The Bad Boy's Heart (Bad Boy Series #2)

Chapter Sixteen: Mrs. Weasley's Howlers Cower Before Tessa's Verbal Bitch Slaps

Chapter Sixteen: Mrs. Weasley's Howlers Cower Before Tessa's Verbal Bitch Slaps

It may be snowing outside but inside the gym it feels like flames are licking every surface of my skin. Once the routine finishes I drop to my knees and very attractively pant like the dog I never had.

A pair of tanned and toned legs appear in front of me and I can practically hear the smugness on her face.

"I thought you were in shape." Lindsey Owens, star of the college dance team and the girl I'd begged and stalked at times to let me audition for the team says as I resist the need to sprawl on the floor.

"I thought so too, my trainer has a lot of explaining to do." I mumble under my breath but she still manages to hear me and lends a hand so that I can get up.

"You'll get used to it. I should've warned you that we do some hard core cardio to get in shape for the season. This particular routine was made to single out the yuppies from the professionals."

I wrinkle my nose and wonder how on earth I ended up being the yuppie in this situation.

She notices my crestfallen expression and gives me a sympathetic smile, "But you did good. You're definitely better than all of them." She looks disdainfully at all the other freshman recruits who aren't fairing any better than me, one of them actually looks quite green and just as I'm making that observation she rushes past us and into the adjoined locker rooms where we can hear the sound of her retching.

"Charming," Lindsey snorts and then beams at me, "they've been in conditioning since before school started and yet they can't even make it past the first ten minutes." She shakes her head," You've got good form and you pushed through. We like that and I know that if you keeping working hard at it, you'll ace every routine."

With that she swishes her still perfect hair and walks away. Since it's taken a whole lot of effort for my limbs to keep operating while we talked, I give them a break and crumple on the floor.

What did I get myself into?

***

The next day after practice is a Tuesday, a day no one really appreciates or talks about and rightly so because it's brutal. I'd had a full busy day on Monday with getting up at 6 for my first official rehearsal with the team and then I'd been at the library getting work done ahead of finals week. After that I'd been in classes till the evening before going to my room and crashing for a good couple of hours. I'd woken up and got some more reading done, fitting that in between talking to Cole and making sure that his streak of doing things for me without even asking me would come to an end.

I'd gone home with him after staying at the club for a short while. He doesn't seem to have a set agenda of the things we could or could not do as a couple that others no longer considered a couple. Ugh, it's too early for me to think about the convoluted maze that is this new strategy especially since I haven't had coffee. I'm standing in line in the coffee shop trying to plan my day when someone bumps into my and the cell phone I'm holding in my hand falls to the ground. Grumbling, I pick it up hoping that I don't have to replace it when the person behinds me leans in to, as if to help me pick up the phone.

" I knew he'd get rid of you someday soon."

I freeze since unfortunately I've become all too used to hearing her voice. She's inconsequential, another backyard bully who thrives on making people feel bad about themselves and I've had it up till here with her. It's nice to think how immune I've become to her opinion when a couple of months back it would've made me shrink into myself and run straight for the hills.

Straightening my back, I turn towards her and smile. She may have dropped my phone but she hasn't seen my latest text. Looking her in the eyes and giving Allison a saccharine smile, I speak to the person on the other end of the phone when they finally pick up.