Here Comes Trouble

(Ian Crawford, #1)

www.andralake.com

smashwords edition

WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or
distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this
book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without
written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied
in reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All names,
characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual
events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is
entirely coincidental.

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

About the Author

I’d always felt unusual. It was as if I was
only pretending to fit into the world like everyone else. My
teachers called me a dreamer, while my mother said I had no fixed
identity. Maybe she just didn’t want to see who I was.

I longed to work in the music industry. My
parents kept telling me how hard it was to get those kinds of jobs
and how
poor
I’d be. I kept telling them that I didn’t care
if I was poor. I didn’t need a lot to be happy—not the way they did
with their fancy cars and country club memberships. I’d been
looking forward to going away to school for the entire last year of
High School. University was where I was going to discover myself
and what I was meant to do in this world. I’d find likeminded
people and finally feel like I belonged.

So, I’d saved up enough money and taken a
loan in order to attend school out of state and get a shared room
in a dorm. Then I’d enrolled in a Bachelor of Arts.

Mr. and Mrs. Watson had hated that, so I
knew it was the right decision.

I’d desperately wanted my own room, being an
introvert, but splurging for one would mean I couldn’t eat for the
rest of the year. As it was, I’d been barely able to afford the
plane ticket and had been restricted to bringing only one large
suitcase, my messenger bag with laptop and purse.

On a warm day at the end of summer, I
arrived on campus with my measly possessions and found the building
that would be my home for the next eights months: a grey building
shaped like a block. The main floor of the building consisted of
the lounge and kitchen. Several guys were sitting in the lounge
watching something on TV, the volume cranked. Most of them were
holding beers. They turned their heads and waved hello to me as I
yanked my bag over the lip of the door but didn’t make a move to
help as I proceeded to lift and carry it up the next three
stories.

I finally got to the fourth floor and
dropped my suitcase heavily. On the front of every room was a
whiteboard with the names of the occupants written in such neat
script, it almost looked like a computer had written it. I counted
the doors as I pulled my bag down the hall and calculated room 414
would be at the end of the hall. The door was open, the room empty.
The whiteboard read “Melissa and Alexis”, only it wasn’t written in
the beautiful script like the others. It was as if our names had
been erased and rewritten.

As I stood there frowning at it, the
bathroom door opened behind me, and a tall brunette passed into our
room.

“Your last name is Watson, but your name was
written first because it starts with an ‘A’. I just changed it to
be correct.”

Okay then
.

I followed her into our room, which was
shaped oddly at best. My guess was that it had once been a large
single room but they were low on rooms and now they needed to cram
two people in here. Best way to describe it was a large rectangle
with a small rectangular jut out, which held a desk and a wardrobe.
It became apparent Melissa had already claimed these when she sat
down at the desk, swiveled her chair to face me. The larger
rectangle held my desk, a wardrobe and both of our beds...which sat
perpendicular head-to-foot. I really hoped her feet didn’t
smell.

“I’m Alexis,” I said just to say something.
I’d been worried about sharing a room, and the fact we were going
to be squished together only made me feel worse.

Melissa had black curly hair held up in a
messy bun and thick, black eyebrows. On most people they would beg
to be plucked, but on her they somehow worked. Her skin was pale,
her jaw quite square. She frowned at me with those dark eyebrows as
she took me in.

“How old are you?” she asked. “You look like
you should still be in High School.”

Yeah, I heard stuff like that a lot. I was a
tiny build—very tiny—with fine features and a line of freckles
across my nose. Oh, and small boobs. Nothing made you look younger
than that.

“I’m Seventeen, but I turn Eighteen
September 30
^th
.”

“Did you skip a grade or something?”

“No, my parents just didn’t want to hold me
back. I was already starting to read and ready for grade one.”

Melissa sniffed, a habit I was going to get
very used to.

I sat down on the edge of what would be my
bed and glanced around the tight room. Yep, this was definitely a
single that had been converted. “What about you?”

“Nineteen.” The way she said it, I knew
she’d assumed some sort of roommate superiority over me. “You’re
kind of late getting here.”

“I had to work up until yesterday.”

“You missed the best party ever.”

I turned in the direction of the voice to
see a short, blonde girl in our doorway. She had been speaking to
me, but her eyes were still on Melissa, and she looked wary.
Apparently Melissa didn’t make anyone comfortable.

“This is Alexis,” Melissa said. “Or Mini-me
as I’m going to call her.”

Mini-me? Seriously?

I smiled tightly. “Except I look nothing
like you.”

“I meant because you’re so small and young.”
She smiled smugly.

Sensing the tension in the room, our visitor
piped up. “I’m Carly. I live in the single room next door.”

Lucky girl
. I smiled. “Nice to meet
you.”

“So yeah there was this epic party in
another building—all the freshman in residence pretty much. It got
pretty crazy. Everyone moved to Quad and drank until Campus Cops
kicked us out. Too bad you missed it.” Then she quickly rushed to
add, “But there’s an orientation for this group of buildings in
Quad today at two. We were just going to grab lunch and go. Do you
want to meet us there?”

“Sure.”

“Great.” Melissa stood up abruptly and gave
me a tight smile. “See you there then.”

The two girls left and I sighed, fell back
on my bed. Alone time. Finally. I was just about to get up and
close the door when another girl stuck her head in. She was tall
and super thin with wavy brown that ended at her chin.

“We were wondering when you’d come,” she
smiled. “Lex, right? I’m Lena.”

