The Fluke

26 - Luke

I don't know what Gavin said to Jules in the hallway but not knowing doesn't make me want to pummel his ass any less.

Don't worry about it, Connelly.

As if anything to do with Jules doesn't concern me. Gavin has no idea what's happening between us. It makes me wonder if Jules is fully aware of what I want from her. With her. Not even what I want but what I think I need.

For the record, I don't consider myself a violent person and the only time I've ever been in a fight was when I was 17 when this guy at a house party wouldn't stop hitting on my girlfriend. He kept pushing her, even when she told him that she had a boyfriend, and then I saw him grab her and try to pull her into a back room. From across the party I could see the fear in her eyes and read her lips when she told him no.

So I broke his nose. I call it a fight, but I was so blinded by rage that he didn't stand a chance.

Even though Jules isn't technically my girlfriend, yet, this situation with Gavin feels like a more subtle version of what happened back then. Some creep with an ego problem moving in on my woman and not taking no for an answer.

I didn't want to come back in. I tried to convince Jules to leave with me, go anywhere but here. Be alone. But she reminded me she came to spend time with Spencer and she wants to watch some tennis, which is how I find myself wound tight as I'm sitting back in the suite.

I've been doing my best to pretend Gavin isn't here and it appears he's doing the same. He's sitting outside in the stadium seats with Slade, Nate and Amber while Jules, Spencer, Tessa and myself huddle around the Moët champagne tower that some teenager in a green polo shirt very carefully rolled into the room.

"Spence, there's eight of us." Tessa picks up two of the dainty champagne glasses that are stacked on the tray and holds them against her face like a pair of eyeglasses. "Why are there, like, 85 coupe glasses?"

"Ignore her. That's what I do," Spencer says to the kid. "Do your thing."

We all watch as this kid, who doesn't look old enough to drink, plucks the chilled bottle of Moët from the ice bucket and expertly removes the foil wrapping and the wire. Then he picks up a blade I hadn't noticed was on the tray, runs it back and forth across the bottle a few times before thrusting the knife up. We all gasp as the cork and top of the bottle fly up and away with a loud pop and the kid pours champagne into the top glass of the tower, bubbly spilling over into all the glasses below.

We all clap as Spencer pulls a crisp folded bill from his money clip and hands it to the 15 year old in the polo. "You nailed the presentation, Jake. Come see me in a few years and we'll party Spencer style."

Jake looks at the bill in his hand, realizes it's a one hundred dollar bill, and throws his arms around Spencer's middle before running back where he came from.

"The kid wasn't wearing a name tag," I note.

"So what?"

"So, what, you frequently befriend teenagers these days? How'd you know his name?" I ask more out of wanting a distraction rather than actual curiosity but I get more than I bargained for with Spencer's reply.

"Gavin gave that kid a hard time the other day when we were on the grounds and I felt like I should try and make it up to him. I remember when a hundred bucks felt like a million at his age."

I obviously get caught up on the first part.

"Try to make it up to him with a hundred dollars? What the hell did Gavin do to him?"

"Nothing much, you know how Gavin gets. He was just running his mouth and poor Jake was an easy target."

I don't think it was so much about Jake being an easy target as it is actually about Gavin being a grade A fucking douche. Now that I've seen his true colours, it's impossible to unsee them.