Page 31 of Wild Card 13

She glanced up at me finally, still smiling a little. “B plus,” she muttered. “I’m honestly kind of impressed.”

“Kind of?”

“You still thought mitochondria were a government conspiracy three weeks ago.”

“In my defense, science sounds fake sometimes.”

Lucy rolled her eyes, hugging the books tighter against her chest as she tried not to laugh again.

Every tiny reaction she had around me suddenly felt like winning something.

I shifted closer before I could overthink it and gently took the books from her arms.

Her eyebrows lifted slightly. “What are you doing?”

“Celebrating.”

“With my textbooks?”

“With you.”

The words came out easy.

Lucy blinked at me once like the answer caught her off guard.

“Come on,” I said, hooking my thumb toward the front entrance already. “We’re getting food.”

“What kind of food?”

“The best kind.”

“That tells me literally nothing.”

“You ask too many questions.”

“You answer too few.”

“That’s part of my charm.”

Lucy snorted softly under her breath as we started down the hallway together, our footsteps echoing lightly across the tile.

And then came the new problem.

Hands.

Specifically—what the hell was I supposed to do with mine now?

Because technically she was my girlfriend. Which meant holding hands probably made sense.

Right?

But there had to be timing involved.

A system.

A smoothness factor I absolutely did not possess at the moment.

I glanced down subtly as we walked side by side toward the front doors.