Free Dominate (University of Gatica #5) by Lexy Timms Page A

way,” Jani said. “Chrissy's this way.”
    Aileen sighed and let herself be dragged over to where Chrissy was standing with Ryan. And with Tyler.
    “Hey,” Tyler said, not looking at her or at Jani when they caught up to them.
    That was all he said, just that generic ‘hey’. Nothing to indicate that he'd seen her. That he missed her as much as she was missing him, and Aileen felt her heart wrench. She'd been right to do what she'd done, then. He obviously he didn't care.
    “Hey,” Jani said, a little grudgingly, like she wasn't sure how to just ignore him but she didn't want to betray Aileen by being too friendly with her ex. Aileen kind of loved her for that.
    Groups were making their way toward the indoor track, and the one that Jani and Aileen were with seemed to have decided that it was their time to head that direction. They started slowly meandering, and after a glance at each other, Janie and Aileen followed.
    Cornell's indoor track was big, and obviously expensive, but it didn’t have the character of Gatica’s, and Aileen's favorite would always be Wavertree Fieldhouse. Still, the smell of rubber almost made her smile.
    There were a lot of people milling around already, their voices echoing off the high ceiling.
    Slowly, the chaos became order, teams taking their places and the seats filling with spectators. The first heats were starting soon, and the little group that Aileen was with claimed a spot in the infield to warm up and watch the other races.
    Her preliminary race was first, before Tyler’s.
    Aileen, who had been throwing herself into running with a vengeance in her attempt to get over Tyler, wasn't worried about the preliminary heat. She took her place at the blocks forty minutes later, glancing from side to side to take in the girls she was running against.
    The gunshot rang out, and the race started.
    It wasn't any harder than she had thought it would be. She bounded over the hurdles easily, running the end of the race with long, distance-eating strides. She was half a body's length ahead of the closest person behind her.
    The crowd cheered, but it wasn't the frantic adulation that came with the races where the outcome really mattered, and she felt somehow dissatisfied as she walked away from it, despite the fact that she would be moving on to the quarterfinals. But then, she hadn't expected anything else.
    She should have felt good about it. She'd won, and that was all that was really required of her at the moment, but there was a restlessness under her skin that the easy races hadn't shaken.
    Watching Tyler's heats was a kind of torture all its own. She watched his body move down the track, every muscle pulling perfectly against the next to maneuver him out through his opponents and into the lead for an easy race. Watching, she remembered the way that he had felt under her hands the first time that she traced the shapes of muscles under the skin.
    This was really getting ridiculous.
    She was going to stop thinking about Tyler and focus on racing, because she didn't have time to do anything else.
    The quarterfinals weren't any harder to run or win than the prelim race, although one of the girls from New York State, the redhead that she'd seen Tyler and Ryan talking to, almost got close as she came in second behind Aileen.
    After the race, Aileen went back to the hotel and showered instead of staying and watching the rest of the events. She felt kind of guilty for not watching Jani's high jump, but it was only qualifying and she was sure that her housemate would forgive her. She just didn't know if she could bring herself to stay and watch Tyler again. She already knew that he would do well. There was no way anyone in that quarterfinals field could touch him any more than they'd touched her.
    Dinner was loud. There were a lot of track people in the hotel, chattering over their food. People who had made friends through years of passing by each other in tournaments and who only ever really got