by Caro Carson
But he couldn’t remember having a woman say she loved him before they started sleeping together. He wouldn’t have slept with her, in that case. He wouldn’t have taken advantage of her feelings.
He stomped up the rest of the stairs. This wasn’t about him. This was about Kristopher. You don’t try to seduce a woman if it would violate a school ethics code and get her fired. Kristopher needed to learn that basic rule before somebody got hurt—specifically, Rembrandt.
A professor.
Damn it, damn it, damn it. Not a student teacher, either, not a PhD candidate, but a full doctor. She held a position of trust in the community. She was somebody.
She was way out of his league—but he’d known that from the first moment he’d laid eyes on her, hadn’t he? Like an idiot, he’d let her flirt with him, anyway. He’d flirted back like an even greater idiot. They’d shared that electric, time-stopping moment—so now, he wanted a woman who was out of his reach.
He hit the third-floor landing and stalked through his apartment to the iron ladder that led to the roof. She was so damned young to be a full professor, even at a community college. She must be some kind of genius, the kind who graduate from high school early and zoom through their college educations before they’re legal to drink. An actual genius.
Of course she was.
He walked out to the roof, went straight for the punching bag he kept there and started pummeling it.
Of course. Of course. Out. Of. His. League.
He stopped, eventually. The heavy bag swung from its chain, slowing, coming to a rest. Connor swiped his forearm over his wet forehead and caught sight of his constant reminder: the small purple tattoo near his inner elbow, badly drawn by another prisoner using the cell block’s one contraband needle, a souvenir tattoo Connor had been given the night before being released. Ink was hard to come by on the inside, but the cell block had deemed him worthy. Most inmates on his block got a going-away gift of black eyes and kidney punches, so Connor had held out his arm as if he didn’t mind having his body altered permanently by criminals.
He threw more body shots at the heavy bag, but his hands needed to be taped up. He flipped open the lid of the storage bench to grab the tape, although it was too late. The skin over his knuckles was already scraped from the canvas. Stupid of him. It would make him look like a thug who’d been in a fistfight when he handed a customer a drink in a fancy glass.
He was a thug. He just refused to fight in public and let the world see that he was. He’d set up the makeshift gym where no one could see him, on the roof over the 1980s addition in the rear of the building, out of sight of the street. As he wound a strip of cloth around his stinging hand, he walked to the street-front edge. Central Texas was so flat, Connor could see the central green of Masterson University to the north. The lawn was always manicured, the fountain in its center always a shimmering circle of blue, even in the hot Texas summertime.
He looked down an alley to the east, to the grittier side of town, warehouses and construction offices, the sheriff’s office with its holding cells. To the west, he could see the rest of the historic downtown, all the way to the end of the picturesque original streets of Masterson. It was easy to pinpoint where the building code changed, because the logos of the gas stations at that distant intersection were brightly, jarringly colored after a mile of mellow brick and stucco. College kids didn’t dart into traffic to run from one gas station to the other.
Past the horizon, the road ran through miles of ranchland, then into the town of Bryan, where Kristopher and Bridget had driven together two nights a week to learn Shakespeare at the community college from Dr. Dee.
Connor turned in a slow circle as he secured the hand wrap at his wrist. Somewhere out there, to the east or the west or maybe only one street away, a woman named Delphinia was very sad.
Don’t be taking everyone’s sad tales with you out of the pub, lad.
He walked back to the bag and started hitting.
If she walked back into his bar one day, he would make her a bourbon and Coke and leave her to her own business, just as he would with any other customer.
He hit hard. Harder. Since he liked the way she looked, he might admire her from a distance, but anything more between them would be absurd.
She was a woman with a doctorate. He had taken the GED test and gotten a piece of paper that said his education was equivalent to a high school diploma. Worse, he’d done that behind bars, years after he should have graduated from a real high school. The only reason he’d gotten the GED was because the study sessions took him out of the prison’s common area for two hours, five days out of seven. He’d just wanted two hours a day where he didn’t have to be ready to use his fists without a second’s warning.
His fists and wrists were hurting now. He moved to the softer speed bag, but he got the rhythm going too easily. It did nothing to distract him from his thoughts.
A genius professor and a bartending felon weren’t even close to being equals. She liked him, though. She’d come to talk to him after the rehearsal, when she could have left. He’d watched as her gaze had dropped to his tattoo—yeah, there was some high-voltage sex just over the horizon, if they headed in that direction. He knew it in his bones. He’d felt it on his skin.
He couldn’t let it happen. She might love it—she might, like others, believe she was in love with him when the sex was good—but it would only end badly for her. A convicted felon was never an asset. His presence would cause raised eyebrows in her world. People would question her judgment. He would be a social albatross around her neck, dragging her down professionally. It wouldn’t be long before that dragged her down personally, too.
He’d told her she was welcome to come back any time, but it would be best if she never did.
He would be her biggest mistake.
Connor stopped punching. The teardrop-shaped bag swung to a stop.
It had been a good afternoon, nothing more. Nothing less. He’d always wanted to see a Rembrandt, and now he had. She’d been reading a book that had surprised a laugh out of her.
