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  "My concentration's shot today, Ames," I said, and handed it to her.

  "I can tell. What's got you worked up?" She smiled, handing the page back to me and making a check mark next to my name in her gradebook. "Anything to do with the announcements?"

  I nodded.

  "He's new, he'll learn in time," she laughed.

  I had a bit of a reputation at Carroway. I kept to myself mostly, but people still looked up to me and I seemed to be one of the most popular people in the entire school. I wasn't quite sure how it happened, other than people who recognized my last name, but I didn't question it. One of the things people quickly learned when they came to Carroway as new students was that you didn't mess with Lexington's group.

  "He will learn." I inclined my head. "But sooner than you think."

  And I walked out of class.

  oOoOo

  "He's going to flip his lid tomorrow when he goes to school," Avery said, amused. I could tell she was daydreaming about what his reaction to our prank would be, and I made an entertained noise in the back of my throat.

  "That's the plan." I surfed through the channels on the television in my room as I sat on my bed and leaned against the wall. I thought about what the four of us girls spent doing that entire afternoon, and I couldn't keep a choked laugh from escaping. Another one soon followed it, and Avery and I were in fits of laughter on my bedroom floor moments later, gasping for air.

  "I can't—" she gasped, "I can't believe we did that! Oh, we're going to be in so much trouble!" Mirthful tears streamed down her face.

  "Oh come on, Avery, you know Hotchins never does anything to us." Hotchins, the school's headmaster, was pretty lenient with the four of us, especially considering the ever so generous donations our families have made over the years.

  "But what if he does this time? I can't believe we did that," she repeated.

  "For someone who sounds so worried about discipline, you sure don't look worried."

  She shrugged. "What can I say, it's too funny to fret over."

  "True story." I burrowed into my bed and Avery lounged around on the edge of it, stealing the remote and taking over the channel-surfing task. She spent the night at my house (and vice versa) so much that her parents didn't even question it, even on school nights. It was just a normal occurrence.

  So I drifted off to sleep, completely satisfied that Xavier Sinclair would think twice before making a public spectacle of me again.

  oOoOo

  Xavier strode quickly to his locker, already five minutes late to class due to having overslept his alarm. Christian appeared behind him, apparently suffering from the same tardiness, and quickly imitated Xavier's movements a few lockers down.

  Xavier finished spinning the dial on the combination and pulled on the locker door, but it wouldn't budge. The handle went up, though, so he knew he hadn't gotten the wrong combination.

  "What the—" he mumbled, releasing the handle and spinning the combination again. He pulled the handle up again, this time wrenching hard at the locker door. It swung violently open, crashing against the locker next to it and the sound echoed down the hallway. He made no move to retrieve his books, however, instead simply staring wide-eyed into his locker.

  Christian saw his expression and walked over, following Xavier's line of sight. He whistled lowly.

  "I told you not to mess with her, man," Christian said, staring into the locker.

  "Shit," Xavier breathed. He wasn't sure if he was impressed or damn pissed off, but those two were certainly having a showdown for dominance in his head.

  Chewed up gum completely lined the interior and the door of his locker, covering every available surface. He could make out the outlines of books, pens, pencils, paper, and the walls of his locker under the massive amount of gum coated thickly over every surface. In the center of the mess, a simple piece of yellow notepaper with neat, slanted writing sat.

  You did ask for your gum back, love.

  Chapter Two

  Ahh, Friday, most glorious of days. A day for slacking off on schoolwork, looking forward to the weekend, and planning for all kinds of partying. If anyone knew how to throw a blowout bash, it was a Carroway student. For the moment, though, I was content to act in a completely silly way and to hell with appearances.

  I wasn't going to lie; I had an absolutely unhealthy obsession with music. Especially rock and roll. I usually picked a band and listened to it continuously for about a week, then changed it once the week was out. So nobody was ever surprised whenever I locked myself in my room and the walls vibrated in tandem to their beats. It was just a fact of life around me.

  That week, AC/DC ruled my speakers and I loved every minute of it. My older brother, Dominic, shook his head when he saw me dancing in the kitchen in my favorite pajama pants, a tank top and socks, mp3 player headphones in my ears. I had an outrageously good time making up silly dance moves and it never failed to entertain him, so he never complained when he walked into a room to find me standing on a table or jumping on the couch. He even danced with me sometimes.

  Dominic and I looked very much alike, except he definitely didn't look girly like me (obviously). He had my chocolate brown hair, shaggy and a bit long for a guy's hair, but it looked good on him. He had the same sea-green eyes as me, and was seriously tall. Over six feet, easily. I was definitely shorter than him, but the family resemblance ran strong with us. 22 years old, he went to university about an hour away, so he didn't bother with an apartment; he just lived at home. Dominic was also my legal guardian.

