Page 2 of Even if You Fall

I pressed a hand to Owen’s chest when he took another step, eliminating the last of the distance between us, and grit my teeth. “I’ve told you to stay away.”

“You don’t want me to,” he crooned in a voice that would’ve had me in a puddle on the floor, ready to do whatever he asked, just a month ago. As it was, I still felt my breath hitch when he leaned in, still felt my heart speed up when one of his hands gripped my hip, trying to pull me closer.

So easy . . .

It would’ve been so easy to let my heart and head take over despite everything I now knew about him and everything we’d been through.

Grabbing his hand in my free one, I forcefully removed it from my hip and shoved him away. “The letter in your pocket says otherwise.”

Anger briefly flared through that alluring energy pulsing from him. “Speaking of,” he began in a too-casual tone that had me tensing, “I got a call from a friend that you applied to a school out of district.”

I couldn’t have stopped the way my expression and shoulders fell no matter how hard I tried. Couldn’t have stopped the oxygen rushing from my lungs as if someone had just punched me because that’s exactly what it felt like.

I’d told the other district it was a sensitive situation, considering I’d wanted to slip quietly away to heal my broken heart in peace. I’d asked for discretion until a decision was made on their end to avoid this exact conversation. There hadn’t been a decision yet, and nowthis...

A smile that was as beautiful and enticing as it was wicked spread across Owen’s face as he eased his hands into his pockets and started walking backward, toward the door of my classroom. “You work for me, or you don’t work anywhere.”

“You can’t?—”

“You work for me,” he repeated, his words slower and colder than before to ensure I grasped the severity of them, “or you don’t work anywhere. And how easy it would be to keep you from working...”

I didn’t have time to consider his veiled threat or worry over how he knew what he did because not more than a second after he stepped out of my classroom, one of my students stepped inside.

Just like that, an excited smile stole across my face as a bubbly, “Good morning!” poured from me as if nothing had ever happened.

Then again, I’d learned long ago that my pain, anger, and sadness weren’t meant to be shared with others—they were emotions meant for me, and me alone.

If I smiled bright enough, no one ever suspected anything was wrong.

If I smiled bright enough, I almost fell for the pretense too.

Asmile could do a lot of things, like calm heart rates from a shock of excitement or fear. It could also charm or mesmerize. It could unnerve or send a warning. It could disarm and put at ease.

It all depended on the delivery.

My smiles tended to disarm the people around me and put them at ease. I considered it an art, seeing how I’d spent years perfecting my smile for that exact purpose. And right then, that smile was on blast.

I just had to keep holding it.

However, this time it was more for my sake than anyone else’s.

“Tell me everything,” Ada demanded once she was settled at my kitchen table with a cup of coffee. The sweet, old woman’s attention was on her great-niece—my housemate—and her brand new, absolutely stunning, engagement ring.

I sank to my own seat and listened with rapt attention as Lainey recounted how hernowfiancé—who was as terrifying as he was gorgeous—had proposed a couple nights before. Not that I hadn’t already heard the details. I had. Three times.

And I was genuinely thrilled for Lainey. Beyond, actually.

She and Asher were perfect for each other. They complimented each other the way couples should. Each gently pushing the other to be better—to be who they truly were—all while bringing what the other lacked to the relationship.

They were beautiful together.

But that didn’t stop the little sliver of jealousy from working its way into my chest. It didn’t quiet the voice in the back of my head, reminding me that everyone around me was getting married, and I was still just...here. Then again, my status as a single, twenty-eight-year-old woman was entirely my fault.

Worry and a sense of responsibility had kept me from straying far from my parents until that responsibility had also sent me away to college. But, as with growing up, I’d chosen quiet nights in my dorm with a book over going out or making friends. Once I’d graduated and settled into my career as an elementary school teacher, not much had changed. If I wasn’t at work, I was home reading or rewatching my favorite movies and shows.

Other than of the fictional variety, there hadn’t been mentomeet...until Owen Vance.

And even though it could be argued that I’d been too naïve to see every one of his red flags until I was too far gone, I liked to think that wasn’t it. On paper? Sure. But until you met him, you couldn’t understand his ability to manipulate people and draw them in with a smile or a look. To be in Owen Vance’s presence was to beseen—to beloved.

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