Strength (Mark of Nexus #1) (3 page)

“Good afternoon, Ms. Collins,” a woman said in a pleasant tone. “I’m calling on behalf of R.S. Tobler Laboratories.”

I must’ve made a face, because I found myself staring down two curious expressions across the table. “Okay?”

“We’re contacting area college students about our influenza vaccine program. There are two free events coming up in—”

My spine straightened with indignation. “You called my
cell phone
to tell me that?”

“It might be the only way to protect yourself, Ms. Collins. And those you love.”

I gritted my teeth. “Sorry. Not interested.” And with that, I hung up. Gabby and Aiden continued to stare.

“The stupid school must be selling our numbers,” I grumbled and slid my phone back into my pocket. “Have you guys gotten any calls about flu shots?”

Aiden shook his head. “No, but I’ve already had mine.”

“Shocking,” Gabby said with a grin. “You? Hide from germs?”

“You had one, too!”

She scoffed. “For my
program
.”

Oh God. I needed to change the subject before they wandered down that path again. “So, who was that guy who came to see you this morning, Aiden?”

“What do you mean?” He tilted his head to the side. “Nobody came to see me this morning.”

Was he on crack? “I...thought I saw a guy leave your suite.”

“Are you sure it was mine?”

I shrugged, flinching at the dull ache that’d settled around my shoulders. “Pretty sure.”

He paused, fork in hand. “What did he look like?”

“Uh, tall, dark hair, blue eyes...”
Menacing, intense, devastatingly handsome.

Aiden slapped his hands down on the table, nearly lunging over the top. “That was
Wallace
, Rena.” His eyes looked like they were about to bulge out from behind his lenses. “Wallace!”

My heart stopped.

“What?” I froze with a fry halfway to my mouth. “What do you mean?”

Gabby leaned toward me. “You saw the seventh-floor psycho, and you didn’t tell me?”

“No,” I snapped, before I realized what I was saying. “I mean, yes, I saw him, but I don’t think he was a psycho. I don’t know.” I fixed my bewildered gaze on Aiden. “Is he?”

He looked taken aback. “How would I know?”

“You’re his suitemate. You share a bathroom with him.” My anxiety began to bubble over. “Does he hide bodies in the shower? Has he ever been escorted out in handcuffs? Think. Do you even talk to the guy?”

Hot Guy couldn’t have been Wallace. There was no way.

They both stared at me.

“What?”

Gabby was the first to recover, patting my arm. “You’re kind of freakin’ out, girl.”

“I am not.”

Aiden adjusted his glasses and cleared his throat. “To answer your questions—no.”

My heart was racing. I felt like a detective who’d just stumbled over a lead. Why it mattered to me, I didn’t know, but I was going to find out. “Why don’t you talk to him?”

He blinked. “You know why. Believe me, if you had to hear the things I hear every night, you wouldn’t talk to him either.”

“So, what? You just ignore him?”

“Why are you so interested?” Gabby cut in, looking at me as if I had grown two heads.

“I’m not interested. I’m just curious.” I sighed. “Can’t I be curious?”

“I don’t ignore him,” Aiden continued, rubbing the back of his neck. “I mean, if I see him at the sink in the morning, I give him a nod or say ‘hey’. Then I just find a reason to leave.”

“Why?”

“Rena! Geez.” Gabby shook her head. “Give the boy a break. What’s your fascination with the psy—er, what’s his name?”

“Wallace,” Aiden and I answered in unison.

She gave us a look and took a sip of her Diet Coke. “Whatever. I think we should just stay away from him. The guy is dangerous.”

“Fine.” I wasn’t going to tell them the rest of the story. The way they were talking, they’d probably have me report it to the school, and what complaint would I give them? That he’d activated my girl parts? It was best to just drop it.

“Hey, I got it!” Gabby straightened in her seat, inspiration lighting her features. “Maybe he’s a nymphomaniac.”