He’d wanted to read the same book she read. That had been enough for him at the beginning, a harmless connection. He could make it be enough now—but he didn’t know the book’s title. If she never came back, then he’d never know.
It shouldn’t matter.
But it felt like it did.
Chapter Six
Delphinia nearly, but not quite, ran up the walk toward her front door.
It would be unseemly for any of the Drs. Ray to be seen racing across the campus on foot, no matter how late she was—and she was quite late. Not only had Vincent called her to ask her to account for herself, but her parents had, too.
The brick walk was longer than it needed to be, because it took a serpentine path from the road to the house. The house itself was significant, one of four Greek Revival homes that had been built in the 1920s for the deans of the four colleges that made up Masterson University. Tourists stopped their cars on the street to photograph the home and read the tasteful roadside plaque which announced that Dumas House was on the National Register of Historic Places.
The other three homes were Aramis, Athos and Porthos, named after the Three Musketeers. This house really should have been named D’Artagnan after the fourth musketeer, but Delphinia assumed no dignified dean wanted their house associated with a hot-headed young man of ignoble birth, even if D’Artagnan was the hero of the story. Instead, the house had been named Dumas after the author of the Musketeer books. Her parents found this quite satisfactory.
Dumas House had eight thousand square feet of living space, with an attached portico to one side and a detached garage behind, which had held horse carriages when motorcars were still unreliable curiosities.
The first floor was used to host college events, from large receptions in the ballroom to soirees in the library or music room
. The caterers had a checklist to follow in the kitchen, so they’d leave it as they’d found it, but Delphinia’s things still went missing. Last week, it had been a quart of milk and a whimsical whisk with a lighthouse for its handle. The whisk was a mass-produced souvenir, so the dollar amount of the theft could not justify wasting the campus police’s time. Her parents did not fuss over insignificant things like a souvenir from New England.
Her father had become the dean while she’d been at her college in New England, so she hadn’t grown up in Dumas House. When she’d moved back to Texas after finishing her bachelor’s degree, she’d chosen the bedroom that had French doors leading out to the roof of the portico, which was flat and had a low iron railing all around. Delphinia had thought it would be lovely to sit out there and read. She hadn’t known that she’d be photographed by tourists if she tried to.
Regardless, given Dumas House’s size and location, it would be nonsensical for her to live anywhere else, as her parents had stated. They were correct, although Delphinia had never felt at home here. She had not earned this house. Her father had.
She balked as she neared the front steps. She was windblown and breathless, not fit to greet this evening’s guests, if any should be lingering in the foyer. She changed direction and cut across the grass to the portico entrance.
She slowed her steps. It was time to compose herself. This was it, the end of her adventure. She’d gone to a pub. She’d immersed herself in Shakespeare instead of Victorian essays. She’d dared to talk to a man who looked like a keg-carrying Greek god, just to satisfy her curiosity about what it was like to spend time talking to an alpha male.
It was arousing, that’s what it was.
She wished she’d never spoken to him. That little detour had taken her down a dead end. Now she had to get back to the main road, metaphorically, but she felt so disoriented. Not giddy. There was a difference.
Delphinia stood before the portico’s double doors and took a steadying breath. Seven months had passed since she’d put herself on the waiting list for the junior faculty apartments. She was nearly next in line. She could do this for a little while longer.
With a turn of the doorknob, she entered her parents’ world.
The coast was clear. She’d cross the foyer, tiptoe up the grand staircase to her bedroom, freshen up, then join the alumni cocktail event that Vincent had insisted she invite him to.
She was on the second step of the staircase when she realized the foyer wasn’t completely empty. Vincent was standing by the front door, looking outside through the leaded glass. He was silhouetted by the last of the daylight, alone. Just like the bartender.
He dropped his gaze to the floor. His shoulders drooped. If he wasn’t a dashing lone wolf, he was still a faithful guard dog, keeping vigil by the door. She would give him more credit from now on. He might seem remote at times, even cold, but this was evidence of how much he cared for her.
She turned and leaned over the banister, intending to call his name, when Vincent kicked the front door. “Where is that bitch?”
She froze, shocked. He’d said it so rapidly under his breath, she might not have heard it right. She must not have heard it right. But he’d kicked that door, undeniably.
In the next second, she realized a part of her wasn’t really shocked at all. She’d had an uneasy feeling about him from the start, but he’d never done anything violent or even discourteous to confirm her nonspecific uneasiness.
He kicked the door again in another burst of violence, startling a gasp out of her.
He whirled toward her and for one second, she saw his eyes go wide and his face go white. It was gone so fast, she might have imagined it.
“There you are!” He rushed over, and she braced herself for who-knew-what, but he only stopped by the staircase to grasp her hands and lift them off the banister to kiss her fingers, her knuckles, the back of her hands. She was only two steps above him, but it had the disconcerting effect of looking down on the man as if he were down on one knee to propose.
“I have been worried sick,” he said, sounding heated, not cold. “You’re an hour late.”