  "You're going to break your ankle doing moves like that in socks," he nodded at my feet, and I just grinned at him.

  "Of course I won't," I teased. "I'm much too talented for that."

  "Or you're just full of it." He nudged my shoulder with his own as he reached up into a cabinet to get a glass.

  I scoffed at him. "I'll have you know," I said imperiously, hands on my hips, "that I am not full of it. I am simply sure of myself."

  "Arrogant," he tossed back.

  I muttered an insult under my breath and he grinned at me. He filled his glass with water at the sink and sipped it leisurely. I pushed his shoulder lightly and he spilled some water on the floor.

  "Why dearest sister, what was that?"

  "What was what?" I asked innocently, eyes wide. I picked up a dish towel and cleaned up the mess I'd inadvertently made, while he watched.

  "Don't play that game with me," he smirked, and "Your phone's been ringing off and on for about twenty minutes, by the way. You looked like you were having so much fun in here I didn't have the heart to disturb you."

  "Shit," I muttered, and tossed the dish towel directly into my dearest brother's face.

  His laughter followed me out of the kitchen.

  6 Missed Calls, my phone announced when I flipped it open. I scrolled through my recent calls list and saw that four were from Avery, one from Torrance, and one from Christian. Dialing Avery's number quickly, I checked the time. Her last missed call was from three minutes ago.

  "Oh, now you've decided to pay attention to me," Avery teased, picking up on the first ring.

  "Yes, ma'am, I have to keep you in line you know." I tossed my headphones on the coffee table. "So what's all this about? Everyone and their mother's been calling me. I didn't even notice until Dominic told me."

  "Christian just texted me from class."

  Our school was pretty flexible when it came to making class schedules; generally the student could pick when they wanted to start class as long as it was an hour within reason. Christian worked after school in one of the shops in town, so he started class an hour before Avery and I. I lived about ten minutes away from the school, six if I sped, so I never bothered to get ready until the last minute. By my calculations, I had about ten more minutes before I had to leave. Avery left my house that morning to go pick up clothing of her own for the school day, and I'd commenced eating breakfast and dancing around like a loon.

  "Oh? What'd lov
erboy have to say?" I ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time until I reached the top. Walking towards my room at the end of the hall, I flipped on the light and surveyed the mess.

  "Loverboy wanted to tell you to watch your back," Avery said seriously, and I paused, picking through the dirty clothing on the floor looking for something to wear. Carroway had uniforms, but on Fridays they let us go to class in street clothing. It made Fridays a lot of fun, for some reason, besides the obvious end-of-the-week reason.

  "Watch my back, eh? Do I have assassins after me?" I picked up a white spaghetti strap shirt and surveyed it.

  "No, worse. Xavier saw what you did to his locker."

  "Really," I drawled, pleased. An involuntary smirk spread across my face and I continued foraging for clothing. "I wonder how he reacted."

  "Christian was there," Avery filled in, "he said Xavier didn't know what to do. He apparently just stood there laughing for a few minutes, shut his locker and went to class without any of his stuff."

  "Interesting." I picked up my favorite pair of dark skinny jeans and my black chucks, and went into the bathroom adjoining my room. "I'm going to put you on speaker, keep talking."

  "That's all I know. Think he's going to retaliate?"

  I contemplated this for a second, propping a foot high up on the bathroom counter and yanking the laces on my shoes to tie them.

  "Yes," I decided. "He's not going to take that lying down."

  "Then today should be interesting," she said, and I could hear the laughter in her voice. I quickly layered black eyeliner on, ignoring all other makeup in favor of my usual. Satisfied, I left my hair down in slightly messy waves and nodded my approval at my reflection.

  "Could be," I agreed absentmindedly, fishing around my trinkets jar for my car keys. "He might not do anything until after the weekend, though. It's not like he's had time to come up with a plan."

  "True. I figured I'd warn you just in case. I'll see you later, Sloane, I've got to take a shower before class."

  "Sure thing." I flipped my phone shut. Avery and I never really said 'bye'.

  "Dominic, I'm leaving," I called out, walking across the foyer to the front door.

  "See you," he yelled from somewhere in the house, and thus my Friday began.

  oOoOo

  Sloane didn't see Xavier standing around the corner when she passed him to get to her locker. He studied her, watching her graceful movements and wondered if she was an athlete. She wore jeans and a white spaghetti strap shirt, utterly forgettable attire but it only seemed to accentuate her natural beauty. She was slim and tall, with angular facial features and chocolate brown hair that framed her face and made her bright eyes stand out. She had gorgeously full lips, but he already knew that. He smirked at the memory.

  He fought the urge to chuckle when she tensed and stepped aside slightly before opening her locker. Smart girl, he thought. She didn't seem to expect him to let sleeping dogs lie. It just meant he'd have to plan something out to sufficiently surprise her. As she pulled books and pens from her locker, he typed out a text message on his phone. Pulling up the new number in his contacts list, he sent it. Seconds later, Sloane frowned and reached into her back pocket, where her phone was vibrating.

