CHAPTER SEVEN

HARPER

I close the bathroom stall and place a hand against it for support, breathing hard.

This is bad. This is very, very, very bad.

I’m sweating, feel like I’m stuck in my own personal greenhouse as I try to rein in the anxiety.

I go over it in my head, what’s at stake, but every time I do, my thoughts slip back to Colton’s fingers and touch, the expert way he made me come. The more I think about it, the more I wonder what his tongue — what other parts of him — could do.

Breathe, Harper.

I do, long and slow, pushing off the door and standing there nodding at myself, building back my composure brick by brick. Because I won’t let this disrupt my life. I have more control than that… or at least I thought I did.

I actually jump when my cell starts to buzz in my pocket.

“Yes,” I answer, my voice unsteady.

“Caffeine?”

It’s Mindy.

“Yes,” I reply, the desperation clear.

“Jesus,” she laughs. “It’s not an injectable, you know.”

“Mug, bowl, a puddle on the floor—I don’t care what it comes in, I just need it. Now.”

“Copy that.”

*

Mindy works as PA to the Dean at Branton College. I always thought the life of a PA was a constant stream of calls and poorly timed appointments in the middle of the night, but Dean Mayson is pretty chill. Mindy works nine to five and that’s it.

I arrive at Wired, a tiny café on the edge of the science block. It’s coming up to lunch and already bustling inside, but I spot Mindy holding a spot by the window.

I take off my coat and dump my stuff down. It’s an inferno in here—not unlike a certain student’s place of residence I may or may not have been at last night.

Mindy has three coffees ready.

I nod down to the first. “Mayson’s?”

She nods back, picking it up. “Tall, non-fat latte with caramel drizzle. I don’t know if we have a Dean sometimes or a SoCal hipster.”

I sit and swipe up my coffee—black, strong, as boring as I am. “Branton could do worse. Besides, I think this place benefits from a woman’s touch.”

“Speaking of speaking,” says Mindy, “you never did detail what happened last night.”

Oh, you mean the hook-up I had with one of my students, unware or not? I swallow and divert my eyes. “Can we let that one go?”

“See,” enthuses Mindy, fist-bumping me on the shoulder, “11am and he’s already forgotten. Just what you needed, right?”

His breath on the side of my neck, his fingers inside me… I’m losing it. “Yes,” I reply simply, “right.”

I may as well be a plane glass window given the way Mindy sees through me. “What is it? Did he have a ten-foot cock or something?”

“Ssshh,” I whisper, looking around with concern. “No, though I think he is kind of… big.”

Mindy leans in. “You think?”

“I didn’t actually see it.”

I shouldn’t be telling her any of this, but Mindy’s the one person who gets me around here. Still, her position means I have to tread carefully. If word got to the Dean… Not to mention she’s the only one who knows about James, my affair with a tenured colleague. I don’t know which one is worse, frankly. It only increases the intensity of the poop-storm I’m happily walking into.

Mindy’s cell vibrates across the bench. She picks it up, eyebrows knotting. “Duty calls,” she says, standing and collecting her things, a coffee under each arm, “but we are not done here, missy. Not. At. All.”

I salute. “Yes, ma’am.”

I watch her head outside into the snow, walking until she fades into the white.

I stare down at my coffee, but all I’m seeing is him, Colton. I close my eyes and repeat my mantra.

Block it out.

Block it out.

Cock it out.

Cocky pout.

Cock in mouth.

Damn it!

And there he is again with that smug look of satisfaction on his face.

What is going on with me? I was sane yesterday—sad, yes, but at least my faculties were in order, synapses firing in perfect sequence. Now? My head may as well be filled with fireworks.

I hustle outside heading nowhere in particular.

I’m halfway across the quad when I hear a familiar voice.

“There you are.”

I spin and find James there with his satchel by his side, his glasses on. He’s smiling. “James, what are you doing?”

He continues to smile like everything is completely normal between us. “How’s your thesis coming along?”

“My thesis?” I reply, dumbfounded. “You didn’t give a damn about my thesis when we were together.”

“I’m simply asking out of interest, one professional to another.”

“Professional?” I scoff. I step up to him. “If you think we can somehow go back to ‘professional,’ especially given what you said, you’re wrong.”

He keeps smiling, damn him. I want to wipe it off with the back of my heel, Wonder Woman style. “Harper, Harper,” he starts, “why are you acting like this?”

“Why am I acting like this?”

“I mean, you were such an exciting fuck.”

He’s mocking me. This prick is actually mocking me. “You did not just say that.”

“And I’m sure the thesis is coming along swimmingly given you’ve been working on it for, how long has it been again?”

“Fuck you and your stupid whalebone glasses.” Not exactly the saltiest of insults, but enough to allow me to walk away.

He grabs my arm from behind, but I pull away. “We are done, James. Don’t speak to me again. I’m serious.”

He slides a hand into his pocket, holding the shoulder strap of his satchel with the other. “It was nice to see you, Harper.”

I walk quickly, my heart pumping.

I look around, but no one has noticed the exchange.

His snide, snarky manner has my blood boiling. How did I not see what this guy was from the start?

Without thinking, I find myself at the ice rink. I come out high in the stands overlooking the rink, taking a seat and observing the players below.

It takes a while, but I manage to find Colton amongst the players swooping left and right, easily shuttling the puck towards the other end of the rink.

I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t think I know anything anymore only that I wanted to see him for some bizarre reason.

He stops and looks up, right at me.

Fishsticks.

I stand, crouching, and slip back around the top entrance, my back against the wall, breathing like I’ve got a chainsaw in my chest.