Near the north side of the building, I found Mel walking, though it looked more like she was pacing. And, surely enough, Dean was not even thirty feet behind her.
He looked…like shit, actually. Dean looked like shit. It wasn’t a sentence I ever thought I’d think, mostly because the dipshit never looked terrible, even when he was drunk or saying piss-poor stupid things. He was a good-looking guy normally, which was why I gave Mel a pass when it came to her weakness for him.
But today? Oh, today he looked terrible. His nose was in some kind of splint, and it looked as though dark, splotchy bruises lined his jaw.
Wondered how much uglier he’d be once I was up close.
The angle I came upon them, I had to walk past Mel to get to Dean. Both of them saw me coming, but it was too late for either one of them to do anything. I was on a warpath, and I would not be dissuaded.
Mel’s face brightened at my presence, and I stormed past her, throwing down my bag. A good thing I was too poor to afford my own laptop; would’ve broken it in half or cracked the screen at that display of aggression. But it needed to be done. I needed to get Dean’s attention, and me slamming down my bag in the middle of the sidewalk in between classes was sure to get his—along with everyone else’s who was nearby.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” I practically hissed out the words as I met his bruised face head-on. He was a bit taller than me; if I had to guess, I’d say he was dead near as tall as Mel, maybe an inch higher. Now that I was less than a foot away from him—standing far too close, but in instances like this, you had to be close to get your point through—I was able to see just how bad the bruising really was.
Looked like I wasn’t the only one Dean had been in a fight with.
“I’m not doing anything,” Dean spoke, narrowing his eyes down at me…although his tough-guy expression was basically nullified by the fact that he wore some kind of nose brace. Beneath it, his nose appeared a tad swollen. Did somebody break the poor boy’s nose?
Good for them.
“I’m just walking,” he added, pushing his luck. Each word he said pushed his luck with me. I was so not in the mood to deal with his shit.
“No, you’re not just walking,” I informed him. “You’re following my friend, being the worst stalker I’ve ever seen. And that—that’s not something I can sit back and watch.”
Dean’s jaw clenched, his teeth grinding in the ugliest way possible. This guy might normally have a pretty face, but he did nothing to hide his inner ugliness. If he wasn’t this terrible back in high school, college changed him for the worse. I highly doubted Mel would spend years with someone who was as dickish as Dean. No, the dickish behavior had to come after.
“What are you going to do about it?” Dean posed the question. “You think you can beat me in a fight, Kelsey?” He laughed, right in my face, too. The bastard.
“I think it looks like you’re pretty shitty at fights,” I told him, sizing him up, paying extra special attention to the bruising and whatever was on his nose. “I mean, have you looked in a mirror recently? You look horrible. You really want to look even worse? Because you will, by the time I’m done with you—”
Dean scoffed, his brows furrowing, and he leaned closer to me to whisper, “Just like Levi. So headstrong. It’s going to get you into trouble one of these days.” Worded and spoken like a threat, one I took seriously.
“Are you going to stop following Mel, or am I going to have to show you that I mean business? I’ve taken down bigger guys than you.” Okay, couldn’t recall offhand exactly when or where I’d taken down bigger guys in a non-sexual way, but I was sure I did. I got into some shit with Ash, back in high school.
Seemed like ages ago, even though it was really only half a year.
“I’m going to do what I fucking want.” That was all Dean could say, all I gave him a chance to say.
I mean, I did give him a fair warning to admit he was being a douchebag in stalking her, but now? Now I was kind of pissed. He thought he could walk around campus, doing whatever the hell he wanted, when he wanted? Oh, he had another thing coming.
He’d see a blow to the face coming; it looked like whoever it was gave him a few good punches, so he’d probably learned from his mistake of not guarding his face enough. I could take a chance and go for it, but I didn’t want to gamble.
No, I’d go somewhere lower.
“Okay,” I said, sounding like I’d had enough, that Dean convinced me he was the almighty and I was just a slave to him, that I’d let him go on and do whatever it was he wanted. An innocent voice. A voice he believed, judging from the way his stern, annoyed expression relaxed. Not for long, though.
My right hand curled into a fist, and in the blink of an eye, I gave him the hardest punch I could at this angle. Underhanded, right in the kidney. Right where it would hurt something fierce.
Dean took a step back, his eyes widening, his hands moving to touch where I’d punched. He wasn’t the kind of guy to stand back and not retaliate, so I knew I had to leave. Plus, there were too many other students watching; that meant no ball-kicking, for now. If I found
