8. Jace

8

JACE

T essa Collins is relentless.

It's like she took our little stunt at the carnival as a personal challenge, and now, she's everywhere. I'm not even sure how she does it, but every time we turn around, there she is. In the library, at the student union, even at the gym—always watching, always scheming. I thought after the carnival, after we rattled her a bit, she'd back off. But no. Instead, she hit back harder, showing up at every Sigma event like it's her mission to keep us in check.

I can't help but grudgingly admire her tenacity, but it's getting under my skin. None of us signed up for a game of cat and mouse with the girl who's practically made a career out of dogging our every move.

"She's becoming a real problem," I mutter as I push open the door to the frat house, finding Alec and Devin already in the living room. Alec's got that look on his face—the one that says he's been thinking too hard about something, and Devin's pacing like he's ready to tear his hair out in frustration.

"She's not just a problem," Alec says, leaning back in his chair. "She's everywhere. She's keeping tabs on everything we do. We need to figure out how to get her to back off before she pulls something that gets us in serious trouble."

Devin scowls, arms crossed over his chest. "It's like she's daring us. Trying to prove she's smarter than us, as though we're just a bunch of idiots."

I flop onto the couch, rubbing my temples. "She's playing the long game, and I hate to say it, but right now, she's winning. We've gotta get ahead of her before she takes things to the next level."

Silence falls over the room for a beat as we all let that thought settle in. It's not just about saving face anymore. Tessa's starting to push buttons that could bring the whole fraternity down if we're not careful.

We're trying to tread a careful line right now, between letting ourselves give in to the desire to harass her into stopping and keeping ourselves in check to stay out of trouble with the dean's office.

"We need another meeting," I finally say, breaking the silence. "We've gotta figure out what we're gonna do before she gets the upper hand."

Alec nods. "Yeah. Let's get the guys together. This is about more than just some personal grudge. She's turning this into a war, and we need a battle plan."

And for the first time, I realize just how deep we've gotten ourselves into this mess with Tessa. We underestimated her once. That's a mistake we won't make again.

The mood in the room is tense as we sit around the big oak table in the back of the frat house. Alec's got his serious face on, Devin's fidgeting, and Matteo looks like he'd rather be anywhere but here. Julian leans back in his chair, twirling a pen between his fingers like he's waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"Alright, let's get this started," Alec says, his tone clipped. "We've got a problem, and we need to deal with it. Tessa Collins is on our backs harder than ever. She's showing up everywhere, getting in our business, and we need to get her to back off before she does real damage."

"Is that why we were taking all those photos of her at the carnival?" Matteo asks, scrunching his nose.

I shift in my seat, feeling the weight of the situation settling in. "Yeah, about that…" I start, glancing at him and Julian. "The reason we had you guys take all those pictures was our attempt to get her to back off. We thought if we made her look bad enough on social media, she'd be too embarrassed to show her face around Sigma Theta ever again."

Devin lets out a sharp breath, shaking his head. "But instead, it's like we lit a fire under her. She's doubled down. She's everywhere now, pushing even harder."

Matteo winces, clearly uncomfortable. "Look, I wasn't exactly thrilled about taking those pictures in the first place," he mutters. "I don't know if this is the right way to handle things."

Alec shrugs, his expression unreadable. "It seemed like a good idea at the time. But it's backfiring. She's relentless, and if she gets wind of us pulling stunts like that, she's gonna come at us even harder."

Devin rubs his chin, his mind obviously racing. "We can't afford to let this spiral out of control. Tessa's got too much of a platform. She could do another podcast episode about the carnival stunt, turn it into another hit piece, and we'd be screwed."

Julian nods in agreement. "Exactly. If she makes it public that we tried to humiliate her, we'll be looking at more than just bad press. The administration could step in, or worse, alumni could pull funding. We barely survived the last scandal."

Devin leans forward, eyes narrowed. "So what's the plan? We can't just let her keep pushing us around."

