FOR THE NEXT two weeks Penelope ignored Bishop the best she could. Occasionally she hung out with Bryce, but she spent most of her time going to class and studying. Nights, though, were the worst, because even though she and Bishop were back to barely speaking to each other, it seemed neither of them could give up their nightly reading sessions in the library.
Not able to stand the silence the way Bishop could, Pen entered the library before him one evening and tucked the tiny lace panties she’d worn on her first date with Bryce into Bishop’s book. The panties that Bishop, not Bryce had taken off her that evening at the end of her date.
Her pulse racing, she settled in to read, fastidiously ignoring Bishop when he came in at his usual time. She peeked through her eyelashes as he opened his book and the lingerie fell into his lap. With a quiet exhalation, he picked them up and brought them close to his face so his eyes could focus on them. He seemed puzzled at first, but it was clear the moment he realized what he was holding in his hand.
He sucked in a breath and flicked his gaze to her so quickly that their eyes met for a moment before she looked down at her book. Slowly, her heart pounding against her ribcage, she raised her head to look at him again.
He was still staring at her in that intense, dark way he had. That look, though a little unsettling, always made her core clench with a small thrill. In bed at night, she imagined that was the same look Bishop would give her if he was bracing himself on top of her, just one thrust away from taking her for his own. She felt her cheeks color at the thought.
Her guardian could own her with that look, and she wondered if he knew that.
She inhaled a shaky breath as she fought not to give in and look away, no matter how overwhelming was his penetrating gaze. Without breaking eye contact, Bishop crushed the bit of lace in his fist and shoved the panties into his pocket.
Penelope frowned. She hadn’t actually expected him to keep them. She liked those underwear.
He held her look a heartbeat longer, and then settled in to read as if the incident hadn’t happened. Pen looked down too, staring at the pages of her book, only now she was too keyed up to read.
She huffed and dropped the book into her lap, but he ignored her as if he hadn’t noticed.
The tightlipped truce they’d been maintaining was ridiculous, and even though she’d started it, she wasn’t sure she could endure it for another minute. She considered a dozen things she could blurt out. She could be friendly. She could start a fight. She could bust out in the Cooper College fight song and march around the room pumping an invisible baton.
Anything but this heavy, loaded silence.
Finally, she settled for sighing again, theatrically, and opened her book back up to a page she’d probably just stare at.
“What are you reading, Penelope?”
She jumped when the sudden, deep timbre of Bishop’s voice cut through her thoughts. It took a moment to remember which book she was holding.
Ah, yes. The same book she’d been reading over and over again since a few days after her eighteenth birthday.
“Ethan Frome,” she answered, with forced nonchalance. She flipped a page and didn’t look up.
“You’ve read that already.”
Now she raised her head, surprised that he remembered. “I’ve read it many times.” She held it up so he could see the cover. “This is a first edition printing. I bought it with my birthday money.”
He made a noise of disapproval. Her brows knit.
“Not an Edith Wharton fan?” she asked icily.
“Not an Ethan Frome fan.” He scowled. “That’s a dreadful book. It’s depressing. Why would you read it more than once?” He gestured toward one of the walls of bookshelves the library boasted. “You should be reading Jane Austen or Lucy Maud Montgomery.” He shook his head, still frowning, and flipped a page in his own book as if he wanted to rip it from the binding.
“You always think you know what’s best for me, don’t you? Gentlemen heroes? You think that’s what I should be swooning over? Men who treat women like fragile china dolls?” She slammed her book shut. “Perhaps you haven’t met me, Professor Cole, but I am hardly a precious flower with delicate sensibilities.”
He glared at her. “You are precious to me,” he said, each syllable heavy and precise, his eyes boring into her.
Not able to control her mouth, as usual, one of her many flaws she couldn’t give a damn about, she went in for the kill. “You know what? I like you better when you’re making me gag on your cock.”
He shot to standing, his book forgotten, fury emanating from him like the blast of an atomic bomb. She actually flinched before she caught herself.
“Don’t talk like that. Don’t bring that up,” he barked at her, a general admonishing a lousy soldier.
She’d gone too far. “I’m sorry,” she said quickly, meaning it. “I know you’re sensitive about that. I shouldn’t have said it.”
He glowered at her, not acknowledging her apology.
“Sorry, Bishop! Seriously. That was totally below the belt.”
Gaze still locked with his angry eyes, she realized what she’d said and couldn’t help the giggle that suddenly bubbled up. One giggle turned into three, and soon she was holding her stomach, laughing full out.
His stern face seemed to crack and a corner of his mouth twitched up. Finally, he collapsed back onto the couch and snorted a laugh out his nose before giving in to a full-on gale with her.
