Free Pale Stranger (PALE Series) by Mac Flynn Page B

who I just saved?"
    I held out my hand. "I'm Trixie Calhoun." He gave my hand a good shake, though not any harder than I was still shaking from the near-death experience. "So what are you in for?" He stared at me blankly. "What are you majoring in?" I rephrased.
    "Oh, the social sciences. You know, psychology and sociology," he told me. I would run into a handsome guy who probably wanted to study me rather than date me. "And what's yours?"
    "Rocks, and I was going to be doing some boring research with them before that hit-and-run," I replied.
    He flashed that smile again. It was mesmerizing, like a certain pair of blue eyes. His physique was powerful, with strong, tanned muscles and tight-fitting clothing that showed off all his curves. His golden hair was even lighter from a lot of sun exposure, and he had an easy, friendly manner to him. I physically jolted myself from my thoughts; without realizing it, I had compared Will with Benson. Will was the complete opposite of Benson in his dashing, tanned body and outward demeanor, and he still had brains enough to be going to college.
    "You're looking me over like I'm your next meal," he teased me.
    I sheepishly grinned. "Sorry about that, just thinking about-well, about other stuff."
    He leaned across the table and dropped his voice. "I hope it's some good other stuff."
    I blushed; this guy was really forward, but that wasn't something I hated too much so long as he didn't grab my ass like some of the customers at the diner. "Maybe it was, and maybe it wasn't."
    He glanced at his watch and frowned. "I guess maybe we can find out later. I have to go to a study meeting with a friend." He pulled out a folded slip of paper and handed it to me. "When you can pull yourself from your rock books, give me a call." He left, and I opened the paper; it was his phone number and address. He lived off campus on a well-known party street, but then most of the streets were party streets if college students lived there.
    I pocketed the paper and resumed my studies, but managed to get revenge on my would-be assassin. The idiot taggers were still playing a few minutes later when I sat at the end of the table looking through some books. I saw them running down the tables toward me and recognized the attempted murderer. When he flew by my foot happened to slip out from beneath the table, and the guy went flying face-first into the rough, cheap, commercial rug on the floor. He slid for a yard and clutched his face in pain before he swung around and glared at me. His face was one long rug-rash, complete with little pebbles from the other students walking on it all day.
    "What the hell did you do that for?" he screamed at me.
    I put on my best confused expression. "What? I didn't do anything. You tripped because you were running."
    My fake expression didn't work; he scrambled to his feet and rushed me. I dove over the table in time to escape his clutches, and kicked some books back in his red face for good measure. He howled at the pain, but that didn't stop him from running around the table after me. I wove in and out of the tables with my pursuer close at behind, but I had the upper hand. My body was nice and skinny, but his was bulky; he had a hard time squeezing between the people at the other tables, and by the time we'd gone past a half dozen tables he had a dozen people chasing him.
    They tackled him and people came out of the bookcase woodwork to see what was the matter. Somebody tossed a chair, and the brawl began. I dodged chairs and stepped over overturned tables to snatch my bag and hightail it out of there. I heard later it was the biggest fight ever to take place in the library; even larger than the Great Computer Chair War of '08. I hurried home before the cops arrived, and was a good little girl for the rest of the evening.

CHAPTER 9
     
    "So have an exciting time at the library?" Benson asked me the next day.
    I shrugged. "Not really. Just read some books, met a guy after an