Blind Spot - Katana Collins Page 0,14

notes higher, and his eyebrows arched.

“You bother me,” I snapped. I immediately regretted looking when I was met with his smug grin.

“I like a challenge,” he offered with a head tilt.

“Well, then, consider me your Everest.”

“Is that an invitation to climb on top of you?” he asked, his eyebrows lifting, awaiting my response.

I shook my head because, seriously? That line was cheesy. It also made my skin tight and tingly. “If those lines have ever worked, then I feel really disappointed in my generation.” I managed to keep my composure with the retort, even though my mouth felt dry.

I’m disappointed in myself. Why did that easy smile and stupid, smug line have me blushing? I’d never in my life needed a cold shower—until this very moment. The flush heated my cheeks and sent tingles of awareness spiraling down to the tips of my breasts. The very thought of him crawling on top of me caused my skin to reach to lava-like temperatures. I took a sip of coffee to calm my frazzled nerves. Holy hell, could he sense how he was getting to me? Thank God the professor chose that moment to come in and call the class to order.

The first thirty minutes or so was spent with him handing out the syllabus and speaking exclusively in French. I hated when teachers did that—they think it forces you to learn the language, but mostly it just results in me zoning out. I struggled to keep up, only catching every fourth word or so, and when I stole a glance at Tate, he was doodling in his notebook. He flicked a glance at me, smirking, then tore out the sheet, sliding it over to my desk.

It was a sketch of Archie, giving Betty flowers with a word bubble above that said “Fuck Veronica.” I snorted and covered a hand to my mouth. The professor caught my eye with a stern look, and I flipped the sheet over quickly.

Once he went back to his French (i.e., gibberish), I snuck another glance at Tate, and a tremor skimmed across my chest. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from that cobalt stare of his. It was as though he could hypnotize me into a trance, and with a snap of his fingers, I would reveal all my secrets, all my fantasies, which I was perhaps even too afraid to admit to myself, to him. I swallowed against my drying throat because, shit, that scared me.

Where is this vulnerability coming from? I’m not a girl who grows weak in the knees.

I wasn’t the sort of person who melted when a cute boy looked at me, and the fact that he could weaken me with one simple glance was terrifying.

Something rustled in front of me, and I looked to the seat in front of me to find Harrison handing me a pointed stare and a stack of papers. I startled, taking a page and passing the rest down. A test? On the first day?

Son of a bitch—I was going to kill Reagan.

Chapter Five

TATE

“Tatum Gordon Michaelson, so help me, you will straighten yourself out. Do you hear me?”

Mom’s voice shrilled higher with each passing second.

I debated saying nothing, just to hear her go supersonic. “Tate. Are you listening?” she screamed, and I jerked my head back from the deafening sound. Even Buddy perked, tilting his head at the odd noise.

“Yes. Jeez, Mom. I hear you. Every dog in the building can hear you.”

There was an exasperated huff from the other line. “Don’t you sass me. Besides, that mutt of yours is the only dog in the building, and you know it. We had to pay three times what a normal pet deposit would be.” Mom had the quintessential southern belle drawl—a perfectly practiced one considering she was born and raised in Illinois and didn’t come to South Carolina until college. “You should call your father and thank him for getting you out of this jam. Again. He almost let you sit in jail all night this time.”

I sat down in front of my laptop, firing it up. I didn’t doubt that for a second he wanted to leave me there. But there’s no way he would—it would hurt his precious campaigning too much. “I will, Mom.”

“Your community service is two hundred hours.”

My stomach lurched. “Two hundred hours? That’s—that’s like a month of full-time work. It’ll take me months to finish on top of classes.”

She was silent for a moment. I imagined her sitting at our dining table,