Page 43 of Forbidden Heart

“Can I work here to pay it off? Please?”

Silently, I try to calculate how long that will take me. Wednesday, Thursday... December... carry the one.

Anderson nods understandingly, and my shoulders sag in relief.

“Yes, you can work here to pay it off, but I’m going to need someone who’s a student to vouch for you. Is there anyone who can do that?”

The first person who comes to mind is Silas. If he’d just stuck around, we could have used his student number, and then I could have worked to pay off the box. But I don’t have a way to contact him, and I doubt he’d ever vouch for me. He’d be way more likely to throw me into the fire and watch me burn.

Tate would help, but I can’t ask him to rescue me again. Not when he spent all weekend helping his sister and probably got next to no sleep. He doesn’t need to deal with my problems on top of his own.

Charles can easily afford to help too, but he already bought me so much. The makeup. The princess dress. All the silky dresses and jeans and sweaters he had delivered to the apartment. Plus, my expensive flats and the laptop. At this point, I already owe him so much I’ll probably never be able to pay him back. How could I ask for more?

Which only leaves one person. JJ. My Knight in Shining Armor. But what if I ask him for help and he says no? What if he says it was all my fault and I should fix it? What if he doesn’t believe that Silas is partially to blame?

“Roonie?” My fairy godblazer calls me back to earth.

“Charles,” I blurt out. He has a private plane! He’ll pay for the box. I’m sure he will.

“Charles who?” Anderson prompts.

I feel a wave of doubt. I don’t want Charles to think I’m using him. Not when just last night, I kept insisting I wanted to find a job so I could stand on my own two feet. I’m such a hypocrite.

“I’m going to need a last name,” Anderson presses.

Herrington is on the tip of my tongue, but I can’t bring myself to say it. “JJ Campbell,” I tell Anderson instead.

Of the three guys, JJ’s the only one who hasn’t seen me at my worst. He wasn’t there when I first arrived at the apartment, covered in mud and dirt. He wasn’t around when I flooded the apartment. He never bought me clothes the way Charles and Tate have, and at most he paid for some pizza and burgers—not any of the fancy, expensive food.

I don’t owe my Knight in Shining Armor anything. At least, not yet.

“JJ Campbell.” Anderson nods. “Tell him to bring his student card and one piece of ID. I’m going to have to verify he’s a student and enter this into the system.”

“The system?” I gasp.

“It’s just an automated billing program,” Anderson explains. “The purchase will go on his student card, but as long as you can work it off, I’ll remove it from his account like it never happened. Think of it as insurance.”

“Okay.” I quickly punch in JJ’s number. The phone rings and rings and then JJ picks up, sounding a little out of breath. “Roonie? Is everything okay?”

“Yes. I mean, no!”

“What happened?”

“It’s nothing bad. Well, not that bad. Okay, it’s kind of bad?”

“What? What is it?” JJ cries.

“Nothing. I swear. I fell and broke something, and I need a student number, and I don’t have one and...”

“Are you at the campus health center?”

“What? No.” I quickly explain that I’m at the jewelry store.

“Don’t go anywhere,” JJ shouts. “I’ll be right there.”

“That’s not going to be a problem,” I tell him, looking at Anderson.

Less than ten minutes pass before the bell above the front door jingles and JJ runs in... followed by Tate and Charles.