So much for dropping it.

I looked down at the table and pinched the bridge of my nose. “And what makes you say that?”

“Aiden’s always hearing muffled screams and growls, right? That’s rough sex. And you know how he rarely leaves his room? Solo sex! Duh.”

A queasy feeling settled in the pit of my stomach. The thought of Wallace being a sex fiend was even more horrifying than the thought of him being a psychopath. “Okay, nobody calls that solo sex, and it doesn’t matter, anyway. It’s none of our business.”

Aiden turned to Gabby, fighting another blush. “I don’t think he’s a...a what-you-said, anyway. I’ve never seen him bring anyone back to his room.”

Gabby’s eyes widened until I thought they were going to pop their sockets.

“Oh my gosh! What if he’s got them chained up in there?” Her hand flew to her mouth, as if she were really considering it.

“Them?” I asked, already cringing.

“The girls he’s sneaking in there. Or the guys. What if he’s forcing them to act as sex slaves?” Gabby started fanning herself with a napkin. “Girl, Aiden will just have to come to us. We’re not wanderin’ around up there anymore.”

I let out a deep breath. “Gabby, he honestly didn’t seem like a sex offender.”

Oops.

Her motions ceased, and she turned to face me. “How would you know? I thought you just caught a glimpse of him in the hallway.”

“I did.” The corners of my mouth pulled back in a grimace. “It was just kind of close up.”

Neither of them said anything, waiting for me to continue.
Sigh.
“Okay, I ran smack into the guy, and he caught me.”

“What?” Aiden looked aghast. “You let him touch you?”

“Is that what I said?” I pursed my lips. “He caught me when I lost my balance. It’s not like I asked him to grab me.”

“Oh my gosh, Rena!” Gabby’s eyes were as wide as saucers. “Was he creepy? Do you think you’re his next victim? Does he know where we live?”

I took another deep breath before answering, hoping to soothe my frazzled nerves. “He wasn’t exactly creepy, but I was definitely scared for a second. I guess he’s just kind of...”

“Intimidating?” Aiden offered in a dry tone.

“Yeah.” I shot him a look, wondering where this attitude was coming from. “He was big and intimidating.” I turned back to Gabby. “I doubt he knows where we live, and I have no intentions of becoming a victim, okay?”

She looked uncomfortable, but nodded anyway. The situation had been blown out of proportion, but there was nothing I could do about it now. Maybe if I stayed away from the seventh floor, I wouldn’t have to worry about it. I mean, I went a whole semester without running into the guy. What were the odds I’d ever see him again? As far as I was concerned, the whole thing was over. Done.

Chapter Three

That night, I awoke to a blaring alarm. I threw back the covers and gritted my teeth. “I hate people!”—a pretty routine reaction, considering Reid has more fire alarms than any other dorm on campus. Somehow we ended up with all of the drunk, immature pranksters this year. Lucky us.

Gabby cursed for a solid twenty seconds as she rolled out of bed, shielding her eyes. At least, I assumed she was cursing. It was all in Spanish and could’ve been part of a song, for all I knew.

A flashing light seared my retinas as I fumbled around. How photosensitive epileptics made it outside, I’d never know. It was something I’d have to ponder when the alarm wasn’t threatening to shatter my eardrums.

I got up, shoved my socked feet into sneakers, and dropped my lanyard around my neck. We had the heat cranked up in our room, so I’d been sleeping in a black tank top and cartoon pajama pants. That’d go over really well outside.

I stumbled toward my wardrobe, flung the doors open, and grabbed the first hooded sweatshirt I saw. “C’mon!” I yelled over the alarm, making a break for the door.

The strobe continued to flicker as Gabby hurried across the room in incongruous, slow motion. “This sucks.”

“I know.” I jerked on the handle and propped the door open with my shoulder. “Go.”

Ow. Before this door kills me.

