He turned around when she was done. All the way aroundand then his arms went up to cover his head and she understood. What she said had affected him, strongly. Maybe more than his words had affected her. It took him twice as long to get it together, and even after he had he couldn’t quite look at her. He just kept staring at the wall and clenching his jaw.
And saying things. Oh yeah, he said things, in a strained, shaky voice.
“I meant what I said, you know. That you are the very best.”
“I know. That’s why I’m going to ask you not to say it again.”
“I can’t stop. I have the opposite of whatever idiocy infected me in high school.”
“What, like insane-need-to-compliment fever?”
“Pretty much, yeah,” he said.
“Well it has taken a raging hold of you, let me tell you.”
“I know it seriously cannot be stopped.”
“I think you have a terminal case.”
“Not a bad way to go, if you ask me,” he said, so soft and sincere it took all her strength to stop herself smiling in response. She could feel her lips trembling. Her cheeks ached with the effort of pinning them down, yet still she knew she was failing. She could see it in his satisfied expression.
And hear it in his words.
“That’s better. Seeing you look happy.”
“I am happy,” she said, then added without thinking: “Are you?”
Of course she didn’t mean anything by it. It was just a polite habit, based on interactions with people other than Tate. People who had actual problems, who lived troubled lives, who might answer with a god no. Tate would never need to answer with a god no. His life was full of endless possibilities and unfettered glory. He could snap his fingers and have a thousand people follow him to the ends of the earth.
He even looked that way, in the dim light of the narrow hallway between these offices.
His hair was the color of caramel, just as it started to burn. Every item of clothing suited him perfectly, from the rich gray-blue of his V-neck to the jeans he’d tucked into his sandy boots. He exuded cool from every pore; he could have stepped off the cover of a magazine.
Yet all she could see was his face as it slowly sagged. It was like watching someone cut the strings that had held a mask in placea mask she hadn’t known he was wearing. She thought that smiling golden god who had tormented her was the real him, but for a second she couldn’t be sure. Just for one heart-rattling second, and then the door to the office opened and that glimpse of something else was goneso fast she would imagine later that it had never existed.
It was just a trick of the light.
Better to focus on the real and the now.
“What can I do for you two today?” Professor Harrison asked.
Then she took a breath and answered.
“Nothing,” she said.
Chapter 7
She agreed to meet him on neutral ground to start with. The only problem was, it didn’t really feel like neutral ground once she got there. The quiet of the library was suddenly stifling, and the spot he’d chosen was isolated and closed in. It was right at the back, between two towering shelves that shielded them completely from view. She took a step into that sheltered space and felt as though she’d dropped off the face of the earth.
There wasn’t even a window.
There was just the dim quiet, rows of falling-apart books, and Tate Sullivan standing in the corner, like an ogre lying in wait for the easily duped damsel. The only thing that stood in the way was a table and two chairs, neither of which seemed like a good enough defense.
If he sat on one chair and she sat on the other, their knees would probably touch.
Their hands would most likely brush as they handed each other books.
She had to think fast, before any of that happened.
“Okay, before we get startedthere have to be some ground rules.”
He shrugged one big shoulder.
“I figured as much. Shoot.”
“First of all…no sudden moves.”
“What kind of sudden moves do you think I’m going to make?”
“Handing me a book when I’m not prepared. Waving a hand in my face if I start to fall asleep. Touching my arm to draw my attention to something.”
“What if I just promise to do those things in a way that does not seem murderous?”
“Everything you do seems murderous to me. Literally everything.”
“I could try moving super slowly like this,” he said.
He actually demonstrated, inching toward a book on the table in such an exaggerated manner it made her want to laugh. Then he pretended to nod in agreement with the book’s contents in that exact walking-through-mud way, and that want to laugh got even harder.
She had to cover her mouth before she spoke.