“Alexis,” I corrected.

“You should go with Lex,” she advised
solemnly. “It sounds cool.”

Right. I bit my lip. Apparently everyone had
a name for me. “Um, are you going to that orientation thingie?”

Lena laughed. “I don’t do organized events.
Have fun though.” And then she left.

I spent the next hour unpacking my clothes
and personal items and putting sheets on my bed. Then I sprinted to
Quad to meet Carly and Melissa for the orientation. I wasn’t an
organized events person either, but I wasn’t going to be rude when
Carly was trying to include me. And even if Melissa seemed
controlling and, well, bitchy, I had to put in an effort. She was
going to be my roommate for an entire eight months. The last thing
I needed was to make an enemy my first day arriving.

In the middle of the Quad was a large
fountain. Only when I got close did I realize how massive it
actually was. It was situated in a circle that had been cut out of
the earth like an amphitheatre with stairs leading down to it. On
the ledge of the fountain, four people—two girls, two guys—stood
wearing red sweatshirts with the words “Resident Coordinator”
written across them. I searched the crowd until I found Melissa and
Carly standing at the top of the stairs. A female voice welcomed us
as I pushed through the crowd toward them.

“Today we’re going to play an icebreaker to
help you get to know each other. When Ian calls your name, come
down and get your piece of fabric. After all the names are called,
we’ll make our way to the forest on the edge of campus where we’ll
explain the rules of the game.”

I stepped out from the crowd to stand beside
Carly, and that’s when I saw him. He was holding a sheet of names
and waving a piece of orange fabric over his head, his eyes
scanning the crowd as he waited for someone to come down and take
it from him.

I actually had to blink to make sure he was
actually standing there. My only thought was
holy shit.
I’d
never seen such a good looking person in the flesh before. He
looked like he belonged in a magazine ad or on television rather
than working as an RC. His features were chiseled and perfect, his
dark hair falling in waves across his forehead and his chin
smattered with stubble. I longed to rub my hand or face along
it.

Apparently Melissa thought the same thing.
She was practically drooling a she asked, “Who
is
that?”

Carly smiled knowingly. “That’s Ian. I heard
all about him last night. He’s in second year and supposedly he was
nominated for president last year but decided not to run.”

“Why?”

Carly shrugged. “I guess he’s not really
into that kind of thing. He only acts as RC for the perks of living
for free and doesn’t want all the responsibility of being a
president.”

“He’s so hot.”

That was an understatement. He was
gorgeous
, in this completely natural
I-just-rolled-out-of-bed sort of way. I continued to stare, the
girls’ voices wafting over me until I’d tuned them out. I couldn’t
take my eyes off him. If he looked this good in a sweatshirt, what
did he look like in a tight shirt? Or better yet, naked?

As if sensing my eyes on him, he looked up,
and our eyes locked. My first instinct was the glance away, to
pretend I hadn’t been staring, but his eyes held me in their grasp.
And I knew in my gut what was coming, that he was going to avert
his gaze, act like he hadn’t noticed me…only he didn’t. Instead,
the side of his lip lifted in a small smile.

“Stop staring at him.” Melissa nudged me,
hard. “He can see you!”

I glared at her, effectively breaking eye
contact with him.

“He looks like a god,” Carly said. “Like a
Greek god. Don’t you think?”

“Alexis Watson.”

My name rang out over the crowd. Ian was
holding a blue piece of fabric over his head, looking left and
right. In the midst of my daydreaming, I’d totally forgotten we
were waiting to be called.

He called my name again, and I hurried down
the steps to him.

“Alexis?” He raised a dark eyebrow as I
approached. I hadn’t been able to see from my old vantage point,
but his eyes were strikingly green against his hair.

“I go by Lex,” I said, hoping it would make
up for the fact that I’d appeared not to know my own name, or at
least make me sound cool.

“I like Lex.” He held out a piece orange
fabric, not the blue one he’d been waving around. When I grabbed
it, he held tight, leaned forward so that his mouth was beside my
ear. Our fingers touched, sending sparks of electricity down my arm
and into my core. I’d never experienced anything like it before. He
still had a firm grip on the paper, and when I pulled harder, a
smile twitched at his lips.

“It rhymes with sex,” he whispered, finally
releasing the fabric.

Well shit
. Pivoting quickly, I ducked
my head, hoping to hide my flaming cheeks as I took the stairs back
up two-by-two. At the top, Melissa was waiting with her arms
crossed and Carly’s eyes were as wide as saucers.

“What was that about?” Carly asked. “You
said you go by Lex and he said he likes Lex, and then we saw him
whisper something to you.”

“It was nothing.” I shrugged and tied the
orange fabric around my wrist. “He was just...flirting or
something. He probably does it all the time.”

“Well what did he say?”

“He said ‘Lex rhymes with sex’.”

Carly let out an excited shriek and Melissa
snorted, crossing her arms tighter if it were possible. “Definitely
a flirt. Lex sounds like a boy’s name.”

The group began leaving the Quad and we
followed. I walking slightly behind Melissa and Carly so that they
couldn’t see my face. My mind was on the feel of Ian’s fingers when
they’d lightly grazed mine. Never before had I felt something like
that—like static electricity that had started in his body and
traveled into mine. And the way that he’d whispered in my ear...
Flirt or not, I knew he wouldn’t have done that in front of an
entire group of students unless he’d thought I was cute. The idea
excited me more than it should. Guys hadn’t seen me as someone to
flirt with back home.