Wilder (The Renegades) (4 page)

“First off, she did the stunt. She could have said no and demanded you get her back on the ship, and you know you would have. But she didn’t. She strapped up and trusted you.”

“Yeah, well, look how that turned out.”

“We’ll figure out what happened to the rigs. We just have to find them. I bet one of the crew took them for storage before Bobby could get there. Don’t stress about it.”

I hoped that was all it was, an accident, a quickly cleaned-up site, but something nagged in the back of my head that this wasn’t how it looked, and I couldn’t put my finger on why. “Yeah, let’s find the rigs. I’ll catch you later.” I faced the party and looked for the quickest route out.

“Pax, she didn’t scream.”

“What?” I asked, turning back around.

“That entire ride, even when you dropped her over the pool. When you fell, she didn’t scream. She might have been scared, but she didn’t let it show. Remember that when you go apologize.”

“What makes you think I’m going to apologize?” I never apologized. Sorry wasn’t a word I said. Why be sorry when everything you did brought you to where you were? Made you who you were? Even the most epic mistake was merely another thread that wove into whatever tapestry we were.

“I saw the way you looked at her. Believe me, you’ll apologize, if not for this, then for something else.”

The one thing I could hardly stand about Penna? She was almost always right.

I looked down both hallways before I knocked on Leah’s door. Penna was right, I didn’t want her at the center of some kind of rumor storm, but I couldn’t exactly barge into her room through the sliding door yet—not after she’d made those
easy access
comments.

The door swung open, and Leah glared up at me, her face shiny from a shower, wearing a white tank top and pajama pants. Holy shit, did she have to have such a killer body? Why couldn’t she be average? Bitchy? This attraction was damn inconvenient.

“What do you want, Wilder?” she asked, crossing her arms under her perfect breasts. But I wasn’t looking. Hell no. My eyes were firmly on her face, where they’d remain. She leaned to look behind me. “And where is your legion of cameras and adoring fans?”

I grimaced. “No cameras. No fans. Can I come in?”

She arched an eyebrow. “And if I say no?”

“I’ll be forced to sit outside your door until said cameras and fans show up.”

She snorted but backed up, letting me into her suite. The door shut behind us, and she led me to her sitting room, which was smaller yet more welcoming than mine. I ran my hands over my still-damp trunks to make sure I wouldn’t leave a puddle of water she could slip on later. “I like this room.”

“Good, since you insist on paying for it. How long do I have before the camera crews show up and demand entrance? Because I’m not letting them in here. I didn’t sign up for that, Wilder.”

“Paxton,” I corrected her. “I’m Wilder to the rest of the world, but since we’ll be spending an insane amount of time together, I’d like to not have to keep that public face up around you, if that’s okay.” Damn, I bit that out harder than I intended. Something about this girl set every one of my nerves on edge, made me forget the cool, collected demeanor I’d worked so hard to perfect over the last few years. I could tell with a single glance at her crossed arms that this girl—this puzzle—had walls a mile thick. Walls that I desperately needed to breach if I wanted to keep her happy, wanted her to give a damn if I passed or failed. “And no cameras. They don’t have the right to be in here. Your room is completely off-limits to filming and the crew.”

Her shoulders relaxed in obvious relief. “Well, thank you for that consideration.”

“And you can tell your roommate that there’s nothing to worry about.”

Leah shook her head, the wet strands sliding along her top. “Rachel can’t make it until next term. She has mono.”

Damn.
Three whole months. How the hell was I going to keep Leah happy until Rachel got here? Penna’s research showed they were basically inseparable. What if Leah hated me and left before the term was over? This definitely had the potential to fuck my carefully laid plans. “So you’re all alone in here? Are you going to be lonely?”

She rubbed her hands down her arms. “I’m perfectly okay. Besides, if you need to study, you’re right, you’ll be doing it here, because I’m not going anywhere near those cameras unless I have to.”

My muscles relaxed as I realized she wasn’t going to renege on our deal and not tutor me. “I understand.”

“Okay then. Do you have your schedule so I know what classes you have?”

“I have every class you do.”

Her mouth dropped open. “How is that even possible?”

“I needed to know you could help me, or take notes if I had to miss class.”
Because I engineered it that way.

“Did you sleep with the registrar or something? How did you make that happen? You know what? I don’t even want to know. We have seminar at nine a.m. tomorrow. Do you think you can make it? Or were you planning on waterskiing behind the ship or something?”

“That’s not even…” Huh. I wondered if it
was
possible. Maybe if the rope was long enough, and we launched from—

“Unbelievable. No wonder you need a tutor. You’ve killed off all your brain cells doing stupid crap. Tell me something—are you just here for the Renegade Channel?”

