I squeezed the pillow around my head and groaned, 'Charlie, if you don't answer that bloody phone, I'll shove it so far up your arse you'll only be able to speak in ringtones.'

I didn't know what time it was, but it had to be some ungodly hour. I wasn't an early to bed sort of guy and the shrill cry of the mobile charging on Charlie's nightstand had drawn me out of a deep slumber. Whenever sleep attempted to reclaim me, it cried out again. Charlie could sleep like the dead, but he wasn't deaf. I knew he was trying to ignore it. The only person who'd call so late was his sister, and it was usually over some nonsense about her hair or a fight with a friend.

Apparently, if Chantelle was too tormented to rest, then no one else should be allowed to, either.

Charlie rolled over with a huff and slapped his hand down heavily onto the offending device. Sheets of rain dropped outside, hammering against the glass. Through the crack in the curtains, I could see it cascading down like a waterfall. It was speckled with white. Hail at this time of year? Even the weather was angry at my idiot friend for disturbing the peaceful night.

'What?' Charlie croaked in the handset. He had sandwiched it between his ear and the pillow. I knew that move. No doubt he'd soon be snoring and drooling all over his phone while Chantelle obliviously prattled on.

Except... perhaps not?

Charlie sat bolt upright, snatched up the phone and held it to his ear. 'Say that again?'

Even I was interested, and I was never interested.

'What do you mean? Slow down!' Charlie snapped at her. I dragged myself into a sitting position and forced my eyes to focus through the dark, taking in the sharp edge of concern in his eyes which were illuminated by the phone screen. Something told me that this wasn't about a bad manicure when Charlie asked, 'What the hell made you think that was a good idea?'

'Chaz,' I hissed, slapping my hand against the duvet to catch his attention, 'Hey, what's going on?'

'Hold on,' he hissed at me. 'No, not you, Chan'. Okay, where are you?' There was a pause before he exploded incredulously, 'You think I care if you get a bit wet? This is your own fault, and you dragged them all out there with you!'

For one fleeting, ridiculous moment, an image of Beth flashed in my mind. Bedraggled, cold, possibly face down in a puddle on the expansive grounds while Chantelle just left her there and worried about her hair being ruined in the downpour. Not that I cared, of course. We'd been acquainted barely two days and, in that time, she'd made a thinly veiled death threat against me and made it abundantly clear that she'd rather make up excuses about studying than so much as sit beside me in class.

No, I didn't care a bit if she was stuck out in the rain. It was probably her own stupid fault, anyway.

'Chaz!' I snapped with renewed urgency. 'What's going on?'

He covered the phone with his hand. 'Chantelle dragged her friends off to the lake for some stupid reason. I don't know. You know how she gets when she's hysterical.'

'When isn't she hysterical?' I asked before I could stop myself.

Charlie's eyes narrowed. 'Anyway,' he continued far more gravely than I'd ever heard, 'she said that they're all too worried to go back in the rain on their own and they want me to go help them. Sounds like she made Jenny go out there, too. She'll be sick to death if she stays out in this rain. You saw her, she's far more delicate than the rest of Chantelle's friends.'

My friend was seeking reassurance that the girl he was so suddenly smitten with – yes, smitten, like a puppy meeting their new owner for the first time – was most likely unharmed and safely sheltered from the rain in one of the school's outbuildings. I couldn't offer said reassurance. Jenny seemed like a sensible girl, but Chantelle wasn't. She wouldn't have found them an unlocked building to crawl into until the rain stopped, nor would she have taken a single umbrella or decent coat. They were probably all in impractical designer outfits, freezing to the bone.

'Want me to come with you to look for them?' I offered.

Charlie considered it a moment. I could hear Chantelle yelling at him to stop ignoring her through the phone. I couldn't understand how they were twins. Honestly, one of them had to be adopted. Perhaps there'd been a mix up at the hospital. Their similarities ended at their features. Charlie was kind and loyal, while Chantelle was... well, she was Chantelle. I thanked whatever God there might be that my mother had always laughed off any suggestion of their parents that Chantelle and I should be matched up during our childhood. My mother knew me well enough to understand that I'd never tolerate such a shrill and shallow wife, even before I'd turned ten.

'I got it,' Charlie said. 'You stay here. I'll call if I need help.'

That image of Beth continued to turn in my mind. Ridiculous ideas floated the surface of her drowning in the lake – probably tossed in by Chantelle and her minions – or of her cradling a twisted ankle and shivering alone on the slick lawns. I'd put on my shoes shortly after Charlie had left. He'd call for my help, I was certain of it. He always did. Charlie didn't know how to function without my support.

Alright, that was disingenuous of me, but he relied on me like a brother and I wanted to be ready to bolt out of the door should he summon me.

Time wore on and the images continued to plague me. I mentally swatted them away like annoying flies. Beth wouldn't even be there. Besides, it was a joke that I should be paying her any mind. I should be more concerned that my best friend was running around out in the rain while his sister was likely catching a serious cold. I didn't know why I was so stuck on thinking about her. I wasn't even sure why I'd tried to sit beside her in class when she'd made it obvious that she hated me at first sight.

Maybe that was it?

Maybe I was just relieved that she hadn't latched onto me like a social leech and begged for a dance?

Maybe I was just enamoured with the aura of sanity radiating from her in this sea of madness?

It might also have been her arse.

No, it was definitely the sanity thing.

My phone vibrated in my hand and I answered it before it was at my ear. 'Hey, you found her?'

'Beth says they're at that wooded path we walked through earlier.'

'Beth?' I asked. 'What's she doing out there?'

'Looking for Jenny! Can you come out and help us get her back to the dorms? Chan' and the others are all safe. They're the last two.'

'Yeah.' I was already running out of the door. 'I'm on my way.'

I stopped at the edge of the path. I was already soaked through and had only been out in the rain for a few minutes. It was nothing to Jenny and Beth. The sight of her made my blood run cold. Stubborn and determined, she tried to raise her friend up onto her feet by herself. I had to admire her attempt even if it did fail. Beth staggered and fell. I lunged forwards a step but Beth steadied them both, protecting her friend gallantly and preventing her from coming to more harm. Unable to move, she shielded Jenny from the onslaught of rain with little thought to how it might impact her. My chest might have swelled with pride at this selflessness had I not been so concerned for her welfare.

Charlie joined the pair, approaching at a jog. It was difficult to hear them over the din of pounding rain but I gathered that she was frustrated at his late arrival. Satisfied that my friend had his paramour in his arms, I wasted no time in approaching Beth. I'd hoped that she might be able to stand under her own power, but from the way that she remained on the ground, her breath misting through her parted lips, I could tell just how physically and mentally exhausted she was.

Without waiting for permission, I grasped her wrist and pulled her arm across my shoulders. Her dark brown hair was plastered to her graceful neck, her clothes sticking to her skin. I felt like I was handling a block of ice and fear coursed through me once more. Despite her involuntary trembling, her eyes were aflame with indignation when she realised that I was her rescuer.

'William? What are you doing?'

'Helping,' I replied gruffly, glad that she had no idea that torment I'd suffered in my room. How I'd feared the worst for her.

'I don't need help,' she protested stubbornly. 'Let go of me!'

'Don't be so bloody stubborn! Just hold onto me. I'll get you back to the dorms,' I vowed.

I needed to get over my sudden and intense infatuation with this impossible girl.

She was headstrong, reckless, stubborn, and utterly, unimaginably intoxicating. I had no doubt that should I continue in the company of Beth Bennett my life would be turned upside down and inside out before I got out of this school, and I didn't know that I was strong enough to endure it.

I didn't know that I was strong enough to endure her.