She muttered something and shoved the suite door back, before rushing to join the disheveled herd of coeds at the end of the hall. Our Resident Assistant, Jane, was barking orders and ushering everyone toward the exit with a clipboard-turned-cattle-prod. “Come on, people!”

I wanted to punch whoever pulled the alarm.

We crowded down the narrow stairwell, our grumbles echoing off the walls. At each floor’s landing, more people flooded the stairs, and everyone struggled to make room. God forbid we ever had a real emergency. We’d all die.

By the time we got to the lobby, I was sweating. I would’ve liked to have blamed the cramped passage, but the physical exertion probably had something to do with it. There was no need to bother with the sweatshirt. I was burning up.

Gabby caught the door, and I was right behind her. The winter air felt crisp, almost damp—a nice little wakeup call from Mother Nature. Too bad my own mother would’ve had my head, had she known I was outside in a tank top.

We followed the mass of people toward the parking lot and stopped beneath one of the street lights. Sirens screamed in the distance, but nobody seemed to notice. The whole thing had become standard procedure.

“Oh my gosh, Rena!” Gabby jerked me to the side.

“What?”

She lifted my arm with disbelief written all over her face. “Are these bruises?”

I blinked. Sure enough, there were markings around the sorest part of my shoulder.

“I don’t know.” A stupid response, but I really couldn’t remember seeing them before. They weren’t there when I showered this morning.

Her eyes widened, and she stepped around me. “Girl, what the hell have you been doing? They’re on the other side, too!”

Okay, that was just weird. Faint, purplish blotches marked both shoulders, with five distinctive spots on each arm. They almost looked like—

“Are those handprints?” she shrieked, and a few guys turned around to look at us.

I felt my face heat up. She was going to make people think I was abused or something. How the hell was I supposed to know what’d happened to my arms?

“Rena?”

I looked up and spotted Aiden and his roommate, Josh, walking toward us. Aiden, I should’ve picked out right away, but Josh blends in with a crowd—light brown hair, hazel eyes, and skin like a humanoid chameleon. The boy just isn’t memorable.

Forcing a smile, I gave a quick little finger-wave. “Hey.”

Oh crap. They were closing in, and Aiden’s eyes hadn’t left my shoulders. How was I supposed to explain the bruising? Knowing him, he’d want a whole dissertation on the subject.

Without a plan in mind, I threw the sweatshirt over my head and backed toward the nearest escape route. “Um...sorry, guys. I think I, uh, see someone I know. I’ll catch up with you in a minute.”

I spun on my heel and swallowed the guilt forming in my throat. Since when did I run from my friends? I jerked my arms through the sleeves. And why did I feel so damn claustrophobic, all of the sudden?

The influx of nervous energy propelled my feet into motion, and I broke through the crowd—making for the birch tree at the edge of the lot.

“Are you okay?”

My heart kick-started a wild rhythm as I whirled around. One hand automatically shot up to block my face, and the other fisted tightly. “W-What?”

“Whoa, whoa.” Hot Guy—I mean,
Wallace
—lifted both palms in defense, gesturing he meant no harm. “I wasn’t trying to sneak up on you.”

I lowered my fists and clutched a hand to my chest. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”

His features darkened as if suddenly overcome with shadow. “Yeah, about that...”

Chapter Four

He was working up to something—I could tell by the way he shifted from one foot to the other, blue eyes locked on the barren, gnarled branches above. What could he possibly have to say that was that difficult?

I watched as strong, well-defined arms crossed over his chest and creased his t-shirt. For the early hour that it was, that shirt should’ve been wrinkled. Slept in. The temperature rose as my gaze lowered. His gym pants were twisted, and his shoes hadn’t even been tied. Had he been wearing
anything
when the fire alarm went off?

As soon as the image registered, I jerked my head down—too embarrassed to look him in the eyes. Maybe Gabby was right. Maybe he really was a sex fiend.

So, why did he follow
me
?