My eyes widened. “I thought you didn’t know who I was?”

She rolled hers. “Come on. We’re still close enough to port to have good internet, and there’s not a lot of Paxton Wilders running around. Google is pretty nifty with the whole search thing.”

I swallowed. How much did she know? “What did it tell you?”

“That you run a YouTube channel with a few friends who all have ridiculous stage names, you’ve won a couple X Game medals in motocross or snowmobiling or something.”

“Both,” I answered automatically.

“Great. You enjoy flinging yourself off mountains and buildings and generally see exactly what it would take to kill yourself, and I’m responsible for getting you through this academic year while you’re doing it all over the world, right?”

Fuck.
She put it together so quickly. “What makes you think that?”

“Well, I doubt those hugely expensive cameras are here to document some boring reality show featuring your academics center stage, so the only plausible explanation is that you’re here to take your little channel international. Or is it bigger?”

“Bigger,” I answered truthfully. “Some of the things we have planned aren’t exactly legal in the U.S., so it seemed to be a great time to shoot the documentary. What else did you learn?”

“That you prefer leggy blondes who have a disproportionate ratio of breast to waist. Which is fine with me; I’m sure there’s a full treasure trove here to select from, and I’m safe since I don’t fit any of that criteria.”

“Whoa, when did I even hint—?”

She threw her palms out. “You didn’t. I just figured I’d get ahead of you. Look, you almost killed me, dumped me into a huge pool, and now I’m stuck with you if I want to stay on this trip. I understand what I signed up for. But I will not be involved in anything you do—like I was today—ever again. You and I are business only, got it?”

I nodded slowly. “Got it.” What the fuck just happened?

“Good. Now you can leave. I’ll see you at seminar in the morning.” She walked to the door and held it open until I left her room, closing the door behind me with a loud
click.

I was halfway to my room before I started laughing. Little Eleanor Baxter had done the one thing no other girl had done in my lifetime—dismissed me outright.

I knew I liked her for a reason.

Chapter Three

Leah

At Sea

Books, paper, pen, registration information…yep, I had it all. I sent another glare toward my espresso machine and headed out the door for seminar. Screw World Literature, I needed a course in how to use
that
.

Maybe it was good to kick my caffeine addiction. But morning coffee with Rachel was the one thing that had gotten me out of bed when I’d wanted the universe to swallow me whole freshman year, and now it was a habit I couldn’t break. It wasn’t even the drink itself as much as it was the routine, knowing that the world didn’t care if I wanted it to stop turning—it was going to keep going, and so was I…whether or not I saw the purpose to it.

So I’d gotten up every morning, carefully masked the pain, the hopelessness, and the dread that took up residence in my soul every time the alarm clock went off and I realized I was still alive…still the
lucky
one. I showered off the sweat from the nightmares, put on my clothes, and poured a goddamned cup of coffee with Rachel, because that’s what living people did. They…lived.

Sure, the time had passed, my memories of
him
softening enough to breathe, to move on.
Brian.
See? I could think his name now without crying. There was even a sweetness to it instead of the oppressive grief that had been my constant companion these last couple of years, but I still dreaded mornings.

Maybe this trip would change that.

Maybe my heart wasn’t pristine. Maybe it was stitched together. Maybe the seams were even a little frayed over the parts that refused to knit—the parts I had a feeling never would—but it was whole again. I was living.

And if I didn’t hurry, I was going to be late for seminar.

I glanced toward Paxton’s room and debated knocking on his door.
Nope. He’s a big boy.
There was zero chance in hell I was going to be his babysitter for the next nine months. I’d thought about it all night and came to the conclusion that the only way I was going to keep my sanity this year was to distance myself whenever possible.

But if he missed seminar, I’d be forced to fill him in.

His door opened, and I breathed a sigh of relief—until I realized that he wasn’t the one walking out of it. A beautiful brunette in bright white shorts emerged, pulling her hair down around her sunglasses to frame her face until she saw me standing outside my door.

Then she raised those glasses and stalked toward me.

“So you’re the one,” she sang sweetly, her eyes nowhere near matching the saccharine tone of her voice.

“The one, what?” I asked. It was too early to deal with this.

“The one who wormed her way into my harness yesterday.” Her eyes swept up and down my frame, her arched eyebrows making it fairly obvious that she found me lacking.

“Look, I don’t know who you are—”

“I’m Zoe.”

The girl from yesterday.
“Well, hi, Zoe. I’m Leah, and despite what you may think, given that you came out of Paxton’s room, I’m only his tutor. I had zero desire to be a part of that insanity yesterday, so if you have an issue with what happened, you can take it up with your boyfriend.” The worst part of it all was that I didn’t even have a sense of pride that I’d gone through with the stunt—just a nauseating fear that I’d have to do something like that again.

