Page 56 of Going All In

Chapter 11

Darcy sat inthe back of her Decision and Cost-effective Analysis class Thursday morning, hoping that the professor didn’t call her name because while she pretended to scribble notes, the only thing she could focus on was the fact that Jake’s responses to her texts had been off. She’d texted good game when they’d beaten Calgary, to which he’d responded with thanks. Then after last night’s loss, she said sorry about the loss and received thanks, going out with the guys for drinks.

That was it. No funny banter back and forth. No inappropriate texts. No what are you wearing right now.

Nothing.

Not that the texts were part of their deal, but she’d gotten used to them, and she missed them. Even the inappropriate ones.

They did something to her nerves that she didn’t want to be on board with, but who the hell was she kidding? She was definitely on board.

Not that her recent behavior would convince Jake of that.

Son of a bitch.

“Darcy, what would you look for in this scenario,” the professor’s voice invaded her thoughts.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

“Sorry. Can you repeat that?” she asked, wishing she could sink down into her chair when the man all but glared at her.

The guy in front of her pushed his laptop into her line of sight and bumped up the text size so she could read it, just as the professor repeated his question.

“Sorry,” she said, then rattled off the answer from the guy’s laptop and hoped it wasn’t obvious.

The professor moved on to another student in the class who had a follow-up remark, and Darcy took in a deep breath. That had never—NEVER—happened to her before.

“Thanks,” she whispered to the guy.

He turned toward her and smiled. “No problem.”

Fucking hell. That was embarrassing. See. This was the problem. She was thinking about Jake. He wasn’t supposed to distract her. He was supposed to distract her mother.

Thirty minutes later, class wrapped up and Darcy gathered her stuff. She had one more class and then office hours this afternoon. And then a stack of essays to review for her TA class. And she was due for her shift at the coffee shop soon.

She was exhausted. And all she wanted to do was find Jake and apologize. The team had flown home this morning.

“Hey, want to grab a coffee?”

Darcy looked up and saw the guy who’d saved her in class standing next to her.

“What?”

“Might help keep you awake?”

“Oh. Yeah, I zoned out in there. Thanks for the save.”

“No problem. Darcy, right? You work at the coffee shop right off campus?” His smile was genuine with no smirk in sight.

“Yeah. You’re James, right?”

“Yeah. So…” He rocked back on his feet.

She’d never paid much attention to him, but he’d been in a few of her master’s classes. Studious, friendly, attractive.

“Sorry. I can’t. Got another class and then office hours for one of the undergrad classes I TA.”

And you have a boyfriend.

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