“Below the belt,” Penelope wheezed, barely able to take a breath between guffaws. “No pun intended, Bishop.” She collapsed again, crying with laughter.
When their fit of merriment ended, she wiped her eyes, feeling more relaxed than she’d felt since the night of her date, and the ensuing fight she’d had with Bishop.
He sat on his side of the couch, his posture finally casual, almost friendly. His hair was wild, but still fantastic, as usual, and his eyes sparkled with a gaiety that made her soul sing. She was struck in that moment with just how perfect he looked. Dressed in his typical uniform of long-sleeved black shirt, dark jeans and socked feet, Bishop could have just stepped out of an ad for a hip clothing company.
God, she loved him.
She stopped breathing. Fuck. Fuck! Where had that come from?
But there it was. She was in love with him, and the realization hit her like a sonic boom. Suddenly, it was if she’d been unknowingly storing up all these secret feelings for him, and now that her brain had finally caught up with her heart, they’d all come pouring out, flooding her with too much emotion at once.
Her longing for him nearly choked her. She swallowed an inexplicable sob that bubbled up from somewhere deep inside. It was the wail of that stashed-away girl, staring at the floor in her distant dorm room. The girl with no family, who thought she’d be lonely forever, but who’d finally found the matching other half of her soul.
Pen had suppressed the cry, but maybe she shouldn’t have. Those tears were fucking warranted. Because she was still that lonely girl, even though now she had a room in her father’s home. She’d been through enough. Being denied the one person who made her happy, made her feel complete—the man who made her feel a love she never dreamed she’d have—well, that was just goddammed unfair.
Why was her relationship with Bishop always a roller-coaster of anger, despair, lust and love?
Picking her book back up, she trailed her fingers along the antique cover. There was a long list of books she loved, but there was a reason she’d been fixated on this one lately.
“Do you remember what Ethan Frome is about?” she asked Bishop.
He glanced up, brows drawn. “I remember it’s gloomy,” he offered.
She ignored his critique. “Ethan Frome is a story about a young woman desperately in love with an older man she lives with. A man she can’t have.”
She glanced up. Bishop had lowered his book to his lap.
“I relate to Mattie,” she added softly. “I understand that kind of hopelessness.”
Bishop’s face saddened, and then Pen was looking into those shadowed, wounded eyes that drew her to him in the first place.
“But if I remember correctly,” his deep voice was tinged with huskiness, “Mattie and Ethan’s attempt to be together destroyed the young woman’s life in the end.”
So, he did remember the book.
Pen blinked rapidly as tears threatened. That would not be the end of her story. It would not.
She looked down at the small volume and clutched it tightly with both hands. “You’re wrong,” she stated. Taking a deep breath, she hoped to keep her voice from shaking. “The fates of Ethan and Mattie were sealed by his refusal to be with her, in spite of their love.” She loosened her grip on the book, not wanting to harm the binding. “Besides, I don’t read the epilogue. That’s the awful part. I just pretend it didn’t happen.”
She glanced at him to see he was looking at her wryly, one eyebrow raised.
“So, you rewrite the ending to suit you?” he asked, bemused.
“No,” she answered in a prim tone. “I don’t have to read that ending if I don’t want to. I just choose love. There’s never anything wrong with choosing love.”
He curled one side of his mouth, seeming to consider her words, but his expression reflected doubt at the sentiment.
She sighed in exaggerated fashion. “Look, let’s not argue about hundred-year-old literature. I hate fighting with you. I miss you when we don’t talk.”
Now his mouth curved into a charming, almost shy smile. “Me too.”
As happy as she was that they were talking again, she just couldn’t look at his sensuous mouth without needing to crawl over and kiss it. She stood up instead. She couldn’t bear one of his rejections in the vulnerable mood she was in. “Goodnight, Bishop.”
As she passed by him he reached out and grabbed her arm, sliding his hand down to tangle his fingers into hers. She stopped and looked down at him as he brought her hand to his lips and kissed it softly. Her knees nearly melted beneath her.
She studied his eyes, knowing exactly where this could lead, and that it would never be far enough for her. She bent and kissed him on the cheek, dangerously close to his lips. The scruff of his face bit into her skin, and every part of her awoke in a cascade of tingles.
Hesitating, her mouth just a few centimeters from his, she ran through all the things she wanted to do in that moment. But in the end, the thought of the typical pattern between them, and the disappointment and hurt she’d have to deal with, brought any thoughts of seduction to a halt.
Feeling more mature than she’d ever felt, and not liking it one bit, she straightened, pulled her hand from Bishop’s, and left the room.
*****