He makes a face, then moves in a negative motion but seconds later does the opposite and plops down at the end of my bed. All the way in the corner, like he’s afraid I’m going to bite him—or jump him.

It’s such an un-Jaxon-like move that for a second, I just kind of stare at him. And then decide, screw it. I’m not going to spend the next hour feeling awkward. I’m just not. So I flop down on the bed next to him and ask, “What did one bone say to the other bone?”

He eyes me warily, but his shoulders relax—and so does the rest of him. “I don’t think I want to know.”

I ignore him. “We have to stop meeting at this joint.”

He groans. “That was…”

“Fabulous?” I tease.

He shakes his head. “Really, really awful.” But he’s smirking, and finally I can see something in the depths of his eyes—something real, instead of that terrible blankness.

Determined to keep it that way, I tell him, “It’s kind of a specialty of mine.”

“Bad jokes?”

“Terrible jokes. I inherited the talent from my mother.”

He lifts a brow. “So terrible jokes run in the DNA?”

“Oh, it’s totally a gene,” I agree. “Right next to the ones for curly hair and long eyelashes.” I bat my eyes at him to make a point, much the way Macy did to me a little while ago.

“Are you sure you didn’t get it from both sides?” he asks, face totally innocent.

I narrow my eyes at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing.” He holds his hands up in mock surrender. “Just that your jokes are really terrible.”

“Hey! You said you liked my octopus joke.”

“I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.” He reaches for my leg, drapes my foot and ankle over his lap. “It seemed rude to kick you when you were down and out.”

“Hey! I may be down, but I’m not out.” I try to pull my foot back, but Jaxon holds me in place, his long, elegant fingers instinctively finding the spots that hurt the most and massaging them.

I moan a little because the massage feels really good. And so does having his hands on me. “How are you so good at that?” I ask when I can finally speak again.

He shrugs, shoots me a little smirk. “Maybe I inherited it.”

It’s the first time he’s mentioned any family except his one cryptic comment about his brother yesterday, and I jump on it. “Did you?”

He stops for a second—his hand, his breath, everything—and just looks at me with those eyes I try so hard to find emotion in. And then he says, “No.”

His fingers start back on their massage like they never even stopped.

It frustrates me, but not enough to push when he has No Trespassing signs posted all over himself in huge black letters. Which says a lot more about him than he could possibly imagine.

We spend the next couple of minutes in silence as he massages my foot until the ache is almost completely gone. Only then, when his fingers finally still for good, does he say, “My eyes.”

My gaze darts to his. “What do you mean?”

“That’s what I got from my mother. My eyes.”

“Oh.” I lean forward until I can once again see the silver flecks against the darkness of his irises. “They’re beautiful eyes.” Especially when he’s looking at me the way he is now—a little bemused, a little intrigued, a lot surprised. “Did you inherit anything else from your mother?” I ask softly.

“I hope not.” His words are low, unguarded, and it’s the first time he’s ever been so open with me.

I search for something to say that won’t break the mood, but it’s too late. The second he registers what he said, Jaxon’s entire face closes up.

“I need to go,” he tells me, setting my foot gently on the bed before getting to his feet.

“Please don’t.” It’s barely more than a whisper, but the sentiment comes from deep inside me. I feel like I’m seeing the real Jaxon for the first time up close and personal, and I don’t want to lose that.

He pauses, and for a moment, I think he might actually listen to me. But then he’s reaching inside the pocket of his designer jacket and pulling out a rolled-up piece of paper that’s been fastened with a black satin ribbon.

He holds it out to me.

I take it with hands that I have to will to stay steady. “You didn’t have to—”

“It made me think of you.” He reaches up, takes a gentle hold of one of my curls, as has become his habit. But this time, he doesn’t stretch it out and let it boing back into place. Instead, he simply worries it between his fingers.

Our eyes meet, and suddenly the room feels about twenty degrees hotter. My breath catches in my throat, and I bite my lower lip in an effort to keep myself from saying—or doing—something we’re not ready for.

Except Jaxon looks like he might be ready for all kinds of things, with his gaze fastened on my mouth and his body swaying toward me just a little.

And then he’s reaching out, pressing his thumb against my lip until I get the hint and stop biting it.

“Jaxon.” I reach for him, but he’s already across the room, his hand on the doorknob.