Alec straightens up, his voice firm. "We go after her full tilt. We dig up whatever dirt we can on her, anything that'll make her back off. If she wants to play dirty, fine. We can play dirty too."

Matteo looks uneasy, his fingers tapping nervously against the table. "I don't know, man. This feels like we're crossing a line."

I glance at Alec, knowing he's not backing down. "We've already crossed lines, Matteo. The question is whether we let her destroy us or if we take control."

Julian chimes in, his tone practical. "Tessa could cause serious trouble if she decides to make an episode about what went down at the carnival. If we don't shut her down soon, she'll have us by the throat."

Alec nods, resolute. "Then it's settled. We find a way to take her down before she takes us down."

Matteo shakes his head. "I'm not going to do anything to hurt her, but I'm still loyal to the frat first and foremost. If we find something that can get her to back off, let's do that. Otherwise, we should try not to go too far."

"Jace and I will try to find what we can," Alec offers. "We have a responsibility to protect the fraternity though."

With that, the meeting breaks up and Alec and I head upstairs to his bedroom to do some digging. We start with looking through her records at the school, at anything publicly available.

Coming up short, we switch tactics. Alec uses his admin privileges to look into her academic record but even that turns up nothing.

"This is getting us nowhere!" Alec says, running his hands through his dark hair. "I feel like Tessa can't be as squeaky clean as she's pretending to be. Everyone has skeletons in their closet!"

"Maybe we're going about this the wrong way," I suggest, leaning back in the computer chair as I let my mind wander. "Her skeletons might not be in the system. It seems like a reporter would be sneaky enough to know how to keep the bad stuff off the record."

"So what then?" Alec asks, a frown on his face.

"So, we need to get closer to her," I say, a smile creeping over my face. "One of us gets her to open up and bam, we've found out what we can use against her."

Alec nods. "You should be the one to do it. You've got natural charm."

"I agree," I say with a playful smirk.

The opportunity to get closer to her comes sooner than expected. The next time I'm at the library, I see Tessa lurking in the stacks, ostensibly keeping an eye on me. I grin to myself before smoothing a hand over my hair and approaching her.

She's pretending to read Love in the Time of Cholera and I push the book down gently, lowering it so I can see her vivid green eyes as they stare up at me.

"Can I help you?" she asks, tone haughty but I see the hesitation there.

"I was hoping you could help me, actually," I say, plucking the book from her hand and examining it. "Good book. I love the romance between Florentino and Fermina."

Tessa stares at me and I take a step forward, enjoying the way she takes a step backward, her back hitting the bookshelf.

"What do you want?"

"I'm sick of all this back and forth between us," I tell her. "We all are. We got our feelings hurt and we lashed out stupidly. I was thinking maybe we could call for a truce?"

"A truce?" Tessa asks, swallowing as I stare down at her face, her plush lips looking enticing with the red lipstick she's wearing.

"Yeah. What do you say? Can we be…friends?" I ask.

"Friends?" she repeats, and I can't help the smile that crosses my features. She might act high and mighty but she's not immune to my charms. I reach down and brush her cheek with my thumb.

"What do you say?" I ask.

Tessa licks her lips and her reply is swallowed up as I bring my mouth down to hers, kissing her hard. I can't resist, her siren's call is too alluring. She's adorable in a dorky way, but she's got such tenacity too.

It isn't long before she's kissing back and then suddenly the two of us are grinding on each other, bodies writhing together in the stacks. Something about being near her makes me lose all sense and I find myself getting lost in the pleasure she brings.

Our bodies tangle together, tongues twisting around and around as our lips slide over each other. Her hands are under my cotton shirt, tracing my sides as my hands work under her ass to lift her, pinning her in place as we continue to kiss. Her hips rock against mine, clothed pussy rubbing against my aching erection.

Footsteps echo around the corner and the two of us break apart hastily, rearranging our clothes as someone approaches the stacks.

I'm panting, trying to catch my breath as I realize what I've done. I take off, needing space to sort out my head.

What the hell have I done?