She folded her arms. “Our conversation? Hmm, yeah, no, I don’t remember putting waste time conversing with a random loser on my schedule today.” She scoffed, brushing past me toward the mirrors. I watched her face in the reflection, keeping my distance.

“You used my answers for your test,” I said. She swiped her finger over her lower lip as if touching up her lipstick, but the motion seemed fabricated. She was nervous. Trying to look disinterested. “I expect to be compensated.”

“Compensated?” She laughed, glancing back at me over her shoulder. “Compensated for what? For me sitting next to you? A lot of people would pay me for that privilege.”

I had no doubt they would. But lucky me, I had something she wanted, something she needed.

Feeling this much confidence was such a head rush. I just wanted to see her squirm. “Sorry to break it to you, Jess. Things are going to operate a little differently now. If I do the work, I’m getting paid. That goes for your boyfriend too.”

I had plans for Kyle. The amount of blackmail I had on him could probably put that bastard in prison, but I considered myself a pretty nice dude. Nothing had to happen as long as he backed off.

“Is this part of your whole new thing?” she said, narrowing her eyes at me in the mirror. “The dark clothes, dyed hair, piercings. You shouldn’t let Manson and Lucas influence you like that, you’re better off staying a nerd.”

I’d changed my look, it was true. After a lifetime of wearing uniforms to school, polo shirts and khakis had been all I knew. But without my parents breathing down my neck, I let loose. Lucas helped me buzz my hair short and dye it. Manson pierced my ears and I’d stretched the holes. I was envious of Lucas’s tattoos, but stick-n-poke wasn’t my style, so Vincent and I were both saving up to get pieces done.

Maybe to Jess it looked like I was trying too hard, but it didn’t stop her from staring.

She looked at me differently this year. It was like something surprised her every time she saw me. I wasn’t going to fool myself into thinking it was an attraction, but it was something.

It was a crack in her armor.

“I’m not joking.” I stepped closer until my reflection filled the mirror behind her. She smelled so good. Strawberry and vanilla, sweet cream and sugar. I wasn’t sure if it was shampoo, perfume, or that gloss she put on her mouth, but it practically made me salivate. “Either you start paying up every time you use me to cheat or I’m telling the principal.”

There it was, nice and simple. No real blackmail other than the simple threat that I would tell someone exactly what she’d been doing.

Her eye twitched. “Fucking snitch.”