HOW TO CATCH A BAD BOY

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she asked him, “You scared me!”

Chandler raised both hands as he took a step inside the kitchen, “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to. Emily said you were here so I came to say hello,”

Elena didn’t roll her eyes, but she did let her eyelids fall shut before lifting them slowly. Hiding her reaction made her even more fascinating in Chandler’s book. He saw her shoulders rise and fall as she took a deep breath and let it out. It made him grin.

“What?” she asked, with a bit more heat behind her tone.

“Just find it funny that you need breathing exercises to deal with the other Kendrick brother. Am I really that vile?”

“I wasn’t doing breathing exercises,” she explained calmly. “I just … wasn’t expecting,” Elena paused, and her dark eyes flicked briefly in his direction, “Well… you.”

“Not many people are, love.”

“That is not my name,” she snapped.

“I am aware of that.” He gave a brief glance of his own, careful not to piss her off more than he already had. “I just think that it fits…. Well, you,”

Her expression suggested that she’d noticed the way he used her own words back at her, and he had to try hard not to smile again.

“Was that supposed to be a compliment?” Elena asked. This time, her gaze wasn’t brief. It didn’t move away from him. It pinned him in place, like a bug under a light.

His eyebrows popped up. She might not be snarky like her sister, but this was a banked heat he wasn’t expecting. “Depends on if you like it.”

The thing was that she did like it, but she didn’t want him to know that. Her brow furrowed, but she didn’t answer right away. “What are you even doing here? I don’t remember inviting you,”

“Ouch. You know, you were a lot nicer to me at the club last week.”

“Well, I’m not always nice,”

He tipped his head back and laughed deeply. That laugh made Elena unaccountably nervous, and she couldn’t pinpoint why. Maybe because she didn’t want to make Chandler Kendrick laugh. She didn’t want to have him in her apartment, looking slightly rumpled and more casual than he had the night she met him.

“What do you want, Chandler?” she asked.

His eyes warmed slightly at her use of his name. She didn’t want that either.ConTEent bel0ngs to Nôv(e)lD/rama(.)Org .

He scratched the side of his scruff-covered face. “Right now, I want to know why you’re looking at me like that, Elena.”

She tipped her head back and sighed. “For some reason, I feel like the quiet little girl on the playground who just caught the attention of the mysterious cool guy in class who never pays attention to anyone.”

Her honesty took even her by surprise. Not because she wasn’t a generally honest person. But she’d barely given the thought any time to process, and boom, there it tumbled out of her mouth.

Chandler hummed. “Not far off, I guess. But you have to admit, you are a pretty intriguing young lady.”

Elena didn’t know what to reply to that statement so she simply rolled her lips together.

“Look,” Chandler continued, “Elijah told me you were having a little party so I came to say hello, and to give you this too,” Elena watched as he slipped his hand into one of his pocket and withdrew something wrapped in a green gift wrapper. Slowly, she took it when he offered it to her and Chandler stood there, watching her open it up.

Elena removed the wrapper and opened the box. Inside there was a princess themed key holder. Beauty and the beast to be precise, and it was the most beautiful and cutest key holder she’d ever seen. There was a tiny Belle and the beast in the glass along with the enchanted rose. It kinda looked like a slow globe too as there was snow all around inside the glass.

“It’s beautiful,” Elena whispered before she lifted her head to look at him. He’d been staring at her, watching her reaction to his gift and from the smile on his face, to him, it was a mission accomplished. “Thank you, Chandler. I love it,”

He shrugged, “You’re welcome. I’m glad you like it. I wanted to get you something that said, ‘Welcome to your new apartment’. Consider it a peace offering too,”

“Why would you need to bring me a peace offering,”

“I don’t know. You seem to be upset with me for some reason. I wasn’t sure what I did,”

“I’m not upset with you,” Elena replied after the slightest hesitation, “I have no reason to be,”

The way his gaze searched her face, she felt like she was being subjected to the human equivalent of a lie detector test.

“Are you sure about that?” His tone was chock-full of skepticism, and Elena couldn’t blame him. “Because I feel like I got a weird vibe from you when we met at the mall. You didn’t invite me to your party, and you weren’t exactly thrilled to see me just now when I showed up.”

“Yup, I’m sure.”

“Are you telling me the truth?” He slipped his hand into his pocket and watched her intensely, “So why wasn’t I invited?”

Elena turned away from him and opened the fridge, pretending to look for something inside. She knew she looked silly, so she closed it and faced him again. “First of all, this ‘party’ was Emily’s idea, not mine. She handled the invites because I don’t even know anyone in Vacaville. I only know Elijah and that’s because we went to the same college, and even if I wanted to invite you, I had no means to contact you. You should know that since you made no attempt to keep in touch. Also, you didn’t get an invite but yet, you showed up so I don’t see any reason why we’re having this conversation,”

Chandler said nothing for a while. With his hands tucked into his pants pockets, the light in the kitchen cast shadows under his cheekbones. He looked dark and terrifying even though his lips were still smiling in her direction. His head tilted, “Okay then.” He said finally. That wasn’t the reply Elena was expecting. He squared his shoulders and opened his mouth to say something else when Emily burst through the door.