“Rest that ankle,” he tells me as he opens the door. “If it feels better tomorrow, I’ll take you to my favorite place.”

“Which is?”

He quirks a brow, tilts his head. And doesn’t say another word as he slips into the hall and closes the door behind him.

I stare after him, the scrolled-up piece of paper he gave me still in my hand. And wonder how on earth I’m going to keep this beautiful, broken boy from cracking my already battered heart wide open.

26

The Uniform

Doesn’t Make the Woman,

But it Sure Does Bring

Out the Insecurities

Pants or skirt?

I stare at my closet and all the clothes neatly lined up in it, courtesy of my cousin. I know I should have done this last night, but after a giant plate of nachos followed by three episodes of Legacies and a marathon gossip session over my jam-packed day, I didn’t have the energy to do much more than lie in bed and think about Jaxon.

I turn toward my desk—and the paper Jaxon brought me yesterday, which is lying directly under the copy of Twilight he sent me. Not because I don’t like it but because I like it too much, and I don’t want to share it with anyone. Not even Macy or Heather.

It’s a page ripped straight out of a copy of Anaïs Nin’s journals—I don’t know which one, because the heading doesn’t say. I almost googled it yesterday to find out, but there’s something special about not knowing, something intimate about having only this one page of her diary to go by. To have only these words that Jaxon wanted me to see.

Deep down, I am not different from you. I dreamed you, I wished for your existence.

The page has a lot more than that simple phrase on it, but as I read and reread it about a hundred times yesterday, these are the words that jumped out at me over and over again. Partly because they were so swoon-worthy and partly because I’m starting to feel the same way about him. About Jaxon, whose deepest thoughts and heart and pain seem to so closely echo mine.

It’s a lot to take in at any time, let alone on my first day, when my mouth is dry and my stomach is churning with nerves.

Which is why I’m currently standing here, in front of my closet with absolutely no idea of what to wear. Because I obviously worried about the wrong first-day stuff…

Do the girls usually wear their uniform pants or skirts here? Or doesn’t it matter? I try to remember what Macy wore the last couple of days, but it’s all a blank besides the tropical-print snow pants she wore for the snowball fight.

“Skirt,” Macy says as she walks out of the bathroom, a towel wrapped around her head. “There are wool tights to go with it in the bottom drawer of your dresser.”

I close my eyes in relief. Thank God for cousins.

“Awesome, thanks.” I slip one of the black skirts off the hanger and step into it, then add a white blouse and black blazer before going over to my dresser for a pair of black tights.

“If you wear the blouse, you’ve also got to wear the tie,” Macy tells me as she opens one of my dresser drawers and pulls out a black tie with purple and silver stripes on it.

“Seriously?” I demand, looking from her to the tie and back again.

“Seriously.” She drapes it around my neck. “Do you know how to tie one?”

“Not a clue.” I head back toward the closet. “Maybe I should go for one of the polo shirts.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll show you. It’s a lot easier than it looks.”

“If you say so.”

She grins. “I do say so.”

She starts by draping the tie unevenly around my neck and wrapping the longer end over the shorter end. A couple more wraps and a tuck and pull through—all narrated by my cousin—and I’ve got a perfectly tied tie around my neck…even if it is a little tight.

“Looks good,” Macy says as she steps back to admire her handiwork. “I mean, the knot’s not as fancy as some of the guys wear, but it gets the job done.”

“Thanks. I’ll look up a couple of videos on YouTube this afternoon, make sure I know what I’m doing before I have to tie it again tomorrow.”

“It’s pretty easy. You’ll get the hang of it in no time. In fact—” She breaks off at the loud knock on our door.

“Are you expecting someone?” I ask as I move toward the door, motioning for her to move back toward the bathroom, as all she’s currently wearing is a towel.

“No. I usually meet my friends in the cafeteria.” Her eyes go wide. “Do you think it’s Jaxon?” She whispers his name like she’s afraid he’ll hear it through the door.

“I didn’t think so, no.” But now that she’s planted the idea in my head… Ugh. My already nervous stomach does a series of somersaults. “What do I do?” My own voice drops to a whisper without the conscious decision to do so on my part. He texted me last night before bed, but I haven’t seen him since he came to my room yesterday around lunch, and after lying awake half the night thinking about him, I’m feeling hella awkward.