In my rearview, I saw them sprinting after me, but they gave up after ten yards. I flew out of the far end of the parking lot, turned onto Adams College Drive, which led out to North Torrey Pines, and cranked the throttle.

What the fuck was that?

My mind raced over the situation. I wasn’t too worried about those guys following me now that I was on my bike. One, they couldn’t catch me unless they had sport bikes, and two, with three of them banged up pretty good, I doubted they’d be in hot pursuit.

I wanted to call Samantha and tell her I was okay, but her phone was gone. I didn’t have Kamiko or Romeo’s numbers, so I couldn’t call them. And I didn’t want to head back to campus too soon, because I wanted to wait until those guys were long gone, and because someone would probably have called campus security by now.

The one thing that couldn’t wait was putting my helmet on. A quarter mile from campus, I rolled to a stop on the side of the road and grabbed my helmet from where it was strapped to the side of my bike. No need getting pulled over for riding without a helmet on top of everything else.

After my helmet was on, I cruised toward La Jolla Village. I ended up at the La Jolla Village Square mall and parked outside the Ralph’s grocery store. I swung my leg over the seat and took my helmet off. I was sweating good from the exertion of the fighting and the running. My helmet liner was damp with perspiration. I strolled inside Ralph’s. Pausing at the liquor aisle, I considered grabbing a bottle of bourbon, but I had to ride my bike home. So I snagged a huge bottle of water off the shelf in the beverage aisle and went up front to pay for it.

I set the water on the conveyor at the cash register. The clerk, a young woman with a sleepy expression and too much eye makeup, looked up at me and grimaced.

That wasn’t the reaction I was used to with the ladies.

“What happened to your face?” she asked.

I reached a hand up and touched my cheek. Now that the adrenaline from the fight was wearing off, I felt the throb on my cheek bone where one of the rugby guys had clocked me. He’d hit me harder than I’d realized. A dozen lame excuses raced through my brain. Ran into a door. Tripped on the sidewalk. Fell down the stairs. Stepped in front of a forklift. Wrestled a bear. Went twelve rounds with an elephant. Etc., etc., etc.

I winked at her, “Got in a fight with a drunken rugby team.” Sometimes the truth sounded too ridiculous to believe. That was my plan.

She arched an eyebrow, “All by yourself?”

“Yeah.”

She frowned skeptically, “Really?”

I chuckled. What was it about my physical appearance (muscles, tats, banged up face) that said, “this guy doesn’t get in fights”? It always amused me when people didn’t believe the truth.

“Really,” I said.

She flashed a big smile, and her sleepy expression gave way to a pretty set of teeth. She had a rocking little body and was actually cute when she wasn’t halfway to slumberland. “Do you need someone to put ice on it? My shift is over in half an hour.”

I hid my grin. Much better. This was the sort of treatment I’d come to expect from the ladies.

I saw her eyeing the tattoos on my arms, and the script of my Fearless tattoo which peaked out of the notch in my V-neck T-shirt. I grinned back. “I’m good. Just the water.” I flashed her a dimpled grin.

“You sure?” Her eyes narrowed into bedroom territory, but not the sleepy kind.

Yeah, too much eye makeup. Not that I cared. I had a girlfriend who was going to move in with me unless her parents put her under house arrest. “Totally sure.”

The cashier harrumphed in a cute way, kind of like a sleepy kitten, then rang up my water bottle.

I paid cash and walked out to my bike, guzzling down the entire bottle before climbing on my Ducati and riding back to SDU.

SAMANTHA

Romeo called campus security on his phone while we watched in horror through the glass doors as Christos fought with the jerks of Team Testosterone outside of Paiute Hall.

“There’s five guys with SDU rugby shirts beating up my friend!” Romeo shouted into his phone. “What? One guy! Yes, he’s fighting them all by himself! Please send someone right now! They’re in front of Paiute Hall!”

“Ohmygod!” Kamiko screamed. “They’re hitting him!”

I was freaking out because Christos was in danger from the guys outside, but possibly worse danger if campus security showed up. SDU had actual police on campus. They were the same ones who’d arrested Christos the day we’d met.

I had to do something to stop this.

I was about to push the doors open when Crew Cut fell into them, blocking them shut.

The next thing I knew, two more guys were out of commission and Christos was sprinting out of sight with the last two guys chasing after. Everything had happened so fast, there was no time to do anything.

Crew Cut and his buddy with blood running down his face were trying to lift up their friend who had been knocked out.

“Pick him up,” Crew Cut grunted.

Bloody Face draped one of the unconscious guys arms around his neck.

The two of them hoisted their friend and started walking across the lawn in front of Paiute.

“They’re going to get away before security gets here!” Kamiko growled. “They’ll get away with it! That’s not right!” Kamiko pushed the panic bar on the door with a loud thunk and strutted outside.

“Kamiko!” I called after her. “Don’t! Stay inside!”

She ignored me. “Get back here, you guys! I’m pressing charges as soon as security shows up! You guys are going to get expelled!”

Crew Cut turned awkwardly while trying to support his buddy. “Back off, bitch.”

“Stop!” Kamiko shouted, striding toward them.

I couldn’t leave her alone with those guys, so I jogged out to join her.

“Don’t make me tell you twice,” Crew Cut said to Kamiko.

“Come on!” Bloody Face said to Crew Cut, “we need to go, man!”

Crew Cut snarled at Kamiko. “Fucking cunt.”

“Fuck you, you stinky assbag!” Kamiko shouted.

I grabbed her by the shoulders. “Stop! Don’t make this worse.”

“But they started this, Sam!” she pleaded.

“I know.” But all I could think about was the cops showing up and asking questions and Kamiko or Romeo blurting out Christos’ name. Before I had time to explain myself, two uniformed cops walked across the big lawn in front of Nyyhmy and Paiute.

“That’s them!” Kamiko shouted.

Two flashlights flicked on and danced across the three remaining rugby guys. “Stop where your are, sirs,” a voice commanded.

Fuck.

“Oh, thank god! They’re here!” Romeo said to his phone, now standing beside me and Kamiko. “Yes. Two cops just walked up. Thank you.” He lowered his phone to his side.

I wasn’t sure if Romeo had hung up his phone or not. I grabbed it from his hand.

“Hey! What are you doing?” he asked.

I ended the call on his phone. Had I not, I worried the operator might have heard what I was going to say.

“All three of you, put your hands up!” one of the cops shouted.

“We can’t!” Crew Cut said. “Our friend is unconscious.”

Shit. I was pretty sure whoever got knocked out in a fight looked like the innocent one.

“Some guys jumped us,” Bloody Face said to the cops. “Beat the shit out of us.”

WTF? Were they blaming us for starting this? At least they wouldn’t be able to pin it on Christos if they didn’t know who he was.

The cops were getting closer to all of us. I had only a few seconds to strategize with Romeo and Kamiko before the cops could overhear everything I said.

“Don’t mention Christos’ name,” I hissed.

“What?” Kamiko asked, confused.

“Sam,” Romeo said, “why’d you take my phone?”

I thrust Romeo’s phone back into his hand. “Listen! Tell the cops that Christos was a stranger walking by and he tried to help out. Don’t say his name. You don’t even know his name. And don’t mention his tattoos. Just say he was some random guy.”