“I’m—I’m sorry.” She tugged her hands back, but he kept a firm grip.
“Where were you?” He looked so concerned, yet she’d heard him call her a bitch. Hadn’t she?
“I was tutoring. I forgot about the reception.”
“You forgot.”
“Yes.” She tugged her hands hard enough that he couldn’t pretend she wasn’t trying to get loose. When he let go, she put her hands behind her back, but that made her feel unstable on the steps, so she rested one hand on the banister, higher than the top of Vincent’s head, so he couldn’t grab it easily.
This was ridiculous. She was in her house. There were probably forty people only a room away. She shouldn’t be feeling so unsafe, so she raised her chin and asked, “Why did you kick the door?”
But he spoke at the same time. “You’re lying. I drove to Hughes Hall myself, looking for you. You were not there. No tutoring was taking place.”
“I didn’t say I was tutoring in Hughes Hall. I was tutoring elsewhere. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I don’t feel well. I’m going to retire for the evening.”
She saw a flash of anger in his eyes, before he dropped his forehead into his hand. “I’m making such a mess of this, aren’t I? I’ve been so worried for a full hour. When I couldn’t find you at Hughes Hall, all kinds of terrible scenarios went through my mind.”
She felt like she was in The Twilight Zone. He’d violently kicked the door, but now he looked so devastated. “Masterson is a very safe campus—”
“I know, I know.” He sighed and shook his head, then looked up at her a little flirtatiously, but like a sad puppy dog, too. “I know, but you are a very pretty girl, Miss Delphinia Ray. If a girl were going to be stolen away, a thief couldn’t find anyone prettier than you.”
She wasn’t a girl. She was nearly thirty. You may call me Dr. Ray or Professor Ray.
Vincent put his hands in the pockets of his slacks. “I let my imagination run wild. It’s not hard to do when you’re a lawyer. I’ve seen too much in courtrooms. It’s one reason I decided to teach instead of do. Forgive me?”
Maybe she was the one who’d let her imagination run wild. I saw a flash of anger in his eyes sounded like a line from a novel. She was too susceptible to fiction, too easily carried away by stories. She’d sat on a barstool and talked to a bartender, and she’d fooled herself that she’d felt some kind of special, sizzling connection. The fact was that he had a great body, and she’d simply been aroused.
Once, she and her girlfriends in New England had lied about their ages to see an all-male review. There must have been hundreds of women in the audience, and every single one had been aroused to some degree, laughing and flipping their hair and tucking cash into men’s thongs. Incredibly fit men had a predictable, primitive effect on the female brain. It wasn’t magic or romance or love. It was science.
She needed to be practical. The fact was, a kick to a door took one impulsive second. She had to weigh that against the fact that Vincent had been consistently polite, even solicitous, for months and months.
“Nothing to forgive.” She managed a smile and started up the stairs. “Just give me a few minutes to freshen up.”
He took his hand out of his pocket immediately and looked at his watch. “How many minutes? I want to meet Joe Manzetti. He’s the CEO of one of the biggest construction companies in Texas.”
“Ten minutes?” She waited for the magnanimous billionaire’s wave. Take fifteen. Or for the patient cowboy’s answer. Take as long as it takes.
“Make it five. He was one of the first ones here. He might leave any minute.”
“Why don’t you go on in, then? I’ll find you.”
“Because I need you to introduce me.”
“I
don’t know him very well. He’s only been here a couple of times, and you could—”
“Delphinia Ray. I cannot walk in there without you by my side. When your parents noticed you weren’t here, I rather publicly volunteered to drive over to Hughes Hall to get you. If I walk into that reception now, empty-handed, I’ll look like an ass whose date couldn’t be bothered to show up for him. An ass who then went chasing around campus after her but couldn’t find her. Don’t do that to me.”
Delphinia felt tired. It was easier just to go along. “I’ll be as quick as I can.”
“Hurry.”
She’d only made it halfway up when he called after her. “Don’t wear that black dress again. I want people to talk to me, not be distracted by you.”
“All right.” She’d never thought of herself as the kind of femme fatale whose appearance could make men forget what they were doing. Vincent was being absurd, but it was a compliment. She couldn’t object to a compliment.
Hours and hours later, when she was lying in her bed and staring at the dark, she realized Vincent had never answered her question. Why had he kicked the door?
He must not have heard her, because he’d spoken at the same time. Spoken over her.
Unlike the bartender, the man to whom she’d only been physically, predictably attracted. It’s only science.
He wasn’t her type. Vincent was her type. Vincent had always been her type.
She kept staring at the dark.
There was a science behind human arousal, but the bartender had not been flexing bared muscles like in Magic Mike when she’d felt that special sizzle. He’d been making her laugh with Shakespearean wordplay.
Maybe her usual type had been wrong all along.
Chapter Seven
“There’s no problem in the world that isn’t best faced once a man has a dram of whiskey in his hand and a friend who’ll lend an ear. Mark my words as true, or my father never called me Seamus Murphy.”
Connor handed Mr. Murphy one of the rocks glasses that had come from the pub and sat down in an armchair. “Slainte.”