As we started to climb inside, a truck braked right next to us, and a window rolled down.
“Hey!”
Nate was grinning at us. He had on a dress shirt with the top unbuttoned, and his hair was spiked up.
Logan grunted out a short laugh. “You sure you left the fraternity, Nate? You’re only missing a crew sweatshirt for your neck. You’d be the image of Yale assholery.”
“Missed you too, Logan.” Nate rolled his eyes and gestured around the lot. “Let me park my baby, and I’ll hop in with you to wherever you’re going.”
I was about to decline, but he headed toward a parking spot. As he did, I glanced to Logan. “I’ll tell him—”
“Let him.” Logan shook his head, letting out a long sigh. He leaned back in his seat, his head falling to the backrest. “I’m the asshole. I’ll get my shit together. I know what you were going to do, and we’ll talk. I promise. I’ll let you know what’s going on, but you’re right. I know you want my head in the game.” He rolled his eyes. “I’ve been an asshole almost all year, but we have Seb-ass-tian to deal with. Monson will have the latest updates on him. We need to hear what he has to say before heading back to the reception.”
I was slightly relieved. “Thank you.”
“I know. I know. Trust me. I want nothing more than to pound Seb-ass-tian’s head in, and it’s game time.” He grinned at me. “You have no idea how boring senior year was. No one to fight. No one to deal with. It was all too easy. Maybe I got bored. Maybe that’s the problem.”
He laughed to himself as Nate climbed into the backseat.
Logan remarked, “Maybe I need a war to get all my demons out.”
“What?” Nate was reaching to shut the door, but he heard Logan’s last statement and froze. “Huh?”
Logan said, “Nothing. You’d better have the latest and greatest on Seb-ass-tian.”
“I do.” Nate leaned forward as I eased out of the parking lot.
The Elite formed in a small crowd outside the door, but I didn’t think they would do anything against Sam while we were gone. Heather was there. It was Sam’s parents’ wedding and Mark was her stepbrother now.
Logan saw the group, too, and met my gaze. We were thinking the same thing.
I murmured, “She’ll be fine. Mark will step in if he has to.”
“He better.”
Nate was talking, but he stopped and looked between us. “What?”
“Nothing. Can you start over? I wasn’t listening,” I said.
“Yes.” He started as I drove away, “Sebastian was allowed to buy a house off campus, but their place is only a block away.”
Logan cursed. “Let me guess. All his roommates are the same douchebags from his fraternity house?”
“No.”
“No?” Logan’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s surprising.”
“Campus stepped in. They thought the same thing, so they set a rule in place that no more than five members of their fraternity could live in the same place. If they have more, they’re violating the rule and can be expelled. No clue if that’s legit or not, but if they want to be students there, I guess it’s allowed. They can have non-students live there or guys who weren’t members of the fraternity.”
“How many are in the house?” Logan questioned.
“They’re allowed three, and have two more guys who weren’t members of the fraternity.”
“Well,” Logan snorted, “that’s something.”
“They’re a block off campus?”
Nate nodded. “None of the members are allowed to live on campus unless they’re in the dorms.”
I knew the rules. I’d been there at the hearing when they were instated, but Sebastian had connections. He had money, too. Those rules could’ve been bent from last spring until now.
“Good,” I said. This was good. Cain U was enforcing their policies.
Logan was watching me. “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking Sebastian is waiting for us to come back. He’s getting all his ducks in a row, and when we’re in place, he’ll start again.”
“You think?” Nate was looking between the two of us, his hands dangling over the sides of our seats. “So much damage has happened.”
Not to me. That was the bottom line.
I shook my head. “Sebastian wants to hurt me, and it hasn’t happened yet. He hit Marissa in the hit-and-run and when they jumped me, I hurt them more than they hurt me.”
Logan grunted. “Prick. Prick. Prick. He’s a super prick…in my asshole.”
Nate and I paused, glanced at Logan, and then skipped over that one.
I said, “Sebastian always gets his way. He pushes people around to do what he wants, and I didn’t do what he wanted. He wanted to control me, and I said no. Every time he’s tried to hurt me, it hasn’t worked.” I sighed. “I don’t want Sam to be a part of this. At all.”
Logan and Nate gazed at me.
Nate nodded, saying, “Fine with me.”
Logan frowned, narrowing his eyes. “She is a part of this.”
“Not this. Not this war. She’s out.”
“He’ll go after her anyway.”
“We can’t include her in this. That means all talk about Sebastian, anything we do against him—she can’t know about it. If she’s involved with anything, we’re giving him an excuse to hurt her. I know it sounds ridiculous, but if we separate her from this, he might not focus on her as much.” I was wishing, but I had to try something.