Count On Me(21)

There’s an electric surge through me as his hand brushes against mine while we’re walking and it almost stops me in my tracks. If I didn’t want to escape him and the way I’m feeling, I would stop, but my need to get away wins out. I can’t let him, or anyone else, see me break down.

“Belle, stop.” His voice commands softly and I’ll be damned if my body doesn’t instantly respond. It does nothing for the racing of my heart, but it does ground my thoughts, at least for the moment.

I raise my eyes in question and I catch his smile again. The fluttering I felt yesterday returns and I’m confused. What is it about Kayden that makes this happen?

“I want to walk with you, but it’s like you can’t get away from me fast enough.”

“What do you want from me?!” I scream inside my head, wishing that the words would just come out of my now half open mouth. If I could just get the words out like a normal human being, maybe all of this could end and I could get back to normal, but no, that’s never how my life works.

Sliding my backpack off my arm, I unzip it and drag out a notepad and pen. I begin scribbling and I push the pad at him, zipping up my bag and turning again to walk away.

Let him take what he wants from it, but I can’t be a part of whatever it is he’s attempting to do. I might not be like everyone else, but I did mean what I wrote him yesterday. I don’t want to hear his apologies. I can’t believe it.

“What do you think I’m trying to do?” he calls to me when I’m about three feet away. Stopping and waiting a few seconds to see if he’s going to follow that question up with anything, I turn back on my heels and stomp back to him. Grabbing the pad from his hands, I again start writing. If nothing else comes from this, I need him to know that I can’t be near him right now. It’s doing more harm than good.

I think you’re trying to do what you started with Eric yesterday. You told me you enjoy hurting people. So if this is your way of getting close to me so you can hurt me, just stop. I don’t like you standing this close to me, touching me, because I don’t know what it means. It makes me feel things I don’t understand and it’s scaring me. If you care at all, please, just let me go or everything’s just gonna get worse.

I start to walk away again, but this time he doesn’t give me a chance to get more than maybe two steps away. He grabs me by the wrist and spins me around until I’m facing him again.

“This isn’t a trick. I know you don’t believe that, so I’ll let you go for now, but Isabelle Reagan, I’m not done with you.”

True to his word he releases his hold and I just stare at the place where his fingers rested. My heart is still beating wild in my chest and the words I want to say are all garbled and stuck in my throat. Before I can start walking away, he does first and the minute he’s out of earshot, I let out the breath I’ve been holding.

What does he mean by ‘I’m not done with you’ and why did my heart still for a tiny second when he said my name that way?



Kayden



Whatever it is you’re trying to do, just stop. Please leave me alone.

I actually expected to see those words, so when they came, it didn’t even faze me. It was everything that came next that blew me away. It was hard to read at first, her having written it as fast as she did, but I got the gist pretty damn quick.

If I wasn’t determined to do what she told me, seeing her back as she walked away from me would have seriously pissed me off. I’ve never had this much trouble getting close to a girl, let alone talking to one. Usually they climb all over themselves trying to get my attention and that’s not me laying on an ego trip, it’s the truth. When you’re a football player, it’s almost a god given right that every female within spitting distance will want you. At least that’s how it is in Wexfield.

Isabelle has got to be the most difficult girl, no—person that I’ve ever dealt with and it’s got nothing to do with what’s wrong with her. She’s just not like any other person I’ve met before and that’s why I’m so damn determined to get close to her, even if it means blowing up the entire social order of the school to do it.

I know it’s only a matter of time before word of me talking to her gets around. By lunch it’s going to be front page news in the school paper for Christ sakes. It’s just the way it works here, but I seriously don’t care.

It makes me feel things I don’t understand and it’s scaring me.

She’s not the only one that’s confused by what they’re feeling. She’s also not the only one that’s scared here. This girl, damn. I’ve been going out of my way to avoid her since the day I turned ten. What the hell I’m doing around her now is beyond me. I don’t want to scare her, but I also don’t think I’m quite ready to give up on her just yet. I need to know what it is about her that I can’t seem to walk away from first.