Tempting(68)

The smile she tried to push across her face was shaky at best, but her eyes were so genuine and beseeching, asking me for something when I didn’t even know what the question was yet. “I changed my major.”

“What?” I yelled, ice prickling over my skin again. “You did what?”

“I changed my major,” she repeated, her voice stronger this time, her chin tilted up an inch.

“Why? You’re a damn good writer, Adele. Why the hell would you do that?”

Holding her head up like a queen, instead of a girl wearing a wrinkled sheet, she stood from the bed. “I changed it because of what happened today in your office. Because it will make our lives easier. So I don’t have to constantly worry about who’s looking at us and who suspects something. I changed it for you. And I changed it for me.”

I spun, hands gripping my hips, because I had a split second where I actually wanted to throw something across the room.

“Nathan, I can do anything else and still be satisfied. I’m smart, it’ll be easy for me to find something else. And now once this class is done, I’m not technically your student any more. I’ll be twenty two in three months, there’s nothing anyone can say about us.”

The walls pressed in on me, the pale grayish blue that always used to soothe me now felt like I was being swallowed by salt water, filling my lungs until I couldn’t breathe. That was the thing about guilt, it filled every part of you until you couldn’t get the oxygen that you needed to survive.

I felt guilt over Diana, how I’d not only ruined, but ended her life. And now Adele, making a unilateral decision about her future, which seemed so long and unending given how young she was, throwing away something that she was so talented at. Because of me. I think my skin started vibrating, because I clenched my stomach muscles tight to try and stop my shaking.

When she laid a hand on my shoulder, I erupted, whipping around and shoving it off of me.

“Why would you do this?” I bellowed at her face, and she shrank back. “Did we have a talk about our future that I missed?”

“Okay,” she said, staying remarkably calm considering I was ready to shatter my entire room, “I get that I surprised you. And I’m sorry that I put on Diana’s ring—”

“Don’t you dare,” I whispered. “Don’t you fucking dare say her name right now. My wife has nothing to do with this bullshit conversation we’re having right now.” Her face paled even more, but the black bile churning in my head wouldn’t slow, wouldn’t settle. My body wanted it out, like the words I aimed at her would somehow purge them from me forever. “You don’t just flippantly make those decisions, Adele. A grown-up would know that.”

“Fuck you,” she snapped. “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. And if you’d calm down for one second so I could explain, you’d know that.”

“Explain? Oh yes, please explain to me how any of this makes goddamn sense.”

“You know what? I’m going to go. You need to chill the fuck out before we talk about this again.” She moved over to where her clothes laid in a pile on the floor. For the first time since I’d met her, she hid her body from me. She kept her back turned while she slipped on her leggings, kept the sheet wrapped around her shoulder while she put her bra on.

“Ahh, so now you want to talk to me about things. I get it. You’re one of those girls.” Her body stilled, shoulders curved in while she’d been attempting the awkward task of pulling her shirt on while not exposing herself to me. “Better to beg forgiveness than ask permission. And that makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? You come in here and think that getting me off, that screwing me before you tell me is somehow going to make it better that you made a huge fucking decision about a future that we have never talked about.”

“You’re being an ass, Nathan,” she said on a slightly wavering voice, avoiding my gaze at all costs. “And I’m done talking to you about this until you’ve calmed down.” She finished dressing, tossing the sheet back onto the bed that we’d found release on together only a few moments earlier.

“You’re right,” I said, and her eyes finally found mine. “You are absolutely right, Miss Morello. We are done talking about this.”

“What does that mean?” Her voice sounded shrill, taking on a panicky edge.

“I bet you’ll figure it out when you grow up.”





Chapter Thirty-One





Like it wasn’t controlled by my brain, my left arm reached out and my hand swiftly slapped him across the face. The resulting stinging in my palm paled in comparison to the pain splitting my chest down the middle.