Chapter 40: Old Rival

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When I woke up the next morning I just lay there, thinking about being single and free...and not entirely happy. My ecstatic buzz from breaking up with Landon and losing all the stress that came with it had worn off, though I was still in a good mood it wasn't nearly as powerful. So I bounded out of bed, got dressed and headed downstairs to the kitchen for breakfast. Blade was nowhere to be seen but that wasn't entirely unusual and I still felt him around, though he didn't come find me. So I ate a quick breakfast and darted back upstairs to my room to brush my teeth and grab my things for school. By the time I emerged, Blade was there in the hall, already headed down to drive me. 

Perfect timing.

I adjusted my bag on my shoulders, and jogged up behind him, favoring my good leg to leap up and onto his back, locking my arms around him. To my credit, I only winced a little when the impact jostled my stitched leg. Not a great idea to be running and jumping, but him carrying me the rest of the long way downstairs to the car was well worth it.

"I thought Jordan told you not to run because of your stitches," Blade mused, not the least bit fazed as he hooked his hands under the backs of my knees to support my weight.

"He said not to do too much and jogging a few steps down the hall is hardly exerting myself," I said, dropping my chin onto his shoulder. What a wonder to be able to touch him without feeling a constant onslaught of crushing guilt because of Landon. "Besides, you carrying me means I get to rest more, right? So I'm actually following Jordan's orders better than you are."

"Sure you are," he said, squeezing my thighs tight as he sped off downstairs in record time. As I carefully slid off his back and we got into his car he continued. "You know, you've been in a really good mood since yesterday afternoon and it's kind of freaking me out."

"I'm just happy. What's wrong with that?"

"You finished your period, maybe that's why."

"Oh shut up. I finished that days ago so that can't be it. And stop creeping on my cycle. It's weird."

"Or maybe it just takes a few days for you to stop being all psycho and hormonal."

At least he didn't deny the weird comment.

"Keep shooting comments like that and I might just go back to being psycho without the excuse of being hormonal."

"Oh come on, you're telling me the reason you've been avoiding me all this time was because you were hormonal?" he asked, annoyance clouding his voice now.

Shit. "You noticed?"

"Of course I noticed. And I also noticed that it was after Friday night that you started ignoring me," he said, with an exasperated puff of air. "So why the fuck do you keep doing that? We kissed. You enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. What's the problem?"

"Because of Landon? Because it was cheating? Because cheating is bad? Do I need to take you back to childhood ethics class or what?"

He waved my argument away. "The guy is hardly a saint himself. He has no right to complain for something he used to do. Fucking hypocrite."

"That still doesn't make it okay. And that's not the kind of person I want to be either."

I would admit that the whole bond and blood drinking thing had certainly skewed things, made my self control practically non-existent, but I was sure that if none of that had been involved I wouldn't have cracked, even if there might have been close call. Not that that was all that much better, but it would saved Landon more heart ache and me from my guilt. Even without our bond or him drinking from me, there was something there and I was still to blame.

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