Chapter 128 Chapter One Hundred And Twenty Eight
LENA'S POV
The TV droned on, the kids laughed and played somewhere behind us, and Jace just kept staring. Not once did he take his eyes off me. It was starting to make me a little uncomfortable.
Finally, I couldn't take it anymore.
"Shouldn't you be focused on the TV?" I snapped, huffing with annoyance.
His lips curved into that infuriating smirk, and he said. "Why focus on that when I have a much better view right next to me?"
Heat flooded my cheeks instantly, and I went red as a tomato. I cleared my throat, trying to regain some composure. "I'm surprised you're even down here at all. Shouldn’t you be off somewhere doing whatever it is you usually do? How come you're not in your room blasting music and sulking?"
"If you want to be in my room so badly, princess," he drawled, his voice dropping to that rough low rasp that made my stomach flip, "all you have to do is ask."
My face went nuclear. "I… that's not what I meant-—" I sputtered, then scoffed, crossing my arms defensively. "Can you stop with the constant flirting for five seconds? Please?"
"Where's the fun in that?"
"Jace, please stay on topic " I practically begged.
He shrugged, although his expression grew softer. "My brother told me you were having a hard time, so I wanted to make things easier for you."
That caught me off guard. I blinked at him, then gestured broadly at the disaster zone surrounding us. "Really? And how exactly is this giant mess supposed to make things easier?"
"Well, I first started by trying to read about it," he admitted, running a hand through his hair. "So I could explain it better in kids' terms. But that didn't go anywhere since Martin and I preferred to just mess around with the books instead."
I rolled my eyes so hard it almost hurt. "Wow. Real mature."
"Then I tried the hands-on approach, and I tried to show them a few plays."
"Let me guess," I said dryly. "They turned that into play too?"
"You know me so well. Rosie was picking it up really well so you know I had to let them have fun.” His grin widened, “You wouldn’t know what having fun is like? Would you, princess?”
"You're impossible," I muttered, shaking my head in frustration.
I turned back to my notebook, determined to at the very least salvage something productive out of this chaos. I was going to do my job and do it well, and I would not let him distract me.
Suddenly he moved closer to me, close enough that I could smell the fresh, musky scent of his cologne that made my head swim, while I tried desperately not to think about it.
“There's plenty of room on this couch, Jace. Can you move back to your spot please?” I sighed, biting the pen cap with annoyance.
"I see you've made a new account." He said, catching me out of the blue.
My pen froze mid-word on the page, and my entire body went still.
"How did you find out so fast?" I asked slowly, not looking at him.
He completely ignored my question. "Who took this photo of you?"
"What?" I turned to face him and immediately regretted it.
He was holding his phone up, and on the screen was my new Instagram profile, the one Nicole had just set up a few hours ago.
The profile picture stared back at me: a candid photo of me wearing that red dress from the party, the one that hugged every curve and made me look like someone else entirely.
I looked like a whole different person, much different from the person I recognised in my mirror, with a lot more skin showing than I remembered.
I looked confident and cool and dangerous almost. The lighting had been dim and sultry, and the angle... well, it definitely wasn't PG. I knew my mom probably wouldn’t be happy to see it.
"This doesn't seem like you," Jace said, his voice tense. "I mean, it's hot don’t get me wrong, but…"
"It's none of your business," I cut him off sharply, looking away. “You can’t stalk me in person and online too, Jace. Pick a struggle.”
Jace scoffed, “Stalk you?”
“Wait a minute, there’s a laundry on the field. Looks like we’ve got a holding call against the offence. Move 'em back ten yards!” the announcer on the TV yelled.
I scribbled down “laundry” on my notepad, because I had no idea what it meant in terms of football and I wanted to look it up later.
I was writing it angrily, so my handwriting looked jagged and aggressive as I wrote.
Halfway through the sentence, the notebook was plucked from my hands.
"Hey!"
"I’m talking to you. Eyes on me," Jace commanded, holding the just notebook out of reach.
I huffed in frustration, trying my best to reach for it. "Come on. Shouldn't we be focusing on the plays instead of my social media? I need that so I can take notes."
He smirked and pulled his hand back further, forcing me to lean across the space between us and get even closer to him. "Answer my question first, princess."
