"You are the worst lab partner I've ever had in my entire life. Acne Aaron helped more than you." Ellie finished off her statement by whacking the back of my head with her notebook. I grunted, keeping my face pressed into my arms and my eyes closed. Perhaps sleeping through AP Physics was not the most effective way to prepare for our exam at the end of the year, but today I was much too tired to care.

Ellie whacked me once more.

"Would you cut it out?" I groaned. My eyes burned and my head pulsed with an exhaustion that never went away. It bored deep into my skull and made everything cloudy and slow. Well, it made me cloudy and slow.

"Hey," she said, "if Maverick was here, I'd be hitting him with my notebook. But he's not, you are, and I don't think I'm ever going to understand this dumb lab."

I hummed sympathetically and kept my upper body slumped over my desk. I was in no mood to try to figure out equations or keep up with Ellie's ceaseless chatter. Normally I appreciate someone who filled the silence, but she was driving me mad.

"You know what else I don't understand?" she began. I would have slammed my forehead against the desk if I had the energy to lift it. I knew where this was going. "What is so important about that journal that you would sell yourself to fricken Satan himself just to keep it secret. And you know what else I don't understand? Why Maverick gets to know and not your best fricken friend."

She punctuated her words with one last smack of her notebook against my head. I swatted it away and sat up, hardly letting my eyes adjust to the harsh fluorescent lights before I snapped at her.

"It's not like I wanted him to find out. He stole my journal there wasn't much I could do about it."

"Then what about me?" she countered. "What's so bad that you can't tell your best friend? We don't keep secrets from each other. Remember?"

Yes, I told Ellie all about how Maverick was blackmailing me. It wasn't like I could go to my cousin. Miles would only try to smash his head in, and as convenient as that would be for me, I didn't need him landing himself in a jail cell or racking up some assault charges.

So that left my best friend. It was a little bit of a conflict of interest with the fact that my big secret was the gigantic crush I had on her since middle school, but there wasn't anyone else to open up to and at the time I didn't want to face this alone. Right now, with her constant harassment and pestering, I wish I had.

Ellie lowered her voice to a whisper. "Selling weed on the side is one thing, but being on the payroll of the biggest dealer in our school is another. Whatever it is that he has over your head can't be worth it."

"It's only temporary, El, just until I get some dirt on him."

But even I didn't believe the words that came out of my mouth. Maverick's "little black book" turned out to be nothing more than false hope and unnecessary risk.

"I'm telling you Ang, you're in too deep," Ellie said. She struck me with a sharp gaze I did everything in my power to avoid.

I huffed and reached over for our worksheet, pointedly ignoring her comment, and stared at the words on the page. They didn't make any sense.

"I'm not giving up that easy," she warned me. I shot her a look.

"Can we talk about something else?" I asked. My voice was sharp but her returning glance was sharper. Clearly, the answer was no, so I added. "I have other things to worry about right now."

"Oh please do tell. I'm sure there are things much more pressing in your life than Maverick Weir. Are you becoming a jewelry thief now? Is the Mexican drug cartel looking for you? Has Floppy risen from the grave with an army of other zombie bunnies to seek revenge on you for being an awful pet owner?"

Ouch. She only brought up Floppy when she was trying to strike a chord.

Regardless of her sarcasm, I knew it was an invitation to share. But where did I even begin? Maybe with the fact that I not only went into Maverick's room, but stole his childhood doodle book and had no way of returning it. Or perhaps how my cousin is now dating Ducky, whose main function in this little gang is to break noses and leave those short on payments in a puddle of fear. Or how final exams for the semester start in just two days and I hadn't even begun to study.

But I knew the real reason that I couldn't get any sleep at night.

"My mom has been getting suspicious. Normally she's too exhausted from work to pay attention to anything I do, but she can tell I've changed," I admitted. Ellie was looking at me, but I kept my eyes trained on the pencil in my hand, letting the words pour out before I could take them back. "I'm afraid she's going to find out what I've been doing."

Ellie sighed, letting her frustration from before slip from her features. Her movements were delicate as she reached across the aisle to lay her hand on mine.

"It's not too late to walk away from all this."

"I can't," I said, frustration seeping through my grounded teeth, "You know I can't."   

But the truth was, even if Maverick wasn't holding all this crap over my head, I wasn't sure I'd want to. And it was about so much more than just the money. People looked at me like I was a different person. I was a different person, and there was no way I wanted to go back to living the life of the helpless and pathetic girl from before.

The bell released a shrill ring, snapping me from my thoughts. We gathered our things and filed behind the rest of the class as they poured out into the hall, but I didn't make it much farther than a few steps passed the doorway.

Maverick's lean frame was slouched against the wall, the heel of his boot kicked back against the brick. The breath escaped from my lungs as soon as his dark eyes met with mine, my stomach twisting when the corner of his lips tilted up.

"Come on, Ang. Let's go," Ellie said pointedly, wrapping a hand around the inside of my arm. I rooted into the floor despite her light tugs, sending her an apologetic glance, almost helpless.

"I'll meet you at lunch, alright?"

Her eyes flicked past me to where Maverick stood, a sigh escaping her lips. "Maybe you should just sit with your new friends."

I cringed at the bitter undertone of her voice, paralyzed as she spun on her heel and disappear down the hall. An electric current ran through my skin as I felt Maverick's eyes on me, raising the hairs on the back of my neck.

I crossed to the other side of the hall and stopped in front of him, feeling the full gravity of his gaze tugging at me. All this time around him and he still sent adrenaline shooting through my veins with a single look. At the very least I had gotten better at meeting his eyes.

