“I guess I don’t want you to feel like you’ve got to buy me things. Because you don’t.” I pull away just enough to look into his eyes. “You know that, right?”
He shakes his head, gives me a confused look. “O-kay.”
Flint is still within earshot—and probably watching us walk away—so Jaxon pulls me into an alcove a few feet ahead. “What brought this on?”
I search for the right words as it strikes me again how little we actually know each other. “I wasn’t raised to spend money like you. The pendant and now—” I glance down at the phone still in his hand. “A brand-new, latest-edition iPhone. It’s a lot, and I just don’t want you to think I’m with you because of what you can buy me.”
“There’s a lot to unpack in that sentence, so I’m going to need a couple of minutes to unravel it all. But first—” He slips the new phone into my jacket pocket, then takes Flint’s out of my unresisting hand and leans out of the alcove into the hallway again.
“Hey, Montgomery!” He waits until Flint turns to look at Jaxon with an expectant expression on his face and yells, “Think fast,” as he tosses the phone to him in a perfect, curving arc. Flint flips him off even as he catches it, which makes Jaxon laugh.
I swear, I’m never going to understand these two.
He’s still laughing when he turns back to me, and for a moment, I can’t help thinking about the boy I met four months ago. He never laughed, he never smiled, and he definitely didn’t joke around. He hid his heart behind a scowl and his scar behind his too-long hair, and now look at him.
I’m not vain enough to think I’m responsible for all of it, but I’m grateful that I got to play a part in pulling him out of the darkness. In saving Jaxon as much as he’s saved me.
“Okay, now, back to what you were saying,” Jaxon tells me as we continue walking and make the turn that will take us to the entryway. “First of all, this probably sounds incredibly douchey, but it is what it is. Money isn’t something I spend a lot of time thinking about. I’ve lived a long time and I’ve got a lot of it and that’s just the way it is. And honestly, you may not think so, but I’ve been really restrained so far.”
I reach into my pocket and pull out the thousand-dollar-plus phone he just gave me. “This is restrained?”
“You have no idea.” The little half shrug he gives me is all kinds of sexy. “I’d buy you the world if you’d let me.”
I start to make a joke that he already has, but the look on his face is too serious for that. As is the way he reaches down and clutches my hand like it’s a lifeline. Then again, I hold on to him the exact same way, this boy who makes me feel all the things, all the time.
“Jaxon…”
“Yeah?”
“Nothing.” I shake my head. “Just Jaxon.”
He smiles, and as our eyes meet, I swear I forget how to breathe. I don’t actually pull it together until he says, “Come on, let’s finish taking some of those pictures before the bell rings.”
“Oh, right. The pictures.”
“You sound so enthusiastic.” He shoots me the side-eye as we walk around a corner, and both his brows are raised. “They are important, right? I mean, you weren’t going to ride Flint for some other reason, were you?”
“What?” I whip my head around, ready to tell him off, only to find him silently laughing at me. “Ugh. You did that on purpose.”
“Did what?” he asks, all innocent except for the wicked glint in his eyes that he doesn’t even try to hide.
“You’re a—” I try to pull away, but he wraps an arm around my shoulder and holds me tight against him. Which leaves me with only one course of action: I elbow him right in the stomach.
Of course, he doesn’t even flinch. He just laughs harder and answers, “I’m a…?”
“I don’t even know anymore. I just…” I shake my head, throw up my hands. “I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do with you.”
“Sure you do.”
He leans in for a kiss, and it should feel like the most natural thing in the world. I’m in love with this boy, he’s in love with me, and I positively adore kissing him. But the second his