After another deep kiss, he was gone, and I felt a little breathless.

Until Claire popped into the room.

PUNCHING’S MY THING

TAYLOR

Claire stepped aside so Logan could leave, then made a beeline for me. I braced myself, thinking she was going to ask about Jason, but she didn’t. She’d already heard the Logan rumor and wanted details. I wasn’t sure if that was better or worse.

I told her the basic truth, that we were sleeping together. She knew it, but I guess she hadn’t known how involved the sleeping together part meant. She wanted to know more, but I didn’t have anything else I wanted to tell her. Logan and I hadn’t nailed things down, and I didn’t really want to. Most girls might jump at the chance to lock him down, but I wasn’t lying when I’d told him I had baggage. Even though I was starting to deal with things, I had a long way to go. And I had to go to work, so Claire was pushed off…for the moment. I knew she’d want more gossip later, but for now, I was almost eager to punch my timecard.

Telling Logan about my mom and how Eric had left me helped open that door to healing, but it was all so fresh. My worry about the Jason situation helped to distract me, but as I left for my shift at Pete’s Pub, I thought about my mom. I thought about Eric—what I’d say to him if I saw him again. After a moment I felt overwhelmed with pain and bitterness. I felt panic coming on, so I shut it down.

I started off again, but heard my name behind me. It was Jeremy Fuller. “Hey, Taylor.”

He had stopped a few feet behind me, but came forward when I waved. I could feel the disapproval emanating from him.

“Hey back.”

His eyes narrowed. “Logan Kade, huh?”

Yep. There it was. “You heard.”

He nodded. “I did, but I’m not surprised. I saw him outside of my party. I saw how he was looking at you.”

Of course, he did. “I don’t want to be rude because I don’t know you very well, but…” I had no clue how to handle this, but he had an opinion. “I’m not sure if I even want to hear what you have to say.”

“I could see that. But…”

But…it was coming anyway. I could see the wheels turning in his mind. I waited.

“He’s going to hurt you.”

I nodded. “I’ve been told.”

“What are you doing then? I don’t get it.” He took a step closer. A stream of students milled around us. A few glanced over their shoulders or gave us sidelong looks as they went by. A few had knowing looks on their faces, but others seemed curious. A few were irritated because we were in the middle of the sidewalk; I liked those guys the most right now. They had no opinion on my love life.

“Are you supposed to?” I shook my head. “Get it, I mean. I can understand my two best friends having an opinion, but you… You’re my TA.” Suddenly, I knew why he had an opinion. Thinking back, I should have seen it right away, my first day in his class. I’d blamed it all on paranoid girls who were into him, but he had a part in it, too. “It’s because you like me.”

“It’s because I care.” His eyes were full of caution. “Logan Kade hurts people. That’s what he and his brother do. I don’t want that to happen to you.”

“Why do you care?” Because he did. More than maybe he should’ve. There had to be a reason. “Who did Logan hurt that you cared about?”

He shook his head. “It was no one. No one to him, but it was someone to me, and he’s going to do it to you too. I know what you went through last year.”

I stepped back. “Stop. Right there. Just stop.” My mom, Eric, my dad’s absence—he had no right bringing that up. “I’m sorry for whoever you cared about that Logan hurt, but you don’t know anything about last year.”

“I know what happened. I know that’s why you moved back.” He was becoming so intense. “I know your dad’s been emotionally absent.”

The students around us all started to spin together, becoming one long line that wrapped around us, that wouldn’t stop. My hands clutched my bag straps. I hung my head. I wanted to bury it in the ground beneath me.

“Kade is going to shatter you,” he said. “He’s the wrong guy for you to be seeking comfort with. He doesn’t know how to give it, or to be loyal, or to be—” He bit back the rest and closed his eyes. I saw the strain on his face. “Logan Kade destroys lives. That’s what he does.”

I was seething inside, but I asked, grinding out, “Who? Who did Logan hurt that you cared about?”

He didn’t answer right away. He stared back at me, the anger flaring in his eyes, and then it faded and he murmured, almost brokenly, “It was no one to him. She was a girl who had a crush. That was it, but she meant the world to me. She liked him, and she told him at a party. He was drinking heavily. That’s what she said, and she approached him. They had sex, and afterwards…” His voice grew hollow. “He didn’t remember her the next day. It shattered her. That’s not what she did normally, but he didn’t even remember…I cared for her. I would’ve been there for her.”

“What happened to her?”

“She left school.”

So Logan was drunk, a girl came up to him and said she liked him. He slept with her and…that was all Logan’s fault. I shook my head. Jeremy was wrong. He was so very wrong, but watching him, I could see that he didn’t care. He was still holding on to the past, on to losing that girl. He wasn’t being rational when it came to Logan.