Page 16 of Promises We Meant to Keep

“Because you’re drunk.”

“Yeah. I am.” Kamryn was back to covering her face.

The movement of the car likely wasn’t helping the situation. Elia made sure to drive as steady as she possibly could all the way back to the school. She hesitated when she entered the gates, almost taking a right toward the dormitories.

“Is it safe to assume since you were out tonight that you’re not the house parent on duty?”

“Hardly. Charlotte’s on duty.”

“Good.” Elia turned her car away from the student dormitories and drove toward the on-campus housing that was reserved for faculty and staff. She’d lived in one of the houses there for the last decade, and it would be a much better place to recover than someplace where students could come in at any moment and need something.

“Where are we going?”

“My house.” Elia parked the car and turned the engine off. “So you can sleep this off in peace.”

“El…Dr. Sharpe. I don’t think that’s a good idea. I’ll just go back to my apartment.”

Elia paused again, looking Kamryn over. This was a mess that Elia felt compelled to clean up. She was more annoyed with that than any kiss that had happened. The warmth from the car was fading with the engine shut off, and she really didn’t want to sit there and debate this for much longer.

“I think after kissing me, you’ve earned the right to call me Elia.”

“Oh God.” Kamryn covered her face again, shaking her head side to side. She stopped suddenly. “No sharp movements. That was a bad idea.”

“Come along.” Dragging herself out of the car, Elia moved to the passenger side to get Kamryn out. They walked side by side, Elia’s hand around Kamryn’s waist again to keep her steady.

Elia unlocked the door and immediately pocketed the keys while she helped Kamryn inside. There’s no way she would have made it up the stairs to her third-floor apartment. She put Kamryn onto the couch and then stripped out of her jacket and tossed it over the arm of the lounge chair.

“Think you can take your own jacket off or do you need help with that?” Elia asked, annoyance seeping through her words.

“I can do it.” Kamryn huffed, and she started moving and undoing the buttons. “That last shot was a mistake.”

“So were the first two.” Elia walked around the couch and into the kitchen, pulling out a glass from the cabinet and filling it with ice and water. The last thing she had expected tonight was to be taking care of her new boss.

Her new boss who clearly didn’t deserve the job she’d been hired for.

Handing Kamryn the glass, Elia sat down on the chair. “Why did you and Lauren break up?”

“Which time?” Kamryn mumbled.

“Start with the last one.” Why was Elia even asking this? Kamryn’s life wasn’t hers to pry into. And yet, she wasn’t sure she’d ever get an honest answer if she didn’t ask now, and her nosy sensibilities were playing up.

“We both cheated.” Kamryn lay back heavily into the couch. “Not the first time. We never did a really good job of growing up together. Being in a relationship with Lauren was being stuck at sixteen and the first time we snuck off to…” Kamryn stopped talking. “Never mind.”

Have sex.

That had been what Kamryn wasn’t willing to say. And she’d avoided it because Elia had been her teacher at that point. It would have been on her watch because Lauren had been assigned to Elia’s dormitory their last two years at Windermere.

“It’s both of our faults.”

“Lauren cheated with Rosie,” Elia surmised.

“She did.” Kamryn wrinkled her nose in the most adorable way. “It wasn’t pretty when I found out. Greer calls Rosie the Replacement, but I don’t think she’s anything like me.”

“No, I don’t think anyone would accuse you two of that.” Elia couldn’t imagine that. With what she had witnessed tonight, Kamryn would never be as cruel as Rosie so easily was. Even drunk, Kamryn was apologizing and groveling. That nearly brought a smile to Elia’s lips. “What did you do after you graduated?”

“Went to college. Went to graduate school. Got a few degrees, broke my heart a few times. I grew up.” Kamryn stared into her glass like it held all the answers to the questions she wasn’t asking.

Elia could connect with that. She’d stared down at a glass like that more than just a time or two, hoping for some kind of answer to questions she didn’t dare put out into the universe. “Why teach?”

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