerating until the Porsche went as fast and hard as it would go.

Mom was in the entryway when I got home, waiting for me.

“Jace, sweetheart, I just want to—”

“Are you firing her?”

“What?”

“Are you firing the tutor?”

“What? No, I just—”

“Then I don’t want to hear it.”

“Please, just five—”

I was already on the stairs, headed to my room. She called after me twice more, and I kept walking because if I stopped, I was going to say something that even I couldn’t take back.

I stopped at Martin’s door and pushed it open. He was asleep, one of his train models still clutched in both hands, all the tension and deep sadness he carried all day, gone.

I crossed the room quietly and eased the model out of his grip and set it with the others on his shelf, before standing for a moment to watch over him.

This. This was the only thing in my life that made any sense. My little brother.

“I’m just doing what’s best for you both,” Mom said softly from the doorway. “You know that.”

I pulled Martin’s blanket up to cover his ears and walked out without answering.

She meant well. She always meant well.

But meaning well didn’t stop the parade of useless, condescending, pathetically unqualified "tutors" who’d walked through this house over the last two years and made is brothers life worse instead of better.

Like the one who kept talking over him, the other one kept touching him when he’d made it clear he didn’t want to be touched. The one I’d overheard in the kitchen on his phone, calling him, my brother, a retard.

I made sure to beat the fear of God into that one, personally.

Eventually, I went back to my room, jacket on the floor, sitting on the edge of my bed with my head in my hands, when I heard the front door open downstairs.

My mother’s voice came first.

Then another lower, quieter voice.

I went very still.

I counted to sixty. Then to sixty again. Then I stopped counting.

Soon I heard her footsteps on the stairs. Heard the guest room door, directly across the hall from me, open and close. Heard her moving around in there, opening and closing drawers.

Like it was normal. Like she hadn’t cost me a game today and walked away from me like I was nothing.

I lasted five minutes.

She was bent over a box with her back to me when I shoved her door open, unpacking like she had every right to be here.

I crossed the room, grabbed the box, and furiously threw it at the wall. It burst open, the cheap contents skidding everywhere, and she spun around with her eyes wide.

“What the…”

“You’ve got some nerve, Hartwell.” My voice came out rough, scraped raw with fury. “You actually showed up. After everything I said. After everything that happened today, you still walked into my house.”

She pressed her fingers to her forehead, closed her eyes and exhaled, “Oh God, not this again-”

I stepped closer, snarling at her, “Fucking look at me when I’m talking to you.”

She opened her eyes instantly. I’d moved without thinking, and now we were close enough that I could see her expression shift from mild irritation to a deep, primal fear. Good. She should be very afraid.

All of a sudden, she opened her mouth to scream on top of her voice.

“Mrs Daw—”

I covered her mouth with my hand before she could finish. My other arm hit the wall beside her head, and she stumbled back into it, and suddenly there was nowhere for either of us to go.

We were nose to nose, breathing hard. I could feel her pulse hammering against my palm, and her eyes above my hand were wide and dark and furious.

I was acutely aware of everything. The warmth of her skin. The softness of her lips against my palm, the way she smelled. The rise and fall of her chest.

Stop it. Focus.

“Since you insist on staying here for whatever stupid, misguided reason, there are a few rules you must follow. I will tell them to you, and you will nod to show you understand. Got it?”

She nodded slowly, her eyes clouded over with fear as I towered over her much shorter frame.

“Rule number one.” My voice was low and gravelly in her ear. I made it as threatening as possible.

“Outside this house, you don’t know me. You don’t look at me. You don’t speak to me. You don’t exist anywhere near me. I don’t care what you have to do differently; you do it. Do you understand?”

She glared at me above my hand, then she nodded sharply.

“Rule number two.” The skin contact was making it very difficult to think in straight lines, and I hated her for that, too.

“You stay in your part of the house. Your room, the study, the kitchen. That’s it. Despite what my mother might think, you are not a guest here; you’re here to do a job, so you go where the job requires and nowhere else. Stay out of sight. Do. You. Understand?”

She nodded. Her eyes hadn’t left mine; they stared straight through to my soul, making me feel like she could see every layer, even deep underneath, at the things I never wanted anyone to see.

“Rule number three.” I held her gaze and made sure every word landed.

“My brother is not a charity project. He is not something for you to practice on or feel good about yourself for helping. He is a human being, and you will treat him exactly like one. And if I ever, ever find out that you’ve done otherwise, tried to use him to get revenge on me or—”

I felt a sharp, sudden burst of pain, right across my palm. She’d bitten me!

I yanked my hand back, and she took advantage of my being distracted to shove me hard with both hands.

I was so completely caught off guard that I actually stumbled backwards.

“I have never bullied anyone in my entire life.” Her voice was shaking, but her eyes were absolutely furious. “I would never hurt your little brother. Never. He’s just a kid, and not all of us can be monsters like you.”

I looked at her. At the anger still blazing in her eyes on top of everything else she was holding together, and I felt a pang in my chest that I refused to name.

I reached into my pocket, pulled out her phone, and threw it at her.

She scrambled a bit before finally catching it against her chest, while I walked to the door and grabbed the door handle.

“Just you wait, princess.” I pulled it open. “You have absolutely no idea how monstrous I can get.”