"I don't have the money yet," I told him. Would it kill him to be a little more patient?

He kicked off the wall, coming close enough for me to flinch back. He was polite enough to ignore it, falling in step with me as we drifted down the hallway, hands still bunched into his pockets. His lips were parted for a moment in hesitation before he finally said. "Actually I wanted to talk to you about something else."

I glanced up at him, the surprise clear in my expression. His eyes flicked to mine, but only briefly.

"Look, about the other night. I don't normally get that wasted," Maverick said. His words were tense as if was a struggle to get them past his tongue. He looked away, his eyes squinted and crinkled at the edges.

I was struck with the complete and utter awkwardness of the situation. Maverick, the eye at the center of the storm, who had always radiated with unwavering confidence — arrogance even — was undeniably uncomfortable. And that fact alone was enough to make me uneasy as well.

"Okay?" I answered. It was a lame response, but I wasn't sure what he was getting at and I wasn't sure I wanted to know. In fact, I was starting to wish I had followed Ellie.

"I just mean," he paused before shoving the rest of the words out, "you didn't need to take care of me like that."

"Oh."

On one hand, it was reassuring that I wouldn't have to drag Maverick out of a pool of his own vomit every weekend, but on the other hand I still had his book. I could think of only one situation in which Maverick would invite me into his bedroom while still sober and that definitely was not happening.

"It's alright," I assured him thoughtlessly, "You're actually a lot nicer when you're drunk."

Why did I say that? Why in the world did I just say that?

He glanced down at me with a hesitating smile inching onto his lips, eyebrows quirked, and I was hit square in the chest with another blow of regret and awkwardness. I wanted to crawl under a rock and die there.

I stopped at my locker, glad to busy my hands with the combination, glad to have an excuse to look anywhere but his eyes. Glad Maverick was better at filling the silences than me.

He reached for the back of his neck, taking a quick glance around before lowering his voice enough to ask me, "I didn't do anything too embarrassing, did I? Honestly, I can't remember much."

My lips quirked up at the edges, remembering the night with bitter humor. Where did I even begin? When he puked all over the front lawn? Or when he practically gave me a strip tease in the middle of his bedroom? To be honest I wasn't even sure I wanted to remember either of those things — well, maybe just one of those things — so I settled for something much simpler.

"You have a very impressive Star Wars figurine collection."

"Oh God." He cringed, his eyes squeezing shut in mortification. He groaned, leaning his forehead against the lockers. "I can't believe I showed you that."

I laughed, and for the first time in days, I felt like I could finally breathe. He peeked at me from the corner of his eyes, a similar smile taking over his lips. The truth was that in secret, Maverick was a gigantic nerd, and there was something so incredibly endearing about that. Endearing enough for me to forget for a moment that he was a violent and intimidating drug dealer.

"I like your tattoo too," I said.

His amused smile warped into something much more suggestive when he leaned in close as if he was going to tell me a secret. His warm breath fanned across my neck. "Which one?"

I could hardly register the question. My head was thrown into a dizzying swirl. Before I could stop myself, my mind was reeling for all the possible locations his other tattoo could be inked, a blush creeping onto my cheeks as I did.

A voice cut down the hall and sliced right through the tension that was pulled taught between us, sparing me a moment to catch my breath and regain my composure.

"Hey, Mav!" he called, "You get anywhere with Tristan?"

Annoyance flashed over Maverick's face as he shot Sol a look, glancing back at me. I got the distinct impression that wasn't something I was intended to overhear.

Solomon faltered for a moment, but didn't waste any time in his attempts to distract me, throwing an arm around my shoulder just as my locker door clicked shut. I was ushered down the hall.

"Angelica, I almost forgot. I have to talk to you about something," he started. He took his free hand and ran it through his blonde hair. His voice was sheepish. "I've got this friend, Shane, and I sort of owe him a favor. He talked to you at that party on Saturday, thought you two hit it off a little."

My eyes narrowed. "Shane with the Redskins jersey and cigarette permanently hanging out of his mouth?"

He nodded.

"Pass," I said, practically snorting. I could count that guy's brain cells on my fingers.

"Come on, he's a really good guy," Sol insisted. Doubt that. "What's the problem? You don't like red heads?"

"I don't like smokers, specifically I don't like kissing people who taste like an ashtray," I said, delicately removing his arm from my shoulder.

"It's just a date. You don't have to stick your tongue down his throat." Sol practically threw his head back in frustration. He slapped Maverick's arm with the back of his hand. "Help me out here."

Maverick flicked his eyes between the two of us, his expression once again coated with a cool mask, before returning his eyes to the hall. "Shane's a massive tool."

"I said help me," Sol groaned. We were nearing the cafeteria when they split off towards the hot lunch line, but Sticks called back at me before I could disappear to find Ellie. "Ducky's already got a table in the courtyard. Meet you there."

The offer came natural to him, almost thoughtlessly. It left me hesitating in the middle of the hallway while they rounded the corner. I don't think I'd ever actually been invited to anything with the boys before. Did that mean Sol actually wanted me to be apart of the group? Did I want that?

No, of course not. They were violent and dangerous. They were delinquents, with substance abuse problems at that.

But then again, Ellie did tell me to go sit with them, whether she truly meant it or not. And how was I going to find out why Solomon mentioned Tristan earlier if I didn't do some snooping?

I promised Ellie this was only temporary until I could find the skeleton's in Maverick's closet. As much as I hated it, I needed to jump on any lead that came along.