She can’t possibly be a freshman, so what is she doing here?
I sit down next to her. She smells nice, like vanilla and maybe something floral. And she’s very studiously highlighting parts of the syllabus. Since I don’t have one, I say, “Got an extra copy of that?”
The professor, an older looking man with gold-rimmed glasses, stops his droning. He clears his throat as he glances down at a stack of papers. “Mr. Callahan?”
“Yes. I’m here.”
The professor keeps his gaze on me as he talks. “Students, please make note of the start time for this class once more. 8:30, not 9. It will benefit your academic career not to be late to class. Other professors may not be so… accommodating.”
He punctuates that by passing a copy of the syllabus my way.
Fuck. I can feel my blush like a five-alarm fire. “Sir, I’m sorry. I was up early for practice and went home to get changed before coming here, and I must have mixed up the times with my other morning class.”
A girl looking back at me shrugs, as if to say, tough. I resist the urge to make a face at her. Beside me, Beckett heaves a sigh.
“What?” I say.
“I just lost a bet with myself. I thought you were late because of an alarm malfunction.”
“I’m an athlete. I don’t have alarm malfunctions.”
“Ah,” she says. “Right, I forgot that you guys are gods who never need alarm clocks, whereas we mere mortals—”
Mr. Professor clears his throat again. He’s still looking my way, although I’m gratified to see him raise his eyebrow at Beckett too. “As I was saying, the tenets of academic writing at the college level include…”
“What are you even doing here?” I whisper.
She taps her foot against mine under the table. “I’m wondering that about you.”
“I failed this class when I first took it.” I don’t know what compels me to be totally honest with her. Maybe it’s her big brown eyes or the way she’s twirling a little sparkly gel pen or how I can’t stop remembering how her lips felt on mine.
I shove that thought away. She’s my teammate’s ex. Even if she was interested, I couldn’t.
“I transferred here last year,” she murmurs. “Even though I took classes like this at my community college, they didn’t accept all my credits.”
“That sucks.”
She shrugs slightly. “It’s not like it’ll be hard, right? We’ve been in college for three years already.”
I look at the syllabus. Twice-a-week seminar-style meetings. Weekly writing assignments. Peer feedback. My skin begins to crawl. Give me partial differential equations and I’m fine, but this? This is impossible.
And of course, a third of the grade is a final research paper on a topic of our choosing. Fuck. Me.
This class might not be difficult for her, but it’s going to be hell for me.
I give her what I hope is a semi-normal smile and settle in for the rest of class. But despite my best efforts, I can’t stop stealing glances at her. She looks just as pretty now as she did fancied up in that little white dress. My type, too; those full tits are distracting even in a T-shirt.
Did she choose me to kiss because I’m her type as well? I’m not dumb, I know she kissed me to get back at Darryl. But she could’ve approached any guy at that party, and I’m the one she landed on.
She bites her lip as she thinks. That’s cute.
The professor wraps up his spiel with an in-class assignment. We’re supposed to read an article about research into academic writing and distill it down to a paragraph explaining the thesis and main points.
I stare at my copy of the article for so long the words start to blur. All around me, the other students are highlighting keywords and scribbling notes in the margins; Bex seems to have a whole color-coded situation going on. I tug at the collar of my shirt, glancing at the clock. We have twenty minutes for this assignment, and five have already passed.
I force myself to read the first paragraph again. I pick up my pen, tapping it against the table before underlining a sentence with a bolded word in it. I remember that tip from one of the tutors I’ve had over the years, be it the one my parents hired in high school or the many I tried to work with at the writing center at LSU.
“If you’re stuck, try reading the topic sentences first,” Bex says.
I glance over at her. She taps my paper with her pen.
“Look,” she says. “There are a couple of sections in the article, and each of them covers a different topic.”
“But then it just talks about something else,” I say.
“Not quite,” she says. “I know it seems like it, because it starts out talking about research into academic writing and then switches into an anecdote, but that’s just to humanize the topic a little. It’s not important information.”
I’m only about seventy percent certain I know what an anecdote is, but I don’t want her to think I’m even more of an idiot than I already sound, so I just nod along. “Seems unnecessary.”
She snorts, which makes a dude in front of us clear his throat pointedly.
“Skip down to the part where it discusses the study on formal writing education,” she whispers.
She takes me through the article, showing me her own annotations as examples for what to focus on. I can’t help but be a little distracted by the way she smells and how much I’m yearning to lean in closer, but in the end, I have a halfway decent paragraph to hand in. Something about the way she explained it made way more sense than in the past, which is weird, considering I’ve always had such a block when it comes to writing. If she was the professor, I’d probably get an A in this class.
I reach over and pluck her pen out of her hand. She gives me an outraged look, but I just grin and scrawl thank you on her syllabus. I have to resist the urge to include my phone number. That would definitely make her scowl even more adorable, but I don’t want to come on too strong—because a plan is forming in my mind, and I need her on board for it to work.
After all, who would say no to a paid tutoring gig?
7
BEX
“Hey, Bexy.”
I turn to James, a scowl already planted on my face. I figured he was going to follow me outside, but no one calls me Bexy. Darryl ruined that nickname completely.
I hike my bag over my shoulder and shade my eyes as I look up at him. He’s even taller than Darryl. It’s seriously unfair that he’s up there and I’m all the way down here. “It’s Bex.”
“Sorry. Bex, can we talk?”
I thought he was attractive at the party, all dressed up in a black suit, but this is somehow better. He’s wearing a tank top that shows off his drool-worthy shoulders, athletic shorts, and sandals, and I have no idea why it’s working so well for me, but it is. The irrational part of my brain is chanting, “Lick him!” Pathetic.
But his eyes are so blue.
I mentally put my foot down. “I have work.”
“Where do you work?”
I huff out a breath. “Just make it quick. I need to be back across campus in fifteen.”
“Let’s walk and talk, then.”
He literally starts walking away, and I can’t help it, I burst out laughing. He looks so confident—and if he headed that way, he’d end up in town.
He looks back at me, frustration in the set of his jaw. “What?”
“It’s this way.” I point in the opposite direction and start fast-walking. “And you can walk with me, but only because I have a feeling you’re going to make this conversation happen one way or another.”
He jogs to catch up to me. “What makes you think that?”
I look up at him. “We kissed.”
“We did,” he agrees. He lowers his voice. “It was a good kiss.”
“I’m sorry I did it,” I blurt as my cheeks heat up. “Darryl—” I stop walking abruptly and bump into him. He steadies me, his big hands on my shoulders, and for a hot second they feel like a brand going straight between my legs. What’s with this guy? My body loves when he’s close. The entire time I helped him with that assignment, I wanted to lean my head on his shoulder.
“Bex,” he says. “Look at me.”
If I look into those ocean eyes, I’m afraid he’ll be able to see how much he’s affecting me.
He hooks his finger under my chin and tilts my head up. My hands flutter around him for half a second before finding their way to his sides, resting lightly. Even through the shirt he’s wearing, I can feel the power in his body. Stupid athletes with their stupidly sculpted bodies. Something about knowing the dedication that had to go into creating and maintaining it gets me every time.
“Hey,” he says, still holding me in place. I’m frozen, looking up at him, torn between pulling away and staying put. “Don’t worry about it. I know a jealousy kiss when I see one.”
“I didn’t realize you were his teammate.”
He just shrugs. “Like I said, don’t worry about it. We talked; we’re cool.”