Page 37 of Night Shift

“Did you say—”

“You know what I meant.”

“You’re a mess, Holiday. A mess. I’ve never seen you so off your game.”

I huff and perch on the corner of his desk. “Big parties overwhelm me. I like the dancing, sometimes, but mostly I just feel claustrophobic and self-conscious.”

“About your dancing?” Vincent asks. “I took a ballroom dancing elective freshman year. I could teach you some moves.”

He sounds way too excited about the prospect of embarrassing me.

“My dancing is fine, thank you very much.”

My eyes land on the stack of books on his desk—one of which is familiar.

I hold up Engman’s Anthology and arch an eyebrow.

“You know you have to return this, right?”

Vincent shrugs. “Not for another week.”

I do the math myself to confirm. I hate that so much time has passed. It feels like I’m losing bits and pieces of the memory, even though I’ve been replaying it in my head religiously. The details are smoothing over—the specifics of the conversation and the little touches during our kisses are becoming one big, amorphous feeling. A vibe, if you will.

I zone back in and realize I’ve been staring at Vincent’s mouth.

He’s noticed this, of course, and watches me with eyes so dark and smoldering that I feel like he’s struck a match along my spine.

“Read me something,” he murmurs. “Out loud.”

He must know what he’s asking of me. He has to. My heart hiccups as I push off the desk, take a few steps into the middle of the room, and let the book in my hands fall open, pages sliding over each other until I spot a yellow Post-It peeking out from the top. I flip forward to it and find an Elizabeth Barrett Browning poem. My face splits into a grin.

“Did you bookmark this?” I ask, holding it up so he can see.

Vincent hums noncommittally.

“Say over again, and yet once over again, That thou dost love me,” I read.

Outside, somewhere down the hall, someone screams, “Sarah! Where’s Sarah? Bitch, you took my phone—”

Vincent huffs and marches to the door.

“Can I close this?” he asks me, suddenly a little shy.

My entire body heats. “Sure. Totally. Of course.”

Vincent presses the door shut and, after a moment’s hesitation, twists the lock. He shoots me another glance, to check if I have any objections. I suppress the urge to shoot him a very dorky thumbs-up. Instead, I look down at Engman’s Anthology and clear my throat. Before I can begin reading aloud again, Vincent crosses the room in three long strides and stands behind me, so close I can feel the heat of his body in the inch of air between us.

He’s reading over my shoulder—just like the night we met.

I have to swallow hard to prevent a shiver of heat from rolling down my spine.

“Say thou dost love me, love me, love me—toll The silver iterance!—only minding, Dear, To love me also in silence with thy soul.”

I read slowly. Meticulously. Selfishly, because I want to stand right here until I’ve memorized every detail of this moment. The warmth. The smell. The gentle thump of distant music, the muffled chaos down the hall. The indescribable feeling of relief, that somehow we’ve made it back here. Back to each other.

“Well, Professor Holiday,” Vincent murmurs when I reach the end of the sonnet, “what do you think?”

“This one’s too easy,” I croak, voice as weak as my knees.

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