Page 5 of Kept

Misgivings gnawed at me as Rhett laid out the wine glasses on a lacquered table. He didn’t seem to share my apprehension at all as he uncorked the wine, poured it, and handed me a glass. My fingers brushed his when I took it and a shiver ran down my spine, one that had nothing to do with fear of being caught after hours with a professor.

He caught my gaze and held it. “You don’t need to worry,” Rhett said gently. My emotions must’ve been far more transparent than I believed. “Students and mentors stay late all the time.”

Maybe it was the fact that he’d given me the tools to become one of the top English students in my high school, or that he’d always treated me with utmost respect. No matter what it was, I trusted Rhett Harlow implicitly.

I took the wine and sat in a chair, forcing my limbs to loosen. This was Bourdillon. Nobody here had the time to play dumb jokes on people, not even the scholarship students. Everyone was too caught up in their own world of academia and prestige to care for that kind of crap.

“I really appreciate the welcome wagon,” I said, watching Rhett pour his own glass. “It’s hard, you know? Going from community college to this. I figure I’ll make all kinds of social faux pas tomorrow.”

Rhett let out a low laugh. “Everyone does, don’t worry. Even the students who grew up around this.”

“Did you?”

Rhett sat in the chair across from me and leaned forward, raising his glass. His smile slipped a little, revealing that darker expression I’d caught a glimpse of earlier. “Oh, my first year in Bourdillon was an absolute clusterfuck. But this isn’t about me. It’s about you, Jane. I knew when I was tutoring you that you’d go on to make something great of yourself.”

My lungs felt numb. Yeah, maybe I could’ve… then life hit the fan like it always does.

“Bourdillon is lucky to call you one of its students,” he continued, those pale eyes fixed on my face with a hungry bent. “So, here’s to you, Jane. You’ve come far, just like I knew you would.”

I raised the glass and drank when he did, the sweet alcohol burning its way down my esophagus. “Thanks, Rhett.”

“I’m curious, though.” He took another swallow. “Why the SCS? You were going to go to Northeast, right?”

I didn’t bat an eye at the acronym for Second-Chance Scholarship. Once you were past the gate, everyone dropped the longer title. “Ididgo to Northeast, for almost three years. My mom got lung cancer in my junior year and…”

A painful lump rose in my throat. Those had been hard days. From everything to nothing, but the worst of all was fearing I’d lose Mom before her time.

“Her insurance wasn’t great. We couldn’t afford both chemo and my schoolbooks and dorm fees, so I came home to work when she had to quit her job. I only found out about the SCS because we were looking into moving near Mulholland for the Petersen cancer treatment center here. Mom pointed out how close Bourdillon is to Mulholland, I saw the application, and… the rest is history.”

Mulholland was a nearby town not quite big enough to be called a city, but it housed one of the country’s most advanced cancer therapy clinics. The move out here hadn’t just been for my education.

“I’m glad it all worked out for you two,” Rhett said. I could detect nothing but perfect sincerity in his voice.

I almost immediately wanted to kick myself. Why would Rhett beinsincere? He was literally the guy most girls wanted to drag home kicking and screaming to meet their parents.

Except he’s convinced you to stay after-hours alone with him and booze, knowing there’s clauses to the contract, an acid voice whispered in the back of my mind.

Rhett wasn’t that kind of guy.

“So where do you live now?” He grabbed the bottle and poured more wine in my glass. I’d somehow downed the entire thing in sips without realizing. My mouth tasted like wood and berries, the tang coating my lips and heating my stomach.

“We rent a little cottage between Bourdillon and Mulholland, about a mile or so away.” It was a half an hour walk for me, but we called taxis to take Mom to her appointments. “There’s a lot of those around here.”

“Yeah, lots of woodsmen. They’re usually pretty happy to rent out their places off-season, but some just move on altogether.” Rhett looked at me over the rim of his glass and leaned in closer. “There’s a lot of privacy around here. Some parts of the woods, you could walk for days and never see another soul.”

I believed that. Bourdillon University was ensconced in a rainy, heavily-forested little valley nestled in the northern Appalachians. Some of the footpaths I’d found behind the cottage seemed to lead off to nowhere at all.

“Which one are you renting?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but something about the question felt… leading. I looked down at my wine as glass clinked against wood. Rhett reached out, his long fingers sliding over the back of my hand and sending trembles through my nerves.

“Hey. Sorry, Jane, that was a really creepy question. You don’t have to answer. I’m just excited to see you again.” It was impossible not to feel like my chest had been hollowed out into empty air when he smiled like that. “I knew you’d go places. I didn’t expect you to fall right into my lap.”

Oh, sweet Jesus. I raised the glass, breaking the contact between our hands, and drank more wine while I sorted through my swirling thoughts. Now there was a sentence fourteen-year-old Jane would’ve paid cold, hard cash to hear.

But now, so many years later, I was pretty sure Rhett was flirting with me… but why? What interest could a rich guy who was a professor possibly have in a scholarship student?

I was grateful for the numbness that slowly began to creep over my lips and shoulders as the wine took effect.

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