Normal. Almost.
Her phone buzzed first. She checked it, frowning faintly. “My mom’s blowing up my phone. I need to get home. Walk out with me?”
“I just need ten more minutes,” I countered. “I promised Mr. Lewis I’d leave it clean.”
Avery hesitated. “You text Luke?”
“Yes, he knows I’m here with you.”
“And your mom?”
“Yep.”
Avery’s phone buzzed again. She glanced at it then grimaced. “I’ve really gotta go. But seriously, you’ll only be here ten minutes after I leave?”
I rolled my eyes. “I promise, ten minutes max. Besides, I’m not here alone. There’s still staff in the building.”
She left reluctantly, glancing back once before disappearing down the hall, already typing on her phone. I knew she was texting Luke.
I finished rinsing the brushes slowly then put the charcoal away. After, I wiped down the counter and finally stacked our canvases carefully off to the side of the counter. The building had changed into that hollow after-hours hum. A phone ringing in the direction of the office. A door slamming somewhere far off.
I shut the art room door behind me, my bag slung over my shoulder. It was quiet in the hallway, deserted. Halfway down the hall, the hairs on the back of my neck prickled. I wasn’t alone. Someone was watching me.
Logan stepped out from the shadowed stretch near the science wing. There was no smirk. His expression looked predatory. “You’re alone,” he observed.
My fingers flexed around my phone as I shifted my weight. “Not for long.”
A humorless sound left him. “Luke’s not here. He’s still at the rink.”
The hallway felt narrower. He stepped closer.
Something in his expression slipped—whatever restraint he usually carried was gone.
“Stay the hell away from me.”
“You don’t get it,” he continued, voice low and uneven. “What happens next isn’t about you.”
I tried to go around him. His hand shot out and caught my wrist. Hard. My phone slipped from my grip and clattered uselessly to the floor.
“Logan. Let go.”
“It’s not personal,” he pressed. “You’re what he cares about the most. That makes you the only way to get to him.”
That was when I understood. I was the instrument. The pressure point.
“You’re dating the favored heir to the family that buried mine when his dad fired my father, stripped his pension, and basically blackballed him,” he continued. “We’re going to lose everything. And you think someone isn’t going to make them pay for that?”
“This isn’t your fight,” I replied.
He tightened his grip.
“Everything is my fight now.”
I twisted my wrist toward his thumb, Edwardo’s voice in my head—break the grip at the weakest point.
His fingers loosened just enough. I ripped free and stepped back, bringing my fist up fast and tight the way I’d been taught. I drove it straight into his nose. The impact jarred up my arm.
Blood bloomed instantly. He staggered. For half a second, I had space. I pivoted, aiming a strike toward his throat.