Page 10 of Wicked Little Secret

I pass through them sensing the opposite energies. Cummings’s offense and Wicker’s oaf-like sense of humor.

But neither matter.

I wasn’t concerned with stupid meathead types like them many years ago when I attended this same college.

I’m certainly not today as a professor.

The barista hands me my coffee looking grateful I’ve broken up the mini frat party. Though something tells me the second I’m out of earshot, two douchebags as big as Samson Wicker and Lucas Cummings will pick up right where they left off.

Armed with my peppermint mocha, I head toward Harper Hall for the year one law orientation. I’m mere footsteps outside the hall when Dean Rothenberg appears in his latest tailored suit jacket and pocket watch combo.

The gold chain practically glints in the pale autumn sunlight as he grins broadly at me, and a gust of wind blows through his thinning, peppered hair. He drips arrogance with every step he takes; he’s fromsuch an affluent family that his position as dean is more for optics than anything. Handed down to him from his father, the dean before him.

He holds out his hand for me to shake. “Theron, how was your summer?”

“Uneventful,” I answer, begrudgingly accepting his handshake. “I did manage to get plenty of reading done.”

He chuckles, the lone fastened button on his jacket straining against the paunch of his belly. “That’s about what I’d expect of you. It must run in the family. I vacationed on Montbec Island for the summer. Notice the tan?”

“Yes,” I grit out. “You are redder than usual.”

“You’re always welcome to join,” he says, ignoring my slight. “Me and the other bachelors on the trip met some very attractive—veryyoung, might I add—women at the beach. We had the time of our lives. Maybe next year you’ll live a little. Get out more and have an eventful summer.”

He strolls off whistling a tune.

I’m fuming on the inside for the third time today and it’s not even ten a.m. yet. I’m not normally a hot-tempered man—and find those who are reductive—but today’s an exception.

After checking the time, I don’t bother heading to my office. Orientation for the first years starts in twenty minutes.

“Theron, there you are. Since you’re already up, will you make sure no one else is lost in the hall?” calls our faculty head, Pamela Williamson, the second I walk into the room where the orientation is being held. She’s up at the front of the room barking orders at the other professors that’ll be briefing the group.

The rows of chairs have slowly filled up as our year ones trickle in uncertainly and then nab a seat. A deep breathleaves me as I don’t bother challenging her. The more time I spend out of the room, the better.

Orientation has never been a part of the semester that I’ve enjoyed.

Williamson insists all the year one professors attend to put faces to the names and to ease the students’ anxiety about their upcoming classes. I sip from my peppermint mocha heading out into the hall, glancing around for any stragglers.

It’s as I turn the corner that I collide with one of them.

She’s bustling down the hall, clutching her books and leather bag, hardly paying mind to where she’s going. The books she’s carrying fly out of her arms. My cup of coffee tumbles out of my hand and splashes along the front of my tweed jacket.

The drink’s still warm, quickly staining.

A second passes where she freezes and her eyes double in size. I’ve gone still too, for different reasons.

The same pulse of anger I’ve felt all morning long returns in yet another scowl.

If there was one word to describe her, it would be mortified. Her lips have parted, drawing attention to how glossy and plump they are. She has a beauty mark on the apple of her cheek and long lashes that frame brown eyes that change shades in the light—with the sun pouring in through the arched windows, they’ve turned almost gold.

Her hair’s full and curly, neatly smoothed back into a thick ponytail. The rosy strip of fabric matches the cropped cardigan she wears. As she quickly digs around for a towelette in her bookbag, the hem of her cardigan rises and reveals a sliver of bare skin.

An inch of her flat,taut stomach exposed.

It draws attention to how the pleated skirt she wears sits enticingly at her rounded hips.

She’s not very tall. More than a head shorter, as she comes to her senses and then steps back from me.

It seems to occur to her that she shouldn’t be standing so close, rubbing coffee off a professor the way she is.

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