Her mouth opened, but before she said anything else, the door between mine and Paxton’s opened and a tall, willowy blonde walked out with her arms full of books. Was she the girl I’d seen yesterday on Paxton’s balcony? She glanced between us and shook her head. “Don’t be a bitch, Zo. If Wilder had wanted you on that line, he would have taken you.”

Zoe’s eyes narrowed, but she simply turned on her heel and dismissed me, as if she’d realized I wasn’t worth talking to. I breathed a little easier with every step she took in the opposite direction, swaying her flawless figure.

A stab of irrational jealousy ripped through me. Of course that was the type of girl Paxton went for. He wasn’t the guy to settle for anything less than perfection.

“Thank you,” I said to the girl as she approached.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said, offering me a kind smile as we walked toward the elevator. “You’re Leah, right? Wilder’s tutor?”

I nodded. “That’s me. How did you know?”

Her laugh was musical. “You’re kind of the talk of our little town right now. I’m Brooke, Penna’s sister.” She must have seen the confused look on my face, because she took mercy and explained. “She goes by Rebel.”

“Ahh, one of Paxton’s Renegades.”

“Yep, one of the Originals. Those guys are inseparable and inflicted with the same daredevil disease. Wilder’s a magnet for those kind of people.” The way her voice softened caught my attention.

“Oh, are you two…?”

She hit the button for the elevator. “No way. And he’s not with Zoe, either, no matter how badly she wishes. She’s full of shit and probably crawled out of Landon’s bed, so don’t let her get to you about Pax.”

“I don’t care who he dates,” I protested as the doors
dinged
open. “I just need him to keep his grades up.”

“Well, that makes a whole bunch of us,” she said as we took the elevator to deck eight. “I know it’s odd, the position he’s put you in with the suite. Weird, but you’re kind of his Obi Wan.”

“Are you seriously telling me I’m his only hope?” I asked, unable to stifle my grin.

“A girl after my own heart.” She laughed. “And yes. You were selected for him for a reason, not simply tossed into the tutor pool.”

“Weirdest thing ever,” I muttered as we walked through the doors onto the deck.

The auditorium, which had been the theater before the ship was remodeled for the program last year, was filling quickly. “There’s Penna. Did you want to sit with us?” Brooke asked.

Without Rachel, who’d been my security blanket these last couple of years, I’d have to make new friends or sit in my room alone the next three months until she got here. “Sure, thanks.”

“Oh, and Leah,” she said, gently stopping me with her hand on my arm, “maybe the question isn’t why it’s weird that you’re stuck with the Renegades, but why you’re the one he chose.”

She patted my arm and walked toward her sister, leaving me a bigger mass of confusion.
Chose?
He
chose
me? He was allowed the choice? None of the other tutors I’d met had been chosen, they’d all simply been assigned.

We took our seats next to another blonde, and I immediately recognized her as the girl I’d seen outside on Paxton’s balcony. “Nice to meet you, Firecracker.” Penna waved from the other side of her sister.

Apparently Paxton’s nickname for me had traveled fast.

“You, too, Penna. Or do you prefer Rebel?” I asked, realizing my error.

She had a supermodel smile and matching legs. “Penna’s fine for you, Leah.” The genetics in that family were seriously enviable. “Of course Wilder is late. I barely got him up when I walked out the door.”

“Oh, you room together?” That would explain the balcony.

“Yeah, it’s a three bedroom, and they thought the team should be together.”

I nodded, not knowing what to say. Conversation wasn’t something I was particularly skilled at, and nodding usually saved me from whatever awkward comment was undoubtedly going to come out of my mouth.

My watch read 9:05 a.m. Of course he was late, but I saved the seat next to me anyway.

“Good morning, students, I’m Dr. Paul, Dean of Academics.” A middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair appeared from behind the curtain center stage. “Welcome to the
Athena
. I trust that your first night went well?”

A cheer went through the auditorium.

“Good. Now it’s time to buckle down. Today is your first full day of classes. The ship functions as a self-contained college campus. You’ll have regular classes, exams, homework—all the fun. You should have registered for the relevant shore excursions, but if you find that you need extra credit, contact your professors to see if they’re offering any extra field studies to boost your grades.”

“Morning, Firecracker,” Paxton whispered in my ear as he slid into the empty seat next to me.

“You’re late,” I chided, trying to ignore the way my stomach tightened at the sound of his voice.

He simply winked and slid a steaming cup of coffee my way. I took a tentative sip and nearly moaned in ecstasy. Where I’d had an outright battle with the huge espresso machine, he’d obviously had no issues with his.

“Thank you,” I said with a soft smile, more than aware that I hadn’t exactly been nice to him yesterday.