  Staying on top of your game, I see.

  Sloane smirked, not even bothering to look around before dropping her bag to the floor and pushing her hair away from her eyes before replying. She typed it out quickly and sent it, stuffing her phone back into her pocket and grabbing her bag again.

  Xavier's phone lit up and he saw her response.

  Spying, I see. How uninteresting.

  He shook his head and snapped his phone shut, not even bothering to reply. There would be more than enough time for retorts later, but for now he had to go to his Calculus class. He was still relatively new, but he'd learned quickly that his teacher did not like latecomers, and didn't hesitate to kick them out of the class.

  Calculus was easy for him, so mostly he just sat without taking notes, observing his classmates while they interacted. People-watching ranked in the top ten of his favorite activities, and he did it often. One of the first observations he'd made about Carroway was that ninety percent of the student population had extremely rich parents. Trust fund babies, the lot of them. Not that he could judge, he mused, but it still made for interesting ego competitions between the students. The one group nobody seemed to dispute was Lexington's. His mind wandered back to the conversation he and Christian had the day before.

  "You're talking about her like the sun shines out of her ass."

  "Here, it does."

  "Oh yeah? You're gonna have to fill me in on this."

  Christian thought for a second before answering. "People look up to her. She's probably the most intelligent girl in our class, and she doesn't take anybody's shit. She's been the most popular person here since she set foot in the school."

  "What's so great about her?" Xavier asked skeptically.

  Christian shrugged. "She doesn't take shit from anybody. She calls it like she sees it and she gets along with people who don't try to fake anything. She knows everyone around here by name, but only has a close couple of friends. Oh, and she became kind of infamous around here after she punched this guy's lights out for being an ass to his girlfriend before school a few years ago. Knocked him clean unconscious. She pulls shit like that all the time, nobody knows what's going to happen when trouble's around and Sloane shows up."

  Xavier raised an eyebrow. "You seem to know a lot about her."

  "Known her since first grade."

  "Wow."

  "Yeah. And her best friend is my girlfriend."

  Xavier whistled. "Guess I might've gotten you into some trouble there."

  "Nah, Ave won't care. She never passes up an opportunity to tease her best friend."

  "Mr. Sinclair?"

  Xavier jerked out of his reverie and looked questioningly at the teacher, who seemed to be waiting impatiently for an answer to a question Xavier hadn't heard.

  "What was the question again?"

  The teacher sighed and repeated, "If you take the first derivative of a function using distance with respect to time, what does that tell you?"

  "The velocity?"

  "Correct. Please try to pay attention next time, Mr. Sinclair."

  Xavier put two fingers up in a mock salute and commenced ignoring the lesson.

  Sloane Lexington. Probably an heiress, definitely an arrogant chick extraordinaire, and a puzzle. He'd never had anyone coat his locker in gum before, and he had to say it amused him to no end. He'd borrowed paper and pens from Christian for the day considering the state of his belongings, but he didn't really mind. He'd just have to come up with a solution that would inform Sloane that she wouldn't get away with pulling stunts like that for him. It'd probably just provoke her again, but hey, at least it would make life interesting.

  James Ferrelly, one of his new friends at Carroway, twisted around in his chair to look at Xavier.

  "Did Lexington really fill your locker with gum?" he asked point-blank.

  He nodded. "She did."

  James snorted, earning a few questioning looks from surrounding people. "If you're lucky, she'll stop there."

  "I have a feeling we're even at the moment."

  James picked up on his tone and watched him carefully. "You're not seriously considering getting back at her for that."

  Xavier didn't respond. The bell for class rang and chairs started scraping back, people shuffled around and James stood.

  "Well," he said finally, "if you need help with this plan, I know Sommers has your back but I'm in if you want me."

  "Getting back at Lexington for something?" Xavier laughed.

  "Nah, but anyone willing to challenge her is going to need somebody to pick up his appendages from the floor when she's done with him."

  "I appreciate the confidence." Xavier rolled his eyes. They walked out of class together and headed down the hallway, casting around random c
onversation. Xavier saw Lexington's redheaded friend walking down the hallway towards him, and scanned the crowd trying to find Lexington. She showed up seconds later, catching up to Avery and talking animatedly. Her face lit up when Avery laughed at whatever she was narrating, and they were continuously getting closer. Lexington noticed his presence when they were a few yards away from each other, and an arrogant half-smirk crossed her face.

  Turning to Avery, she reached up and rubbed the lower part of her face ruefully.

  "You know, Aves, my jaw kind of hurts today," she mused, and Xavier shook his head. "Maybe I slept funny last night."