"Jace, seriously, give it back!"
"Make me."
I glared at him, “God, you’re so annoying!”
I tried to be clever about it when I realized what I was doing wasn’t working. While he was focused on keeping the notebook away from my right hand, I reached with my left, attempting to catch him off guard.
It didn't work.
Instead, I stretched too far, lost my balance, and suddenly the world turned upside down.
“Ahhhh!” I yelled from the shock, my voice high as a little girl’s. Before I knew what was happening I was halfway to the ground, and somehow, somehow Jace caught me. But despite that, the speed sent us both sprawling across the couch in a heap.
When the world finally stopped spinning, I found myself pinned underneath him, unable to move.
Jace started laughing, “What the hell was that scream?”
I blinked in surprise. His body was pressed against mine, solid and warm and impossibly close.
One of his hands had caught my wrist, holding it above my head, while the other braced against the couch cushion beside my face.
His chest rose and fell rapidly, and I could feel each breath like it was my own.
My fury evaporated, replaced by a far more dangerous feeling. I couldn’t keep getting into these kinds of positions with him, it wasn’t good for my heart.
He stopped laughing, he too realizing the position we were in. His eyes had gone dark and half-lidded, his pupils blown wide.
He was breathing hard, we both were, and the air between us felt charged with electricity, like lightning about to strike.
"Now look what happened," he murmured, his voice rough and low. "If only you'd just listened to me."
I couldn't find words to say, let alone think past the weight of him, the heat radiating from his body, how his gaze dropped to my lips and stayed there.
"Are you really okay with posting that? It just doesn’t seem like the kind of thing you would be comfortable with" he asked quietly, seriously. "I'm worried about you, Lena. Tell me who made you post it."
His question jolted me back to reality… sort of, and I snapped out of it. "Nobody made me do anything," I said, glaring at him and trying to sound defiant even though my voice came out breathless. "Now get off of me."
"But I'm so comfortable. A beautiful girl like you with murder in her eyes… I’m exactly where I need to be.” His thumb traced a lazy circle on my lower lip. "Aren't you?"
I was. Heaven help me, I was.
The couch felt soft beneath me, and Jace was warm and solid above me, and it felt so perfect and intimate and magnetic, I knew if I had died in that moment, I would have died happy.
But I was too stubborn to admit it.
"Get off of me or else," I threatened.
"Or else what?"
His face lowered toward mine, his breath ghosting across my lips. His free hand, the one that wasn’t pinning me down, brushed stray strands of hair out of my face.
My heart hammered so hard I was sure he could feel it somehow.
“I know what you’re doing” I whispered. “And I’m not going to kiss you.”
“Hm.” He whispered back. “Then why do you sound disappointed?”
I had no response for that one.
His eyes asked a question, “Do you want this?” And my body was screaming yes even as my mind tried desperately to remember all the reasons why this was a terrible idea.
He was so close. Another inch and he would—
"Look, Rosie! Lena and Martin fell over!”
We both froze.
Martin and Rosie had rounded the couch, their faces appearing above us and peering down.
Jace rolled off me smoothly, sitting up as though nothing had happened.
"Oh no," he said with exaggerated innocence, not even slightly out of breath. "How did that happen?"
What a jerk. He was perfectly composed, meanwhile I felt like I'd been hit by a truck.
He stretched out his hand to help me up, that smug smirk playing at the corners of his mouth. “Need a hand.”
“No, thank you.” I swatted his hand away and scrambled to my feet on my own, my face burning hot enough to start a fire.
My heart raced as though I'd run a marathon, and my hands were shaking. I was furious; at him for being so smug, at myself for almost kissing him, at the universe for interrupting us, at everything.
I opened my mouth to unleash every ounce of fury I had—
Beep. Beep. Beep.
My watch alarm went off.
I looked down at it, then back up at Jace, who was watching me with hooded eyes and a knowing smile that made me want to both slap him and pull him back down onto that couch so we could finish what we’d started.
"Looks like your one hour is up," I said, trying to make my voice sound normal instead of shaky.
I crossed my arms, channelling every bit of authority I could muster. "Playtime's over."
His smile widened, slow and dangerous and full of promise.
"For now," he said softly, just loud enough for me to hear.