He winked.

My stomach nearly dropped to the floor. How was something so simple so incredibly sexy?
At least he has a shirt on today.
I called that a win for womankind. After all, we had to study somehow.

“All classes occur during at-sea days. When it comes to shore days, if we’re in port, you’re given free rein. You’re adults, after all. But you’d better be on board when it’s time to sail, or we will leave you behind. If you are so unfortunate as to be left, you’d better make it to the next port before we leave, or you’re out of the program. No exceptions. That includes you, Mr. Wilder.” He pointed up to Paxton, who grinned.

“Hey, I made it on before we left port.”

“Uh-huh.” Dean Paul didn’t seem amused. I liked him already.

He went on to explain meal times, activities on the ship, locations of the bookstore and our classrooms. I took copious notes while Paxton sat with his arms folded across his chest, looking bored.

“Now this is the first excursion of its kind. I’m sure you’re all familiar with the Semester at Sea program, and that is not what we’re doing here. It’s a full academic year on board the
Athena
. You’ll go home for Christmas and return in the new year just like any other college. You’re expected to keep up your grades, and you can be expelled like at any other school. This program is unique in its makeup, its opportunities in port, the freedom you’re given, and its work-study program. Respect all the students aboard, stay out of my office, and we’ll get along fine.”

The differences in the programs were what made this one so much more expensive—hell, it catered to rich kids—but the work-study made it possible for people like me. The expense afforded the luxury for kids like Paxton.

“Ready for Lit?” Paxton asked as we exited the auditorium.

“No cameras?” I asked, looking both directions down the hall.

“I think the crew is still hungover. Besides, they’re not that interested in the academic side of this. Hey,” he said to Brooke as she started to pass us. “Little John said you had the Bermuda papers.”

“I did,” she answered. “Don’t worry, I popped them into your safe after I faxed them over to the permit office.”

“Sweet. Thank you,” he said before she went ahead to her class.

“It must take a lot of coordination to do…whatever it is you do.”

“It does. I’m lucky I’ve got some great friends to do it with.”

As we walked down the narrow halls, I was acutely aware of the eyes on us, but I did my best to ignore them. If this was the cost for taking the trip, then so be it.

“So, I met Zoe this morning,” I said, sneaking a sideways look at Paxton. “She’s…um…”

“She’s something else,” he said, shaking his head. “Was she a bitch?”

“She was…unfriendly.”

He flinched. “I’d apologize for her, but she wouldn’t be sorry. When they opened up the reservations for the team first, I figured she’d skip out. College was never her thing, but then she signed up, and I couldn’t tell her no. She’s a Renegade.”

He held the door for me into our classroom, and I buried my instinct to smile. This wasn’t a date, for God’s sake. He was just being a gentleman. “How many of you are there on the ship?”

“Three of the Originals who started the channel, and we do the majority of the stunts and all the larger ones, but the entire team is about fifteen of us, plus camera crew. Landon is another Original. Brooke and Penna handle a ton of our tech, but Penna’s also a badass on a bike. Don’t let her cute looks fool you.”

“Noted,” I said, taking an empty seat in the front. He surprised me by sliding into the one directly behind me instead of beside me.

“Some view,” he said quietly into my hair, which I’d left down today.

I took in the floor-to-ceiling windows that ran the length of the room. For miles there was only blue Caribbean water. “Breathtaking.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, but I felt the slight movement of my hair, and when I glanced back, he dropped a few strands from between his fingers.

I snapped my head to face forward.
Not for you. That guy is not for you.

“Good morning, class,” our professor said as she sailed through the doors, headed for the podium. Her red hair was swept into a topknot, and she wore the same kind of linen pants I did. “I’m Dr. Mae, and I’ll be your professor for World Literature in the first trimester. If that’s not the class you signed up for, the door is behind you,” she added with a friendly smile.

“We take on a ton of reading in this class, and I’ve found that students work better in pairs to discuss reading on their own time. First and third rows, turn around and meet your partner.”

I turned to see Paxton grin, his blue eyes sparkling more than the water we were sailing through. “Hi.”

“Go figure,” I mumbled. There was no escaping him.
Why do you want to?

I nearly scoffed at my own thoughts. There was wanting something you couldn’t have, and then there was being shown fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies right out of the oven and being told not to touch—they’d burn you, and besides, they were for the prettier, whole girls, not the broken ones.

Broken girls got the stale, crumbled, oatmeal raisin ones.

“Now find out a few things about your partner, because you’re going to give their introduction.”

“You have to be kidding.” If there hadn’t been twenty eyes on me, I would have slammed my forehead into the desk. Like Paxton needed an introduction.

“Okay, what do you want the class to know, Mr. Wilder?” I asked.